🌵🚬🌪 Repost @juliusbaerartcollection The #JuliusBaerArtCommittee started to collect Francisco Sierra in 2014. The painting ‘De Excursie’ is the latest addition to the group of his artworks. In a calm, bare desert landscape, stones resembling pedestals are grouped together. On the highest stands a cactus, next to it a smoking worm-like figure and in the middle a black sculptural stele, all three of them united in a reciprocal exchange. Where does the boundary lie between reality and fantasy? Looking at the photorealistic yet surrealistic paintings of Francisco Sierra, this contrast seems somewhat unclear. Sierra studied violin and is self-taught as a visual artist; having acquired his artistic techniques and knowledge of art history independently, he displays an extraordinary and impeccable level of craftsmanship. His peculiar, multilayered subjects are painted with masterly, brilliant precision and often raise more questions than they answer. Our habitual ways of seeing things are challenged when the artist paints ‘something in this very loving and precise technique, which is based on a strange aesthetic’, taking a cheeky look at the somewhat fusty genres of still lifes, landscapes and portraits. Image: Francisco Sierra (b. 1977), ‘De Excursie’ (2016), oil on canvas, 80 x 60 cm, courtesy the artist and #JuliusBaerArtCollection @francisco___sierra #FranciscoSierra #CorporateArtCollection #SwissContemporaryArt #ArtInspires