Andrew Gray

"Hope Floats" - Original Acrylic Painting of Hand & Reflection, Serenity Theme

2024

Josh Talbott's (US based) "Spring" is an acrylic painting that depicts a rubber toy duck trapped in a spring loaded mouse trap Bio: Josh Talbott grew up ...

Josh Talbott's (US based) "Maneuvers" is an acrylic painting that depicts a green army man toy with a bright red hungry hippo and blue marble with random ...

Josh Talbott's (US based) "Half Spent" is an acrylic painting that depicts a empty honey bear jar reused as a piggy bank, half full of coins with a light blue background. Bio: Josh Talbott grew up in suburban/rural Georgia in the southern US. His first work as a professional artist was in scenic painting and murals for various production companies. An attempt to deepen his well of possibilities led to New Orleans where as a street artist he sold works to people from all over the world before loosing everything in hurricane Katrina. With short stints in Santa Fe and then Los Angeles Josh arrived in the small coastal city of Los Osos, California where he lives and works today. His curiosity is voracious and interests are many, including scuba/ free diving, sailing, surfing, gardening, geology, rock hounding, rationality, AI, history, and philosophy. In his studio there is always an audiobook on, and outside of the studio there are all manner of activities making there way into his work. He has many private collectors scattered across the globe and murals in San Francisco. ARTIST STATEMENT We live in a time of extreme and accelerated change, growing complexity, and specialization. At every stage in our human trajectory from primitive beginnings crawling out of the sea to the present gauntlet of challenges, our thinking tools and their uses are central to the story of what it means to be human. My work is informed by a fascination with thinking tools and the effects of programming and environment through the different phases of life and our capacity for storytelling. My practice consists of constructing small-scale still life scenarios of toys and other artifacts of human development, then creating photorealistic acrylic paintings of these scenes. The work juxtaposes the familiar and playful with a contemporary, complex, adult world. While I am interested in the science of the mind, and what it means to be a human, my work seldom features the human form, focusing instead on the objects and items that are frequently left behind. As such, the subject of the painting becomes the viewer him or herself because their own humanity is ultimately what is revealed. My work honors toys as thinking tools for small people and the scenes depicted explore the ways in which the culture of our formative years leaves a lasting mark and continues to shape our storytelling. The plastic artifacts of my formative years carry memories of simultaneous confusion and wonder at the world around me. These are sensations and emotions still very much present in my life. What were your imaginings and dramas when you played with toys? Are you living them today? The multileveled still life paintings of familiar toys are bright and accessible and connect to the viewer's nostalgia and playfulness while provoking deeper insights into our current evolutionary, cultural, and technological moment. I place each little curio with care into meaningful relationship to their interlocutors and environment. The plastic dinosaurs often depicted are emblematic of childhood curiosities, of great wonder and speculation at past worlds and the depth of evolutionary time, and yet they are made of a material that illustrates our shortsightedness, a quintessential human quality that makes it quite possible that these plastic creations will outlast us all. I do my best to draw inspiration and resources from everywhere to build a visual language. In my divergent path I find the musical compositions and the story of composer, Philip Glass inspiring. The story of his devotion to his craft and his subsequent successes have encouraged and inspired me. I'm influenced by writers such as Kurt Vonnegut, Robert Sapolsky, and Yuval Noah Harari, the many books by Simon Winchester, Daniel Dennet, Robert Wright...

Josh Talbott's (US based) "Entropy" is an acrylic painting that depicts an overturned blue glass jar with clock hands spilling out onto a white background. Bio: Josh Talbott grew up in suburban/rural Georgia in the southern US. His first work as a professional artist was in scenic painting and murals for various production companies. An attempt to deepen his well of possibilities led to New Orleans where as a street artist he sold works to people from all over the world before loosing everything in hurricane Katrina. With short stints in Santa Fe and then Los Angeles Josh arrived in the small coastal city of Los Osos, California where he lives and works today. His curiosity is voracious and interests are many, including scuba/ free diving, sailing, surfing, gardening, geology, rock hounding, rationality, AI, history, and philosophy. In his studio there is always an audiobook on, and outside of the studio there are all manner of activities making there way into his work. He has many private collectors scattered across the globe and murals in San Francisco. ARTIST STATEMENT We live in a time of extreme and accelerated change, growing complexity, and specialization. At every stage in our human trajectory from primitive beginnings crawling out of the sea to the present gauntlet of challenges, our thinking tools and their uses are central to the story of what it means to be human. My work is informed by a fascination with thinking tools and the effects of programming and environment through the different phases of life and our capacity for storytelling. My practice consists of constructing small-scale still life scenarios of toys and other artifacts of human development, then creating photorealistic acrylic paintings of these scenes. The work juxtaposes the familiar and playful with a contemporary, complex, adult world. While I am interested in the science of the mind, and what it means to be a human, my work seldom features the human form, focusing instead on the objects and items that are frequently left behind. As such, the subject of the painting becomes the viewer him or herself because their own humanity is ultimately what is revealed. My work honors toys as thinking tools for small people and the scenes depicted explore the ways in which the culture of our formative years leaves a lasting mark and continues to shape our storytelling. The plastic artifacts of my formative years carry memories of simultaneous confusion and wonder at the world around me. These are sensations and emotions still very much present in my life. What were your imaginings and dramas when you played with toys? Are you living them today? The multileveled still life paintings of familiar toys are bright and accessible and connect to the viewer's nostalgia and playfulness while provoking deeper insights into our current evolutionary, cultural, and technological moment. I place each little curio with care into meaningful relationship to their interlocutors and environment. The plastic dinosaurs often depicted are emblematic of childhood curiosities, of great wonder and speculation at past worlds and the depth of evolutionary time, and yet they are made of a material that illustrates our shortsightedness, a quintessential human quality that makes it quite possible that these plastic creations will outlast us all. I do my best to draw inspiration and resources from everywhere to build a visual language. In my divergent path I find the musical compositions and the story of composer, Philip Glass inspiring. The story of his devotion to his craft and his subsequent successes have encouraged and inspired me. I'm influenced by writers such as Kurt Vonnegut, Robert Sapolsky, and Yuval Noah Harari, the many books by Simon Winchester, Daniel Dennet, Robert Wright...

