Erin Shafkind's Illustrated Studio Tours: Part 2, Julie Alpert

 Follow artist-spy Erin Shafkind and her camera into the lofts, living rooms and breakfast nooks where you can see some of Seattle’s most interesting visual art being created.

Julie Alpert builds spaces. No, she creates worlds — no, she actually layers new universes for us to enter and explore.

[More text and photos by Erin Shafkind after the jump.]

In a quaint and wonderfully decorated home in Columbia City, Julie Alpert lives with her boyfriend, Andy Arkley, and Kiki the cat.

Watch out — Kiki can be a biter, but is also incredibly photogenic.

The living space is a blend of pinks, greens and earth tones, and something about the décor says 1970s, early ’80s TV sitcom.

Andy is a graphic designer and plays in the band Library Science. Julie graduated with an MFA in painting from the UW in 2008. Their styles have a perfect fuzzy unicorn poster combination, but it’s also not that cliché.

Julie makes her art in the front spare room of their house, working with confidence, adding a certain amount of wit and wonder to her layering process. While she is building environments, she’s unraveling layers of meaning while examining and trusting the process of creating as she makes.

Her ability to use simple texture, line, color and shape is strong, and she works with a dexterity common in people who are comfortable with a variety of mediums.

I had the opportunity to visit twice. Both times were informal, but the first was a chance just to see her space. A collector of papers, scraps, cardboard, magazines, etc., she understands that while not all of her materials are recycled, she usually considers the re-use of most items in her transformations.

In a way, I had to interrupt her process for the second visit. But I wanted to see the scraps, the pieces, the bits spread throughout her space and even the house.

To see it meant dealing with some distraction from the outside, as every layer is like sheets in a cozy bed of creative dreams. It’s no surprise that people like Michel Gondry and Jessica Stockholder are influences. Both use color, layers and a variety of narratives to investigate spaces beyond the known visual realm.

Alpert has work on view at the SAM rental gallery, will be showing in April at Grey Gallery, and she and I are collaborating on a project that also opens in April as part of the group show “You’re So Cool” at OHGE Ltd.

To see more of Julie Alpert’s work, visit her Web site, juliealpert.com.