A couple days ago, Sean and I were walking through a stunning BC rainforest reflecting on the connection many metalheads feel to nature. As we looked around at the cycle of growth and decay that flourished around us, we talked about how a disdain or even hate for status quo human society goes hand in hand with a love for the natural world, because one exists at the expense of another. Nature also embraces death and decay because it is at the foundation of life itself, when many human belief systems and societies fear and hide from death and death imagery, all the while obsessing over it. That’s why I am so fascinated with artists who explore human decay, and create images that celebrate its beauty, even when it is instinctively ugly. Hermann Försterling is a painter and photographer whose images remind me of our inevitable demise, twisting our faces into masks of pain and covering our bodies in earth. His work is ugly in its corpselike celebration of the human body, but at the same time it is joyful, celebrating our place in nature and its cycle of life and death. He uses copper plate etching to create haunting imagery that is bathed in the greys and blacks of decomposition. Take a peek at one of his photographic collections below and make sure to explore his site for more.
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