Black Cats by Tadashige Nishida (1993).
Born in Kagoshima in 1942, Tadashige Nishida studied at Chiba University before traveling to Spain and the United States to study as a post-graduate. Many of Nishida's works present depictions of cats, though he also has produced a number of studies of trees and Mount Fuji.
born in San Simón el Alto, Malinalco, Mexico, 1989
Lives in Tepoztlán, Mexico
Pacheco is an artist, draftsman and set designer. His work embraces the romance and disasters of Mexican history whilst the historic archive of his hometown, San Simón el Alto, feeds his knowledge and imagination. He tells his stories through drawing, starting from the landscape and its accelerated transformation linked to political and identity interests, institutional corruption, centralisation of the population and the the expansion of cities. Pacheco proposes an alternative narrative to question the idea of “identity” imposed on a large part of the Mexican population.
"Shara Hughes was born in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1981. She completed a BFA at the Rhode Island School of Design in 2004. Hughes later attended the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture. She now lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.
Hughes is best known for her bright, invented landscapes, which merge memory, illusion, and observation with expressive brushwork and wild, sometimes clashing, palettes. Hughes rarely refers to external images, instead creating painted worlds that reflect her inner vision and emotional state. ‘I work intuitively’, Hughes has said. ‘I don’t mix up palettes or lay anything out, so when I’m painting, I’m reacting to what I’ve just done. Working this way makes it exciting for me to paint because I never know what’s going to happen. I think that’s why my work seems alive and playful’.
Birds by KIKI SMITH (b. 1954, Germany)
Kiki Smith was raised Catholic and draws heavily on traditional bird symbolism. She uses birds—particularly doves, which represent peace, the Holy Ghost, and freedom—to examine spirituality and mortality.
She kept birds as a child for over a decade. This lifelong affection evolved into a desire to incorporate animals into her art to represent our shared instincts, movement, and vulnerability.
Her process is deeply tactile. She often creates bird reliefs and sculptures using materials like bronze, aluminum, and silver. She views the natural behavior of birds as its own form of environmental "technology"—using the things around them to flourish and build architecture.
"Andrew Cranston (b 1969, Scotland) is a painter-storyteller, a way of working that is enhanced by his often painting on the linen bound covers of old books. His stories coalesce in the process of making - the paintings emerging gradually through the manipulation of his materials: layering, lacquering, bleaching, collaging and constantly re-working his way into images that seem to shift backwards and forwards in time. He has described one of his works as ‘a painting that came out of my brush one day’, a statement that sums up his approach. They are resolutely contemporary in spirit and yet connected by a strong thread to painters of the past, especially perhaps to the intimism of Vuillard and Bonnard, or to Matisse or Munch."
Paula Kamps (1990–2026) German painter dies at 36
Poet and painter Paula Kamps’ works are uncomfortable and incomplete reveries. The artist employs a wet-on-wet, ink-on-canvas technique and a two-part studio process that relies on indeterminate outcomes; the resulting compositions feature figures and faces formed out of spills of color, with arms and hands emerging from masses of pigment. Kamps' work explores fabulation, treating the artist as a disjointed narrator whose recollections are eventually occluded by the passage of time.
Her paintings, often featuring fragmented figures, flowers, and scenes of daily life, bridge watercolor and drawing, with hazy and brilliant stains of color and arcane symbology. She held solo exhibitions at Galerie Christine Mayer in Munich, M. LeBlanc in Chicago, and Sans titre in Paris, and more; taught at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago; and her work is held in permanent collections of institutions such as the X Museum in Beijing.
A Look Into Frank Stella’s Mesmerizing Collection of Diné Textiles
Assembled over decades, the late abstract artist Frank Stella’s breathtaking collection of textiles made by Diné women enters the spotlight for the first time in a New York City presentation ahead of its upcoming sale. Stella developed the selection of 40 weavings from the 19th and 20th centuries according to his personal taste for bold color palettes and dynamic geometric patterns, shirking the typical collecting benchmarks for Diné textile scholarship.
“ What Frank admired so much was the workmanship and the artists who made them, because their sense of geometry resonated a lot with him,” McGurk continued. “They were just so natural and so direct, but really inspired. Frank liked more of the design, the look, the feel, and the idea of the person who made it, rather than the condition.”
“ He would wrap himself up in one in the living room when it was cold, and we hung another up in our house, but they were not on display to other people,” the artist's wife said. said.
Ahlberg Yohe (a leading Navaho textiles scholar) said that most of the objects were categorised as Transitional Period/Era weavings (c. 1880–1910). These are marked by a period of major change in Diné life and artistic tradition due to the emergence of an Anglo market through trading posts, the importation of synthetically dyed yarn, and the consumer shift to rugs, wall-hangings, and decorative pieces over the intertribal preferences for classic blankets known for their durable and meticulous craftsmanship.
(all photos Peter Pap Rugs)
Kristian Zara tells his story:
"I was born in 1986, in Elbasan, Albania. Growing up in a country preparing for drastic political changes leaves heavy drops in your memory—even when you experience it all unconsciously. As a child, you absorb everything unfiltered, especially when you belong to a politically persecuted family—something that persisted for many years after the fall of the dictatorship. And this was no longer imposed by the regime itself, but rooted in the mindset of a society suddenly speaking openly after a seismic political shift.
