Douglas Hale multiplies, extends, and flips imagery to create kaleidoscopic and surrealist pictures. With his mind-bending configurations, it is no wonder he has been commissioned by Tessa Rose Jackson, Imagine Dragons, and Flyleaf to illustrate albums and merchandise. It is clear Hale has an interest in music, as many of his collages feature musicians like FKA Twigs and Erykah Badu. In these portraits, Hale adorns the singers with heavily ornate jewels and gold. Sparkle features prominently in Hale’s collages, including those of ancient Greek portrait busts puking gold. These, like many of Hale’s pictures, are set against rainbow backdrops and imbue his images with a dream-like 80s sentiment.
While some of Hale’s images verge on fashion aesthetics, they each retain an element of the weird, thus enticing one to take a second look. In one image, a regal women wearing a gold crown and corset stands tall against a stock photo of a blue sky. The picture seems like something out of vintage Vogue, until one realizes Hale has sliced thin horizontal lines through the model’s neck and thighs.
Whether pulling apart the thematic elements of One Thousand and One Nights or bringing the moon to earth, Hale succeeds at inverting the expected to create supernatural people and places.
In Kensuke Koike’s ongoing “Single Image Processing” series, the artist alters vintage photographs and postcards with both humorous and surreal results. With just a pair of scissors, the artist is able to remix and recontextualize imagery that is otherwise ordinary or nostalgia-fueled.
Though 
San Francisco-based artist 
Chapel Hill artist