portraits

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Art

Geometric Portraits by Silvia Idili Overlay Clusters of Origami-Like Objects on Subjects’ Eyes, Noses, and Mouths

Milan-based painter Silvia Idili paints portraits of men and women that are partially obscured by folded geometric objects, incomplete masks that draw the audience deeper into the subjects’ gaze. Idili explains to JULIET that these origami-like additions featured in The Visionaries “are the symbol of infrastructures created by the mind to hide and mask the true nature of one’s being, which is at the same time an expression of a spiritual tension in relation to the anxiety of the contemporary.”

The portraits invite the audience to take a moment to reflect on their own inner gaze as they make eye contact with the guarded paintings. You can view more of Idili’s portraits and surrealist animal paintings on her website and Instagram. (via INAG)

Photography

Bolivia’s Powerful Cholitas Luchadora Wrestlers Photographed by Todd Antony

All photographs © Todd Antony, shared with permission

Photographer Todd Antony (previously) documents Bolivia’s best-dressed wrestlers in a new series, Flying Cholitas. The women, who are indigenous Aymara, compete in their sport wearing voluminous petticoats, colorful skirts, and long-sleeved lacy tops rather than in the minimal, form-fitting spandex worn by many athletes around the world.

These ensembles resemble ones that Aymara were expected—sometimes even required—to wear during five centuries of oppression under Spanish occupiers. The wrestlers wear these ensembles to show pride in their history and take back their visibility. Similarly, the identifier “cholita,” originally a derogatory term, has been reclaimed in recent years by indigenous Bolivians as a point of pride.

If you’re curious to see the athletes in action, Luisa Dörr and Michael James Johnson were commissioned by Apple to shoot a short documentary on the flying cholitas, which you can watch below. Aymara architect Freddy Mamani has also championed indigenous Bolivian aesthetics with his buildings, which we’ve covered previously on Colossal.

Explore more of Antony’s wide-ranging photography on his website and Instagram.

Photography

Flower-Filled Portraits by Diaja Celebrate Natural Beauty in the African Diaspora

Photographer and designer Ceres Henry embellishes her portrait subjects with floral body paint and fresh blossoms in her Adam & Eve series. The New York-based artist hand-painted each person before the shoot, inspired in the moment by the flowers she had pre-selected, and then worked the three-dimensional blooms into the composition. Henry, who goes by Diaja, explains that she seeks to counter negative narratives and stereotypes with Adam & Eve. “The significance of this series is to highlight the Black and African diaspora as works of art to be admired and celebrated,” she says.

In addition to Diaja’s work as a photographer, she also founded and runs a nonprofit, Artists of Today, which offers pop-up gallery and grant opportunities to emerging artists. The next gallery event is on August 17, 2019, and tickets are available here. See more from Diaja’s multi-faceted creative practice on Instagram.

Art

Peaceful Portraits Shaped from Bunched and Layered Netting by Benjamin Shine

For his “flow” series, artist and designer Benjamin Shine crafts portraits of serene faces using lightweight tulle fabric. The fine netted material allows for dramatic differences in opacity depending on how densely it is is bunched or layered. In his artist statement, Shine explains that his work “centers on ideas of energy, impermanence and the relationship between the spiritual and the superficial.” With his most recent sculpture, “Quietude”, Shine scaled up his signature portraits and built an outdoor sculpture that measures over eight feet tall. The fuchsia-toned sculpture was made an 80 by 20 foot piece of recycled high density polyethylene shaped around a steel frame, and its color shifts as natural light changes throughout the day. Take a peek inside Shine’s studio in the video interview below, and see more of his work on Instagram.

Art

Fine and Street Art Aesthetics Merge in Anthony Lister’s Expressive Murals

Australian artist Anthony Lister paints illustrative murals that blur the line between street art and fine art. The subjects on his walls range from figurative paintings of dancing ballerinas, to large scale portraits with rosy cheeks and red noses. Lister’s unique style is a result of his early influences and experience with graffiti, as well as his formal art education at Queensland College of Art and mentorship with New Zealand artist Max Gimblett.

