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The New Contemporary Art Magazine
Koralie's interest in "folk customs, emblematic monuments and animistic ritual" translates into stencil work on canvas that evokes cultures from across the world and creates illusionary layers. In a show currently running at Jonathan Levine Projects, titled “Indigo Blood Project,” the artist’s newest works are shown. Koralie was featured in Hi-Fructose Vol. 46 and most recently on the Hi-Fructose blog here.
Tel-Aviv-based artist Ori Toor creates prints and animations that rely on happy accidents. His so-called “gibberish” prints are unplanned and unsketched. These vibrant, trippy works merely stumble upon familiar icons and forms, creating final products that both exhibit a single vibe and can be seen as disparate, otherworldly sections.
Justin Lovato, a California native, is a self-taught artist who blends abstract shapes and patterns for scenes that traverse worlds. While his paintings tend toward wild, overlaid landscapes, his works on paper often feature interdimensional beings entangled in the artist’s backdrops. Lovato was last featured on cctvta.com here, in a piece that focuses on his acrylic paintings on canvas.
Andrea Myers is an artist and self-described "maker" based in Ohio. Blending forms of sculpture, painting and fiber arts, she creates collage-like sculptures, wall hangings and installations that explore the space between the two- and three-dimensional. Her works also reflect her deep interest in the process of manipulating "flat" materials, such as fabrics, felt, wood and paper, to create dynamic, multi-dimensional works of art.
It's not hard to become absorbed in Cristi Rinklin’s otherworldly paintings. The artist creates seamless layers of billowing, amorphous forms and sharply defined lines to depict post-human landscapes that appear to hover weightless in space. These worlds, which take the form of both paintings and installations, are influenced by digital technologies while channeling a grand tradition of illusion in painting. "It is my desire to create paintings and installations that seduce the viewer into believing that the impossible spaces that are presented within them can potentially exist," the artist says.
England-born, Toronto-based painter Mark Liam Smith’s figurative scenes are overlayed with abstract shapes and rich colors. His mastery of the latter is even more fascinating when you consider that the artist is colorblind. (Check out the artist’s Instagram page here.)
Robert Proch is a muralist, painter, and animator who lives and works in Poznan, Poland. His dynamic creations, featuring human figures and city landscapes, constantly push the boundaries of what we define as "street art" and "fine art" - whether they're adorning the side of a building or displayed in a more traditional gallery setting. Proch is influenced by both genres, pulling from these two worlds to produce his unique, expressive pieces.
Movement and expression are key characteristics in the work of North Carolina based painter Taylor White. Featured here on our blog, her paintings and murals are instantly recognizable for her chaotic portrayal of bodies which appear to break apart. White has said that she sees the human body as a fragile form, describing her work as an exploration of our emotions.
David Rice fuses the natural and the man-made in his paintings, representing the possibility of a peaceful balance between the two. Featured here on our blog, and in our current issue of Hi-Fructose Vol. 39, his wildlife-filled works address themes like cohabitation, where people and animals are combined to create hybrid beings, often wrapped in colorful textiles. The Portland based painter is about to debut a new series, entitled "High Alpine", his largest body of work to date.
The playful and humorous Dutch artist Parra plunges into a feminine universe for his new solo show at Ruttkowski; 68 gallery in Cologne, Germany. His exhibit "I can’t look at your face anymore" features a new collection of multimedia work, which includes paintings, sculpture and textiles. Parra is well-known for his provocative pieces, featured here, paintings with vivid colors and minimalist style filled with surreal creatures, many of them women.
For Toronto based artist Brian Donnelly, featured here, painting is a risky business. At first beautifully rendered in oil, he then sprays his subjects with turpentine and hand sanitizer until their faces are distorted beyond recognition, to a more limited expression. Donnelly's work is all about embracing limitations: "I ask a lot of questions about art and how we define it," he says. "How far away from the original state can we go before we stop calling something art? In the process, I end up drawing a parallel between the fragile nature of artwork and the human condition."
Strong, clean lines and cubist inspired characters in vivid colors have long been the main signifiers of Berlin based artist James Reka's, aka Reka's, paintings. His previous works, featured here on our blog, depict geometrical figures but the choice of colors, the backgrounds, and the style have dramatically changed over the past few years. His graffiti background is becoming less evident as Reka is increasingly interested in abstraction, and his new work may be his most enigmatic.
