Location: Portland, OR
Website: Obsessive Consumption
Blog: What Did You Buy Today?

Kate Bingaman-Burt is best-known for the drawings she makes of the things she buys. Her painstaking scrutiny of her own purchases force you to take a few moments to consider your own. A simple idea that packs a whollop if you let it. That the drawings are so awesome helps ease the painful sting of self-recognition. But she doesn’t just draw her own purchases– she draws for things you can purchase as well! And if you want to make the argument more circular, in March of 2010, you can buy a whole book of the drawings of the things Kate has bought. (And you can buy them in zine form right now!)

In addition to all the great work she creates herself, Kate is a wildly popular educator. She is a wonderful advocate for her current and former students, first at Mississippi State University and now at Portland State University. Also, she and her husband (Clifton Burt) had to close the Public Design Center when they left Mississippi, but, and I quote, “plans are furiously being hatched for something new that is surely to involve the internet and all things rad.”

I’ve been a fan of Kate’s drawings for so long, I can’t ever remember not knowing about them. We’ve had a number of near-misses in Portland, but we’ll go out for a coffee or beer one of these days. Perhaps it will end up in one of her drawings?