Halloween Trickster Skelve

Stranger Factory is the newest branch of the Circus Posterus family tree, a unique highly visible gallery located in Nob Hill just off the historically famous Route 66 (Central Ave) in the heart of Albuquerque, New Mexico and is dedicated to bringing a new style of art to the area. With their worldwide network of talent, Stranger Factory will bring many incredible names in the post modern, pop surrealist and “lowbrow” art community for the very first time as well as offering aspiring art collectors the opportunity to begin their collections with original works and editioned releases at reasonable and retail-friendly prices. Stranger Factory is the official flagship retail outlet for all Circus Posterus goods including original artwork, limited edition prints and books, sculptural editions and apparel as well as other gifts, novelties, designer toys, and curious objects of beauty and wonder!Having grown up on the West Coast most of my life and coming from a family of uber ‘antique’ collectors and artists, my eclectic upbringing was filled with a wide range of ’Pop’ ephemera. Many of those inspirations now show up in my work and stem from the backdrop of my childhood. The Subject of my paintings is a world of side-show icons, deviant Animalia, and ‘masked’ glorified cartoon alter egos. I utilize these icons and character cultures as antithetical counterparts to what we are lead to believe as being innocent and socially acceptable. Although misfits on the surface, a sense of relation is understood, secret from the public - we are all misfits; hiding behind animated personas, odd and beautifully unusual. Who is it that we relate to? The lonely little boy hiding in a bear suite, the evil lustful pool-hall wolf, the sexualized little girl who secretly wants more. The environment and its limited population are meant to conjure these questions, the viewers are confronted with fiKathie Olivas is an internationally exhibited multi-media artist from New Mexico. Through her current body of work, the Misery Children, she explores society’s insatiable desire to assign ‘cuteness’ and our discomfort with the unknown. A dark blend of early American portraiture set in post apocalyptic times, Kathie’s paintings and custom toys are a satirical look at how fear affects our sense of reality. One of the central questions raised in Kathie’s work is that of ‘what if’: what if these ‘cute’ creatures had their own agenda? Are they attune to something beyond our understanding, or are we simply too cowardly to acknowledge it? Are their misshapen limbs and plated mouths a deformation from living in a desolate wasteland,or perhaps an adaptation for protection? The Misery Children are meant to evoke a nostalgic reaction that reflects isolation, fear and an uncertainty, yet they also act as empowered alter egos. While these characters explore their new lonely worlds, they double as our narrators. They guide us through their reality as they experience it and yet, even in their company, we are granted no reassurance.