Dreams Walking in Broad Daylight

As a means of trying to comprehend the irresistible appeal of Lany Devening's sidewinding, dark-bright sense of place, I like to imagine showing it to an allegedly hip sixty-year-old sci-fi buff with whom I used to work in sales. “Jerry Lewis I get,” I can hear him saying. “Jerry Seinfeld I get. This, I don’t get.” And that’s the point. Devening, proprietor of an Etsy art shop that is quite unlike any other, blurs the distinction between fun and evocative—we’ll call it funocative—to render a set of themes that feel as deliciously dangerous as laughing with a loaded BB gun in one’s hand. A lonely shanty home billows with smoke under an otherwise blue New Mexico sky, the image wrapped in a heart-shaped frame. Four cloned children stride out of a 1950’s classroom, disillusioned by their classmates’ treatment of them. A dog on a porch anticipates the swell of a grasshopper storm.

Whether anyone, including the artist herself, knows the meaning of any of this is beside the point. It is art, the type that simultaneously ups both the IQ and the PQ (party quotient) of any dinner among friends. The fact that the words Lany Devening adds through the mouths of her silent subjects always seem just a little beyond anyone’s reach, well, that’s a good thing in this case. She is, in the end, another fantastic example of the kind of talent that lurks right behind the bushes in Etsy’s own backyard, or in this case right under the sweet dogwood shade of Carrboro, North Carolina. And if you happen to find her art as strikingly magnetic as we do, you’ll be thrilled to know that the artist is offering a giveaway as well. The winner of today's contest will receive a print of Minnesota, courtesy of Lana Devening. To enter, visit LanyDevening.etsy.com, then come back here to tell us about your favorite piece in Lany's collection. Tell us in an additional post if you subscribe to Wishing Willow, or follow us on Twitter, and "tweet" about the giveaway. To post without a Google account, just click “anonymous.” Be sure to also leave your email address. Contest ends 3/05/09.

Be sure to also enter our giveaways here.