Alyssa Monks

I love Alyssa Monks' oil paintings. There's such an intimacy about them. Each show a type of struggle or vulnerability in a beautiful, sensual way. Here are a few of my favorite paintings she's done. The last one, Scream, has been the background on my mac for weeks.

An explanation from her website of the work that she does:

Monks’s work explores narrative figuration. Currently she is playing with the tension between abstraction and realism in the same work, using different filters to visually distort and disintegrate the body. In this shallow painted space, the subject is pushing against our real space with pulsating vibrations of color that can make a painted body seem to have blood pumping through it. Strokes of thick, succulent paint in delicate color relationships are pushed and pulled into place to imitate glass, steam, water and flesh and create a narrative in the painted surface. The result of this pushing and pulling of realism is a confrontation of the tension between mortality and vitality. Striving for anatomical and realistic accuracy, it is her intention to convey an arresting vision that compels the viewer to feel their own humanness. It is Monks’s intent to relate visually the contemporary female experience with sensitivity, empathy, and integrity.

A lot more is contained in her portfolio.