inevitability 2020

"Inevitability", by Alex Gross, is some kind of allegory painted with oils and brushes, obviously. Just look at the surface texture! So smooth and buttery, it's all about the careful layering of thin glazes, almost like an airbrush but definitely not. It’s as if you could dive right into that cotton candy sky. What’s interesting to me is the contrast between this super-slick rendering and the complete weirdness of the image: Thanos, the Marvel villain, with baby Yoda in his arms, riding a giant bunny rabbit, floating above a rainbow meadow. It’s a high-low mix that pulls your eye this way and that. Speaking of which: I can't help but be drawn to the poppy field in the foreground, where each flower is meticulously rendered, as are the bees buzzing around them. It's like a hyper-real dreamscape. Gross is doing something like Magritte, playing with recognizable images but in a way that turns the world upside down. We don’t know what’s possible until someone imagines it for us.