Claire Scherzinger builds worlds in her paintings, crafting alien ecosystems that offer metaphors of our own Western lives. The recent series “Exoplanet: Arca-45672,” in particular, has scenes with a distinct palette and lifeforms whose narratives beg to be deciphered. Works like “Baptism before the vacuum cloud storm” shows a ceremony both familiar and curious, rendered in oils and spraypaint.
“[She] depicts the uncanny through painting as a way of resisting systems of power and considering better ways to live within western civilization,” a statement says. “Painting, in particular, has been her best tool to show this process since it has evolved continuously over the course of human history to challenge conceptions of reality while new information about the universe is discovered. Within this context, the question at the crux of her exploration asks whether it is possible to envision original life on another planet when current species on Earth are what inform our anthropocentric literature, art, and public knowledge of a being considered to be ‘alien.’”
See more of her recent work below.
Curated by artist 
Figurative artist Malcolm Liepke paints expressive images of men and women with increasing sensuality and range of emotions. The gestural quality of his oil paintings (previously covered