Turkish artist Taner Ceylan translates his prodigious technical abilities from oil paintings to graphite and charcoal drawings with his latest series of work, “Golden Age.” While still in its beginnings, the new series takes on mythological scenes, culminating with the recent piece “Divine Ego,” which reads as an homage to Bosch paired with the same homoerotic undertones present in much of Ceylan’s past work. His recent oil paintings balance photographic qualities with unsettling details, focusing on aloof characters in luxurious settings. Ceylan introduces just enough of the surreal — a face obscured, as if caught in motion; blood smeared on an albino peacock’s feathers — to create a chilling, disorienting effect. The artist will be showing his latest work with Paul Kasmin Gallery at Frieze New York, coming up on May 9-12.
