Two solo shows kick off this weekend at Thinkspace Gallery in Culver City, Calif.: Audrey Kawasaki‘s “Interlude” and Stella Im Hultberg‘s “Hollow Resonance.” Both shows kick off on Saturday (Nov. 12) and run through Dec. 3.
In Kawasaki’s show, the the Japanese-American artist offers oil and graphite works on wood panels. Kawasaki’s illustrative style begins with pencil work on the panel, and even after the paint is applied, exposed areas of the wood give the works a dynamic texture. The artist says she enjoys the natural and inconsistent aspects of this canvas. And with her mixture of the ornate and ghostly, fluid transitions, the works shows both European Art Nouveau and traditional Japanese influences.
Hultberg, a South Korea-born, Portland-based painter, mixes drawing and painting for haunting, lush portraits that blend flora and mysterious female figures. The artist studied industrial design and was a product designer before entering a career as an artist. Hultberg’s subjects are a mix of monochromatic renderings and vivid pops of nature. Often, they dissipate into the background like apparitions. Or, as the gallery describes the work: “Darkly beautiful, Hultberg’s feminine imaginary is an ambiguous terrain of melancholic desire.”
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