The history of my ancestors is rooted in the lives of shepherds and wool-production workers who lived between the mountain lines of southern Albania and northern Greece. Apart from being shepherds, they were known for producing knitted woollen goods and carpets, traditionally called qilim in Albanian. These objects were both functional and symbolic—as I think today, they are layers of time, memory, and labor woven into form.
I inherited these elements from my family and grew up speaking two languages simultaneously: Albanian and Vlach. The latter is my family’s native tongue—also known as Aromanian—an Eastern Romance language that evolved from Latin, once spoken in the Balkans during the Roman Empire. This duality shaped my early perception of identity, belonging, and the fragility of expression.
In 2000, I began studying drawing and painting at Elbasan’s artistic high school. After four years, I was awarded an Art Diploma. In 2004, I applied to the Academy of Fine Arts in Tirana. I wasn’t accepted, and shortly after, I left Albania."
Continue reading https://www.meer.com/en/authors/2045-kristian-zara
Peter Grieve's sculptures made from recycled tin and steel capture the natural movements of animals through form and colour.
Sculptor, born in London who studied at Bromley School of Art , 1954-57 and RA Schools, 1957-61. Between the years 1961-64 Grieve taught in Greece, and after at Birmingham Polytechnic.
'I am independent! I can live alone and I love to work.’
Mary Cassatt (1844–1926) was the most celebrated woman artist of her time. A committed member of the Impressionist movement, she was an innovative painter, pastelist, and printmaker. She was the only American to exhibit with the French Impressionists, having met founding Impressionist member Edgar Degas, who invited her to join this avant-garde group of French artists. She was the only American officially associated with the group, and participated in four of their eight exhibitions between 1879 and 1886.
Often dismissed as “sentimental,” her works were, in fact, bold and pioneering both in technique and subject matter. She highlighted the resilience, intellect, and inner lives of women.
In 1890, she attended an exhibition of Japanese woodblock prints and was inspired by the colors and patterns she saw. Using Western techniques, she set out to produce a similar effect, pioneering a new method of printing in color on copper plates.
Cassatt began making drypoints. With this medium, she would use a hard stylus or needle to incise lines directly into a copper plate, which was then inked and printed.
In the final decades of Cassatt’s life, her eyesight started to fade. She created her last works in the early 1910s, and began turning to pursuits outside of art. In 1915, she organized an exhibition with art collector and friend Louisine Havemeyer to benefit women’s suffrage.
(Text adapted from research by Jennifer Thompson, curator of European painting and sculpture at the Philadelphia Museum of Art; Laurel Garber, assistant curator of prints and drawings at the Philadelphia Museum of Art; and Emily Beeny, chief curator of the Legion of Honor.)
Rainy Naha (1949-2026), Native American - Hopi-Tewa, was known for her intricately painted pottery. The tumbling parrots and solstice designs were her unique creations. While she won numerous awards, it was her kindness, laugh, and creativity that brought her so many fans. After working with her for 30 years, she will be greatly missed, but she leaves behind an amazing legacy and family. She is the end of an era.
In 2006, less than six months after artist Vian Sora got married and moved to Istanbul, her uncle, Ammar al Saffar, then Deputy Health Minister in Iraq, was kidnapped from their family home in Baghdad and later killed. Terror invaded Sora’s life as she lost her uncle and her home, so she decided to move to Dubai with her husband. There, she filed a sharia refugee/humanitarian case for her family in the United Arab Emirates. In 2007, after many trials and tribulations, Sora re-settled her parents and siblings, but the financial crisis of 2008 quickly derailed their attempts at re-building a life. Determined to persevere and with few remaining options, Sora and her husband departed for his hometown of Louisville, Kentucky.
“It was a very difficult period,” she says. “My family and I were consistently denied visas to America. I moved between four countries in five years and I struggled to find time to paint or studio space. I confronted multiple difficulties in re-settling my family, particularly since our family home in Baghdad was forcibly taken,” she says. When she finally reached the United States, she and her husband were the primary caregivers of her parents and instead of dedicated studio time, she found herself between two worlds. “It was a low point in my career,” she continues.
However, she was no stranger to struggles or social upheaval. Born and raised in Baghdad, Sora witnessed multiple wars in Iraq firsthand, suffering personal loss while sharing in the collective loss of her country. From a young age, she used art as an outlet to work through the trauma of conflict and displacement. She was surrounded with artists in her daily life as her family ran an antique and art auction. “The creative class was all I knew,” she says, “I picked up a brush at age eight and never let go. I am a self-taught painter.”
2026: A world is succumbing to wars and peace movements are all but gone. The last one in Berlin, where I live, brought together 1500 people only! It's embarrassing!
