Art in Second Life 2022 (61) City Scenes – Modern and Vintage by Colm Midnight @ Galerie ARTCARE

07 Jul 2022 Leave a comment

by diomitamaurer in Art in Second Life Tags: , , , , , ,

I got a group message about a new exhibition of Colm Midnight (colmmidnight) at Galerie ARTCARE. The artists name rang a bell. I had visited the exhibition “Bouquets and Flowers” by Colm Midnight at Noir’Wen City Gallery back in 2020 (read here).

The new exhibition of Colm Midnight is called “City Scenes – Modern and Vintage“. It consists of 12 smaller vintage pictures of city scenes and 16 larger pictures of modern scenes. The pictures are arranged around a court, so that you are in a city scene with a few trees, a fountain and some benches to sit.

Impressions of City Scenes – Modern and Vintage by Colm Midnight @ Galerie ARTCARE (1)

The vintage pictures are arranged in groups of 3 pictures in each of the 4 corners of the squared exhibition space at ARTCARE Gallery. As far as I could gather, all pictures are based on pictures taken in Second Life. The vintage pictures are monochrom,e processed to look old, a bit blurry and with shadows in the corners. Also the scenes were selected accordingly.
What you don’t notice on a fist glance is that some one the modern pictures – not all – are based on exactly the same picture as the vintage pictures. That is a nice contrast showing what can be done with processing.

Impressions of City Scenes – Modern and Vintage by Colm Midnight @ Galerie ARTCARE (2)

When you hoover your mouse over the pictures you can also see where the pictures were taken and I recognized some places, like Soft Melody, a palce that I visited this year (read here).
Also the modern pictures are processed in different ways. For some pictures Colm added a colour filter or exchanged colours thus making them more colourful and intriguing. One picture of the modern scene is in black and white, it could be a vintage picture as well (although it is not placed in the corners. Here Colm used another technique, using a semi-transparent layer of a flower above the corner of a city buildiung with a fire escape. This picture is my personal favourite.

Impressions of City Scenes – Modern and Vintage by Colm Midnight @ Galerie ARTCARE (3)

Colm Midnight (colmmidnight) is from the US, he’s an artist, creator, and admirer of all that is beautiful in SL. He is in Second Life since 2017. Colm “specializes in vivid photography and colorful painting. He seeks to create unique, positive, and bright abstract artworks that enhance and complement the favored environments of Second Life. Rather than presenting a factual reality, he fabricates an illusion to conjure the imagination and lure the viewer into each canvas. He also is a sculptor in real life.” (taken from the accompaying notecard)

Colm has an own gallery, the Gallery CM at Noir’wen City. I decided to have a quick look. At his gallery Colm showcases colourful pictures, mainly pictures of his exhibition “Bouquets and Flowers”.

Impressions of Colm Midnight’s Gallery CM at Noir’Wen City

ArtCare Gallery is owned and curated by Carelyna. Thank you Carelyna for providing the space for the art and for enabling “City Scenes – Modern and Vintage” by Colm Midnight. I enjoyed my visit.

ARTCARE GALLERY – City Scenes – Modern and Vintage by Colm Midnight
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Melody%20Valley/208/234/3081
CM Gallery Noir’Wen City
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Noir%20Wen/89/221/42

Art in Second Life 2020 (58) Milena Carbone’s art at Noir’Wen City

22 Sep 2020 Leave a comment

by diomitamaurer in Art in Second Life, Exploring sims in Second Life Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

I got an invitation for a particular exhibition at Noir’Wen City, that opens officially on Wednesday September 23rd – “Plead guilty” by Milena Carbone.

It’s the second time that I came across Milena Carbone (mylena1992) and her art. I saw her exhibition “Agape in Pace” at The Itakos Project and Art Gallery in March 2020 (read here)

For Milena Carbone’s exhibtion “Plead guilty“, that extends all over Noir’Wen City, I got a notecard from Nieu (nieuwenhove) and later also from Violet Boa, which describes perfectly a tour not only of this but also of 3 other exhibitions by Milena. I decided to make writing a bit easier for me and to simply use it for my post along with my pictures and some comments.

“Plead guilty” by Milena Carbone above the streets of Noir’wen City

Milena Carbone (mylena1992) is a French artist and is in Second Life since mid 2019. She discovered its artistic potential and since then has devoted all her free time to creation, associating, as in real life, images and texts. By accepting the rule of the “double” (the real “I” and the virtual “I”), Milena Carbone includes herself in her artwork. Her creative process is iterative: some of her images inspire her stories and these stories modify the development of the image, which itself transforms the story.

We arrived at dawn in Noir’Wen City after a quick trip, and we have been immediately fascinated by the density and the harmony of this small regenerated and bustling industrial city of houses and restored buildings in its old factories which do host more than fifty galleries and stores of artists and fetish creators. It is here that Milena has taken over the urban and social space of this small town that has literally become the gallery for her exhibition.

Impressions of “Plead guilty” by Milena Carbone above the streets of Noir’wen City (1)

Going up from the harbor to the central place of Noir’Wen City, the artist has arranged along the streets an impressive gallery of portraits of the inhabitants of this unlikely town who find themselves caught in the act of their desires or dreams. We do not know if each of these portraits overlooking the streets is a wanted poster or the image of their prisoner identity. It is in any case the living beacon of a long apocalyptic poem that we can read as we go along.

Impressions of “Plead guilty” by Milena Carbone above the streets of Noir’wen City (2)

Along your way you find posts with some lines of a poem titled also “Plead guilty”. Above the posts you can click to get to a website from Milena Carbone which offers more background information about the 35 exhibits above the streets and the full poem. Here’s a direct link.

