Shout Out to Monika Baer

Monika Baer, 1998

I recently saw an exhibit of work by the contemporary artist Monika Baer.  Her works combined abstract with representational, and showed great skill at handling the medium of oil paint.  What I thought was a buffet of color, were her "Mozart paintings (see picture)."  According to the Art Institute, "this series, the Mozart Paintings, expanded on her interest in the canvas as theater set that had developed in her student years, taken to an extreme, almost cinematic scale. Highly stylized and rendered in elaborate rococo detail, these paintings act as a foil for the more abstracted work that would follow."  Enjoy!