When I lectured at the Contemporary Art Center of Virginia last week, I got to see their current show of the work of Elizabeth Huey, a Brooklyn artist who is originally from Virginia Beach. Although the show is ending as I’m typing this, I wanted to show you, and talk about, some of her images. Among the most prominent qualities of digital art is synthesis, the ability to integrate very different source materials and weave and manipulate them into something unified and complete. Although there is nothing digital about Elizabeth Huey’s paintings, synthesis is a key descriptor of the artist’s work. She works with several different styles or approaches within a single work and unifies them quite nicely by introducing each of the approaches as integrated, reoccurring themes that interweave themselves throughout the paintings.

The digital and physical worlds are bound to integrate and influence each other more and more as time progresses. Although I certainly can’t speak for the artist, I’ll go out on a limb and suggest that these works are a product of their times and are influenced directly by the fragmentation, synthesis and reunification of images made prevalent by digital technology. In any event, I was excited to see these paintings and it was a bonus to an already great experience lecturing at the museum.

The images below are from the artist’s website, www.elizabethhuey.com