2023
Chicago-based fine art painter Bruno A. Surdo creates provocative works centered around the human condition. Classically trained in drawing and oil painting in the tradition of Renaissance masters, Surdo displays a strong command of the human form and explores the depths of humanity through his dynamic compositions of people and places. With a focus on figurative realism and portraiture, he communicates a personal commentary on the world around him through the universal language of visual art. A native to Chicago, Bruno Surdo has exhibited widely throughout the United States and his work is held in prestigious art collections around the world. Founder of The School of Representational Art in Chicago, IL, Surdo is a lecturer and educator who believes in nurturing others.
$25,000
H 78.75 in W 141.74 in D 2.37 in
Chinese Contemporary Art by Su Yu - No Heroes in Troubled Times
By Su Yu
Located in Paris, IDF
Oil on canvas Su Yu is a Chinese artist born in 1987 who lives & works in Beijing in China. He was an old student of prestigious art teachers as Shi Liang & Chen Danqing...
Canvas, Oil
$25,000
H 78.75 in W 141.74 in D 2.37 in
Chinese Contemporary Art by Su Yu - No Heroes in Trouble Time
By Su Yu
Located in Paris, IDF
Oil on canvas Su Yu is a Chinese artist born in 1987 who lives & works in Beijing in China. He was an old student of prestigious art teachers as Shi Liang & Chen Danqing at Oil Pain...
Canvas, Oil
$450
H 14 in W 12 in D 1 in
Reflection- 21st Century Contemporary, Figurative Portrait, Fashion
By Gobe Joseph
Located in Ibadan, Oyo
Shipping Procedure Ships in a well-protected tube from Nigeria This work is unique, not a print or other type of copy. Accompanied by a Certificate of Authenticity. About Artist Gob...
Canvas, Mixed Media, Oil, Acrylic
$5,500
H 27.96 in W 18.9 in D 1.58 in
American Contemporary Art by Carlos Gamez de Francisco - Engaging Conversation
Located in Paris, IDF
Acrylic on canvas Carlos Gamez de Francisco is an American artitst with Cuban origins born in 1987 who lives and works in Fort Myers, FL, and Louisville, KY. He has received numerou...
Canvas, Acrylic
$6,394
H 47.25 in W 43.31 in D 1.58 in
Fauno - 21st Century, oil painting, canvas, portrait, social commentary
By Ricardo Tena
Located in Barcelona, Catalonia
Renowned for his mastery in design and sculpture, Tena embarked on a profound personal journey in 2023, which rekindled his passion for painting after a 30-year hiatus. His return to...
Canvas, Oil, Acrylic
People on Display
By John Hardy (Artist)
Located in Long Island City, NY
People on Display John Hardy, American (1923–2014) Oil on Canvas Image Size: 30 x 40 inches Size: Size: 36 x 46 in. (91.44 x 116.84 cm)
Oil
The Dissidents: Discourse on the Golden Mean
By Michael Tole
Located in New Orleans, LA
Michael Tole says of his work… This work draws a connection between the didactic moralizing tendencies of Neo Classicism (represented in the style of the painting) and Modernism (represented in the architectural setting). Though modern art eschews the naturalistic imagery used by Neo Classicists, both movements pursued a self-important, austere, self-consciously masculine aesthetic that they saw as synonymous with virtue. Set in the MoMA courtyard, a passel of men lounge about, regarding a golden statue which looks terribly out of place in this modernist vitrine. The uncomfortable architectural setting, prisonlike and cold, provides a foil for the odalisque-like young men sprawled on hard stone benches and paying homage to the central idol. In my current work, The Revisionist Histories, I am writing letters to art history, literature, and mythology in an attempt to reflect the social changes that have reshaped our society over the past century. As part of this agenda, I explore the evolution of gender norms, power dynamics, and representation within Western visual culture and what this implies for the negotiation between pleasure, justice, and our culturally specific discourse on beauty. The seed for The Revisionist Histories was sewn when I caught a glimpse of my preteen daughters watching music videos on their iPad as I chopped veggies for dinner. Out of the corner of my eye I caught glimpses of music videos featuring Beyonce, Taylor Swift, Ariana Grande, Katy Perry, and Doja Cat gyrating across the tiny screen. A better parent might have snatched the iPad away, but I was overcome with hallucinatory visions of this pop diva...
Oil, Canvas
$25,000
H 59.06 in W 78.75 in D 2.37 in
Chinese Contemporary Art by Su Yu - The Ying-Yang Game in the Age
By Su Yu
Located in Paris, IDF
Oil on canvas Su Yu is a Chinese artist born in 1987 who lives and works in Beijing. He was an old student of prestigious art teachers as Shi Liang & Chen Danqing at Oil Paintin...
