Uploaded November 2021 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
“My work is deeply rooted in storytelling - exploring visual narratives set in imaginary landscapes. I favor a monochrome palette for its mysterious, dreamlike quality..”
Michael Broad studied illustration at Portsmouth University, earning 1st Class Honours Degree in 1999. He then moved to London to work as a commercial artist and made books in his spare time. One of these books caught the attention of a literary agent and his first publishing contract followed in 2005.
Michael has since written and illustrated over thirty books for children and these have been translated into many languages worldwide. His picture books have been nominated for the Kate Greenaway Medal and the Stockport Schools Book Award, and his fiction has been shortlisted for the Nottingham Children's Book Award and the Waterstone's Children's Book Prize.
Michael continues to paint alongside book projects and his enduring fascination with stories has fed into a body of work depicting a large cast of characters populating dreamlike landscapes. He has recreated many of these characters as porcelain sculptures.
Michael’s paintings and ceramics reside in private art collections around the world and his work been shown in various exhibitions including the Summer Exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts.
[from: michaelbroad.co.uk/about]
Music: Alio Die "Electrostatic Forest"
“My work is deeply rooted in storytelling - exploring visual narratives set in imaginary landscapes. I favor a monochrome palette for its mysterious, dreamlike quality..”
Michael Broad studied illustration at Portsmouth University, earning 1st Class Honours Degree in 1999. He then moved to London to work as a commercial artist and made books in his spare time. One of these books caught the attention of a literary agent and his first publishing contract followed in 2005.
Michael has since written and illustrated over thirty books for children and these have been translated into many languages worldwide. His picture books have been nominated for the Kate Greenaway Medal and the Stockport Schools Book Award, and his fiction has been shortlisted for the Nottingham Children's Book Award and the Waterstone's Children's Book Prize.
Michael continues to paint alongside book projects and his enduring fascination with stories has fed into a body of work depicting a large cast of characters populating dreamlike landscapes. He has recreated many of these characters as porcelain sculptures.
Michael’s paintings and ceramics reside in private art collections around the world and his work been shown in various exhibitions including the Summer Exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts.
[from: michaelbroad.co.uk/about]
Music: Alio Die "Electrostatic Forest"
![Aleksandra Waliszewska [Part 2]](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/ssrZw8hDJIU/mqdefault.jpg "Aleksandra Waliszewska [Part 2]
The young painters nasty children and fantastic animals invade the canvas with their morbid figures and jarring symbolism as she creates a new Gothic style that meshes surrealist imagery, medieval mystery, fairy tale themes and references to the likes of Hieronim Bosch and Francisco de Goya.
Her early works were inspired by the Quattrocenta style characteristic of the work of Piero Della Francesa, Masaccio and Giotto. Of greatest interest was the role of colour and mood, and the way these 14th-century masters applied paint to the canvas. These inspirations were combined with themes that wove throughout modern art and contemporary art history, as well as the immediate world around her. In her 2000 work Three Graces, an iconic painting of the Madonna is paired with a television set. For Waliszewska, the composition of the image is of principal importance. She also cites the works of Polish graphic artists from the 16th century: Tomasz Treter (1547-1610) and Jan Ziarnko (1575-1628) as greatly inspiring for a number of her works. One of her ambitions is to create a publication that would juxtapose their works with her own, illustrating the threads that connect them.
Moreover, in her paintings one can recognise compositions similar to those from Paolo Uccellos frescoes in the cloisters of the Santa Maria Novella church in Florence, or the atmosphere of Vermeers interiors and even the mystical unrest of Giorgio de Chiricos works. Waliszewskas tasteful and aesthetic canvases brought recognition and first exhibition proposals even during her studies.
Her technique varies from a childlike nonchalance to detailed precision in her depictions of uncanny scenes of battling beasts, children lost in the woods, skulls and skeletons, portraits of faces with missing features or exposed musculature. A lone baby elephant would be sweet if not for the unnervingly evil expression on its face. Her works are unpleasant, often obscene, yet there is something magical about them that draws the viewer in and holds tight. She draws on a shared magazine of popular symbols from horror films, comic books, heavy metal and current events.
Waliszewskas works also inspire other artists across genres - most recently Greek film director Athina Rachel Tsangari, known for the award-winning independent film Attenberg (2010) made a film inspired by a series of drawings by Waliszewska. The Capsule was produced in 2012, along with an art installation, as a commission for the DesteFashionCollection 2012, sponsored by art collector Dakis Joannou. Immaculately filmed, with an enigmatic storyline, the production treads the fine line between art and arthouse cinema.
[from: https://culture.pl/en/artist/aleksandra-waliszewska]
Music: Alio Die Imaginal Symmetry
Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWP_OKuVoSQ&t=233s")
