Creative Loafing Tampa Bay readers probably know Amanda LaForest’s work. The Tampa Bay artist better known as The Peach Moon illustrated a David Byrne-inspired bicycling map of St. Petersburg, and she most recently created the cover for CL’s annual Newcomer’s Guide.
This week, the third since our community got decked by the fallout surrounding the coronavirus pandemic, The Peach Moon once again handled CL’s cover. The inspiration was a drone photo by Tampa photographer and musician Dave Decker, and the completed work is undoubtedly from LaForest save for one thing.
“I went for a more peaceful tone instead of a beachy palette for obvious reasons,” she told CL. LaForest also declined to accept our offer to pay her since there are so many artists wondering where their income is coming from these days. Instead, CL is repurposing the money as a donation to a local artist.
“I was thinking about it and don’t currently have my shop open since I’m trying to avoid the post office, but I’ll gladly keep up with the drawings and activities for everyone and work to support/promote artists who rely on their work for income,” she said. My partner works for a utility, so I feel like I’m in a better position than most and would rather any extra money go to them instead of me.”
With the notion that this paper is a celebration of Tampa Bay’s creative class in mind, here are six works from The Peach Moon, which you can buy right now.
We’ll add these to a bigger online gallery of works for sale from local artists, but in the meantime, reach out to [email protected] for inquiries. Follow @thepeachmoon on Instagram.
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