suckers and biters

Krista Madsen built a bar across the street from Jeff White but it took him six months to notice. Then it took her six months to notice him. Then they were in love and taking trips and collaborating on corpses from Bristol, CT to Dallas, TX, but mostly here in Williamsburg, Brooklyn where they go back and forth with their biggering black cat. Jeff is the preparator for the print department at MoMA, an artist, a drummer, a scuba diver, a snowboarder. Krista is the author of 2 novels out by Livingston Press, a creative writing teacher at Gotham, and the wearer of many hats at Stain – often quite literally for the many costume parties. For every one lollipop she is still sucking, Jeff has bitten his way through several, but they try not to let this come between them. $POR

Alric Balka and Jamie Marie Waelchli met while students at Washington State University. Alric recently graduated with dual degrees in Fine Arts and Advertising. He's lived an exhilarating life in twenty-four short years. While working towards his degrees he became well acquainted with the realms of revelry and video games. He is also a master of sarcasm. Jamie is currently working on her Master of Fine Arts in digital media. She makes comics for a hobby. Her life has been more quiet then his, but she was once the star of many plays. They live in Pullman, Washington. $NFS

Jeremy Dost was born in Cleveland on January 30, 1973. Three months later, on March 30, Jena Jones was born in Dallas. The two wandered in search of true love until one fateful autumn day in 1992 (or 1993 – they’re not sure) when stars collided and brought them together. For 6 (or 5) torturous years they were just friends, despite Jeremy’s numerous advances. Finally it was ballroom dancing that won over Jena’s heart. The only thing hotter than HOTlanta, was their love that night in Backstreets, as they embarrassed the drag queens. A few months later, on Halloween, they got engaged and then on Friday the 13th they were married. Judge Pinkie Tumor reminded them, as they exchanged vows in the courtroom downtown, that marriage was for keeps. They’ve kept it. They are both artists living and working in Atlanta with their sons, Thalo and Cy. $150

Mel Prest (sucker) and Andrew Kleindolph (biter) met in San Francisco, but both are Midwesterners by birth. We both went to Mills College, in Oakland, California, for our MFAs, but we went at different times. Happily we met through friends and seven years later we are still together (and also married). Andrew began as a painter but now divides his time between electronics, digital drawings and interactive sculpture. Andrew’s 2006 shows include Swarm Gallery in Oakland, Santa Clara University (solo) and RX Gallery (solo) in San Francisco. Mel is still a painter (and female) and she works primarily with color. Her recent work focuses on transcribing Led Zeppelin songs into tangled gouache line drawings. Mel’s work can be seen at Gregory Lind Gallery, San Francisco, and Branch Gallery, Durham, North Carolina. Their websites are extrasleepy.com and melprest.com. $200 each

Kirsten Rae Simonsen and Scott Groeniger met in 2003, when he interviewed her at a conference in New York. She handed him her images of exotic dancers and Indonesian monsters, and he wanted to hire her immediately. Four years later they are married and stranded together in academic jobs in North Florida. They spend summers in Europe (mostly Amsterdam) and winter vacations in New Mexico. Their favorite question is “when do we leave again?” They both really enjoy motels, truck stops, and old signs. Kirsten’s "fairy-tale gone wrong" work explores the disturbing power of children's fairy-tales, the fear of animals, and the human struggle with the natural world. Scott is concerned with the way the world is quickly falling apart and the horror of the suburbs. He has an ongoing project in China, envirochina.net. The artists’ work can be seen at: http://elasticlimit.com/workself and http://elasticlimit.com/kirstenrae. $100 each

Brian Bell and Linn Edwards met three summers ago during a trip with several friends to Brighton Beach. Six months later, they met again at a party on a rainy November night. After a night of flirting and spying on neighbors, the night ended with a French kiss in the back of a taxi. Several months later Brian hunted Linn down via Friendster, and they went on a first date on the night before Valentine’s Day. After two years they are still going strong, making out in cabs and working on art like it’s nobody’s business. Linn is a photographer living in Brooklyn. This is the first time she has shown work in a gallery that is not a photograph. Please see her work at linnedwards.com. Brian is a self-taught artist who grew up in Ohio but now also resides in Brooklyn. He runs the website lefthandedloser.com. $100

