7 Modern Painters That Create Unimaginable Realistic Artworks

Realistic artworks are widely associated with the northern and southern schools of Europe of the 17th century. A few centuries further, photorealism arose in the 1960s, by a pioneering group of American and European artists. Today’s modern painters continue to push the limits of realism and photorealism, expressing how visual language can be imaginative and abstract. I Lobo You speaks of 7 modern painters who give a new life to this meticulous style in their artworks.

Gregory Block

Denver-based modern painter, Gregory Block presents an irreverent quality in his artworks, that is both whimsical and thought-provoking.

Each of us experiences the constant reality of living in our own minds, messy and abstract though it may be. And painters like the Abstract Expressionists and others could be considered ‘realists’ in that realm. Then there’s the external reality with which we constantly interact: the subject of what we generally consider ‘realist’ art. At best, I hope my work first appears as externally real but, upon further scrutiny, pulls the viewer down the continuum toward a deeper, more internal and mysterious reality that’s less easily quantified.
Gregory Block

Richard Combes

Richard Combes gives common spaces, like office hallways and pedestrian crossing a new life, transforming them into places that spark the imagination. For instance, jam and butter on a slice of bread look both unctuous and inviting.

I like to make a view of an empty street seem like a stage set ready for the actors to appear. Artists who have influenced my work include Antonio López-Garcia, I love the way he paints architecture, Vermeer, for the way he captures light falling on surfaces, and Edward Hopper, for the atmosphere he creates in empty spaces.
Richard Combes

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John Moore

In John Moore’s artworks window scenes have a hypnotic effect, as viewers stare at the picture, it comes to their mind they are looking at a canvas depicting an industrial landscape at dusk that is perched on an easel in front of a different sunset scene outside.

What draws me to subject matter are places that connect with memories, that suggest ideas or perhaps have a melancholy attribute. A representational painting does not require a certain amount of previous information, a context or a degree in art theory. “A representational painting is accessible, available and brings associations that directly connect with lived experiences, and if it has flawless technique, that’s even better.

John Moore

Bruce Cohen

Stylish and surreal are the words that best describe Bruce Cohen’s modern paintings. The stillness with which his paintings are inspired owes to the sculptural quality of the objects depicted and the strong dialogue he sets up between natural light and shadow.

I believe that a painter can take the simplest subject matter and put something of themselves into it. My interiors are a combination of observation, memory and invention. Perhaps this is where they get their dreamlike quality. In my work, it is the combination of flat, two-dimensional shapes and light that gives them a sense of space.
Bruce Cohen

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Matthew Hopkins

Matthew Hopkins works in both watercolor and oil, and the modern painter sees beauty in the seemingly prosaic. In his artworks, a hammer is almost anthropomorphic.

I paint things that endure, things that have been and always will be. To build my paintings, I distill and refine each image using a combination of photos, drawings and working from life. I consider my still-life paintings to be portraits, and I seek what’s significant about the ordinary.
Matthew Hopkins

Yoshihiro Fujita

The Japanese artist, Yoshihiro Fujita, is inspired by Manga comics, as his paintings highlight wide-eyed characters, zeroing in on their doll-like glassy irises.

Unlike real dolls, the dolls I paint are not supposed to be playful. They allow me to provoke a reaction in the spectator by creating a feeling of intrusion and disruption. My goal in the realization of extremely realistic canvases is to cause emotional upheaval in the spectator.
Yoshihiro Fujita

Eric Forstmann

The modern painter Eric Forstmann paints inanimate everyday objects, with amazing precision! His new works featuring shirts, even seem to have personalities of their own.

I love presenting objects of a common nature in a new light, following a kind of oddball arrangement and theater. The objects tell stories that are different for everyone or similar for different people. Realism to me is respect for the actual, a fascination with the minuscule, an adoration for the ordinary. And a strong sense of time and how to spend it, extend it and comprehend it.
Eric Forstmann