In my view the modern trends are clear:
- Dehumanisation - this is how you talk about your opponent;
- Government is here to strip people of dignity and funds;
- Pursuit of victory at any cost is what children learn at school;
- Forever war "a la Afghanistan" is a new normal;
- Humanitarian organisations and laws? Just a nuisance for governing bodies;
- Diplomacy is for pussies, threats are a must;
- War crime is a matter of choice: if I like you, then it's self defence;
- Corruption is a matter of opinion: by the right people it's no big deal;
- Hysterical militarisation is the only method of dealing with economic crises;
- You must choose one narrative and never sway, analysis equals disinformation, accepting enemies' concerns is a crime;
- You chose any terminology you like - no restrictions - "wiping out", "eliminating a civilisation", "good and evil nations", "I will decapitate every regime I don't like", "now your resource is mine"...
I can go on, but would like to introduce a few relevant works by Otto Dix, who has seen it all.
"During 1914 to 1918, Dix served as a German soldier on the frontline trenches where the suffering experienced by him and his fellow combatants was depicted in the work that took him six years to produce after the end of the war.
“I had to go to war,” he said in an interview not long before his death in 1969. “I had to live through it. I had to experience what it was like when someone near me was suddenly hit by a bullet and fell . . . I am such a realist, I had to see it all with my own eyes . . . the hunger, the fleas, the mud, the s**tting in one’s pants with fear . . . To be crucified, to experience the deepest abyss of life . . . If you want to be a hero, you also have to affirm the s**t; only through being there and experiencing for yourself can you become a hero.”
A few years earlier he had conceded that war was a dreadful business, “but nevertheless very powerful. I couldn’t possibly miss it. In order to know something about men, you must have seen them in this unfettered state.”
By the late 1920s, the rallying call of Nazism was growing louder. Anti-war art was targeted for destruction and suppression. Called degenerate art, hundreds of pieces were removed from museums, some to be sold abroad and others missing forever, including a Dix’s black and white painting called The Trench of which only a grainy photograph remains. It is estimated that 260 of Dix’s works were confiscated because they were said by the Nazis “to sap the will of the German people to defend themselves.”
When The Trench was exhibited in 1924, its depiction of decomposed corpses in a German trench created such a public outcry that the museum’s director hid the painting behind a curtain. Another critic described it as “perhaps the most powerful as well as well as the most anti-war statements in modern art”.
Dix died in 1969 at the age of 77."
Very well put, and a sad indictment of our current times and how history is on repeat, thanks for highlighting Otto Dix
John Aldridge RA (1905 – 1983) was a British oil painter, draftsman, wallpaper designer, and art teacher in the United Kingdom. He was elected an Associate of the Royal Academy (ARA) in 1954 and a Royal Academician (RA) in 1963.
Born in Woolwich, England, Aldridge grew up in a comparatively wealthy military family. After attending Uppingham School in Rutland, Aldridge studied 'Greats' at Corpus Christi College at Oxford University and graduated in 1928 with a Bachelor of Arts degree. After finishing university, Aldridge settled in London, taught himself to paint and held his first mixed exhibition in 1931.
Aldridge exhibited with the 'Seven and Five Society' at the Leicester Galleries from 1931 to 1933. In 1933, he presented his first one man-show at the Leicester Galleries in London and in 1934 he exhibited at the Venice Biennale art exhibition in Italy. During this period and for the rest of his life, Aldridge associated with the British poet Robert Graves and the poets and artists centred on him in the village of Deià, Mallorca.
"The glass sculptures of Isabel De Obaldia evoke ancient spirits of Panama's rainforests and seas. Many of her pieces have rustic textures that infuse her powerful forms with a compelling force, echoing the volcanic stone sculptures of ancient times. Her metates and vertical works are inspired by Pre-Columbian sculptures from the provinces of Chiriquí and Veraguas, where artisans carve large animal metates and peg-based images of chieftains.
-Dicey Taylor, Metates, New York, Mary Anne Martin/ Fine Art
Isabel De Obaldia was born in Washington D.C. in 1957 of French and Panamanian parents. De Obaldia was raised in Panama, where her father, Guillermo Trujillo was a celebrated painter. She studied architecture at the University of Panama and drawing at the Ecole de Beaux Arts in Paris. She received her B.F.A. in Graphic Design and Cinematography from the Rhode Island School of Design in 1979. She went on to study at the Art Students League in NYC in 1982. Since 1987 she started working with glass at the world-renowned Pilchuck Glass School.
Aaron Morse, b. 1974 in Tucson, AZ
"I am drawn to the mutability of images, the way that a picture or set of cliches might be altered and changed into another thing," Morse notes. "Paintings are real and unreal. My paintings, though broadly representational, are not so realistic as to be confused with reality, so what then is a Wild West or Sci-Fi image actually doing? It's emotional and symbolic, it calls upon our memories of other pictures, both overtly and subconsciously." Aaron Morse's work invites us to experience the sublime in the manner in which grand landscape paintings are designed to do.
Sky Glabush was born in 1970 in Alert Bay, Canada, and currently lives and works in London, Ontario, where he teaches studio art at Western University, Canada. He holds a BFA from the University of Saskatchewan and an MFA from the University of Alberta. Though the artist is most known for being a painter, his oeuvre spans across multiple media and a signature visual style is not easily identifiable. The works of Glabush are at times abstract, at times figurative, but as a whole, they are the result of contemplation on the material, the process, and his past works.
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