The whimsical, surreal oil paintings of Thomas Ascott use the Smoky Mountains in Tennessee as a backdrop, where the artist himself was raised. This creates a highly personal aspect to these works, part of a new show at Arch Enemy Arts titled “The Astral Woods.”
“Inspiration, for me, is just my accumulated experiences, things I’ve seen, heard, touched and felt through my life, jumbled about in my mind and abused by time until they show up on a piece of paper,” the artist says. “I would love to point to a sketchbook of ordered images that would tell this story, but, as often as not, the images are spit out on scraps of envelopes near a computer or a convenient napkin ringed with coffee.”
The show kicks off May 4 and runs through May 26. See more of its works below.
"Necrosurrealist" 
Sometimes life throws a wrench into our comfy plans and we’re faced with some big questions. As an artist, the question often is – do I quit and accept the defeat? Or, do I rise up triumphantly and make something beautiful to recapture this moment? Anthony Hurd is an artist that has learned to embrace the surprises in life as well as in his work, creating images that seem to arrive to us from some distant land. He depicts psychedelic landscapes of perilous beauty.
French pair