Kelly Beeman’s work portrays intimate scenes of domestic life and the awkward, peaceful, and often claustrophobic situations that present themselves when one is stuck at home. Her paintings have a narrative and cinematic quality that adds depth and intrigue, as if there is always more to the story.
Iverson’s work explores the complicated relationship between industry and the environment. Her paintings feature massive cargo ships, the lifeblood of international trade, in impossible natural settings. The scale of the massive ships, and the geometry of their payload of shipping containers, an affront to the natural world.
Jingze Du uses a grey color palette, with accents of black and grey, to create monochromatic portraits that are both familiar and strange. His contours are undefined, but are strong enough to hold the portraits together, and gives the work a romantic uncertainty. His more recent portraits of celebrities, super heroes, cartoon characters, and animals are approachable in their exaggeration.
Hamilton’s work forces questions on the viewer through paired images that explore themes like western expansion, engineering marvel, political hubris and power, fast cars, the suburban dream, and uniquely american notions of masculinity and femininity. While much of his imagery is derived from times gone by, the themes throughout are contemporary and topical. The result is a sensibility that is both nostalgic and totally relevant.
Amir Fallah’s paintings tap into the visual vocabularies of collage, portraiture, and installation. He explores the immigrant experience and the generational impact that is has and questions the systems of representation inherent in Western art using the parlance and visual language of traditional Islamic art. The scale of his work is epic and and allegorical.
The Chicago-based Baldur Helgason has a style that is rubber hose cartoon animation meets the old masters in settings that reflect contemporary living. He credits the Soviet era cartoons of his youth as inspiration with paintings that feature a character that is playful and mischievous — appearing content in his desperation.
From mixed media paintings to murals, music to album cover art, anthropomorphic boomboxes to tree stumps to garbage cans, Mac Blackout is one of the hardest working artists in a city of hard working artists. With such variety in mediums, Blackout always keeps you guessing, and yet there is an interconnectedness that brings it all together. It is always a treat to catch an unexpected glimpse of his narrative and psychedelic art throughout the city.
Known for his larger scale acrylic work, Levochkin’s paintings are inhabited by unique yet unidentifiable characters who often appear to be engaged in effort to overcome or adapt to the situation they find themselves in. In the tradition of ligne claire, Levochkin’s dynamic use of space results in a sculpturesque balance of figures and objects.
He creates abstract conceptualizations of the human face with everything from a few careful brushstrokes, the splatter of pen and ink, or dozens of hand-painted discards of canvas carefully layered in collage. The process results in unique forms that have a sense of movement that is both abstract and organic.
The German based artist and illustrator’s woodcuts are full of whimsey and feature a cast of half animal/half human characters. The work takes its cues from old fashioned cartoons — preferably of the 1990s Eastern European variety — as well as propaganda, pop culture and folklore. Klonek likes the anachronistic nature of woodcut and the authenticity, charm, and imperfection that it brings to his work.
Originally from Japan and now living in Southern California, Yu Maeda balances flavors of East and West in psychedelic paintings full of color and symmetry. With a background in commercial animation his work has an graphic vibe that takes inspiration from disparate sources like Rat Fink, Lowbrow art, Buddhism, and American film and TV.
Amandine Urruty’s graphite and charcoal works are chock full of objects and details that connect to tell stories on the scale of an epic fairytale. The black and white compositions replete with all manner of pop iconography give the work a spirit of longing that is both nostalgic and hopeful.