Gregory Hare is an artist, singer/songwriter and poet who owns a frame shop in Mt. Kisco, NY. Melanie Wadsworth is primarily a fine artist, but also alters existing tee shirts with her own silkscreens that she sells under the label Prisoner of Candy. She has been an exhibiting artist for approximately 12 years. Gregory has performed his music live in music venues as well as recording a CD and continues to make art in his free time. Both of them went to college in NYC to study fine art. Gregory has lived in Westchester County, New York for most of his adult life while Melanie has been a Manhattan/Brooklyn dweller. They both met around 8 years ago through mutual friends and have been together ever since. They have a 3-year-old son Lionel who is planning to be a superhero when he grows up. $POR

Michael Shores produced his first exquisite corpses with fellow artists during his tenure with the Punkt Dada Gallery (1977-80). Angela Mark has been exhibiting and publishing her work since 1978. They met in 1981 while working as security guards at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. Their collaboration began with a series of automatic drawings and collages, progressed to producing a quarterly magazine, and opening a gallery together in Allston, Massachusetts. Over the years they’ve created and performed improvisational music involving visuals and stagings and about twelve years ago they started to work on paintings together. The moniker SharkArt Studios combines their names SHores and mARK and encompasses their activities musically and artistically, sharkartstudios.com. Some of their painting series include Vampires & Aliens and The Bizarre World of Kinky Sex. Their work will be featured in The World’s Best Erotic Artists to be published this spring by Erotic Signature. $75 each

Justin Duerr (justinduerr.com) lives in Philadelphia. He is an artist and plays in several bands including Northern Liberties, Justin Duerr and the Etheric Phoenix of L.O.V.E., Kat Klix, and the Vivian Girls Experience. Enid Crow (enidcrow.com) lives in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. She is a photographer and sings with Justin in the band the Vivian Girls Experience. Justin and Enid met on MySpace in January 2005. They formed the lo-fi craft pop band the Vivian Girls Experience and started collaborating on several art projects together. On April 25, 2005, after dressing up and taking photos in an abandoned oil refinery, Justin kissed Enid on the lips for the first time. Soon afterwards, they fell head over heals in love. Their first album, Awesome Celebrity Couple: The Kitten Lemonade Stand Years, will be released in February 2007. $30

Taryn McMahon and Keith Lemley met while studying art at the Pennsylvania State University. They have never collaborated before, but enjoy encouraging and supporting each other as artists and as a couple. Taryn grew up in NJ and graduated in 2006 with her BFA degree, concentrating in printmaking. Her work ranges from woodcuts and etchings to intermedia installations and performances. She is currently the printmaking artist-in-residence at the John Talleur Print Studio in Lawrence, Kansas. Keith’s work is primarily founded in interactive and kinetic sculpture, but sometimes crosses into painting, glass blowing, and photography. He explores intimate matters concerning the thought and decision making processes of individual people as well as broader issues in corporate America. Found objects in disguise and lots of experimentation provide his work a playful look at the human condition. $80

In my friend’s loft, I saw this amazing painting by "My friend Kelly." So I thought Kelly was a girl. Then to my surprise on Friday the 13th, 2002 I met Kelly, who turned out to be a very handsome man! This happened around the corner from Pratt. At the time I lived in San Francisco. I ended up going to grad school at Pratt to be closer to Kelly (little did he know, oh, okay he knew). – Jeannette DiCarolis / We did this, that and the other thing. Considered things one way and then the other, only to find things subjective. Beauty IS in the eye of the beholder. Now we want to establish deep roots... – Kelly McCormick / ...in each other's lives. I am a K-5 art teacher. Kelly is a working (and sometimes non-working) artist. We live in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, together. – Jeannette $POR

Erica Cassill sucks on lollipops due to sensitivity of the teeth. She studied traditional Keralan mural painting in South India and continues to paint professionally in this style. Adam Grimes is also a sucker of lollipops. His favorite flavor is cream soda Dum-Dums. He is a mad designer of electro-gadgets and is expert at doodling in the margins of notebook paper. The artists began as roommates in a 3-bedroom Chicago brownstone apartment. After a period of 4 weeks of flirtatious glances, the artists gave in to Cupid’s arrow and began a loving commitment that is entering its fifth year. $40

