WANDERLUST PASSPORTBoy, Nogales, Mexico small.jpg - 54328 Bytes

Photo Art by Melody Winnig


“Not all who wander are lost.” J.R.R. Tolkien

“We got a wanderlust passport here,” the customs agent exclaimed as my son came back into the US with his passport of many stamps. I too have a wanderlust passport and my photo art unfolds from those wanderings on this beautiful interconnected planet.

I am fascinated by border lands. There is an energy at borders, a heightened sense of awareness, a cross-pollination of cultures that thrills me. Sometimes dangerous, sometimes crazy, corrupt and generous. I have been stranded at borders, unable to bribe my way into either country. I have walked miles across the no-man’s land between two countries that were not legally connected, experiencing the strange earth in-between. Borders can be as dramatic as the one between two warring nations or as simple as the invisible line between two gangs or two ethnic neighborhoods. I wander along borders, camera in hand, taking photos as invisibly as I can.

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“Here on the border they can no longer build walls high enough
Eventually we will see what is truly happening.
We will make full-hearted art and build a new syntax.”
Bobby Byrd

My art springs from the unruly intoxication of possibility, from delving into the border lands between photography and painting.Lone Woman, Persepolis, Iran small.jpg - 66019 Bytes I begin with photographs and paint on them with water colors, oil stick, & pastels. I sometimes collage the images & add corn silk or sand. Then I digitally enlarge the images and paint on them again, hoping to make “full-hearted art” & capture a slice of the energy of the people and places where I have wandered.

My art has been shown at The National Center of the Arts, Mexico City; Rencontres Internationales De La Photographie D'Arles, France; The Mark Gallery, Cambridge, MA; Coffey Gallery, Kingston, NY; Ormand Memorial Art Museum, Ormand FL; Alex Echo Gallery, East Hampton, NY; Mandala Gallery, Sarasota, FL; The Fuller Museum & The Fitchburg Museum. As I also create commissions from photos of clients, my commissioned works are in private collections throughout the US, Brazil and Spain.

For inquiries about purchasing art, licensing images for commercial use or for information about creating commissioned works from your photographs, please contact me at mwinnig@comcast.net

Online Galleries

Beggarwoman Koln Germany thm.jpg - 21339 Bytes EUROPA Carnie Guys, San Jose de Valle, Mexico thm.jpg - 21512 Bytes MEXICO & GUATEMALA
Milk Kids thm.jpg - 19559 Bytes INDIA Carpets, Cairo, Egypt thm.jpg - 25351 Bytes CENTRAL ASIA & THE MIDDLE EAST
Woman in Pink, Favela Rocinha, Rio thm.jpg - 18223 Bytes BRAZIL Rasta Man with Children, South Florida thm.jpg - 19876 Bytes FLORIDA & JAMAICA
Woman Smoking, Central Square, Cambridge thm.jpg - 23694 Bytes CITY SCENES Big Wide Sky thm.jpg - 19095 Bytes STATA CENTER @ MIT
Crimson Milkweed thm.jpg - 21292 BytesGARDEN SANCTUARIES Bright Blue Sky, Arizona thm.jpg - 14292 Bytes SOUTHWEST DESERT LANDS
Baghdad Invasion thm.jpg - 24555 Bytes WAR FLOWERS, WAR PAINT Robin at the Beach thm.jpg - 31582 Bytes TRIBE

artkukulogo2mumia3a.jpg - 156714 BytesArt KOU KOU Web

I'd love your feedback about my art at mwinnig@comcast.net

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