Massimo Vignelli
Vignelli, a world renown graphic designer, is famous for his use of Swedish, minimalist design. His work includes icons like the signs for the Metro Subway System in New York City, and the logo for American Airlines. The Swedish school of design is by far my favorite as it is simple, to the point, precise, and very logical, with grids used to map every page layout and all the proportions accounted for. I love that sweet, simple, and clean look. My photography shows a bit of his style, as I tend to place objects in my frame with an account for their position, the diagonals they lie on, their ability to activate the edge, and so on…
Rene Magritte
The Surrealist movement is easily one of my–if not my–favorite artistic movements. The one particular artist who always stood out to me within that movement is Rene Magritte. His paintings, such as the “Son of Man,” “The Treachery of Images,” and “Golconda,” to name a few, invoke a sense of mystery, wonder, and often, humor. I love his laid-back attitude towards his artmaking as well, as seen in his quote,
“My painting is visible images which conceal nothing; they evoke mystery and, indeed, when one sees one of my pictures, one asks oneself this simple question, ‘What does that mean?’. It does not mean anything, because mystery means nothing either, it is unknowable.”
In my images, I too like to play with viewers’ perception in order to create a feeling of mystery and humor, as seen in “Bathroom Mishaps” and “Politik.”
Aaron Nagel
Compared to the other artists listed here, Aaron Nagel is incredibly unknown. His work is a combination of styles, ranging from Neoclassicism to Dada. Most of his fine art pieces are oil on wood paintings featuring the female figure juxtaposed with some kind of dark, often religious, imagery. Nagel’s paintings convey feelings of dread and despair while making the viewer think about the issues portrayed through the painting, such as the issue of questioning the church in the painting, “Idol Worship.” Much like Nagel has done, I do strive to invoke a message through juxtaposition in some of my pictures, such as in “Politik,” with handguns set against a government building.
