Nature and technology collide in the beautifully bizarre paintings of Heidi Taillefer, a Montreal-based artist who has been showing her work for more than twenty years. Her colorful style is informed by the early twentieth-century surrealists, summoning a broad range of figurative traditions, from the drama of baroque portraiture to whimsical steampunk imagery. Taillefer’s themes center around the complex relationships that exist between humanity, nature, and technology. She cleverly “bio-engineers” the subjects of her paintings, mixing animals parts with gears, watches, and other automaton parts. Many of the animals are fused with the bodies of other species, as well as symbolic parts and products that suggest carnal consumption, such as breasts and raw meat on the body of a pig. Elaborate and mind-bending, Taillefer’s paintings provide the viewer with an opportunity to contemplate the growing presence of machines in our biological existences.
Images © Heidi Taillefer Via AFA Gallery