Marcos Raya Painting, Reappropriated 60's Style Family Portrait

circa 2000

Victor Wang's subject is a female seemingly caught in a contemplative moment yet a war rages behind her. She dons a hat shaped as a boat and carries and oar as if to "Dream Away" these other thoughts. Wang uses a blend of luminous colors and buttery textures to evoke these enigmatic moments of meditation. Influence by the Renaissance Masters Titian and Rembrandt for their glazing and layering techniques respectively, the artist builds the surface using heavy paint, swirling and mixing the color on the canvas. The end result is a poetic and emotionally powerful representation of the human form. Victor Wang Dreaming Away, 2017 oil on canvas 42h x 56w in 106.68h x 142.24w cm VWG009 My path through life has been adventurous, exciting, and dream-like. My experience of settling into America in search of better opportunities has been both challenging and inspiring. I use the human face as a vehicle to paint human experiences - worry and wonder, sadness and pleasure - which reflect the emotional stage directly tied to my immigration experiences. I grew up amongst the sunflower fields in northern China. In my childhood years, I played under the bright, yellow sunflowers with my brothers everyday. China’s Cultural Revolution played an important part in my life. During that time, sunflowers were used as political allegories to depict how citizens of China should follow Mao who represented the sun, since sunflowers follow the sun’s movements. People eventually inferred the deception that this symbol masked. After graduating from high school, I was sent to a labor camp in the country for ‘reeducation’ during China’s Cultural Revolution. There, I was subject to grueling farm work. Often, I worked in corn and sunflower fields from sunrise to sunset. Thus, for me, sunflowers evoke both personal joy and sadness. Therefore, to deliver my complex feelings, I use sunflowers as a metaphor to connote my background and emotional stage. My incorporation of collages of figures from China’s Tang Dynasty represents my Chinese heritage and is a constant reminder of where I came from. The texture and earthiness on the canvas’s surface are inspired by the texture of the soil on the farm where I worked in China. Although I often gain great pleasure from the process of painting, it is most important to unfold expressively those feelings within myself. Wang belongs to a generation of immigrant painters from China, whose artistic background was defined by socialist realism but took advantage of their skills and broke away from that tradition to create new subjects in the U.S. “When I was a student during Cultural Revolution, Soviet realism art was among the dominant source of influence and it grabbed us like lightening rod...

Artists are often isolated, but long for an idealized golden era, “La Boheme”. Frequently an artist's closest encounter with “La Boheme” is nothing more than drinking at a bar...

"Pink Hair Lady" is an original artwork by Eustace Mamba and measures 14"h x 11"w x 1.25"d. The artists cuts, arranges, sews, and collages fabric and paints to create layers of textu...

"The Hourglass" Abstract Painting 39" x 27.5" inch by Karim Abd Elmalak Karim Abdel Malak's layered multi-media works are influenced by the old masters. Abdel Malak textured oils are a celebration of the female identity in every sense of the word. His beautiful faces and suave figures grace the canvases together embracing our Egyptian architectural monuments creating a powerful dialogue between women’s identity, her rights, her suffering and our heritage and what it holds in its historical meanings and the deteriorating state. Graduate from the faculty of Fine Arts, Minia University, Graphic Design Department. Illustrator for Sabah El Kheir & Rosalyoussef, Egyptian local magazines. Practice Sculpture. Participant in the 1st Child’s Biennale workshop “Fantasia 1”, Cairo 2003. Won the silver medal in the International Competition of “SHANKERS World Association”, India 1993. Exhibitions: Private Art Works Exhibition at Cairo Gallery, 2001. Public Exhibition at Ahmed Shawky Museum, Cairo 2001. Public Exhibition at Mahmoud Said...