Artwork:
This oil painting captures the dissonance between the chaos of the natural world and the absurdity of everyday life. Smoke-filled skies, heavy and ominous, clash with the fragile normalcy of human activity, a stark visual representation of the tension between the two. The inspiration for the piece came from a friend's experience with wildfire smoke, where apocalyptic scenes of a darkened city sky contrasted sharply with the mundane task of paying for parking. It's a reminder of our resilience in the face of chaos, but also a commentary on the absurdity of maintaining normalcy amidst disaster.
Artist Statement:
San Antonio oil painter blending Contemporary Surrealism and Illustration to explore the unraveling American Dream and climate change realities. Contrasting mid-century optimism with environmental collapse using bold 60s colors and high-contrast compositions, creating a collision of nostalgia and disaster. Inspired by National Geographic and global disasters, reflecting on the illusion of promised prosperity, sparked by a 70s LA landslide revealing fragile stability. Paintings depict dreamlike scenes where past comforts dissolve into impending storms, questioning our potential sleepwalk into catastrophe. Painting is resistance and reckoning, transforming helplessness into a visual dialogue to confront the contrast between past and present, hoping art can inspire change.
$2,000