Joshua Field and Melissa Lillie met in 1993 during their freshman year at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, MD and have been together ever since. They currently live in the growing artist community of North Adams, Massachusetts, the home of the Mass. Museum of Contemporary Art (one of the largest contemporary art spaces in the US) and the Contemporary Artist’s Center. His artwork explores growing social isolation and its impact on identity through narrative paintings, joshuafield.com. Her work addresses the human need to manipulate the architecture of our appearance in relationship to our surroundings, most recently through wall-hung sculpture and headdresses, melissalillie.com. $NFS

Ilana Cohen is an artist. Jacob Reidel is an architect. We like cities, birds, elephants, comics, trains, dioramas, and maps. We met at a New Year's Eve party in 2003. This is our first collaborative project. Ilana manipulates urban landscapes in her drawings. Jacob designs buildings for imagined Victorians. (Connecticut) $100

Tah is known as the “best live Hip-Hop act without a band in New York City.” He blends rawness, savvy, energy and lyrical wizardy into one mess of verbal and visual bliss. A counteractive yet progressive force in Tah’s circle, Demostina is a “visual emcee” bursting with infrared high energy through her illustrations, live painting shows, and music. Her work is often informed by human interaction, sound, and the metaphysical. Tah and Demo met in a school hallway about a year ago in the South Bronx. Despite the unruly student Demo was reprimanding, and the heavy speaker Tah was carrying as he walked past her in the opposite direction, a familiar vibration settled when their eyes met. The organic quality of their otherworldly bond evolved from a silent mutual lusty admiration to a deafening merging of two polar energies. $POR

Mary Kate Maher and Oliver Jones first met in graduate school at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. We became enamored with each other’s looks, brains and, arguably, talent. On Valentines Day 2002, we sat next to each other on a bus ride to New York and read bad magazines to each other. We desperately wanted to hold hands at that point but were too shy. One week later, Oliver confessed his affections for Mary Kate. She wisely returned them. The rest, as they say, is the stuff of history books ... because it is fascinating stuff ... really. We were married last August and have been living happily ever in New York. Oliver is a photographer/sculptor/writer and moonlights as a bookkeeper. MaryKate is a sculptor, mind reader and perfected mess maker. We both live and work in Brooklyn. $POR

Keith Pavia has been drawing for as long as he can remember, which isn’t saying much considering the fact that at age 38 his mind has been forced into a state of premature Alzheimer’s due to the absorption of many toxic art materials into his system. Caroline Watkins says, "I have conscious memories of former lives, I was an artist in more than a few.” She also has an affinity for plant life, particularly orchids. One day while completing a public service sentence at a children’s play garden, Keith noticed a young beautiful woman. He walked towards her with the intensity and focus of a hawk. She stumbled back a bit upon his approach. The air was thick with chemistry and tension. Without hesitation he asked her if she could remember when they were dinosaurs together... She smiled and proposed a drawing excursion to Coney Island. (New York City) $400

Noemie Bonnet and Alejandro Taylor-Escribano. He's a Spanish boy from Manhattan; she's a French girl from the suburbs. High school on the East Side brought them together, and after a few years of semi-platonic friendship, they finally got bit by the love bug and decided that "just friends" just sucked. They're a few months away from their college degrees, which means the end of long distance (she’s in Rhode Island) and the start of a real life together. Hopefully reality won't bite too hard. $POR

Friends first, the relationship between Andy Fish and Veronica Hebard grew despite the years between them, and they began to realize that they had more serious feelings for each other. The first year found Andy in Boston and Veronica in NYC. Through their cell phones they stayed in constant contact watching movies together, and often falling asleep with their phones on the pillows next to them. Now both in Massachusetts they live, work and play together everyday, the passion and excitement they felt has never waned, only intensified. Refusing to take anything for granted, they are both grateful that it is the other one lying on the pillow next to them at the end of the day. Together and separately they produce a series of graphic novels, paintings and commercial artwork for very diverse clients. More of their work can be found on their new website, fishandhebs.com. $75

Donise English and Robert Nilsson met over a beer at a bar in Poughkeepsie, New York and were married 15 years later. Donise graduated from Bard College with an MFA in painting and is on the faculty of Marist College teaching studio art. Robert graduated from Iowa State University and Cooper Union with degrees in Architecture and has his own architectural practice in Dutchess County, New York. $250 each