Andrew Gray’s series "Currents of Color" finds a mesmerizing intersection in "Condition Week, 2024", an acrylic on canvas that stands out at 61 x 43 inches, framed elegantly to 62 x ...

Andrew Gray’s “Beach Balls 2, 2024” is an exceptional piece from the vibrant 'Currents of Color' series, which was a highlight of his recent solo exhibition. Encased in a delicate wh...

Archaic Hercules Skinning a Rabbit, 2019 Acrylic on canvas 53.14 H x 55.11 W in. 135 H x 140 W cm In classical mythology, Hercules is famous for his strength and his numerous far-ra...

Gyre acrylic, spray paint on canvas 80" x 96" 2022 Part of the New Minority Series Dennis Jones was first introduced to the use of a bidet while being extremely ill in Hurghada, Egypt. He has played the game of ‘Jenga’ with prostitutes in Phuket, Thailand. Once he hiked down to the bottom of the Grand Canyon from the North Rim and back in twelve hours. Jones has also visited fifty US National Parks. The work of Dennis Jones is growth oriented. There is diversity among his oeuvre and much risk in such an approach. Eschewing a ‘signature style’ that he considers to be boring, creatively limiting and market driven, he prefers to consider how method and expression intermingle and form a conceptual basis. A cursory glance may consider his prodigious output to lack focus, but a deeper reading reveals that he remains true to himself and allows his work to take him where it needs to go. There has always been the presence of a figure in his work, either implied, or directly visible. One can trace several years of development from his interest in figurative and cartoon-like imagery in, Toyland (2006), through his foray into text based work (2007-13) and a later influence of abstraction (2012-18). Following this trajectory brings one to his current body of work that combines figuration, cartoons and abstraction. He is a visual artist, educator, and architect. Each of the ‘hats’ he wears directly influence his work. He states that ‘a fascination with an integration of material, process and expression, truth of emotion and visually communicating thought are what sustain and drive him as an artist. Jones has participated in over seventy solo and group shows that include local, national and international venues. His creative output includes paintings, sculptures, drawings, installations, videos, photos, books, teaching and residential architecture. Jones’ work was selected to be included in the New American Paintings 2019 Midwest Competition Publication, juried by Staci Boris, Associate Director of Exhibitions, School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Currently, his focus is on a growing body of paintings, in mixed media, on canvas that combine abstraction, figuration and cartoon imagery. Jones had a one person exhibition at the University of Michigan in September through December of 2018. A review of the show can be read on the page titled, Candyland Review. Earlier the same year, He curated an exhibition titled, SIX, that opened in January of 2018, at The Janice Charach Gallery; a five thousand square foot space, located in West Bloomfield, Michigan. The exhibition featured the work of six Detroit artists and provided adequate space for each to show a body of work…essentially six individual shows in one space. Selected venues that have shown Jones’ work include: The OK Harris Gallery, New York; Galerie Protege, NY; The Mary Washington Galleries, Mary Washington University, Fredericksburg, Maryland; The Kraft Lieberman Gallery, Chicago; The Drift Gallery, Portsmouth, NH; The Project Room, Lincoln, NE; The Art Gallery of Windsor, Windsor, Canada; Artcite, Windsor, CA; The Thames Gallery, Chatham, Ontario, Canada; The Kenderdine Art Gallery, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatchewan, CA; Definitely Superior Gallery, Thunder Bay, ON, CA; Gallery Lambton, Sarnia, ON, CA, WKP Kennedy, North Bay...

Sandbar Trilogy is a brilliantly colorful pop art painting, an ode to the popular gay beach scene in Miami, Florida. Three panels of male figures are seen lounging, sitting and stan...

David Stern (Germany, b. 1956) Acrylics on canvas 71 inches by 81 inches Hand signed by artist, certificate of authenticity available Keywords: red, abs...

JENNY DAY is a painter who lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico. She earned an MFA in Painting and Drawing from the University of Arizona, a BFA in Painting from the University of Alaska Fa...

Hannah Barrett’s paintings imagine a colorful, absurdist world inhabited by eccentrics of ambiguous genders and time periods. With tongue-in-cheek nods to the past, Barrett combines...