 It was a beautiful Spring day in Baltimore, Maryland. Not but a few scattered clouds spotted the azure sky. In the sun it was warm and comforting and in the shade it was cool and refreshing. The air was dry and a pleasant breeze carried the fragrance of flowers and grilled food through Mt. Vernon Place, where Augen sat and longed for his love Elsie.
Buses and cars passed Augen as he sat on the marble wall at the East Park and faced the grand monument to George Washington. Augen missed Elsie and wished she could enjoy this moment with her as they would share their nighttime rendezvous. She was traveling with her family and would not be back for another few months. For Augen it was simple to hide in plain sight - all he needed to do was create a mental hologram so he could blend in. Anyone that saw him would see a thin framed middle-aged man that had gone a tad doughy in the middle and not the fuzzy, pale-blue gangly yet doughy suvian of average height that he was. It was a simple trick that all suvians were able to do to blend in, but Elsie was not a suvian and she was not able to blend in as well. The alabaster skin of her saturnine face had typical human features that many men would find irresistible and many women be envious of, but if sunlight was to ever find her skin, it would combust and quickly leave her as a lifeless lump of cremated remains. She was not human and never had been, unlike those humans she could feed on and turn to a vampire. This was always the way for her and her kind - an ancient breed of vampire that aged very slowly, but never died from old age. The males had four horns and although the females did not, they did have four long and deadly canine teeth that were always in place. The statue next to Augen reminded him of his place in this world of humans as well as Elsie’s place. Beasts were beneath them and must be controlled to show them their place. The elders knew that if the suvians ever came out of hiding, they would be in the same place as the beast in the sculpture. The alarm on Augen’s phone went off and snapped him out of such depressing thoughts. He pulled out his phone and with a smile on his face dialed Elsie’s number. She may not be able to sit there with him and enjoy this beautiful day, but her trip overseas planted a wonderful idea in their minds. It was 10pm where she was in Constanța, Romania and the sun had long since set. The call went through and they both tapped the button for FaceTime. “Hello my dear.” Augen cooed. “Hello my love.” Elsie replied. In the candle light Augen could almost see the milky skin on her cheeks blush. “It’s so bright there.” She said as she squinted. “It is beautiful out today and now you just made it even more beautiful.” “It is beautiful here as well. There is magic in the night air here.” She paused for a moment. “I miss you.” “I wish I could have come with you.” Augen stopped the rest of his thoughts. “My dad will come around. Give him time.” Augen could see him look up at her in the background and gave a frown. Augen faintly heard him grumble “What kind of man has no horns. This is no man for my daughter.” Elsie turned so her dad was no longer in view. “Ignore him. I love you just the way you are.” This time, she could see a blush rise on Augen’s fuzzy blue cheeks. She smiled at him. “I should go. My cousins are waiting for us.” They said their good-byes and Augen sat there on the wall with a silly grin on his face. All felt right.  Henrik Aarrestad Uldalen is a self-taught artist that was born in South Korea in 1986, grew up in Norway and currently resides in London. Henrik’s oil paintings have been shown in galleries across the globe and range from miniature to gigantic. He even has murals that grace the sides of buildings, and tiny delicate paintings on glass frames that fit in the palm of your hand. Most of his work is somewhere in-between and that seems to be a comfortable place for his subject matter as well. Henrik’s work is more about feeling than form, despite the fact that the human form plays a major part in his paintings. Like the featured painting “Strife”, his paintings typically seem to begin as photorealistic portraits and dissolve into dreamlike forms or expressions of emotional states. This is sometimes achieved using bold chunky glops of fluid oil paint or even light and airy wisps of smoke and fog where once there was a skull or shoulder. Henrik’s paintings are beautiful, captivating and mesmerizing and I urge you to find more of his work on Facebook, Instagram and his website. You will be happy you did.
Website https://www.henrikaau.com/ https://www.instagram.com/henrikaau/ https://www.facebook.com/henrikuldalen |
Blog StatementAs of October 2016, I intended to use this blog as an accompaniment to my Facebook page and Instagram page. On this blog I post information and updates about my work as well as once a month I highlighted an artist whose work I like (I stopped doing this when I opened my gallery www.GalleryBlueDoor.com). As of March 2017, I began posting a monthly Story Entry with an accompanying illustration of mine. In mid-2019 I took a break from this, but it will resume. Archives
November 2019
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