A summer of uninspired dating experiences led Austin rocker Ashley Ewing to reject ordinary people altogether and approach dating with renewed verve. Consequently, she posted an announcement on Craigslist addressed to all rock stars and movie stars stating that she was single and available for dates. Meanwhile, in a studio across town, the extravagant artist Veronica Ceci browsed these personals and was irked by one ad in particular. She responded with the intent of learning why the poster was not interested in “Art Stars.” A month of e-mails later (all of which were filled with intellectually stimulating banter and definite proof of stardom), the couple met and have been inseparable ever since. $400

Christina Gregor and Scott Cullmann started dating shortly after meeting in an art class in high school. In the summer of 2006, together they climbed down a mountain. Scott is a graduate student at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in the film and media department. Scott is a bodybuilder, shark enthusiast, snowboarder, and also a video documenter of people. He resides in Oak Park, Illinois. Christina is in her last semester as a graduate student at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb. Her favorite food is corn, she enjoys knitting and making stuff she does not like to call art. Christina and Scott both attended Webster University in Webster Groves, MO where they received their BFAs. $200

John Truex received an MFA in 3D Design from Cranbrook Academy of Art and a BFA in Sculpture from the University of Tennessee. An award winning designer, he most recently completed a bus stop for the city of Ferndale, MI. John currently works at Readymade Projects in New York. Having grown up in a family of artists in the foothills of Appalachia, Audrey Hasen Russell also received her BFA in Sculpture from the University of Tennessee, then she went on to get an MFA in Sculpture from Cranbrook. After graduating in 2006 and relocating to Brooklyn, she has been assisting several sculptors and setting up her own studio. John asked Audrey to take him out during the summer before their last year of undergraduate school in Knoxville. They are now living in Bushwick, Brooklyn with their two large cats, Simon and Artie. $POR

Jason Rosencrantz focuses on achieving authenticity while writing and teaching in Los Angeles. Justina Blakeney works on making good choices in New York City. While doing so she wanders, designs, authors, cooks, sings, babysits, messes around on the computer and makes pretty things. Justina and Jason had long been acquaintances when things took a turn for the physical after a New Year's Eve party. Now they regularly rendezvous in cities around the world to make art and make out. $50 each

Brad Archambault and Anne Markwith met in Intermediate Drawing class during the spring of 1999 at the University of New Hampshire. Anne and Brad began dating on August 28th of 2001. Each was pursuing a career in the arts and when it came time for graduation Brad went onto graduate school at Indiana University in Bloomington, IN and Anne moved to New York. The two remained a couple, however the long distance grew tiresome, and Anne decided she too wanted to pursue a master’s degree in painting. In 2004 Anne moved to Indiana. She and Brad moved in together for the first time. Brad and Anne remained in Bloomington until Anne finished her degree in 2006. On March 25th of 2006 Brad proposed to Anne. Anne and Brad were recently wed on December 24th 2006. They both happily reside in Queens and continue to pursue their artistic endeavors. $POR

Chai-Li Chou (Jack) ingredients: 1 _ pounds science, 3 tbs loner, 2 cups sincerity, 1/3 cup humor, 2 _ tbs reason, _ tsp common sense. Feel free to add a pinch of annoyance. / Grace Yang ingredients: 1 lb art, 1 beauty, chopped fine, 2 tbs sluggish, 5 tbs passion, 1 cup of dependence, 2 cups insecurity/vulnerability/ sensitivity. Preparation: toss Jack and Grace and boil in a saucepan for 5 min. Enjoy the bizarre love and kisses. Feel free to add a condom. (New York City) $40

Tricia Zigmund is a Frackville, Pennsylvania native who is currently studying photography at Edinboro University of PA. She has exhibited her photographs and collages both in the U.S. and internationally through various solo and group exhibitions. After receiving her degree, she will return to NYC to pursue a museum career. Joshua Andrus, born in Ambridge, PA, is a photographer currently residing in New York City. Also a graduate of Edinboro where the couple met in 2005, he has participated in various group exhibitions. A solo exhibition in Toronto, Canada is slated for early 2007. In addition to his freelance commercial work, Andrus focuses on fine art photography and Mac computers. A similar interest in their photographic approaches had initiated their friendship, and after a holiday in Boston they became romantically involved. Despite the distance and a Powerbook consistently invading their privacy, Tricia and Josh will be geographically united in May. $NFS

Ting-Hsin Wang is a designer and architect from Taipei, Taiwan. Ray Cross is a silkscreen printer, designer and partner in Peripheral Media Projects and Ad Hoc Art. They met five years ago at Pratt Institute in a mutual friend’s studio. They were married at the Burning Man Art Festival in 2006. They live in Brooklyn with their cat. $200 each