Canvas, Oil
$9,990
H 39.38 in W 47.25 in D 1.58 in
Erupt - 21st Century, Oil Painting, Realism, Animal world
By Augustina Droze
Located in Barcelona, Catalonia
The contemporary artist Augustina Droze, uses animals as symbols to describe her personal lived experiences. Her current body of work explores her life as a foreigner, her gaze upon ...
Canvas, Oil
$8,527
H 59.06 in W 47.25 in D 1.58 in
Florence - 21st Century, oil painting, canvas, portrait, social commentary
By Ricardo Tena
Located in Barcelona, Catalonia
Renowned for his mastery in design and sculpture, Tena embarked on a profound personal journey in 2023, which rekindled his passion for painting after a 30-year hiatus. His return to...
Canvas, Oil, Acrylic
On Stage It's Okay to Be Different - An Homage to the Rocky Horror Picture Show
By Bruno Surdo
Located in Chicago, IL
This crowded theater scene shifts focus from performance to spectatorship, drawing inspiration from the cult spectacle of The Rocky Horror Picture Sho...
Canvas, Oil
The Union of Different Skies: Contemporary Oil Painting, 60x48 in
By Bruno Surdo
Located in Chicago, IL
In The Union of Different Skies, Bruno Surdo transforms an ordinary urban crowd into a contemporary history painting. The compressed space, layered figures, and heightened atmosphere...
Canvas, Oil
The Bustling of Time, Oil on Canvas Painting, Old Masters Style, 2026
By Bruno Surdo
Located in Chicago, IL
The Bustling of Time captures one of Bruno Surdo’s recurring strengths: his ability to turn an ordinary public moment into something quietly theatrical and emotionally resonant. At t...
Canvas, Oil
Interchange Between Myth and Reality - Monumental Painting, Original Oil
By Bruno Surdo
Located in Chicago, IL
Interchange Between Myth and Reality is Bruno Surdo’s contemporary banquet scene—an ambitious reimagining of the grand Venetian feast painting for the 2...
Oil, Canvas
Nature's Web of Dependency - Large Scale Oil Painting with Animals and People
By Bruno Surdo
Located in Chicago, IL
This painting exemplifies Bruno Surdo’s synthesis of Renaissance figuration, Northern allegory, and psychological symbolism. Female figures twist and overlap beneath a lattice of tree branches, while animals—a lamb, fox, squirrel, hummingbird—inhabit the same compressed pictorial space. The interlocking limbs and diagonals recall High Renaissance and Mannerist strategies of sculptural composition, and Surdo’s atelier training is evident in the anatomical precision and volumetric modeling of flesh. Yet the scene feels intentionally dense and claustrophobic. Rather than a pastoral idyll, the forest becomes charged—alive with tension, concealment, and layered meaning. The symbolic animals situate the work within a long art historical lineage. The lamb evokes innocence or sacrifice; the fox suggests cunning and instinct; birds often signify fragility or spirit; the spider embedded in the branches recalls vanitas traditions of the Dutch Golden Age, where small creatures signal mortality and hidden threat. However, the background introduces an additional, more psychological register: the partially obscured eye and the numbers 3, 5, and 7. These are not naturalistic elements; they intrude like fragments from another realm. Their presence subtly aligns with Jungian thought—an area of interest for Surdo—where numbers function as archetypal structures of order within the psyche. In Jungian symbolism, such numbers carry qualitative meaning rather than mere quantity, suggesting stages, wholeness, embodiment, or cycles of psychic development. Their appearance within the forest—traditionally a metaphor for the unconscious—suggests the mind’s attempt to map or structure instinctual terrain. The eye, half-hidden behind branches, intensifies this reading. It can be understood as a symbol of awareness or consciousness emerging from within the thicket of instinct. Rather than divine omniscience, it feels psychological—an archetypal “watcher” embedded in the natural world. The forest thus becomes more than environment; it reads as psychic landscape. Surdo collapses civilization and instinct, rational structure and animal impulse, into a single visual field. Within his broader oeuvre—often concerned with the tension between performance and authenticity, order and chaos—this work becomes a contemporary myth of the psyche. Renaissance form provides authority and structure, while allegorical animals and Jungian symbols suggest the layered architecture of the unconscious. The result is a painting that feels timeless yet inwardly modern: a meditation on innocence, predation, awareness, and the hidden numerical and symbolic frameworks through which the human mind seeks to understand its own wilderness. Bruno Surdo Nature's Web of Dependency oil on canvas 64h x 66.50w in 162.56h x 168.91w cm BRS082 Bruno A. Surdo b. Chicago, 1963 EXHIBITIONS 