Love & Love Art Gallery is, for me, a new venue for art in Second Life. Curated by Lylaya Love (lylaya), and co-founded by her and her partner Bohemio Love (Bohemi0), the gallery occupies a pristine 3-storey building set with a 4096 sq metre parcel set out with a small, tidy garden space before it.
At the time of my visit, the ground floor space of the gallery was not in use – I’ve no idea if it will offer future exhibitions – with a teleport offering the way up to the upper two floors.
On the first of these, Cornelia Augusta (cornelia Longfall) presents Kaleidoscope of Souls, an exhibition of avatar studies across the floor’s two halls and set within an environment that is best appreciated with the viewer’s Advanced Lighting Model (ALM) enabled (Graphics → Preferences → check Advanced Lighting Model if required – note that you do not have to enable Shadows as well, so the rendering impact should hopefully be minimal).
The studies appear to be of Cornelia and her friends / those close to her, and are largely “traditional” in that they offer a head and shoulders view of the subject. They are refreshing in that they appear to have had little or no post-processing. On the one hand, this perhaps means these portraits are not so vibrantly life-like as avatar studies produced by others: skin toning may not appear to be flesh-like, features have not been re-touched or enhanced to add further “humanness” before the avatar’s natural look, etc.
However, on the other hand, they allow us to see the avatars as they are, something that imbues them with their own distinct life, rather than being seen as an image attempting to mimic life. Thus, it is possible to discern within them more of their own nature mixed with the nature of their creators, rather than seeing an interpretation of that mix of natures as perceived by the artist as a result of extensive re-editing.
On the upper floor is an exhibition of physical world paintings by Oblomov (Jos Bookmite) entitled Pesci (Fishes).
As the name implies, the paintings here are very much about fishes – although they are not all piscine in nature; there are also molluscs, sea-snails and mermaids waiting to be seen. Set within an environment suggestive of the sea floor, these are highly stylised sea creatures, some of which clearly have a life of their own waiting to be found in their expressive forms / faces suggestive of a range of emotions, with some of the fish looking very human in their expressions.
Colourful, happy, mischievous, and in places, slightly sinister, these paintings all have their own stories waiting to be discerned by visitors.
Two very different art displays within a single gallery space, joined by their own unique approaches to their subjects, Kaleidoscope of Souls and Pesci are equally enjoyable exhibitions. As they opened in mid-May, I’m not entirely sure how long they will both be around, so do make a point of visiting the gallery sooner rather than later, just in case.
SLurl Details
- Love and Love Art Gallery (Sexy Sands, rated Adult)
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 
Reblogged this on KULTIVATE.
LikeLike