Post #624252 by hewey on Thu, Feb 9, 2012 12:21 AM

Bigbro, I see a few different things that seperates Vantikis latest creation from those ones you posted. Firstly those two pieces you posted firmly have their heritage in medievil times - the basic use of steel for weaponry and armour, the decoration and embelishment. Sure both are certainly 'medievil pop', but they belong to the same family.

Now Vantikis latest mug has no steel element to it at all. The legs to me reek of centuries old wharf timbers. The folds at the side could be equally at home on an exotic tropical fish, but I also see elements of a bannana leaf in there too. The dimpled effect could be either stone (moai influence) or it could the scales of a fish. The overall look has elements of the creature of the black lagoon, but with an inherent primitivism to it. For me its not hard to imagine a piece of pacific art with a similar look using natural materials, based on the locals sightings of the creature in the black lagoon. So it'd have a timber base and then mud daubed on to reflect the creatures wet skin, and leaves to represent the gills.

This is a overmodeled skull from the sepik river, where they covered the original skull in clay

And the use of triangles is commonly seen in oceanic art too

I also think you're seeing more of an influence of 'kustom kulture' art in recent years too, and with that poly pop is taking on a new identity.