Menu
The New Contemporary Art Magazine

Erik Thor Sandberg’s Surreal, Painted Narratives

Calling his surreal paintings “suspended moments,” artist Erik Thor Sandberg captures ongoing narratives that exist before and after the scene in question. Whether it’s a towering skeleton consuming flesh or a fairytale-like jaunt between fantasy creatures, Sandberg’s paintings offer both whimsy and unsettling spectacle. He was last featured on HiFructose.com here.

Calling his surreal paintings “suspended moments,” artist Erik Thor Sandberg captures ongoing narratives that exist before and after the scene in question. Whether it’s a towering skeleton consuming flesh or a fairytale-like jaunt between fantasy creatures, Sandberg’s paintings offer both whimsy and unsettling spectacle. He was last featured on HiFructose.com here.



A statement on the artist’s website comments on that duality: “How often the disturbing and the grotesque capture the viewer’s gaze before the beautiful! Yet, beauty, eternally appreciated, remains an essential component of Sandberg’s work as it contrasts the unsettling and unsightly elements of these imaginary worlds that hinge, unsettlingly, on the verge of our own.”


Such is the case in paintings like “The Way of Things,” in which woodland animals, seemingly sprung from the beard of an elderly man, are gripped and threatened by children. It’s not a story in which viewers immediately find familiarity, yet the the implications and possibilities hidden within the painting are numerous. In “Toehold,” a battle of humanity and nature takes another form, in which another subject’s struggle renders them naked and full of agony.


Sandberg lives in Washington, D.C., and was born in Quantico, Va. He works in both large and small formats.

Meta
Share
Facebook
Reddit
Pinterest
Email
Related Articles
Italy-born painter Fulvio Di Piazza offers a new collection of oil works on canvas in the new exhibit “Entangled” at Jonathan Levine Gallery in January. The solo show kicks off on Jan. 7 and runs through Jan. 28. Di Piazza was featured in Hi-Fructose Vol. 25 and the exhibit "Turn the Page: The First Ten Years of Hi-Fructose," a collaboration between the magazine and Virginia MOCA.
Venezuelan artist Jota Leal and Polish artist Dariusz Zawadzki each mix elements of the fantastic and the surreal in their artworks. The two artists headline Copro Gallery's current group exhibition "Morpheus", so named after its co-curators James Cowan and Morpheus Gallery in Las Vegas. Zawadzki's series exhibits the artist's skill in different media, mixing up oil painting, watercolor, and hand-embellished giclee pieces. His portraits of what look like post-apocalytpic villians out of Mad Max are treated with the rendering of old master painters.
Linsey Levendall draws and paints surreal scenes ripped from the subconscious, his figures containing worlds within. The artist uses a variety of approaches in his dreamlike drawings and paintings, moving between precise linework and chaotic, yet controlled strokes.
Toni Hamel’s recent oil paintings explore our relationship with the natural world. In particular, Hamel shows us how our selfishness and dominion over animals taken an even more disastrous turn. These pieces are part of a body of work called “The Land of Id.” She was last featured on HiFructose.com here.

Subscribe to the Hi-Fructose Mailing List