While Samorì‘s painting skills could easily compete with those of the old masters, it was the unique artistic violence he applied to his work, which was to earn him a spot at the Venice Biennale, as well as recognition and exhibitions all over Europe. Samorì overpaints, draws or scrapes what appears to you as a perfect baroque painting. He goes further and uses a scalpel to peel away layers of paint, granting you access to what lays beneath, offering you access to what usually remains hidden.

The results are stunning and it is the partial destruction, the skillful rearranging and re- composing, that turn his works into sought after contemporary masterpieces.

Nicola Samorì is currently residing in Berlin, working on his upcoming solo exhibition at Galerie Christian Ehrentraut. I recently had the chance to chat and conduct and interview with Nicola about his work:

AK: Removing layers, peeling of the surface and revealing what’s underneath is a big factor of your work. Why?

NS: I find that there are amazing correspondences between the skin and painting. The fact of lifting the paint film with a scalpel highlights this tautology. The inside of the paint always offers an image unknown, a surprising  side that much like skin, reveals a freshness and an intensity unknown in the outer tones.

Is this revealing of layers part of the reason why you work with different, sometimes unorthodox materials like copper plates for your canvas. How important is the canvas, the base layer, for your work?

Yes. It’s as essential as the muscle tissue to the skin, which I commonly associate with the painting. The level on which you anchor the color will transmit a lot of information: wood can be scraped smooth with agility; the copper can provide very intense vibrations of light; the canvas will allow stripping of layers neat or sometimes brutal.

Like with the Holbein painting you often reference art history. Would you say that one needs a knowledge of it in order to fully appreciate your work?

Yes, in order to fully appreciate it, one does. My work rarely comes from outside of art history and you need to know the grammar to form the sentence and to fully understand what the reasons are that define my actions. Otherwise the viewer tends to experience a feeling of loss, sees the work as dramatic, restless or old, which is substantially correct but might not always be completely satisfactory.

You paint, you scrape the canvas, you peel of layers, you overpaint… How do you know when the work is finished?

I do not know. The process can take months and every day something is lost in an attempt to enhance the image. However, I am able to read the weakness of my work. When I paint, something has to happen to the image, something serious, something heavy. When the form has been put in danger and tension is not lost, the piece may leave the studio.

The full Interview will be published in the inaugural issue of “a class of its own” this fall.

His latest project took him outdoors… not back to the street but to the countryside where he created an urban city within, or shall we say underneath, the endless meadows that are part of the MS Dockville festival outside of Hamburg. While Evol usually works and interacts with existing structures, this might be the first time he “broke ground”, got down and dirty and created one of his own.

The art and music Festival takes place from August 12-14. If you’re in the area… you must see! Evol is represented by the friendly people at Wilde Gallery Berlin.

Check out a photo series of the dig on flickr.

Maxime was born in Paris and lives and works now in Rotterdam, NL. These and other works were recently included in the ”Found Footage” exhibition at Galerie Iris Cornelis, Rotterdam.

Her work has a strikingly beautiful melancholy, exploring emotions such as anger, fear, joy, or pain… expressing them through the eyes or shall we say shape of children… Children who often more openly reveal what adults attempt to hide.

The current series of work, titled “American Heroes”, addresses core conflicts between groups of people and the fact that the unknown surrounding different groups breeds anxiety and hatred… Emotions based partially on her own experience growing up as a Mexican-American.

For more information on Claudia Alvarez and her work, contact the kind people at Blueleaf Gallery.

Among my favorites must have been current Chicago resident Jason Salavon. Salavon, who also teaches at the Art Institute, is mostly known for his work where he uses custom computer software to manipulate existing media, combines the result with an averaging process and creates visual amalgamations*.

In Chicago the Portrait series, of what he calls «likely to be the final installment of a broader series begun in 1997», was on display. The pictures applied to his unique averaging proccess, consist of the the bulk of the portrait oeuvres of Franz Hals, Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn, Anthony van Dyck, and Diego Velazquez, respectively and yield, on order to once again quote the artists «atmospheric meta-portraits».

*Amalgamation or amalgam, when used to refer to a fictional character or place, refers to one that was created by combining, or is perceived to be a combination, of several other previously existing characters or locations. To emphasize the origin of their creations, authors or artists may use amalgamated names. But then again, you already knew that didn’t you.

Over the last few years, Gehard Demetz, from the italian region called Tirol, has risen to international prominence. Not only as a result of his extraordinary skills as a wood carver… but also due to the selection of his sculptured objects: children.