2021 Ethos + Truth, Gallery Victor Armendariz, Chicago, IL 2020 Realities, Gallery Victor Armendariz, Chicago, IL 2018 Liberation, Gallery Victor Armendariz, Chicago, IL Blood Sport, Gallery Victor Armendariz, Chicago, IL Art on Paper 2018, Gallery Victor Armendariz, Pier 36, New York, NY SOFA Chicago 2018, Gallery Victor Armendariz, Navy Pier, Chicago, IL 2017 POP!ARAZZI, Gallery Victor Armendariz, Chicago, IL Coming Attractions, Gallery Victor Armendariz, Chicago, IL 2015 SOFA Chicago 2015, Ann Nathan Gallery, Navy Pier, Chicago, IL Bruno Surdo: Allegories, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL 2014 Bruno Surdo: Respond, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL Modern Metaphors, Rockford Art Museum, Rockford, IL 2013 Bruno Surdo: Revelations, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL Vice + Virtue, Northern Illinois University Museum of Art 2012 Contemporary Realism Biennial, Fort Wayne Museum of Art, Fort Wayne, IN 2011 Bruno Surdo, University of St. Francis School of Creative Arts, Fort Wayne, IN Uncensored, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL 2010 Art Chicago 2010, Ann Nathan Gallery, Merchandise Mart, Chicago, IL 2009 Art Chicago 2009, Ann Nathan Gallery, Merchandise Mart, Chicago, IL 2007 Bruno Surdo, Art Institute of Indianapolis, Indianapolis, IN 2006 Context/Content: Making Meaning with the Figure, University of Arkansas, Conway, AR Creative Imaginings, Mobile Museum of Art, Mobile, AL Bruno Surdo: Cycles, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL 2005 Art Chicago 2005, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL 2004 Tragedy, Memory, & Honor, Richard M. Daley Center, Chicago, IL Art Chicago 2004, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL Group Show, Arcadia Gallery, New York, NY Drawings VII, Koplin Del Rio Gallery, West Hollywood, CA Armory Show, New York Armory, New York, NY 2003 Paintings & Drawings, College of Lake County, Grayslake, IL The Art Show, New York, NY Bruno Surdo: New Work, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL Art Chicago 2003, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL 2003-10 International Show of Contemporary Artists, Chicago Art Open, Chicago, IL 2002 Bruno Surdo: Perception of Appearance, Frye Museum, Seattle, WA Tragedy, Memory, & Honor, Richard M. Daley Center, Chicago, IL Bruno Surdo: Transcendence, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL Art Chicago 2002, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL Tragedy, Memory, & Honor, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL 2001 Magic Vision, Arkansas Art Center, Little Rock, AR 1998 Evanston and Vicinity Artists, Evanston Art Center, Evanston, IL 1996 Bruno Surdo: A Personal View, University of Wisconsin, Kenosha, WI 1995 Bruno Surdo: Recent Works, College of Lake County, IL AIDS in Our Society, Loyola University, Chicago, IL Bruno Surdo: Life, Struggle, and Hope, Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, IL 2001 Magic Vision, Arkansas Art Center, Little Rock, AR Bruno Surdo: Dualities of Life, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL 1999 Group Show, Ann Nathan Gallery, Chicago, IL 1998 Group Exhibition, Fine Arts Building Gallery, Chicago, IL 1995 Spiritual Inquiries, Struve Gallery, Chicago, IL 1994 Recent Works, The 14th Annual Juried Exhibition for Lake County Artists, Grayslake, IL Go Figure, Figurative Works on Paper, Chicago Printmakers Collaborative, Chicago, IL SELECTED COLLECTIONS The Re-Birth of Venus, Temporary Loan, Fort Wayne Museum of Art Arkansas Art Center, Little Rock, AR College of Lake County, Greyslake, IL Flashpoint Academy, Chicago IL John Robert Wiltgen Design Shoemaker Ruud Collection Julie & Thomas Danilek Michael Vozzella and Mike Silver Benjamin Fernandez Tom Braake Betsy Colburn Michael Diemand & Lor LaRose Michael Staab & Kathy Brock Bruce Leep Frank Tzurect Mary Foley Rosalyn Carlson Mimmy Turney Janet Long Halstead Billy Hunt Carol Galli Myles Kerrigan Honorable & Mrs. Edwin Berman Theodore Gage Northrop Art Museum Past Present & Future Company Dr. James & Peggy Kemmler Salvatore Monastero Nix & Virginia Lauridsen Joel Miller David & Marlene Zerkel Ann & Andy Abel Claudia Rush Marc Miller Leonard Goldberg Lawrence Pucci Howard Tullman Collection Susan & Manny Kramer James Rinnert Richar Interiors Michael & Nancy Colt Khalid Altijir Dr. Joe Grodman Beryl & Jack Gore Larry Wolf & Eric Naegle Chuck Wolandi Jack Schwab & David Sandelin Thomas Kaczmarek Marti Dinerstein Craig & Michael Golden...
Canvas, Oil
Crossroads of Time, Oil on Canvas Painting, 40x78 in, Signed, 2026
By Bruno Surdo
Located in Chicago, IL
Crossroads of Time This painting captures the feeling of arriving at a moment where lives, generations, and sensibilities overlap without fully touching. Surdo stages the street like...
Canvas, Oil
