Other Artists - Gregory Euclide

I've been wanting to write about Gregory Euclide's work for a little while now but kept putting it off mostly because I feel like I can't do it justice with bloggy words. But this morning something I scrolled past on Tumblr reminded me of one piece in particular once again (more on that later).

Apparently I first saw a piece by Euclide months ago when they first announced the pending release of the new album from Bon Iver. Somewhere I came across a little teaser trailer that featured part of one song and a slow pan over a beautiful, almost tactile piece of artwork that would adorn the album's cover. What I didn't realize was that it wasn't just a painting. In my quick, internet-era viewing, my eyes and brain digested it just enough to realize "i like this art, i'm excited about the album, A+" and I moved on to something else.

[cover of Bon Iver's Bon Iver by Gregory Euclide]

Then later on, somewhere else in the internet world, I came across a photo of his piece/installation...

[Held within what hung open and made to lie without escape by Gregory Euclide]

It stopped me in my tracks. Tiny intricate details, two dimensions flowing into three, nature, miniature landscapes, a place to get lost, mixed media and so many scale changes - it was love at first sight. There is a full set on Euclide's Flickr with close-ups and even a little video.

His smaller pieces are just as enthralling. Landscapes becoming landscapes!

[Moving over the folds of what was more warm than hidden by Gregory Euclide]

The two kinds of art that are closest to my heart are 1) works that looks completely effortless and 2) those that look like they took a lifetime to create. Euclide obviously falls into the second category. The delicate framework and the tiny self-mushroom-like projections of the water bringing the painting off of the paper into the real world show such painstaking attention to detail.

So, what was it that reminded me to write about this work? Unexpectedly, it was a runway shot from Alexander McQueen...

Maybe it's a stretch but the forest in her hair and the tiny woods in Euclide's installation piece seem like kin to me.

I'm planning a post about my attachment to the natural world and my recent growing need to fill my brain with information about how things grow and exist out there in the out-of-doors. I'm glad that other people are making art that looks like the mossy, quiet depths of my current mindset.

Gregory Euclide's website
Gregory Euclide's photos