What is Life? What is Death?

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What is Life? What is Death? nr. 3 Teal & Yellow Beetle / Mushroom, Watercolor Painting on Paper, Stephanie KilgastAs you might know, I have been painting insects on a daily basis since January 1st.For the most part, I did realistic replicas of existing insects, but at some point, that got a little boring to me, so I started doing surrealistic bugs here and there.

The Story Behind

One day I decided to switch medium and used some markers and smooth paper I had around.I mostly fooled around, working quickly, without thinking too much about it.And somehow I halved a beetle in two which gave me an idea, to paint half of the beetle as it's supposed to be, normal and alive and cover the other half with life, mushrooms and biodiversity.Natural growth is something I have been working on for a while, so the choice was rather obvious.And so I started the first painting and while painting I kept thinking about the notion of life and death and how when a being dies, that death is transformed into a different kind of life, or sometimes nourished other life forms. I also remember a video I saw about the notion of death and that on an atomic level, death didn't make much sense, is a rock dead?Thus the series began and was named "What is Life? What is Death?"

Original Art or Prints

The 10 paintings are available on my website, but if you're too late, you can also grab art prints either in my redbubble shop or in my society6 shop. Both are so called "print on demand" shops, so the moment you choose and order a specific design on a specific product, it will be made for you. No stock is ever wasted that way, which I find awesome.

What next?

This series also inspired me back to sculpture and I just started the following small series of artwork where I will give life to these half beetles, half mushrooms beings. So stay tuned for that!xxStéphanieSo you won't miss new artwork being release in the future, you can also subscribe to my newsletter.

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