Artist Spotlight - Chuck Baxter

If you are lucky enough to catch Chuck Baxter working on his Airplane Statue, "Flotsam and Jetsam," when passing the Artist Studio, you will see some truly intense concentration. Chuck is using his signature artistic technique of mounting colorful found objects onto his airplane to create a colorful mosaic. You may find Chuck stretched out on the floor studying several pieces for a particular location on the plane, trying to find just the right fit! Each piece winds up being placed perfectly in his intricately-planned work. Next to his airplane, you will find several piles of his found objects organized by color and size for easy selection.

Chuck Baxter creates found object art from materials tossed in DC’ s gutters and alleys. For the past decade Chuck has built a reputation, in his own mind, as the D.C. area’s foremost collector of gutter gifts. He’s a U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs bureaucrat, a DC artist, and minimal director of his own life. Few of Chuck’s pieces hang in DC business and government offices, and in the homes of art collectors and friends around the world. “I have always felt the pull of throw-aways, and sought to invoke the world of junk as the natural medium for the urban artist.” His fascination with the flotsam of city life and the details of trash, such as broken glass, smashed plastic, crumpled paper, and lost toys, is the starting point for most of his pieces. The underlying compositional theme of his work draws from the common shapes and forms found in the gutter. Chuck currently resides in the Shaw where he simmers in his own private studio.

Learn more about Chuck by visiting his personal artist page at http://www.midcityartists.com/

About the Sponsor
"Flotsam and Jetsam" is being sponsored by one of Crystal City's most colorful restaurants and bars, Freddie's Beach Bar & Restaurant. Located along 23rd Street's Restaurant Row, Freddies has been a signature establishment in the area for several years offering unrivaled karaoke nights, a weekly drag show, and one of the area's most delicious Sunday Brunches. Freddie's also boasts a great outdoor patio, perfect for a lunch stop after a tour of the airplanes once they "land" on the streets of Crystal City in early April.