In depicting the human condition, Jean-Paul Mallozzi uses paint to express emotional narratives. His oil paintings make use of thickly painted areas, moving from more accurate detail to abstract elements and exaggerated colors to imply his subject's feelings. Color is fundamental to Malozzi's paintings. "Each one emits a color that echoes complex emotional states that all of us can relate to," he explains.
Brooklyn based painter Brian Willmont had mostly been making gouache on paper paintings for years and then began to reduce his work, pushing the narrative out of individual pieces. His paintings today share a graphic and theatrical quality with his references, citing obscure movies and novels, such as Suspiria and Blood and Guts in High School, among his inspirations. Today, he works in aspects of trompe l’oeil and airbrush into a unique style of graphic abstraction, using symbols like roses dotted with shining dew drops set against geometric patterns.
Czech artist Jan Uldrych questions reality in his fleshy and atmospheric paintings. Though the artist hesitates to provide any specific meaning for his work, we can find some clues in his titles; paintings like "Anatomy of memories" and "Mild decomposition landscapes" point to Uldrych's interests in the visceral and anatomical, which he abstracts into Rorschach test-like images.
London based artist duo Kai & Sunny like the idea of showing something you can’t actually see and asking bigger questions. Featured here on our blog, their nature-inspired drawings feature geometric patterns that replicate motifs like the intricacies of flower petals and the dramatic bursts of stars, as if looking through the lens of a super-telescope. Though their energetic and abstract line work has the precision of a machine, everything is drawn by hand using ballpoint pens. For their upcoming exhibition at Stolen Space gallery in London, "Whirlwind Of Time", the duo sought out to develop their pen drawing series even further.
Richard Colman is well known for his paintings of colorful human figures bending and twisting into abstract compositions. Featured here on our blog, Colman's new works explore the intricacies and curiosities of human relationships in bold and geometric displays. Similar to the frontalism style seen in Egyptian art, the heads of his figures are usually drawn in profile, while the body is seen from the front. The San Francisco based artist recently exhibited in the rotating Los Angeles exhibition curated by Roger Gastman, "W.I.P." (Work in Progress), which closed over the holiday.
Miami based artist Juan Travieso brings nature to life in his colorful and geometric paintings. Growing up in Havana, Cuba, he loved being outside and exploring his natural surroundings. This passion developed into his appreciation for nature, the core component of his design oriented style. In our interview with the artist, he shared, "As a part of nature, I am aware of the fact that we are trying so hard as a species to disconnect ourselves from what we are. I feel that it is my responsibility as an artist and as a citizen of the world to give voice to the powerless species on this earth."
Oakland based painter Max Kauffman (covered here) seeks to find peace in his soft, loose watercolors that reflect chaos. This journey often leads him to colorful, abstract structures like houses, which he calls his "sanctuaries". In his artist statement, he says, "The world I portray is sometimes yours and mine and sometimes a more magical place – I call it future primitive. It is a potential path or maybe just a way to reconnect with more pure ideas of culture from our past. It is knowing empires crumble, but accepting the growth that emerges in the aftermath." His latest series of paintings for "Beautiful Squalor", now on view at Parlor Gallery in New Jersey, seems to find them in a state of visual disintegration. 
For the majority of his illustration career, Canadian artist Randy Ortiz (first covered here) has drawn images in a graphic style with a surrealistic quality. His love for screen printing and movie posters is apparent in his limited, yet colorful palette, and portrayal of creatures who seem to transform with their surroundings. Among his latest inspirations are artists James Jean or Joao Ruas, who also merge surreal forms of nature with reality in their art. Recently, Ortiz's personal work has leaned in this more emotive direction.
Portland based artist Adam Friedman (covered here) has an ongoing fascination with our universe which he explores in his psychedelic works. His art expands on broad themes centered on time and space and other natural phenomenon. Friedman goes "Into the Aether" with his latest solo exhibition, now on view at Mirus Gallery in San Francisco. His show presents a new series of acrylic and acrylic aerosol pieces on canvas, 3D paintings, and a new mural inside the gallery.
