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.


October 29, 2021

Swirling Ceramic Installations Raise Awareness For the Fragile Beauty of ‘Our Changing Seas’

Inspired by the sea, artist Courtney Mattison expresses its beauty and fragility through her large-scale ceramic installations. In creating intricate sculptures of coral reefs, she relays the importance of this underwater ecosystem—one that is under serious threat because of us. We’ve marveled over Mattison’s work before, particularly Our Changing Seas, which is an ongoing series that features ceramic sculptures depicting coral artfully arranged on walls.

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October 25, 2021

New Book Chronicles National Geographic Photographer’s Long Career of Split-View Ocean Images

What’s just below the ocean’s surface? In the wondrous images by National Geographic photographer David Doubilet, we get a glimpse into the world beneath the water. Known as the “Audubon of the sea,” Doubilet captures vivid sights that are a split view, simultaneously showing what’s happening atop the water as well as within it. The results are fascinating; a magenta jellyfish, for instance, blooms in the foreground, punctuated with a backdrop of tall pine trees.

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