Nemo Soda draws us into a fairy tale world where the inhabitants are twisted, sickly and strange…
The fine-lined detail is out of this world, nearly dizzying, inviting us to look closer…and closer still.
These drawings contain worlds within worlds. I let my eyes wander over them slowly, delighting in the tiny surprises that eluded me at first glance.
I’m going to let a quote from Kelly Denato’s artist bio speak for her work, since I love the way the writer phrases the elusive emotions in these pieces.
What inspires Denato is the beauty of optimism, and its inherent tragedy, just before disappointment. Her paintings, which are marked by darkness as well as gleeful exuberance, are emotional expressions of this elusive pursuit for meaning and the simultaneity of ill-fated happiness.
Denato’s painting technique is characterized by meticulous and tiny strokes layered on a textured background. Her colors are glistening and candy-like, often lifting her characters out of darkness as if they have been carved by lacerating colors.
Her genius is her ability richly layer paint while still employing economy in the use of her line, maintaining an empathetic sense of gesture. Her characters are often floating and tangled, drawn with a masterfully delicate illustrator’s hand and an eye for the whimsically sardonic.
Thank you, Bill, for sharing Eva Jospin’s large scale cardboard cutout forests.
They’re rather like meta-forests, made from the wood that once comprised trunks and branches…deconstructed, formed into products…then cut, glued, arranged and layered to resemble their original form.
From the Source:
The forest – an incarnation of nature in the wild – is above all the setting in traditional storytelling of tests of courage, and can be a gloomy or initiatory place. The forest is also where one encounters oneself. This walk through the forest initiates the visit to ‘ Inside’, which is also an inner journey.
To look at a forest is an optical experience that challenges the typical laws of perspective in western representation. Facing visually the depth of a forest means to forget the horizon, it means to get lost. And is not the danger of getting lost the only risk tied up to that natural labyrinth that is a forest?
Sometimes I see images that are so hyper-real, I can’t believe they’re paintings. I believe Eduard Gordeev’s work is one of the only portfolios that ever tricked me into thinking I was looking at utterly brilliant hyperrealistic paintings when it was indeed a collection of photographs.
I love his rain-drenched urban landscapes…distorted, obscured, until they become glowing abstract textures with only an echo of the unadorned features beneath.
Peter Ferguson has been a successful commercial artist with many high profile companies on his resume. But his online portfolio shows a darker side of his work (literally and figuratively).
This animal’s pose…too wonderful…I can’t.
These surreal vignettes remind me of Northern Renaissance art…with a postmodern twist.
One almost has to strain the eyes to fully make out the complex images within Ferguson’s warm, muted tones. And then there are the sea creatures…droves of random sea creatures.
La Specola Anatomical Collection is on my list of top destinations if I ever make it to Europe.
La Specola is part of the Museum of Natural History in Florence and contains perhaps the largest (and best known) collection of antique anatomical models. It began as the personal collection of the Medici family, and opened in 1775 to the public.
According to Atlas Obscura the museum “also houses some wonderful taxidermy, including now extinct specimens and a very questionable-looking hippopotamus.”
I obviously can’t hear the term “questionable-looking hippopotamus” without being deeply intrigued.
Of particular note is the presence of anatomical Venuses…idealized female forms with their insides exposed. These medical models were a valued educational tool, but evoke all kinds of emotion with their brilliant, uncanny craftsmanship. Some look dead, some look as if they’ve been skinned alive. Others are semi-erotic.
Have any of you visited La Specola?
Today I bring you Amalia K’s big-eyed girls.
They are often sweet…
And sometimes they reflect a subtle sadness.
Others appear empowered through strength and gentleness.
Natasha Cousens (AKA Aiko) creates gorgeous faux taxidermy sculptures, adorned with flowers and thorns.
These lovely animals begin as sketches and take many months to create. She uses fiberglass, resin, ceramic, wood and artificial flowers in the construction process.
She highlights the natural beauty and elegance of woodland creatures while bringing an element of fantasy to each piece. I don’t care for real taxidermy (if it involves the intentional killing of animals), but I would love to have one of these in my home!
From astronomy to architecture, Nick Swan’s paintings create senses of fear, wonder, unease, loneliness, isolation, stability and beauty.
Many of them look like watercolor, but are actually acrylic and oil.
I love this one so much…staring into the light from darkness.
SheWalksSoftly 