Nancy Doherty was born in Warwich, RI and lives and works in Hartford, Connecticut. where she he received a BFA from the Hartford Art School of the University of Hartford in 1987. She has exhibited paintings and drawings throughout New England and New York with an upcoming exhibition at Artworks Gallery in Hartford. David Borawski was born in Hartford, also receiving a BFA from the Hartford Art School in 1978. He has exhibited installations in Virginia and Ohio and has an upcoming solo exhibition at Washington and Jefferson College in Washington, PA. Together: We were introduced by a mutual friend a year and a half ago. Our relationship and our art grows stronger every day. Nancy had the idea to use vellum overlays, so that our drawings are only complete when put together, much like the two of us. $150 each

Kayti Didriksen’s formal training started at Suitland Visual and Performing Arts High School and continued at the Maryland Institute College of Art where she earned a BFA in Printmaking. She became a scandalous artist in 2004 after having her nude Bush painting thrown out of The City Museum of Washington, DC. For more work see Kaytidid.com. She currently resides in the less uptight Philadelphia. She sucks out loud! Justin Gebhard is an architect living and working in Philadelphia. He has previously worked with Officine di Architettura, in Rome and has also worked under Maya Lin. Justin has collaborated most recently in an entry for the Architecture for Humanity design competition for Siyathemba, a girls' soccer league pitch for AIDS awareness. This dude is a total Sucker! The two met while Kayti was hanging a show at a venue hosting puppet karaoke. They bonded over both their handmade puppets. $100 each, $150 pair

Ira Martin is an electrician and artist specializing in sculpture. His work can be seen in the CD cabinets and on the shirts of Metal-heads worldwide. He’s currently working on a non-fiction graphic novel set during the Korean War and enjoys comic book shopping with his son. Meredith Bain is a Computer Operator for the State of New York. After paying the bills and providing her son with homemade super hero costumes she looks forward to any opportunity to create art. This often involves her 2-year-old painting along side her. Ira and Meredith reside in New York in the foothills of the Adirondacks with their son Owen. They met in 1997 while attending Sage College of Albany and began their courtship in Clay Sculpture class. Just as the finishing touches were put on their final projects the creative duo began their relationship. $80

Kristin Renner and Jeff Stark like fun We like art We like ice cream We like Jazz We like fashion design We like painting We like weird We like food We like Jimmy Kimmel monologues We like Graphic Communication We like Robert Rauschenberg We like Christian Joy We like to play strip Sorry We like warm blankets We like tea We like shoes We like Fifa World Cup Soccer games We like late nights We like books We like concerts without smoking We like fresh underpants We like adventures We like new friends We like learning We like jokes We like Bears games We like drawing We like museums We like German Immigration We like Folk art We like Graffiti We like bike rides We like hummus plates on hot dates We like ovens We like skateboarding We like toast We like movies We like each other (Illinois) $75

After meeting on the Great Peace March for Global Nuclear Disarmament in 1986, (an incident Jillian Corbett does not recall), we ended up living in the same activist household in Boulder, CO a year later. After a short and torrid affair, we parted the best of friends, Emily Maynor to San Francisco and Jillian into her VW bus and the road. We lived for a few years mere blocks apart in SF, very much as individuals, then did not see each other for 5 years when Jillian left SF. A chance encounter in Times Square, December 2004, led to a late night talking that rekindled our friendship and our love as we found our grown-up selves much more compatible. Wingnyc.com is our pipedream, realized. Emily's fresh, hand-knit finery, designed with a discerning eye here in Bushwick, Brooklyn compliments and contrasts Jillian's spraypaint stencil work. $NFS

Terry King and John Truelove met in 1992 and have been inseparable for the last 15 years. Like George and Gracie or Bogie and McCall, the King-Truelove team has traveled the world experiencing everything possible there is to experience, and inventing when necessary. Terry is currently many things, an artist, graphic designer, model, musician, songwriter. Ultimately, she is a "Rock Star.” John is the bassist, songwriter, of Coppersonic. (Queens) $POR

