Sinister Play

Today I am researching the works of three artists whose works are drawing based.At a quick glance their works appear to be illustrations from a childrens' book but a closer look reveals their subversive content. All three of them use graphite, pen and ink, colour pencils or gouache on paper and deliberately create impossible scenarios suffused with a sense of foreboding and gentle menace.The aim of all three artists is to explore the vagaries of human behaviour in isolation as well as in relation with other people.

Amy Cutler is an internationally acclaimed artist best known for her enigmatic illustrations of women performing strange, cryptic tasks: carrying horses on their backs in Above the Fjord, sewing tigers in Tiger Mending, dancing with chairs on their heads in Dinner Party. Rendered simply, though with exquisite detail, Cutler's style is reminiscent of European folk art; however, the narratives are left unexplained and the white backgrounds of her drawings provide little context or clues to the meanings. The fantasy world she creates is sometimes humorous and other times ominous.

Above the Fjord

Rachel Goodyear's drawings are  macabre, displaying a mass of ambiguous truths and blatant invention. They walk the line between playful curiosity and sadistic torment, revealing a place where the mundane and the spectacular, the blessed and the cursed, dwell in uneasy accord.Animals with humanistic qualities or humans with animal behaviour proliferate her landscape.

Curling up into comfortable positions 2011

Visitor 2014

Young Hypnotists 2014

Marcel Dzama is known for his intricate dioramas and large scale polyptychs that draw from his talents across a range of media. Dzama works in multiple disciplines to bring his cast of human figures, animals, and imaginary hybrids to life, and has developed an international reputation and following for his art that depicts fanciful, anachronistic worlds.Dzama's work evokes all sorts of emotions: wistfulness, joy, fear, revulsion, wonder, arousal. Drawing inspiration from current events, revolutionary images and his own childhood fears and encounters, Dzama has developed a distinctive-yet-familiar style that's at once playfully twisted, childlike, and disturbing.Dzama draws every day and is still surprised by the darkness of his imagination. "I try not to censor myself at all. I'll go, 'Oh that's nasty!' But I'll go with it." ,he says.I like this aspect of his work since I unconsciously try to edit the flow of my thoughts before they spill out of paper and I try to preempt the reaction of the possible viewer to a certain degree.