Exploring themes of love, sexuality, relationships, beauty, and more.
Art is, of course, one of the most powerful ways to communicate our shared human experiences. From love and sexuality to relationships and connection, we pulled together some of our favorite pieces and artists that dive into these themes.
Cruz Ortiz: Exploring Connections to Love
Contemporary artist Cruz Ortiz examines connections to beauty, hope, social justice, and more in his varied works. His pieces explore love within his identity, Tejano culture, and his wife, Olivia, who serves as a central muse in his work. Ortiz, known for portraying his deep connection with Olivia through his paintings, suggests that falling in love can be seen as a moment of artistic expression itself.
Chuck Ramirez: Beauty in the Mundane
Chuck Ramirez’s Candy Tray Series explores the beauty of everyday objects and the fragility of life. Ramirez photographed discarded plastic trays after their chocolates were eaten, posing the question: When I’m empty what’s my purpose? In Dark Heart, Ramirez turns a Hershey’s chocolate tray into something melancholic. He chose the tray because he loved the blackness of the heart. The series serves as a reminder of the beauty or value in things that are often thrown away too soon.
Xavier Schipani: Navigating Sexuality and Queer Identity
Xavier Schipani, an Austin-based transgender artist, creates paintings that explore themes of gender, body politics, sexuality, and queer identity. His unique voice and personal connection to these topics results in intimate artworks, challenging viewers to confront fear, anger, and the ambiguity of masculinity as performance. Schipani’s art stands as an exploration of sexuality—what it means to be human in a world that often seeks to define and confine.
Margo Wolowiec: Symbols of Beauty & Hope
Margo Wolowiec has a distinctive technique that combines weaving and computing. She searches social media for images using hashtags or geotags and then finds patterns within different groups. For example, in her piece “Just a Thought,” she searched ‘beauty’ and then transferred the images onto groups of threads, including their flaws and variations, as threads shift during printing. And then she weaves the final piece by hand. Wolowiec’s work symbolizes beauty, hope, empowerment of women, and more, and she intends to inspire positive cultural change.
Tom Jean Webb: Reflecting on Relationships
Tom Jean Webb, originally from the UK and now based in Austin, draws inspiration from the American Southwest. During their separation amid the 2020 pandemic, Tom was separated from his girlfriend in England. He channeled his emotions into artworks such as “A Bridge to One Another.” As travel restrictions lifted, they married, and the piece reflects the emotional journey of being apart.
Alexandra Valenti: Self-Love
Artist Alexandra Valenti’s paintings feature absurdist landscapes, disproportionate bodies, surrealist realities, and more – but it’s self-confidence and love that are the driving forces in her work. She captures the essence of women in power positions, manifesting the art into a reality.
Artwork featured at top of post: Xavier Schipani, Untitled, Moonlight Boys, 2022.
