Menu
The New Contemporary Art Magazine

Dima Rebus Portrays Urban Life in Unsettling Watercolors

Moscow based artist Dima Rebus paints subdued watercolors of urban life as envisioned by his subjects. Here, life is occupied by situations that are humorous, but also full of uncertainty and fear. In surreal, slightly unsettling scenes, we find young people sleeping in and forgetting their chores while newer works have more serious implications. Titles such as "Life in my city implies heavy consumption of carbohydrates" also imply the artist's reservations and concerns about environmental issues.

Moscow based artist Dima Rebus paints subdued watercolors of urban life as envisioned by his subjects. Here, life is occupied by situations that are humorous, but also full of uncertainty and fear. In surreal, slightly unsettling scenes, we find young people sleeping in and forgetting their chores while newer works have more serious implications. Titles such as “Life in my city implies heavy consumption of carbohydrates” also imply the artist’s reservations and concerns about environmental issues. In this piece, a teenaged girl looks down upon a cold, stark landscape of buildings, barely made out through hazy air. She may be lying on a snow covered rooftop or the white sheets of her bed, but the image is left unclear. Rebus consistently uses negative space in his art which adds to its dreamy quality, giving us room to explore and consider our own apprehensions.

Meta
Share
Facebook
Reddit
Pinterest
Email
Related Articles
Italian sculptor Gehard Demetz uses small “building blocks” to construct his figurative works. In a new series of sculptures, “Introjection,” the artist pairs figures with personal belongings and religious objects “to highlight the psychological undercurrent between an individual and their belongings, and how the external can become internalized as part of the self.” The series is part of a new show at Jack Shainman Gallery in New York City, kicking off April 27 and lasting through June 3. Demetz was last featured on HiFructose.com here, and he was involved in “Turn the Page: The First Ten Years of Hi-Fructose,” which is currently at the Akron Art Museum.
Casey Weldon’s paintings have always combined beauty with a dark sense of humor to convey a distorted version of reality. Featured in Hi-Fructose Vol. 32 and on our blog over the years, the Seattle based artist's palette has gradually developed a neon-colored luminosity, where his subjects appear to be glowing and bio-luminescent. Moments of darkness and reflecting colors of electric lights are used to convey emotion and spark intrigue in the viewer.
Scott G. Brooks, featured here on our blog, paints offbeat portraits, often expressing a surreal narrative inspired by children's books and his own psyche. Described as twisted, sentimental, and disturbing, his portraits are characterized by his use of wit and the distorted version of reality they present. "Using a language that is easily understood, I tell stories. I weave figures, symbols, and elements together to create a narrative to share with an audience," he says.
San Francisco based artist Lindsay Stripling usually works in watercolor to create her playful illustrations of dreamscapes dotted with simplistic human characters, animals, and objects. But for her new series, exhibiting this week at Flatcolor Gallery in Seattle, Stripling found herself painting in oils after an 8 year break from the medium. "It's my first real adventure with oils in 8 years and it was fun for sure," Stripling says, "trying to carry my looseness from my watercolors into these oil paintings."

Subscribe to the Hi-Fructose Mailing List