When is a painting not a painting?
Mixed media artist Alexa Meade presents that question in images that look like somewhat painterly expressionist/realist paintings but are in reality painted objects, including people.
For her living paintings series Meade applies acrylic paint to the surfaces of objects and walls in way that mimics the appearance of brushwork in a painting, so that the scene, when viewed in a two dimensional photograph, appears to be an oil painting.
The effect is convincing, so much so that it’s difficult to tell until you see an accompanying photograph that shows the scene out of context. In the Portfolio on Meade’s site, the images that pop up when you click on the initial image are usually part of a series, in which the last image is often the one that reveals the “reality” of the scene.
Meade posts her most recent works to a Flickr set.
[Suggestion courtesy of Mark Miller]