We then visited the church transformed for the exhibition into a place of art where Milena offers us the still unknown “sermon of Mahdi”, the fiction of a new Christ illustrated by paintings inspired by the Renaissance religious art and described in a book readable in SL and exhibited in the church.

Impressions of “The Sermon of Mahdi” by Milena Carbone at Noir’wen City Church

From the church, we reached the castle on the heights of the city, where we had a wonderful lesson about “Nude is Art” with forty original paintings of Milena dedicated to the beauty of the body and its grace, beyond eroticism.

Impressions of “Nude is art” by Milena Carbone at Noir’wen City Castle (1)

We end our visit by stopping at the art center of Noir’Wen to sit for a moment in the center of a virtuous circle of fourteen artworks which illustrate the “nine levels of love” linked with five humanist values. We can then slowly savor the deep pleasures of this new artwork of Milena Carbone, which will require us to plunge back into it to capture all the dimensions and emotions it arouses.

Impressions of “nine levels of love” by Milena Carbone at Noir’wen Art Center

While walking, we could have also seen the galleries of many artists such as Belice Benoir (Ars Amandi), Ambre Singh, Colm Midnight, Al Niekerk, Anaya Oneiro, Jos Loll, Ninatchka, Pask Wasp, KarolinaKatt, BobbiEden, Wyald Woolley … We also noted the presence of a museum of virtual arts with an exhibition on the history of the pink Dildo. But these places will be the occasion of a new visit.

It remains in us the fundamental question that Milena Carbone asks us through this new masterpiece: is it fair to plead guilty?

Impressions of “Nude is art” by Milena Carbone at Noir’wen City Castle (2)

With the opening of “Plead guilty” by Milena Carbone, also this years Noir’Wen city festival has started. It takes place in Noir’Wen city during 2-3 months at the end of the summer.
The Festival will revolve around an original artwork created especially by a selected artist, integrated into the city, with the possibility of using all possible types of visual arts and whose concept will aim to “give life” to the city, its inhabitants and its creators. And the artist of this year is Milena Carbone. There will be quite some events.

I visited Noir’Wen City the first time in April 2020 (read here). Noir’Wen City is a permanent fetish fair with over 50 inworld stores, it is a place to socialize, it is a place for the the arts with several galleries and lots of art exhibited in the streets. Noir’Wen City is a big city and as such offers a great background for pictures and it offers also rentals (luxurious villas). Thank you to Belice Benoir, to Nieu (NieuwenHove) and to the whole team as well as to Nathalie Monday and to Violet Boa who gave me a bit more information.

Landmark to Noir’Wen City
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Noir%20Wen/187/156/32
Landmark to Noir’Wen City – “Plead guilty” by Milean Carbone – Starting point
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Noir%20Wen/80/132/32
“Plead guilty” website
https://medium.com/@539568/plead-guilty-1b69921651d3
Landmark to Noir’Wen City Church – “sermon of Mahdi” by Milena Carbone
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Noir%20Wen/116/136/32
Landmark to Noir’Wen City Castle – “Nude is art” by Milena Carbone
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Noir%20Wen/85/221/42
Landmark to Noir’Wen City Art Center – “nine levels of love” by Milena Carbone
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Noir%20Wen/42/117/23
Simploring 2020 (27) Noir’Wen City
https://themaurers.me/2020/04/10/simploring-2020-27-noirwen-city/

Art in Second Life 2020 (38) Bouquets and Flowers by Colm Midnight

29 Jun 2020 2 Comments

by diomitamaurer in Art in Second Life Tags: , , , , , , ,

For Sunday, May 31st, I got an invitation to the opening of “Bouquets and Flowers”, an exhibtion by Colm Midnight at Noir’Wen City Gallery. I couldn’t attend the opening but I went to the exhibtion on Tuesday, June 2nd.

“Bouquets and Flowers” by Colm Midnight at Noir’Wen City Gallery

The Noir’Wen City Gallery is accommodated in an interesting building. Build on poles, the building has an open 1st floor. The gallery itself is on the 2nd and 3rd floor.
The open 1st floor is used as an event area, for example for openings. It has a bar, seating accomodations and a dancefloor. According to the exhibition the 1st floor is decorated with some wild flowers on the floor and with 2 pcitures from the exhibtion.

Event area at Noir’Wen City Gallery 1st floor

The landmark leads directly to the 2nd floor, one of the 2 floors that are fully used for the exhibtion. You’re surrounded by colourful abstract pictures of flowers and flower arrangements. I can only guess, but I think the pictures are created digitally and are not digitalized images of RL art. They are expressive and convince through the composition of colours. I was in particular intrigued by the 2 large pictures between the 3 large windows. For me, they show how colour and art can make a difference for a room.

Impressions of “Bouquets and Flowers” by Colm Midnight at Noir’Wen City Gallery (1)

Colm Midnight (colmmidnight) is an artist, creator, and admirer of all that is beautiful in SL. He is in Second Life for over 3 years. It is the first time that I came across his art. I can imagine that each of the pictures shown at “Bouquets and Flowers” could dominate a room and be an eye catcher. I’m a great fan of colour anyway.

Impressions of “Bouquets and Flowers” by Colm Midnight at Noir’Wen City Gallery (2)

The exhibtion “Bouquets and Flowers” will stay open until August 31st. All pictures are available for purchse. Thank you Colm for your art and thank you Belice Benoir and Nieu (NieuwenHove) for providing the Noir’Wen City Gallery.

Landmark to Noir’Wen City Gallery
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Noir%20Wen/49/153/43