The Society for Art of Imagination Celebrates Its Fiftieth Anniversary

This selling exhibition, ‘Fifty Years’ Fantastic’, showcases 150 works of art selected from pieces submitted by the 400 artists who support the Society internationally. The Society lives by the credo that Art Should be Challenging.  The exhibition will not only be a selling exhibition to raise funds for the charities the Society supports, but also a showcase of some of the past masterpieces from earlier shows that have become iconic images of Art of the Imagination.  Prices for the works start from £150.

This art form has been known by many names, including Fantastic Realism, Surrealism, Magic Realism, Visionary Art, Cosmic Art and Inspirational Art. However the work is neither purely abstract nor rigidly realistic. All artists in the Society work independently of one another across 23 countries yet their work shows a consistent ethos.  This art form dates right back to the visionary paintings of Jan van Eyck and Hieronymus Bosch, through Leonardo de Vinci, William Blake, Dali’s Surrealism right up to Professor Ernst Fuchs, one of the founders of the Vienna School of Fantastic Realism, who is the Society’s Honorary President. Yet despite this heritage, figurative art has only recently been championed again, by none other than Charles Saatchi, and the Society is continuing to recruit artists from across the globe.  The Society for Art of Imagination is the longest running group of living artists in the field of Imaginative Art in the world.

The historical collection of work to be displayed includes pieces by early members, all of whom have had international exhibitions and high profile clients. Brigid Marlin, whose The Flight of Churches has become one of the iconic images of the Society through to her portraits of the Dalai Lama and the Queen Mother.  Ernst Fuchs’ Biblical works include Psalm 69 (1960) and Adam and Eve in front of the Tree of Knowledge (1984).  Whereas Michel Ouen de St Ouen, brought up in Central Africa from an old French family, is inspired by the Holy Grail, magic and the occult creating Sangreal and Eternal Muse that draw from legends of the lands he has lived in.   

Laurie Lipton’s early work Unleashed Passion portrays a child riding a savage black panther in the remains of a nursery, to her more recent Remote Control, where a terminally ill couple act out the passion of their younger selves through glove puppets – her work is known for the incredible detail and realism brought to life by her pencil. Marcus Usherwood’s Dr. Mengele’s Circus, certainly lives up to the ethos of art is challenging. Diana Hesketh’s carved wooden Leopard recalls the traditions of the Benin people. H.R.Giger merges elements from the Oscar-winning film, Alien, a bat and 1930’s automobile design to create his powerful Guardian Angel. Eike Erzmoneit’s The Narrowing of Stagefright illustrates how his work using the imagery of the wall and his fascination for exploring the idea of changing dimensions exemplified by the space analogies that harks back to his growing up in the shadow of the Berlin Wall.  The selling exhibition will include paintings, mixed media sculpture, including work from a new member, Siddy Langley; she is one of the foremost glass blowers in England.

The Society was founded in 1960 by a group of three artists; Peter Holland, Brigid Marlin and Jack Ray.  They called themselves the Inscape Group, to symbolize the ‘inner landscape of the mind’. Then in 1993 the expanding Inscape Group changed its name to The Society for Art of Imagination.  It became a US charity in 2001 with joint patrons Virginia Rogers and Ann Oestreicher.  (The name Inscape is honoured in the title of the Society magazine.)

The Society’s advisory board includes Jeanie, Countess of Carnarvon, Countess Darya Tolstoy, John Amor, Mary Craig, Mary O’Hara, and Dr Padraig O’Toole. The Honorary art patrons include some of the leading artists in this field of art, Laurie Lipton, H.R. Giger, Lukas Kandl, Alex Grey, Brigid Marlin, Martina Hoffmann, Michael Parkes, Robert Venosa, Ingo Swann and Michel Ouen de Saint Ouen.

Michel Ouen de St Ouen Chairman of the Society comments:”The artist should be a creator, a transformer linked to the inner spirit who, with skill and imagination, constructs a creation which embodies or symbolises a significant human value in a way which never existed before; to enhance, illuminate and perpetuate what is best in human values."

Russell Cassleton Elliott

Cassleton Elliott & Co. Ltd.

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