Menu
The New Contemporary Art Magazine

Ian Cumberland’s Reflective, Surreal Scenes

Ian Cumberland’s surreal, solitary scenes have evolved and progressed into even stranger territory, with his figures disappearing into reflective holes and taking part in bleak internalization. The Irish painter uses oils primarily, but in recent works, integrates materials like carpeting and mirrors. Cumberland was last featured on HiFructose.com here.

Ian Cumberland’s surreal, solitary scenes have evolved and progressed into even stranger territory, with his figures disappearing into reflective holes and taking part in bleak internalization. The Irish painter uses oils primarily, but in recent works, integrates materials like carpeting and mirrors. Cumberland was last featured on HiFructose.com here.

“The beautiful, youthful figures of Cumberland’s cast appear fixated on superficial attractiveness,” a recent statement reads. “They exude glamour but their perfection is belied by a mottled complexion and malaise. Some appear at a remove, reflected in mirrors, which have a long association in art history, not least as indicators of the illusory nature of painting itself, but also vanity, and in the mid twentieth century, psychoanalytic self-recognition. Even the surreal black holes that absorb the pictured inhabitants are mirrored, like the surface of smartphones or tablets. These scenes possess a hallucinatory stillness and are heightened by the artist’s vivid use of colour and attention to detail – in fabrics and carpets.”

Cumberland’s work has recently shown across Europe, from his native Ireland to Belfast and London. He’s a recent recipient of ACES Award from the Arts Council of Northern Ireland.

Meta
Share
Facebook
Reddit
Pinterest
Email
Related Articles
Los Angeles-born artist Camille Rose Garcia crafts vibrant, horror-infused paintings. A new show at Dorothy Circus Gallery in Italy, titled “The Ballrooms of Mars,” compile a new body of work from the artist. Her multimedia pieces are often cited as being influenced by Max Fleischer, Disney, ’50s-era films, and the work of William Burroughs. The show kicks off Feb. 24 and runs through April 7.
John Brosio’s oil paintings introduce towering monsters and pop cultural elements into the everyday, whether it’s a giant crab or a Big Gulp. The artist has a knack for mixing terror and humor, leaning on his talents in realism to add both components to the work. Elsewhere, he takes a childlike approach to rendering these beasts, reaching back to the sketchbooks packed with dinosaurs and fictional creatures as a child.
With his signature “Ohlala” character, Reen Barrera creates both mixed-media paintings and windable toys. The figure moves between cutesy and menacing iterations, appearing both hardened and crudely decorated. In the moving wooden sculptures, the deceptively simple actions show ingenuity from the artist.
In the way a funhouse mirror warps the mundane into the absurd, Brazilian artist Rafael Silveira combines innocuous imagery with the vaguely grotesque to provide a disorienting sensory experience not unlike that of a carnival, where the cheery morphs in and out of the eerie until they are no longer distinguishable.

Subscribe to the Hi-Fructose Mailing List