southern artists: katie runnels

it's impossible to mention shop scad without talking about its former art director: katie runnels. katie was responsible for the interior design and decoration of shopscad and proposed the original design concept for their website, as well as curating fine art submissions, styling website photography, and creating artwork and design concepts for promotional materials.

in addition to the amazing work katie did for shopscad, she's done equally amazing work on her own, through her studio, the constant gatherer. katie is primarily a mixed media artist whose collage-style sculptures have become a big hit on sites like etsy and poppytalk handmade. she has a real knack for combining found objects (which are often vintage) and turning them into beautiful sculptures, vignettes, and yarn wreaths.

for me, katie's work represents a powerful segment of the young southern artist community. she and her counterparts have a great respect for the art, objects and traditions of the past and always seem to find creative ways to work these actual objects and fragments into their contemporary work. i personally love katie's use of non-traditional accents like vintage scrabble letters and vintage millinery flowers, but her work is so wonderfully varied that there's always something for everyone.

click here to read katie's blog and see past and current work...