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Artistaday.com - Find new contemporary art, create your own gallery of art

Guest curator: Brooke Shaden  
Los Angeles, CA artist


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About Brooke


Brooke Shaden was born and raised in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, near the Amish Country. She holds two degrees from Temple University, one in film and another in English.

The square format and heavy texture in her work are intended to create a painterly aesthetic that defeats certain boundaries of photography. Using these tools, she creates new worlds through her images.

Self portraiture does not need to be autobiographical, says Shaden, who uses it instead to place herself in unfamiliar or unreal places, often inside-out or idealized. In her work she struggles to define what it means to be human.

Shaden currently lives in Los Angeles. Her work has been exhibited locally and internationally.


Brooke's selections


Mike Doyle

New York, NY

"

What Mike Doyle creates with legos has the power, mystery, pain, and intrigue that so many try to capture with more accessible forms of media. He creates deep worlds using something so innocent and unassuming that the medium in itself creates a fascinating juxtaposition: innocence with destruction, old and new, imagination versus reality.

"

Chris Berens

Amsterdam, The Netherlands

"

Chris Berens is creating work that begs you to look for longer than a lot of art does. There are details within details, and illusions where you least expect to find them. There are shapes that pop off of the screen, yet there are even more shapes within those that draw the eye in and hint at stories within stories. Clearly there are layers to his paintings, and what I love most about it is the way that the colors and subjects are seemingly of a fairy tale world, yet there is darkness within. If each component stood on its own, they might not seem so mysterious; yet when put together, they take on a new life that creates a story not yet told.

"

Ray Caesar

Toronto, ON, Canada

"

Ray Caesar is bold and imaginative, a combination that can easily draw someone in with the placement of the right color or a subject that is altogether unique. His subjects seem powerful and present, as if they are about to jump off the page and engage the viewer in battle. That might seem to be a strange thing to say about very feminine female characters, but simply in the way they stand or the expression on their faces they seem to hold stories that beg to be told.

"

Alex Kisilevich

Toronto, ON, Canada

"

Alex Kisilevich is taking the idea of isolation within society to a new level by coming right out with it and physically representing that disconnect that we have all felt at one point or another. His subjects stand in familiar locations that are either blank or vast. They represent spaces that hold memories. The subjects are trapped, but also seem to be hiding.

"

Emil Alzamora

Beacon, NY

"

In the statues of Emil Alzimora there lies the struggle of life and death. Human versus nature, human versus animal, these are two themes that play out in his work. There is a sense of struggle made even more painful by the realistic nature of the statues. The viewer can see veins in the body, the tension in the muscles, and the pain on the face even if it is not a human face. Suffering is an easy emotion to connect with, made slightly more distant by the distorted figures. This art proves that no matter who or what you are, we all speak the same language.

"


Check out some other great guest curators


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Alice Yoo

Founder/editor, My Modern Metropolis

Danijela Krha

Editor, Beautiful Bizarre magazine

Lawren Alice

Co-founder/Curator, Arch Enemy Arts

Patrick Bremer

Berlin, Germany artist

Dorothy O’Connor

Atlanta, GA artist

Sayaka Ganz

Fort Wayne, IN artist

David B. Smith

Owner, David B. Smith Gallery

Arthur Brouthers

Founder Culture Initiative, Artist

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