Art Blogger of the Week: Kathleen April Tompsett in Tarragona, Spain

Art Blogger of the Week: Kathleen April Tompsett in Tarragona, Spain


Zoo Without Animals is a special name for an art blog. That's because Kathleen April Tompsett likes to use her imagination and with her blog she inspire ours too. Kathleen also likes literature and poetry. She likes modern art. She likes music. And she likes to make visual compositions. And that's exactly what you sense in her blog - the pleasure that drives it. And it's generous in sharing the pleasure with you. "Your blog is drawn to beauty", a commenter wrote. If you too want to follow up daily, check out Kathleen's Facebook and Instagram.

Art scene 
"Currently I live in Tarragona, Spain where the art scene is quite minimal, but it's only an hour away from the vibrant city of Barcelona. My blog is not at all focused on any one location though, I am from Venezuela, Trinidad and Tobago, and the UK so I am interested in blogging from an international perspective.  Now I work as a writer for an Art and Culture magazine in Barcelona, so I am very active in the local art scene -my job entails going to at least 3 exhibitions per week. In terms of the Barcelona art scene, there are many small galleries which represent young artists at the beginning of their career, and there are two main trends I've noticed: a lot of work related to street art, and a lot of illustrative work, made by illustrators crossing over into art. It's still quite conservative here in a way, and there is not a great deal in the way of really conceptual or installation art, for example." 


Blog
"I started my blog about two years ago as a way to keep in touch with art. I had just finished studying Art and Creative Writing at university and I was in Spain teaching English. At university I'd always loved researching artists, actually this was an important part of our assessment, keeping a file with artists who we were looking at, and I missed it. So basically I started the blog as a way to continue my university research file. And I love it because it motivates me to discover new artists or learn more about artists I already knew. In my blog I don't want to review or criticize, just to share things which are beautiful or interesting to me, I love when I have a story or anecdote to explain the background of a piece. Having art in my life keeps me happy and makes me feel more alive. I haven't really connected with other bloggers yet, but I would like to, I feel it's something I'm missing out on."

Expertise 
"At university I studied Art and Creative Writing. Currently I'm taking a print-making course, but other than that I don't make much art now. I've become more interested in learning about other artists, particularly within modern and contemporary art. After graduating I taught English for a bit, I worked at a literature festival in Trinidad (Bocas Lit Fest) and now I'm writer and editor at a new arts and culture magazine. It's the perfect job for me because I can combine art and writing, and I have an excuse to spend a lot of time at art exhibitions! On one hand it helps my blog because I see so much art and I am learning to write about it in more depth, but on the other hand I spend all my time working with art so I no longer feel such a strong need to do my own art research. As a result my posts are much less frequent than they use to be, but I hope that if there's a decrease in quantity, at least there is an increase in quality." 

Money
"I don't receive any money from my blog, I'd love to, but I don't know how! It definitely has benefited me in other ways though, for example as a kind of portfolio, a sample of my writing and tastes, and as a gauge of the extent of my interest and knowledge of art, which has been very useful when applying for jobs and other opportunities."
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