Posts by Sara Barnes

Sara Barnes

Sara Barnes is a Staff Editor at My Modern Met, Manager of My Modern Met Store, and co-host of the My Modern Met Top Artist Podcast. As an illustrator and writer living in Seattle, she chronicles illustration, embroidery, and beyond through her blog Brown Paper Bag and Instagram @brwnpaperbag. She wrote a book about embroidery artist Sarah K. Benning titled "Embroidered Life" that was published by Chronicle Books in 2019. Sara is a graduate of the Maryland Institute College of Art. She earned her BFA in Illustration in 2008 and MFA in Illustration Practice in 2013.
Photography
September 16, 2019

Photographer Takes a Surreal Twist on High-Fashion Portraits of Opulent Women

Photographer Natalie Lennard, better known as Miss Aniela, offers an unconventional twist on editorial fashion portraits. The images are part of her ongoing series called Surreal Fashion, in which she crafts compositions that initially look like high-fashion spreads but have peculiar qualities once you look closer. A model’s divine blue gown, for instance, leads into an ocean while the train of a yellow dress morphs into a cluster of canaries.

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Sculpture
September 9, 2019

Fantastical Figures Emerge From Hand-Carved Pieces of Found Driftwood

Artist Debra Bernier scours the natural settings around her home to cultivate her artistic practice. Working in sculpture, the artist transforms the things she finds traversing the nearby shoreline into fanciful figures that evoke the same wonder she experiences when she's outside. “While I walk in the forest, explore tide-pools or beach-comb,” she describes to My Modern Met, “I am in awe of Mother Nature's creations.

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Creative Products
September 5, 2019

Pennywise’s Iconic Red Ballon from ‘IT’ Is Now a Lamp Straight Out of Your Nightmares

Are you a fan of horror flicks? If so, then a red balloon probably means something sinister to you. Its presence can only promise that Pennywise the Dancing Clown from Stephen King's It is nearby. To commemorate the terrifying antagonist—and the film's sequel It Chapter 2—online purveyor Firebox is selling a novelty lamp shaped like a red balloon.

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Landscape Photography
September 4, 2019

Interview: Photography-Loving Sea Captain Captures the Quiet Beauty in Everyday Moments

Myanmar-based photographer Zay Yar Lin looks to the fundamentals of art as a way to capture compelling portraits of the world. Focusing on lighting, composition, and color, his often-aerial shots are simultaneously abstract while communicating stories about people as they travel, work, and exercise their spirituality. The images depict everyday moments that are otherwise easy to forget. But thanks to Lin's keen eye, he transforms them into works of art.

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My Modern Met

Celebrating creativity and promoting a positive culture by spotlighting the best sides of humanity—from the lighthearted and fun to the thought-provoking and enlightening.