New York based painter and illustrator Mike Perry is an artist working in a variety of mediums, once describing his collection of works as having an "antsy" energy. He doodles around the clock, whether creating new typefaces for his graphic design work or new burst of colorful characters that amass in his paintings. At his website, he writes that his creative goal is "to conjure that feeling of soul-soaring wonder you have when you stare into distant galaxies on a dark night, when you go on long journeys into the imagination, when you ponder what it is that this life is all about."
Chicago based artist Jonathan Gardner's figurative-pop works combine an overabundance of 20th century styles. His paintings feature simplified figures in spaces that borrow visual techniques by artists like Pablo Picasso, Rene Magritte, Henri Matisse, and Fernand Léger. Gardner makes otherwise mundane scenes more interesting by enhancing the patterns in things like his subject's clothing, wallpaper, and tiled floors. Some of his subjects appear more melancholy, others more humored and lively, as in his images of women tanning by the swimming pool and playing tennis.