Art moments: Photo-realist painting & Bio-design

For today very briefly about two of my favourite modern artists, active in completely different domains, and their fascinating work: Bert Monroy, a "photo-realist" painter, and respectively, Luigi Colani, a bio-designer.

• Bert Monroy's motto:

"As a photo-realist painter, I have often been asked why I don’t just take a photograph. Good question, when you consider my paintings look like photographs. Well, for one thing, I’m not a photographer. To me, it is not the destination that is important—it is the journey. The incredible challenge of recreating reality is my motivation".

Since I'll be in Chicago for a conference at the beginning of May, perhaps there'll be a chance for me to actually see the place the artist is creating in "Damen": by all acounts, this is impressive!

• Luigi Colani's motto:

"Whenever we talk about biodesign we should simply bear in mind just how amazingly superior a spider’s web is to any load-bearing structure man has made – and then derive from this insight that we should look to the superiority of nature for the solutions. If we want to tackle a new task in the studio, then it’s best to go outside first and look at what millenia-old answers there may already be to the problem."

Colani's work is currently displayed at London's Design Museum. And I really hate the fact that it seems impossible for me to make it to London before June 17 until when his "Translating Nature" exhibition runs... Here's a glimpse of what I'll miss.