For Lister, blending styles and exploring aesthetic ideas through what he calls “adventure painting” is something that came with time. “I used to try and keep all of my disciplines quite separate from each other, or at least I thought that was what I was doing,” he told Lost At E Minor. “Over time, I slowly let go of keeping one style and approach isolated from the other and so they quite organically and slowly merged to be what it is today.”

Explaining the difference in emotion between his studio work and his street faces (and why he use his full name for the former and his surname for the latter), Lister told LiveFastMag that “a face on the street represents freedom. When I’m painting on the street I don’t want to sweat over problems that I don’t feel comfortable solving in the public world or in front of an audience, because that’s often what painting in public turns into. [In the studio] I’m thinking conceptually and aesthetically, reflecting about anti-beauty, adventure painting and problem solving; whereas on the street I try to keep it simpler for myself.”

Anthony Lister has an upcoming solo exhibition titled “Modern Masters” opening at Mirus Gallery in Denver, Colorado on September 6. For updates on the show and to see more of his studio work and street art, follow Lister on Instagram.

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A post shared by Anthony LISTER (@anthonylister) on Apr 25, 2018 at 7:40pm PDT

Art Craft

Yulia Brodskaya Reveals Her Process of ‘Painting With Paper’ in a New Book

“Seeing”

We’ve featured the paper-centric work of Yulia Brodskaya several times on Colossal, and the U.K.-based artist continues to hone her craft with increasingly large-scale portraits. Three recent portraits, Seeing, Seeshall, and Pull to the Light, all feature larger-than-life busts of female subjects in a range of traditional dress. Each figure appears to be focused on a point in the distance, connecting with Brodskaya’s sight-themed titles.

Brodskaya’s signature technique of ‘painting with paper’ is a contemporary interpretation of quilling, wherein the artist folds, bends, and spirals strips of colored paper. Rather than densely filling the entire surface with the manipulated paper strips, Brodskaya also incorporates flat fields of color underneath and between each textural element. This two-part technique allows the viewer’s eye to take in the dramatic shapes and shadows.

After developing and evolving this technique over the last twelve years, Brodskaya has compiled a deep dive into her creative process in a forthcoming book, “Painting With Paper”. She shares with Colossal that her book is not a collection of DIY projects.

It’s an insight into my creative process with practical tips on how to work with my methods in various ways of your own. Learn how to work with colors, the importance of testing compositions, which part of the image to start with, and when to consider it complete. I hope you will find the book inspirational and full of practical ideas for artists and paper art enthusiasts who want to advance their creative thinking, or simply get a better understanding and discover inspirations behind my paper artworks.

You can pre-order a copy of “Painting With Paper,” which is set to publish in September, on Amazon. See more of the artist and author’s multi-dimensional work on Instagram, and peek behind the scenes in her time-lapse process videos on YouTube.

“Seeing” detail

“Seeshall”

“Seeshall” detail

“Pull to the Light”

 

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A post shared by Yulia Brodskaya (@yulia_brodskaya_artyulia) on Jul 15, 2019 at 5:25am PDT

Art

Romania’s Historic Cultural and Civic Leaders are Brought to Life in Sculptural Metal ‘Drawings’ by Darius Hulea

Romanian sculptor Darius Hulea manipulates iron, stainless steel, brass, and copper wires to form three-dimensional portraits of historical figures. Ranging from royalty to poets, Hulea’s work often focuses on Romanian luminaries. The artist has rendered Queen Marie, sculptor Grigore Bradea, and philosopher Mircea Eliade along with many others, carefully recreating each subject’s furrowed brows and flowing hair in metal.

In an interview with My Modern Met Hulea explains, “I hope that people will understand that I do nothing but draw in a new way, in a durable material of the past. I can then explore and research, as an artist, mythical, Renaissance, and modern thinking by finding three-dimensional examples that describe us now in a history of the past.”

Hulea received a PhD in visual arts from Cluj-Napoca Art & Design University. He cites his family as inspiration for his creative life: his grandmother and great-grandmother were weavers, while his grandfather worked with agricultural tools. Hulea is represented by Renaissance Art Gallery in Bucharest, Romania. Peek inside the artist’s studio through his Facebook and Instagram accounts. (via My Modern Met)