Born in 1991 in Toronto, Canada, Shantel Miller lives and works in Boston, Massachusetts.

Miller is a storyteller. As the daughter of Jamaican ministers who immigrated to Canada, she takes viewers on an intimate and spiritual journey, shedding light on representations of race, gender, and belief systems. As she documents everyday life and shares with us her ordinary surroundings, her re-imagined spaces specifically depict moments of black life. With oil paints and delicate details, she questions authority, existence, and contemplates what it means to be human. As we enter her meditative space, we find ourselves engaged in a conversation about both the beauties and the limitations of our contemporary visual culture.

Shantel Miller

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Coming Out

Born in 1992 in Seattle, Washington, Brandon Elijah Johnson lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.

As we step into Johnson's world, somewhere between imagination and reality, we become a part of his visual diary. A collector of images, from photographs found on the internet to snapshots taken with his phone, Johnson reinterprets familiar ordinary scenes in his paintings and drawings, perhaps in an attempt to freeze a moment in time. He takes reference images from his direct environment and intentionally - or not - offers a representative picture of today’s world. His vivid compositions draw from pop culture, embrace pastiche, and remain attached to the here and now. As part of a generation willingly returning to figurative painting, Johnson moves away from pure representation, at times infusing a touch of playfulness, and distancing himself from painterly conventions. Between fiction and documentary reality, Johnson’s works reveal a part of our collective memory.

Brandon Elijah Johnson

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And Then I Feel Nothing

Born in 1993 in Lisbon, Portugal, Pedro Ruxa lives and works in Brussels, Belgium.

Ruxa is enamored with painting and inspired by words. It is through painting, but also through objects and bits and pieces of poems that Ruxa attempts to communicate with his senses and sensibility. His works create an intimate dialogue, be it actually between himself and the paint, or us and the words. Through a reconstructed language that is his own, shapes, colors, letters, and sentences become his subject matter. Ruxa constantly creates ever-changing clouds of words and imagery and sticks them on his studio walls, making them the starting point to his oeuvre. Yet, he simultaneously explores the restraints of this same language: what is happening before or after what we see? The more Ruxa tends to take control over his words, his sight, and his emotions, the more he is unable to contain it within the realm of comprehension. But all this is exactly at the core of his aesthetic language and it is undeniably touching, both visually and emotionally.

Pedro Ruxa

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Anthony Sleeping

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Daydream

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Hard Knocks

Born in 1981 in Jacmel, Haiti, Jesse Aridoux lives and works in Queens, New York.

A multidisciplinary artist, web, and graphic designer by training, Aridoux tackles various mediums in his body of work. From drawings to paintings, photography to design, his works reflect on the history of surrealism, abstraction, and classical painting while hinting at the notion of identity and existence. With drawings from his Tessonism series, Aridoux crumples the paper as a way to symbolize deconstruction before unfolding and drawing in each crease, sewing the work back together with graphite, in an act of healing. The process reminds us of the Surrealist’s signature method called ‘Exquisite Cadaver’, with the exception that Aridoux acts intentionally and alone. With his paintings, Aridoux subtly blurs the lines between figuration and the hint at contemporary history often tainted with oppression, injustice, and inequality.

Jesse Aridoux

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Elle (Fanm)

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Home Invasion

How Long Does it Take to Heal

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I Have Authority

Born in 1988 in Tehran, Iran, Reihaneh Hosseini lives and works in Vienna.

Born and raised in Tehran, Hosseini studied philosophy before emigrating to Vienna in 2014, where she currently resides. Trained under Austrian abstract artists including Christian Schwarzwald and Gunter Damisch, Reihaneh soon returned to figurative painting, her favored style for reflecting on the world that surrounds her. As a storyteller, she is inspired by her friends and her everyday life experiences, yet she portrays them with a dysmorphic rendition, exaggerated proportions, grotesque, and distorted features, and an incongruous palette. Her strong sense of corporeality coupled with the absurdity of the scenes that she depicts reveal a psycho-emotional approach to life and painting. The figures that populate her works oscillate between beauty and ugliness, they have a cartoonish appearance that adds a glimpse of humor and playfulness to her compositions, yet they are imbued with philosophical subtleties. Hosseini’s paintings take us to a dreamlike world where each of her characters evokes our unconscious thoughts, our inner child, as well as our mental and social imagery.

Reihaneh Hosseini

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I'm Not Running

Irish Pub

Josh

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Khanya

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Love and War

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Lukewarm

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No Such Thing As Summertime Blues

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Not How I Left It

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Out of a Dark Place

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Painting for Lois Dodd / The Summer Ends

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Paradox

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Sleeping Dani

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So Tired of Begging You to Stay

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Summer Love

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Veris Disquo

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Coming Out

And Then I Feel Nothing

Anthony Sleeping

Daydream

Hard Knocks

Elle (Fanm)

Home Invasion

How Long Does it Take to Heal

I Have Authority

I'm Not Running

Irish Pub

Josh

Khanya

Love and War

Lukewarm

No Such Thing As Summertime Blues

Not How I Left It

Out of a Dark Place

Painting for Lois Dodd / The Summer Ends

Paradox

Revealing

Sleeping Dani

So Tired of Begging You to Stay

Summer Love

Untitled

Untitled

Untitled

Veris Disquo

Search for "Oil"