Fortress by Amy Casey
8"x8" ($24) | 11"x11" ($60) | 16"x16" ($240)
In our third edition with long-time 20x200 artist Amy Casey, we find ourselves enchanted by yet another of her surreal urban spaces. Casey has a knack for embodying different perspectives on city life with her dreamy visuals, whether we're talking intricate webs, or dizzyingly tall towers of buildings. In Fortress, smaller stacks of homes and businesses are loosely wrapped with brick ribbon, calling to mind the winding path one takes while wandering around town.
What makes Amy Casey’s work even more impressive (and hypnotizing) is knowing that each individually inked and drawn building is sourced from her own life. Clevelanders like Casey may even recognize a few of these structures! This meticulous attention to detail allows her to create complex, chaotic worlds, crafted by precise strokes of ink and paint. Her talent has not gone unnoticed—she won the Cleveland Arts Prize just a few years ago and has long been loved by art sites like Colossal.
Locking our eyes on Fortress, we can’t say we’re surprised. An entire world is contained in this complex cluster, or at least the entire world of someone living within the constructed cityscape that is her subject. Casey says the idea of accumulating parts to create a greater whole often fuels her painting. That concept is more than clear in Fortress, where the artist has collected buildings the way one might collect curios: rather whimsically and with gusto.
In a way, Fortress celebrates the home we carve out in the midst of urban chaos—our own places, sure, but also the apartments of friends, our key coffee shops, the restaurants we frequent with our favorite people, all tied together and fortified by the ribbon of our footpath.
With art for everyone,
Jen Bekman + Team 20x200
