| Issue Introduction |
With the release of Issue X, Beautiful/Decay is proud to unveil a new direction in the creative content of the magazine. Over the years, the magazine has touched upon a divergent array of topics, united by a consistent commitment to showcasing only the most innovative talents. The publication will reenergize its dedication to the creative community by expanding its selection of international art and design, while still maintaining its characteristically fresh and informative approach. Beginning with Issue X and continuing into upcoming issues, readers will see expanded in-depth features, including even more comprehensive artist interviews, current show reviews, and a wider selection of gallery reviews on both a national and international level.
For this issue, Beautiful/Decay is proud to include an even broader range of emerging and established talents. The issue is loosely curated around an investigation into phenomenological representations of reality, and the myriad ways in which it may be fabricated, duplicated, or parodied through the artistic process. Our artists both pay homage to and contest the strategies of Western mimetic representation, historically rooted in a more scientific and technological filtering of the external world. The artists included in this issue work within these parameters, yet re-inject this exhausted exploration with unexpected approaches, whether the inclusion of dream imagery, kitsch, irony, distortion, or unusual combinations of formal qualities.
Scott Anderson conflates a dissonant lineup of images derived from his personal vocabulary, whether dream catchers, lunar landscapes, or beer bottles, to create science fiction-style landscapes at once familiar and foreign. Mala Iqbal also imagines alien vistas that cleverly investigate the tropes of painting through her unique blend of magic, kitsch, and a knack for the unexpected.
Michael Swaney chooses to narrate idiosyncratic, boyishly charmed scenes that reference both childhood nostalgia and adult irony. Jeff Whetstone captures uncanny photographs of graffiti-marked caves. The natural scenes, layered with human scribblings, document the phenomena of anonymous marking and the act of creating itself, referencing everything from the Paleolithic cave paintings of Lascaux to ribald rants on bathroom stall walls. His recast panoramas of disorienting rocks are brought back into the realm of the familiar through banal human traces.
Barnaby Whitfield’s feverishly playful pastel distortions both attract and repulse with their candy-colored depictions of subtly grotesque figures. The issue also features an interview with duo design team Oh Yeah Studio, who gracefully merge pencil sketch representational drawings with abstract computer modeled concepts, and explores Oliver Hibert’s hyper-colored images. |
| |
|
|
Advertisers
|
