Glistening eyeballs descend from the sky on a ghoulish head, split open by poorly manicured hands. A horned goat creature stands in a field under the stars. Ragged human hands emerge from the mouth of a gigantic horse. These are the scenes which comprise the intricate ink work of Valley StipeMaas, wildlife expert and monster artist. StipeMaas has fed, raised and caught just about every animal under the sun, and currently splits her time more or less evenly between Athens and the remote coastal island of St. Catherine’s, where she lives three days a week monitoring the island’s small population of ring-tailed lemurs. This intimate connection with the natural world brings an accuracy to her work that, in the monstrous context, lends quite a disturbing effect. There is a sense of deep, cryptic folklore in the pen drawings, a distortion of the animal forms she knows so well.
WHO: Valley StipeMaas
WHEN: Friday, Oct. 7, 5–8 p.m.
WHERE: tiny ATH gallery
HOW MUCH: FREE!
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