Although not as pug-ugly as Socrates, Andrew McCarthy is not a handsome man. Lizzie Rasmont saw through all of that and the two have been an integral part of each other's lives since 2002. They kick together against the pricks, bow together on the strings of emotion, dam together dykes with their little Dutch fingers and appreciate each other greatly. Andrew designs to keep on the lights. Lizzie is currently a designer of form and facilitates craft fabrication. (New York City) $POR

Gio Gaynor and Diana Alutto are both 25-years-old and reside and Harlem and Brooklyn respectively. Both met and work in various after-school programs in the private and public sectors all over New York City teaching collectively art, drama, ukulele, tap dance, improv, cartooning, clowning, ice skating, and whatever else creative that people need a class for. Their artwork, as a result, is heavily influenced by children, as you can see. $NFS

Enthusiastic Sue is a musician at heart. I play bass, guitar and dream of the drums. Aside of music, COLOR is my favorite thing in life. I am currently translating my music into a visual symphony through the use of color and design. Rock on! David Schlaegel is a musician at heart... or a skater... or a traveler... or an artist, it changes in a heartbeat, or a decade, or two. I'm process-oriented, not so much about a finished product as in the joy that comes from doing something that I love until time disappears. We met 10 years ago and have been through many phases in our relationship; brother, sister, friend. We are an unusual pair, we live parallel to each other at all times, in harmony, even during our blue period. We accept each other as they are, and what they are is awesome. (Queens) $POR

Keith and Gina Beavers met in 2001, during their individual quests to live in New York City. Gina moved from Chicago, Keith from Florida. They stayed alternatively on a mutual friend’s couch, became friends and were married in 2005. They live in the East Village with their two cats, where they enjoy late night snacking, sci-fi, reality TV and living in their creative mess. Gina is a painter who received her MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2000. She divides her time between her studio in Bushwick and teaching art in a public school in Canarsie. Keith is a musician and wine guy, who received a recording/engineering degree from Full Sail-Orlando in 1999. He began creating digital photo collages for his music website, Dr K Studios. He also runs a wine bar and writes a blog about wine as the ‘East Village Wine Geek.’ $150 each

Marité Burwell works as an editor, tinkering on everything from children's books to cartoons for Playboy. Currently she's working in travel books, and spent time on assignment shuffling around Prague. She has studied dance, including the flamenco, but had the misfortune to fall in love with a gringo with two left feet. David Hart has a Master's in Art and Art Education from Teacher's College, which doesn't pay the bills. He draws, paints, and makes prints when he can find the time. To procrastinate, he writes, and his work is published online in places like McSweeney's. He works at MoMA in Education and Digital Media. David is lucky to have fallen for a lady that puts up with his oddities, including making up filthy songs about coping a feel. (New York City) $POR

Shelby A. Baron is from Buffalo, and received her BA from the University of South Florida in 2005. She obsessively doodles and writes stories inspired by the wealth of electronically retrievable information and autobiographical fodder available to her. Neil Bender was born in Perth Amboy, New Jersey, and currently lives and works in Florida. His work has been shown nationally and internationally, employing graphic imagery and lurid color to create an overflowing, lascivious world of flowering, fluid fragments that are theatrical and explore many possible genders and sexual situations. Ryan Berg of the glam band Chariot introduced Neil and Shelby in the hallowed stairways of art school, where she showed him the five staples in her head, and he talked longingly of Chicago. Later, they performed the Stones’ “Satisfaction” and Lou Reed’s “Walk on the Wild Side” at a gay karaoke bar downtown. $350 each

Sarah Emerson says she first noticed me (Jesse Cregar) in an elevator and upon first sight she knew I was the one for her. I of course, was not interested in long-term relationships (3 weeks tops) but recognized immediately that she was quite sexy. Our first conversation was the following year, 1995. Shortly after that, Sarah came to my grandmother’s place in the mountains of NC. We spent an incredible summer together and have been inseparable ever since. Of course there are times that she says that I suck, and I tell her that she bites, but these last 12 years have been amazing. During our journey Sarah earned her Masters degree in Art at Goldsmiths College in London and I got one too at Tufts University in Boston, MA. We now live in Atlanta and have a 2-year-old little girl named Harlow who thinks we rock. $100 each