There is an infinite complexity to nature. From sea shells, to the Milky Way galaxy, to the structure of human lungs, there are patterns that exist in everything around us. London based collaborators Kai & Sunny (previously featured here) have always been drawn towards such images created by nature. Opening Saturday, they will exhibit six new ballpoint pen pieces in "The Matter of Time" at 886 Geary Gallery in San Francisco. A more vibrant palette is applied in their new drawings, alongside hand-pulled monochromatic screen prints on copper and paper. Their works magnify and stylize the things that are plainly visible to us but often overlooked. Here, this would be the turn of the tides, represented in energetic, abstract pieces. 
Photos by Curtis Cole. Portland based artist Mark Warren Jacques (previously featured here) makes dreamy, futuristic paintings using various elements of form, color and shape. His upcoming exhibition "Looking at You - Looking at Me", opening June 4th at Flatcolor gallery, exercises these motifs in a series of new seascapes. Warren sees the universe in a unique way. He aims to capture a newfound sense of infinity in these vast, unending places rendered from personal memories. Get a look inside the artist’s studio as he prepares for his new exhibit after the jump.
San Francisco based artist Joe Hengst presents his idea of the future world in imaginative, acrylic landscape paintings. At the core of his work is his belief in man's increasing separation from the natural world. Since the beginning of our time, nature has supplied us with the things we need most for survival, such as food, water, clothing, and shelter. With the introduction of modern day society came a change in how we supply our every day needs. Hengst represents our withdrawal from nature by painting ethereal pieces that experiment with abstraction.
Italy based street artist Teo Pirisi, known as "Moneyless", is constantly seeking to evolve his already abstract style of work. For his last major solo exhibition (covered here), he sought inspiration in geometrical shapes and patterns. These, he feels, are the fundamentals of life that at their core represent a multitude of possibility. As such, they appear throughout his graffiti writing, painting, drawings and found object installations. For his current exhibition, "Fragmentations," at BC Gallery in Berlin, Moneyless reduces this concept to its most simplified form.
Berlin based artist Jaybo Monk (previously featured here) is the architect of an abstract world in his paintings. Human figures, which he likens to "cathedrals", are split apart, masses of muscle and shapes swimming around the canvas that leave us feeling disoriented. Combined, they provide the backdrop for a landscape with no boundaries, a place Monk calls "nowhere". His current exhibition "Nowhere Is Now Here", which opened last night at Soze Gallery in Los Angeles, explores this concept of wandering, both literally and metaphorically.
Canadian artist Alex Garant paints realistic portraits that capture her subjects in multiples. Using traditional portrait techniques, her oil paintings combine graphic design elements with abstraction in great detail. Looking at her work is like getting lost in an optical illusion, where colorful patterns are key to holding the composition together. Among her stylistic inspirations, she credits early ink printing, Pop surrealism, Baroque tapestries and themes found in retro kitsch. This is especially apparent in her use of image superposition, where her subject's 70s-esque big lips and eyes are enhanced.
One man's trash is Khalil Chishtee's treasure. We previously featured the Pakistani artist's ethereal garbage bag sculptures back in 2013, where he breathed new life into unwanted found-objects. Having just come off his debut solo exhibition, "Detritus from Exploded Stars" at Sanat Gallery, Chishtee has since expanded his concept to dig deeper. His latest works make the connection between art created from practically nothing to the creation of life from an empty universe.
Tokyo based Tomoo Gokita paints in a monochrome, abstract style that is simple but haunting to look at. His ongoing black and white gouache series plays on the idea of traditional portraiture. For his next solo show "Bésame Mucho" at Honor Fraser Gallery, Gokita continues to blend this line between figurative and abstraction. If his images feel strangely familiar, it's because he borrows them from vintage film stills, 1970s magazines and photos. Check out our preview after the jump.
Canadian artist Alexandra Levasseur (previously covered here) has new oil and acrylic paintings on view at Mirus Gallery, "Body of Land". Her tormented yet feminine subjects, painted in an expressionist style, make a reappearance as if out of a dream. Levasseur's artwork has always exhibited dreamlike qualities. Here, her subjects exist somewhere between a deep subconscious state and wakefulness. We find them melting into abstract landscapes, non-descript yet wild and untouched. In some of her most gestural work to date, physical form and nature are combined to create a single "body of land."