Riusuke Fukahori

This artist is very cool because he takes a 2 dimension technique and makes something that is essentially 3 dimensional by painting layers on resin. i think there is a lot to be learned from this artist especially regarding new creative way to use paint. also in this way its almost like painting is becoming sculpture into something that transcends medium.

In 2000, when his career reached a low point, he suddenly became fascinated by his goldfish—which despite being abandoned for seven years was still alive. The artist calls this incident “Goldfish Salvation.” Without restricting himself to one genre, he creates diverse expressions with the exclusive subject matter of goldfish.

“I think of goldfish as a living sculpture with man-made modifications. It never reaches the completed form; the goldfish’s vulnerability and imperfections bring out our motherly instinct. The impulse of exploration, “What are goldfish” drives me to create more. Where and how they want to swim, and what they think; these are the questions that I’ve been asking myself when I paint goldfish. I believe this process will help breathe life into the goldfish in my works.”

Zin Lim

Michaël Borremans

Justin Mortimer

Adrian Ghenie

Daniel Pitin

Zsolt Bodoni

Andrew Salgado

Costa Dvorezky

Through his paintings Costa goes beyond the obvious to uncover the symbolism within the human aspect of daily life. His creativity and style come alive through his works depicting dark and surreal imagery. As a viewer of Costa’s images, one is transported to a world of fictional proportions that exists in the recesses of the artist’s mind.
 Metamorphosed human and animal figures shrouded in darkness, suggest the existence of a distorted world-order. These images evoke one to closely examine and question the reality of what one sees. Through his artwork, Costa challenges the observer to not only understand the scope of the actual image, but to also comprehend the feelings that the image provokes. His paintings are as bold as the statements that they make, and it is up to each individual to decipher what the meaning behind the image really is.

Mark Demsteader

Looking at these paintings is like staring through a foggy window on a rainy day. Soft emotion in blurry form pours out of these feminine portraits by artist Mark Demsteader. The Manchester-based contemporary figurative artist is a self-taught master of the human form. His oil on canvas pieces feature pale figures set against a dark background. The dramatic contrast produces an elegant beauty that has captivated his audience in recent years. According to his bio, "His powerful depictions of the female form in clean assured lines of charcoal and gouache have sparked a renaissance of interest in traditional life drawing."
For her 21st birthday, Emma Watson contacted Demsteader to purchase some of his work. To continue developing his extensive collection, the artist took advantage of the opportunity and asked Watson to pose for him. He created 34 portraits, a series simply titled Emma. When speaking about the collaboration, Demsteader said, "In some way I hope these works celebrate Emma in what she has achieved already, and in all the many possibilities to come.”

Heather Horton

Cindy Tower

This is the first time I have seen a painting by Cindy Tower and I became an instant fan. Some works creep up on you slowly, while others hit you in the solar plexus with such convincing force that you wonder how you could have ever missed this artist’s work. Such is the case with Tower. Her large painting, “Maintenance Walk” (2010), is dense with decrepitude.

At the same time — and this part is as unsettling as it is bizarrely exhilarating — part of the pleasure the painting delivers is the artist’s heightened, almost hallucinatory attention to detail, from the crisscrossing rows of overhead pipes to the rusted and defunct machine parts littering the entire factory floor. You are not quite sure what to think. Everywhere you look you see something rusted and eroding, in a state of extreme neglect, more evidence of America’s long, agonizing decline. She uses oil paint (or a mixture oil and finely ground dirt) to depict dirty, often greasy things. As can only be done in painting, Tower slows down the decline — she asks the viewer to look at everything and to ponder what such ample disintegration might mean.

 

Nielly Francoise