In her new sculptures and digital paintings, Debora Cheyenne helps forge the current evolution of Afrofuturism. Her new show at Barney Savage Gallery, titled “Entre Vues,” offers themes of “post-web racial and Pan-African identity,” in her signature soft hues that are visceral in their sculptured form.
Korean artist Mi-Kyung Choi, who goes by the moniker “Ensee,” creates digital paintings that blend pastel hues and the delicate touch usually accomplished with traditional materials. Her illustrations, often depicting obscured faces or longing, youthful subjects, adorn books, publications, and other products.
Taipei, Tawain based artist Hsiao-Ron Cheng, has a certain calmness and serenity about her personality that is reflected in her digital illustrations. Her earlier work, first featured in Hi-Fructose Vol. 24, portrayed wistful, fairytale-like scenes, but more recently, Cheng has shifted her focus to realistically rendered portraits of people in soft, pastel colors. For the past year, Cheng has elaborated on her portraiture by incorporating natural elements and detail in her subject’s expressions and fashion.
When digital painter and sculptor Danny van Ryswyk was eight years old, he had an unusual encounter with a UFO, an experience that continues to profoundly impact his artwork- illustrations and 3D printed sculptures of moody, Victorian-styled figures, often displayed in glass bell jars as if they were scientific specimens. Like that flying saucer from his childhood memory, Ryswyk’s characters are darkly fantastical and strange, monochromatic figures that blend his unique interest in the meaning of dreams and the inexplicable like aliens and Victorian spirit photography.
Ray Caesar’s painterly digital prints, first featured in Hi-Fructose Vol. 31, combine elements that are as grotesque as they are beautiful. He looks to his memories, particularly his own difficult childhood, to see beyond the challenges of reality and find the calm and beauty within. For his upcoming exhibition at Gallery House in Toronto, “Pretty Little Predators”, Caesar illustrates the power of memories- and their impact on our past, present and future lives. Dressed in Rococo and pre-French Revolution era attire, his subjects have a historical quality about them. Caesar sees the past as an important part of his personal life, and an equally important part of his life as an artist.
Lisbon, Portugal based artist Paula Rosa combines digital painting with photo manipulation to create surreal black and white landscapes. Most incorporate painted areas and photography, all put together in Photoshop CS4, merging technology with visions from Rosa’s imagination and dreams. Exploring psychological themes, her landscapes usually portray nudes morphing with their sterile and polluted industrial surroundings.