The wonderful world of artist Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

Jacek Yerka is a Polish surrealist painter from Toruń. He mixes his memories from his amazing childhood and creates some beautiful, inspiring paintings, which are exhibited in Poland, Germany, Monaco, France, and the United States, and may be found in the museums of Poland.

Yerka cites Hieronymus Bosch, Pieter Bruegel, Cagliostro, Jan van Eyck, and Hugo van der Goes as formative influencers of his work. His subject matter ranges from odd beasts to whimsical landscapes incorporating extraordinary architecture, and include imagery gleamed from his childhood.
His works resemble to me the ones from Vladimir Kush another surrealistic painter I've already talked about on this blog, but I also find that the particular magic evoked by his paintings share something in common with the imaginary of Hayao Miyazaki, the famous manga artist and anime director.
Take a magic journey in this gallery which is a brief selection of some water-related paintings and do not forget to visit Yerka’s website here.


©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

©Jacek Yerka

New underwater sculptures by Jason De Caires Taylor

All the pictures ©JasonDeCairesTaylor

Jason De Caires Taylor is a sculptor and in my humble opinion a genius. I've already spoken about him and his work a couple of years ago in a previous post. Take a look if you've missed it:

• Children in the sea and other underwater sculpture

The idea behind his work is to create life-size cement sculptures of people and submerge them into the ocean. As time passes the sculptures become part of the underwater landscape and slowly become artificial reefs ripe with marine life:
a wonderful mixture of art, environment, creativity and marine biology. Something that fits just perfectly with this blog, therefore when, checking his website, I discovered many new masterpieces I immediately feel the urge to write a new post.
The facet of the seascapes created by De Caires Taylor that amaze me more is that his works are ever-evolving: everytime you dive to see them, they've changed while algae and corals encrust the sculptures painting wonderful textures over them.
The following pictures are from his most recent and most "pharaonic" work to date.
It's called, not accidentally, "Eevolucion Silenciosa" (Silent Evolution) and it required the submersion of 400 life-size figures, 9 meters deep, in the waters off Cancun and Isla Mujeres, Mexico! A big job indeed, that it's described in some interesting "backstage" shots.

And now some other new sculptures:
"Alluvia", his only sculptures placed under inland waters:

"La Jardinera del la Esperanza"(The Gardener of Hope) where a female sculpture seems to wait hopefully the growth of the corals that surround her

"Hombre en Llamas" (Man on Fire):

"The Lost Correspondent":

"El Coleccionista de Sueños" (Dream Collector)

and finally some nocturnal shots of the most encrusted faces. Suggestive and haunting.

Visit Jason De Caires Taylor's website for more infos and galleries