Ron Mueck gathers 100 individual, enormous skulls for a new installation at National Gallery of Victoria’s Triennial. The sculptures in “Mass” are crafted from fiberglass and resin, and each is about a meter high. Mueck’s hyperrealist work was last mentioned on HiFructose.com here.
The initial impression is that Mueck is depicting a form that tethers us all. A statement adds to that: “Mass is also a sombre study of mortality, and comprising 100 individual human skulls it calls to mind iconic images of massed remains in the Paris catacombs as well as the documentation of contemporary human atrocities in Cambodia, Rwanda, Srebrenica and Iraq,” the National Gallery of Victoria says. “The skull has been a potent symbol within the art of virtually all cultures and religions, not least the Western history of art, including in Dutch still-life painting and the vanitas painting genre of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries which served as a reminder of the transience of life.”
See more views of the installation below.
Cuban artist Alan Manuel Gonzalez once found it inconceivable to be showing his art outside of Cuba. He has described his paintings as the result of the inescapable circumstance of being created there. Today, censorship in Cuba is the most intense in the western hemisphere. Gonzalez relies on the use of metaphor and surrealism to express both his love for his country and disdain for its problems.
Portrait artist 
Collage artist Sara Shakeel infuses our world with a surreal dose of glitter and diamonds. From bedazzling what some would call "imperfections" on the body to adding glitz to already-tempting fast-food item, the artist’s embellishments take on varying roles in her work. In a more direct statement: The Pakistani artist says that “each picture heals a part of me and i hope it heals a part of you too.”