Linda Ruzga, Artist of Month

March’s artist of the month in the Chicago studio is Linda Ruzga, whose colorful, texture-rich work mirrors her bright and enthusiastic personality. To make her work, Linda layers mixed materials such as silk flowers, beads, foam shapes, feathers, fabric strips, and yarn with glue and paint, and sometimes encrusts the pieces with glitter. She also uses loose washes in contrast with jaggedly drawn marks. The work suggests a geography of eye-catching yet nuanced detail. One of our genre specialists, Corrie, interviewed Linda and her fellow artist, Sue, who is on the curatorial committee and took the lead on this show.  [[{“fid”:”11192″,”view_mode”:”default”,”fields”:{“format”:”default”,”field_file_image_alt_text[und][0][value]”:”Sunday”,”field_file_image_title_text[und][0][value]”:”Sunday, mixed media on board”},”type”:”media”,”link_text”:null,”attributes”:{“alt”:”Sunday”,”title”:”Sunday, mixed media on board”,”height”:366,”width”:652,”class”:”media-element file-default”}}]]C: Linda, how do you feel about being artist of the month?L: I feel good about that.C: Have you ever been Artist of the Month before?L: No.C: Sue, how long did it take you to choose all these pieces?S: Not long. C: Did you have a theme you were looking at? S: No. C: How did you choose them? S: Simple, I know the ones she would like.  C: I see a lot of glitter in these pieces. Sue, do you ever like using that? S: No, it’s a Linda thing. L: I like Bing Crosby. C: What are a couple other things you like? L: I like to eat. I like eggs and bacon.  C: Me too, those are some of my favorites. L: I’m an artist. I’m the artist of the month. You know who did that? Sue did. Sue chose me. S: I knew she would be happy.  C: Did you have any other reasons for choosing her work? S: No, not really.C: How long have you been an artist at the Arts of Life?L: I’ve been here 10 years. I never quit. Never quit doing it. And I like ice cream, it’s my favorite! C: Linda, what are you making right now? L: I don’t know yet. I’m working on something with the ribbons. I’m going to do it tomorrow morning. C: Which one of these pictures is your favorite?L: That one (Blue Head).[[{“fid”:”11190″,”view_mode”:”default”,”fields”:{“format”:”default”,”field_file_image_alt_text[und][0][value]”:”Blue Head”,”field_file_image_title_text[und][0][value]”:”Blue Head, mixed media on board”},”type”:”media”,”link_text”:null,”attributes”:{“alt”:”Blue Head”,”title”:”Blue Head, mixed media on board”,”height”:366,”width”:652,”class”:”media-element file-default”}}]]C: What about you, Sue? S: I don’t know, they’re all nice.