Today Michael Bauermeister is one of the finest wood artisans in the Midwest and the country. He has been featured in countless magazines, art exhibits and even the Smithsonian. You can find his work anywhere from residents on either coast to local hospitals where they provide a much-needed calming, natural presence for patients. So, would you believe that he spent the bulk of his early career building furniture? Bauermeister explains, “When I graduated, I couldn’t figure out how to make a living as a sculpture artist, so I made furniture for 15 years.

There's a saying that local en plein air artist Shawn Cornell has coined as a way of explaining his craft and it goes like this, “If you see snow in the painting, it means the artist was standing in snow. If you see rain in the painting, it means the artist was getting very wet.” That's the medium of en plein air in a nutshell. It's the process of painting your subject on location in the open air, whether it's rain or shine or even snow.

The sculptures in Lisa Hilton’s sun-washed studio are classically designed pieces, interwoven with unexpected additions of fantasy. On one side, an elegant clay woman poses on a litter made from a copper leaf, carried by a giant ant. Along the wall, another female figure cradles a metal nest, her limbs resembling the lichen-covered bark of a tree. And then there are the porcelain animals in the center of Hilton’s studio and at the heart of her current sculpture series.

Carl Harris moves you with a few strokes of his pen. Up-down, left-right, the layered lines in his ink drawings create tones that pull you right into the picture. It’s an unexpected sensation, particularly since his current subjects – massive stone churches, turn-of-the-century row houses, the Arch – don’t budge. But when you peer into a darkened window, or drift along with the clouds, you realize that you’re not just observing Harris’s work, you’re participating in it.

Kat Kissick painting is a roar of color that wakes you up and draws you in. Vibrant acrylic paints and markers are layered on wooden panels – and, sometimes, skate board decks – then carefully edited away in a process Kissick calls “create and destroy.” Her subjects aren’t so much painted as they are revealed, with stories that pivot from whimsical to wary. The occasional white line lends contrast, but Kissick is clear that she doesn’t work with neutrals: “My art is for people who understand color and let it speak to them,” Kissick says.

The Sheet Metal Valley feels especially desolate on a snowy Saturday morning in January. Nestled between Macklind and Manchester roads, this industrial-grade strip of St. Louis is one of only a handful of sites that remind passersby of our city’s manufacturing roots. It’s cold.  It’s gray; it’s thriving. Much like the artist who calls it home.