Feel Like We’re Living in Surreal Times? Let These 5 Leading Hyperrealist Artists Ground You

These artists prove that there's more than one way to do realism.

Javier Banegas, Dream. Courtesy of Plus One Gallery.

Since its founding in 2001, Plus One Gallery has been London’s go-to venue for Hyperrealist art, offering a wide variety of the style by leading artists.

In our present moment, in which everyday life seems increasingly surreal, hyperrealist art can feel like a welcome visual grounding. But there’s more than one way to capture reality—so whether you’re seeking simulacra street scenes or contemporary still lifes, here are five artists whose work you should know, and can currently be seen either online or by appointment. 

 

Pedro Campos

Pedro Campos, Simply Delicious. Courtesy of Plus One Gallery

Pedro Campos, Simply Delicious. Courtesy of Plus One Gallery

Pedro Campos’s still lifes have an air-tight precision, with cans of Coca-Cola, glass canisters filled with jellybeans, bottles of liquor, and coffee-table art books pictured on pristine and glossy countertops. One has the feeling of glimpsing inside the home of a meticulous minimalist with a sweet tooth and a penchant for an after-dinner drink. 

 

Javier Banegas

Javier Banegas, Colour Shavings II. Courtesy of Plus One Gallery

Javier Banegas, Colour Shavings II. Courtesy of Plus One Gallery

Anyone who’s ever dabbled in painting or drawing knows that there’s a luxuriousness to the raw art materials themselves. Javier Banegas certainly does—the artist fills his canvases with pigment jars, art pencils, and canisters of ink that somehow manage to capture the chromatic density of the materials themselves—and could inspire any lapsed artist (especially anyone now at home) to start creating. 

 

Paul Cadden

Paul Cadden, Passing Through. Courtesy of Plus One Gallery

Paul Cadden, Passing Through. Courtesy of Plus One Gallery.

At first glance, one might mistake Paul Cadden’s detailed drawings for black-and-white photographs. His detailed images often have the journalistic feel of street photography, with cropped-in angles and a sense of daily motion. Only closer inspection reveals the images to be meticulously detailed pencil drawings. 

 

Andres Castellanos

Andres Castellanos, Flat Iron Building. Courtesy of Plus One Gallery

Andres Castellanos, Flat Iron Building. Courtesy of Plus One Gallery

Andres Castellanos’s panoramic street scenes are especially poignant, almost wistful, as cities around the globe impose quarantines, asking citizens to stay at home, and emptying out iconic plazas and intersections. Here, see life as it was just a few weeks ago, in scenes of New York, Paris, and London. The images are a soothing escape for those suffering from cabin fever. 

 

Alexandra Klimas

Alexandra Klimas, Olivia the Cow. Courtesy of Plus One Gallery

Alexandra Klimas, Olivia the Cow. Courtesy of Plus One Gallery

Dutch artist Alexandra Klimas is known for her large-scale portraits of farm animals, and mainly cows, animals which used to dot landscapes of Holland but are now rapidly disappearing from view as mega-farms forbid grazing. Her images imbue these creatures with a sense of personality and sweetness.


Follow Artnet News on Facebook:


Want to stay ahead of the art world? Subscribe to our newsletter to get the breaking news, eye-opening interviews, and incisive critical takes that drive the conversation forward.