Arthur Bruso

Review of Buried Secrets by Edward Humes As many religions attest, there are two paths of life to take in the world: the narrow, straight path of good, or the wide, twisting path of evil. The evil path can be the most seductive, as Edward Humes’ Buried Secrets reminds us. While occult practices are not inherently evil, they often tempt and seduce the weak and powerless into believing that they can acquire more power and prestige than they may currently have. Adolfo Constanzo,

Sketchbook Drawings Despite being a photorealist artist when I began my career, I could not draw. I realized this in figure drawing class. My drawings were either sharply focused on a small detail of the body, or vastly out of proportion and having little to do with the actual proportions of human anatomy. The disparity lies in the technique and process of photorealism. When working from a photograph, the most important aspect of rendering has been satisfied for the artist. T

In the spring of 1914, Picasso was still deep in exploring cubism and its possibilities as sculpture.

The first recorded Mesoamerican people, the Olmec (c. 1,600 – 400 BC) conceived of a god that controlled the life-giving rains.

THERE HAVE BEEN PRISONS ever since there have been civilizations with laws that could be violated, but the idea of reforming

An Archeology of Disorder was conceived by Mark Dion while artist in residence at the Royal Edinburgh Hospital.

New Jersey is home to a diverse and robust artistic community; the New Jersey Arts Annual exhibition highlights the work of visual artists a

The title of this book, Passing Strange, denotes an exemplary of strangeness. It alludes to the notion that the story or events related are

At 25 years old, young Jakob Bohme, had a spiritual vision that would change his life.

A female figure of the Cihuateteo type, depicts a woman who died during childbirth. The closed eyes and open mouth illustrate the trope of t

The cabinet of curiosities emerged during the 16th century. While some still exist today, the majority of them are no longer extant, but often drawings of the rooms, or illustrations of the individual objects were commissioned and still survive as intriguing evidence of what they looked like or contained. With The Phantom Museum, Mark Dion pays homage to the lost objects of the cabinets. By creating a facsimile of the object as portrayed in the surviving illustrations, he con

I participated in the group exhibition of PennDesign Alumni, SoHo Show-Off which was up from January 16 - 29, 2008 at the Louis K. Meisel Gallery in New York City. I exhibited these two works. This is my statement from the catalog. "The ancient Greeks understood the spirit of place. That palpable feeling of the energy present in a particular spot or feature in the landscape. Grottoes, meadows, lakes, groves, rocks, trees, streams and even fountains were all inhabited or guar

The 2021-22 Curious Matter Holiday Installation For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them. Matthew 18:20 I DON’T WANT to hesitantly tap my elbow to yours in greeting. But I will. And I do. And I’m glad you’re here. What I’d rather do is throw my arms around you and kiss each cheek. We’ve been isolated for too long, distant for too long. Perhaps, in the past, we imagined ourselves a bit misanthropic, claiming a preference for a go

November 19 - December 12, 2021 My Pet Ram is pleased to present THE BIG SHOW!, a colossal showcase of works by over 75 artists from New York and abroad. Visually threaded through a myriad of styles and aesthetics, THE BIG SHOW! highlights painting, sculpture, mixed media and photography, acting as a snapshot of contemporary art through a variety of mediums. Displayed salon-style and with an abundance of stimulus and visual fodder, these gatherings create a unique dialogue wi

Review of The Awakened Eye by Ross Parmenter The act of looking is vital and elemental to any visual artist. Looking, for an artist is more than just making your way through the world from one place to the next without bumping into things. For an artist, even if you are not an objective painter, you need to understand composition, color relations the expressive qualities of line and texture, to name just a few formal concerns. If you are an objective painter, then deep observ

Souls in waiting: depictions of Purgatory And of that second kingdom will I sing Wherein the human spirit doth purge itself, And to ascend to heaven becometh worthy. Dante, Purgatorio We are born and we die. Hopefully we die after a long, happy and productive life. The question that has evoked the wonder of humans through millennia is, “What happens after we die?” Can all of that quickness of life, the intensely felt emotion, the penetrating thinking, the uniqueness of person

Zapotec Tomb 104 at the American Museum of Natural History.

With this piece, Mark Dion explores our curiosity. The work is conceived as interactive, in that the viewer is welcome to take out the boxes and look inside. Each box has an object or several objects that are waiting for discovery. Search and discovery is the main focus of this work. Dion is hoping to invoke in the participant the sensation of the archeologist discovering a long hidden tomb full of ancient treasure, or at least the furtive guilt of peeking in a strangers medi

At the turning of the millennium, we purchased the house at 272 Fifth Street from the widow Maggie Olson. Maggie’s husband Charlie had died of a heart attack and she could no longer burden the work and expense of keeping the house. Her family had decided that she should give it up after forty years. The old woman didn’t want to move after living so long in one place; there were attachments and memories to living there. But, she did like us and decided that we would take good

Review of Satanism and Witchcraft by Jules Michelet