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© jw lawson, left, sonja thomsen, center, mark brautigam, right

Some recent local inspiration: First, a long-overdue coffee with jw lawson in his War Room space - a studio with great art history, being the former workspace of painter Fred Stonehouse. jw has a new self-published book, Southeastern View, available on his blog. And a few nights later, there was a nice meeting of minds with Sonja Thomsen and Mark Brautigam. Mark brought new work from his amazing series On Wisconsin, and Sonja showed pictures for an installation at the Amoury gallery. And her Lacuna work is in a current show at the Haggerty Museum of Art, a wonderful survey of ten of Wisconsin's best contemporary artists.