Books: A Brush With Nature {Alex Beard}

October 16, 2016

Artist Alex Beard calls his signature style of painting
"abstract naturalism" where abstraction and figuration collide.

Themes of cultural and environmental interconnectivity
are explored within a gorgeous collection
of paintings inspired by wildlife, travel,
and natural patterns inside
A Brush with Nature:
Abstract Naturalism and the Painting of Life
(Glitterati, 2016)

Beard paints intensely colorful, detailed interpretations of the world, and this book includes works made over the past 25 years, as well as a handwritten introduction illuminating his philosophy of the interconnectedness of life, art, and mathematics.

Beard is fascinated by how things

all move in the same way and says

the universality of this truth comforts him.

He uses ink and oil paints to tell stories

and has me listening closely with my eyes.

Sliced and diced

footprint porcupine

Beard's work has been described as

"precise yet abstract visual arithmetic,"

and with little reference for

the school of visual mathematics

(beyond working as a math tutor for years!),

I peeked at the work of graphic artist M.C. Escher,

whose fascination with high and low or

close by and far away is legendary.

Sphere Spirals

Mobius Strip II

Engage with stories told in A Brush with Nature:
Abstract Naturalism and the Painting of Life,
hear Beard's voice paint them in this video,
or witness their beauty live at the artist's studio
in New Orleans where he paints.

Peace to you right where you are.