His works are disturbing and attractive at the same time. Finished and unfinished. Beautiful and frightening. As far as contemporary wood sculptures go, I am yet to come across another artist, another body of work with the same strength, beauty and finesse. By my humble opinion, Gehard belongs on top of the list.

Read a copy of his interview with Yatzer

My interest in sculpture goes back to my childhood, when I was enchanted by those huge religious statues. In Val Gardena there is a consolidated artistic tradition of sculpting that goes back more than three hundred years. Everyone thinks this tradition of wood sculpture came from Poland. I spent the first six years of my training as a sculptor in the Art School in Selva, the village I was born in and where I live today. In 1996 I started teaching sculpture in the Sculpture School in Selva where I taught for ten years. During that time I concentrated on my development as an artist, following academic courses in Salzburg and doing individual research. With the passing of the years and all those changes this inevitably entails, I realized that teaching took too much energy away from my creative work and I decided to stop working as a teacher.

Since everyone is keep on asking us about it, how do you manage to make wood look almost like marble? Do you use any special process?

My work is classical wood-carving with carving steels, mallet and motor-saw. My sculptures are made piece by piece and the building up of the wooden elements I use recalls the logic used in computer science. This sort of process lets me add things and sculpt, take things away and sculpt, with a clear advantage over traditional sculpture.

How do you feel about the fact that your sculptures provoke strong feelings to the people that are almost forced to have an intense reaction when they get in touch with your work? I imagine you watching from a corner with a smile in your face.

I like that everybody interprets my work based on their feelings, depending on their past, experiences and background, constructing their own stories. My greatest ambition is to start a dialogue between my sculptures and those who look at them.

Some people have asked us if there is an intention of denouncing child abuse behind your creations. Is that true or your work is just connected with what we generally perceive as the dark side of life?

My subjects transmit the awareness of becoming adults and thus losing, as Rudolf Steiner says, their ability to “listen” to their unconscious. They live with the burden of guilt transmitted from generation to generation, that in fact does not belong to them. They are children who feel sad about not being able to really be children, but who, on the other hand, still have the possibility to choose to become adults, independently, thus freeing themselves little by little of all the influences transmitted by their ancestors. They are witness to all the effort involved in the process of growth and development, which is achieved through individual will and concentration.

From where do you get your inspiration? Is there any story hidden behind each character? Do you use real models for your sculptures?

By reading and living. I try to create a dialogue, to raise questions and to think over possible answers with every sculpture. I work with pictures of children, overleaping them with those of adults. I want the child to transmit through his movements and expression the feeling of a grown up.

Do you think that any form of art is in its core autobiographical? Which part of your own experiences is reflected in your work?

Absolutely. I have always sought answers through studying and reading to what I remember as the most difficult and mysterious moments of my childhood. More often than not, however, I have found the answers to my doubts in the history of my ancestors. In this way, I like to think that the internal dialogues I had as a child were not in total solitude but were a form of conversation with another world.

The kids in your sculptures seem distant, delicate and at the same time almost threatening. Is fragility and innocence a form of power? Do you think that sooner or later justice puts things in their place?

I put the children in the position of being conscious of their situation or of reacting and obtaining justice on their own.

You live in the mountains of Selva Gardena and I do not know if it is true, but I can’t help thinking of you surrounded by snow, working on your sculptures, trying to put something of the intensity and the calm coldness of snow to them. How does nature and, in general, your surroundings affect your work?

My birthplace has always been important to me and my work, as it gives me the calm and distance I need. But there is one season I don’t even feel comfortable at home. Springtime has always stolen me too much energy.

What is left for you to explore? And which are your future plans?

I would like to pick up certain studies and ideas from where I left off some years ago and rethink them in today’s world. I am interested in diversity and the conceptual comparison between materiality and transparency, in a figurative sense. I see them as being homogeneous. I am also using new materials to my work. The potential of transparency can transmit a new organic quality to my sculptures, softening the hardness of wood.

Interview with Yatzer Magazine

Fiona received her fine art masters from the Manchester Metropolitan University and is currently working on her PhD at the Slade School of Fine Art in London… which fortunately for us, doesn’t prevent her from creating some very fine art.

Fiona is also a finalist for the Guasch-Coranty International Painting Prize and has been Short Listed for the Abbey Painting Fellowship at The British School at Rome…

Fiona Curran. An abstract painter to keep on your radar!

If you live in the Atlanta region… it might be worth visiting Jackson Fine Art for Todd Selby’s first US gallery show! The Selby ‚Äì A Legend!

We need more closet space…

Installation by Derick Melander