Chris LaVoie grew up in Tucson, AZ. He studied sculpture at the University of Arizona and graduated in '04. He then worked as a substitute teacher and took graduate art classes at the University of Arizona. The last class he took was a video installation class where he met a girl named Sarah Hardesty. Sarah grew up in the Northeast. She studied art at Skidmore College and received her MFA in ‘05 from the U of A. She then became the director of a non-profit art space in Tucson before moving to Boston. She teaches art at the Museum of Fine Arts and works in her studio in Hyde Park. Chris and Sarah have now been together for almost 2 years. Their relationship is currently spanning the long divide between Baltimore and Boston. There has never been a better time to sing “I just called…to say…”- you know the rest. $POR

Craig Trombino and Caroline Edelen met through mutual friends in Williamsburg, Brooklyn four years ago. Craig is a visual artist and musician who is currently displaying his paintings in NYC and Paris. Caroline is an actor and musician who performs for two theater companies in Miami and NYC. Together they make music in the band TinVeil. They are working on their second album together. $POR

Jessica and Shawn Doyle first met in 1994 at a party in Philadelphia. Jessica was in love instantaneously with Shawn’s blonde hair, deep blue eyes, and charming demeanor. Shawn was taken aback by Jessica’s quiet nature and brown eyes. When they met again through friends the year later, chemistry was set in motion. They have been together for the past 12 years. In 2000, they went on a camping trip to Niagara Falls, which is when Shawn proposed. They enjoyed a beautiful December wedding. Jessica gave birth to a beautiful girl in 2001. They had a son in 2005. Jessica is an artist, who draws, paints, and makes videos. Shawn is an artist, musician, and carpenter. Together, they have written, and are now directing and producing a film. They happily live in Philadelphia with their two children. $100 each

Terri Saul lives near Berkeley’s Gourmet Ghetto, in Northern California, with her daughter and two miniature tigers. She’s the granddaughter of Chief Terry Saul, her namesake, a Choctaw painter and peyotist. She grew up on the perimeter of the Angeles National Forest, in awe of mudslides. She’s shown twice at Bucheon Gallery in San Francisco. Josh Michels was born south of SF but grew up in Southern New Jersey. This means he talks kind of funny to his West Coast friends, but doesn’t get cold when the temperature drops below 70º. Josh is a graphic designer with an exit strategy from the corporate life that includes making wine and organic goat cheese, and cultivating marijuana. He’s in love with Terri and her amazing daughter Lydia. Josh and Terri have been amorous since May. $50 each

Steven B. Ekerovich: I am currently living in New York after 5 years of mountain climbing and backcountry skiing around the world. I have recently started a small firm representing photographers. One day, Laura “slipped” me her card when leaving he local coffee shop. I had no choice but to call and try to discover who this mysterious person was and well now we’re doing drawing projects together. Laura Lobdell: I am an artist and jewelry designer. Steve struck up a conversation by making fun of my sunglasses. The conversation improved quickly from there. An author who included my custom hand painted doghouse in his latest book, came by and said a brief hello. By way of explaining this funny project, I showed Steve my card which has a photo of my dog and doghouse. It’s not necessarily a bad thing that he took this as an invitation. $POR

Coury Carlson and Dawn Lucas met late one night at a watering hole in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. They felt an immediate connection and continued to chat into the morning. That was the night Dawn started smoking again. Cigs, that is, as Coury calls them. Coury is an Assistant Editor and has worked for MTV, BBC, on documentaries and in advertising. Dawn retouches archive photos during the day, works on freelance design and website projects at night, and prints greeting cards via Letterpress any time she can (dawnhylonlucas.com). Dawn and Coury decided to combine their creative energy and start hyC creative; hopefully providing services in the design, editing, printed, and video world. They live happily together in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, enjoy cooking together, have quit smoking again, and still stay up chatting most nights. Suckers and Biters was their first attempt at creating together and definitely not their last. $POR

Sharon M. Bankert founded Bankert Arts, an art consulting company, in 2005 after working for several years in the field of professional art services, consulting and exhibitions. Her personal work encompasses photography, mixed media and installation (ironstudios.com, riverorthart.com). Matt R. Beranek is a gearhead, with a skate and snowboarding affinity. Matt works as a welder/machinist at an industrial pump company. Sharon and Matt first met at the annual Dia De Los Muertos celebration at Pirate Art Gallery in North Denver in 1997. In 2002, they were reintroduced and have been sharing ideas, adventures and life in general ever since. They share a home in North Denver with three cats, 2 trucks, a 53’ Chevy, 62’ Falcon, 73’ Moto Guzzi and various hot rods in pieces. $POR