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 Raven by Andrew Denman
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"The Trickster"
18 x 24" Acrylic on Cradled Board
2017
Raven
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In this piece, one of my favorite birds, the raven, struts and frets across the stage. Ravens are the omnipresent tricksters and scavengers, but transformed into a densely repetitive background pattern one can’t help but be reminded of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds, while the luminous blue and red palette also suggests something ineffably American. Symbolically, ravens can be bringers of good or bad luck, positive or dreadful tidings, but whichever your view, they are undeniably entertaining. That certainly comes across here with a distinct pop-art vibe, and the marching rows of stridently colorful birds standing in for Andy Warhol’s iconic soup cans.

This is another piece in my recent “Pattern” series. By taking an animal and reducing it to a silhouetted, stamp-like form, and repeating that shape to create a background pattern, the animal subject is pitted against a mass-produced image of itself. In most cases, the effect is humorous, evoking the animal’s ubiquity, life cycle, or reproductive capacity. In all cases, this systematization of a natural shape highlights the significance of the animal in human life and culture.

Nature appears chaotic to us, but it is actually highly organized in its own way. It is our desire to control and conquer, arising from the innately human need for structure, that causes us to project our own artificial categories, our own systems of naming and organizing, onto the plants and animals around us. My patterns series seeks to explore this phenomenon in a fun and playful manner, re-contextualizing wildlife into a world of flat shapes, repeated imagery, brand logos, and ones and zeros, searching for old truths in a new world. As Gertrude Stein once wrote, “There is no such thing as repetition. Only insistence.”


























Welcome to the online home for artwork by Andrew Denman, a California –based, internationally recognized, award-winning contemporary wildlife artist. Denman primarily paints wildlife and animal subjects in a unique, hallmark style combining hyper-realism with stylization and abstraction. His dynamic and original acrylic paintings can be found in museum collections on two continents and in numerous private collections in the USA and abroad. His clear voice, unique vision, and commitment to constant artistic experimentation have positioned him on the forefront of an artistic vanguard of the best contemporary wildlife and animal painters working today.
All artwork and text featured on this page and throughout this website is protected by international copyright laws. Use of these images or text is prohibited without the express written permission of Andrew Denman.