Born into a Southern-German aristocratic family, Albrecht von Stetten grew up in a converted monastery, surrounded by Medieval and Renaissance art. He had to put his artist’s dreams on hold to run the family’s farms, which he quietly turned into one of Europe’s largest agricultural conglomerates.
After selling off much of the business in 2013, his life was a clean canvas again. He returned to his boyhood passion by buying art, which shifted gear when he met Kiki Kim and decided to work with her to build and curate a world-leading collection. A watershed conversation with an artist one night in Spain opened his eyes to the grim reality of the art world, which almost guarantees that true Masterpieces never see the light of day – an enormous disappointment for the artist and a regrettable loss to humankind.
On the spot, Albrecht promised to fund the artist for as long as it would take to bring out his own, personal masterpiece. The experiences that followed eventually led to the IBEX Masters model that liberates, on so many levels, the most amazing super-realistic artists alive today. Each individual artist is offered the golden egg of guilt-free time spent exclusively on their brilliant creations.
This Masterpiece is the triptych Faith, Hope, Love, which was born when, musing on the state of the world, Christiane, doodling and sketching, felt a sentence from somewhere flow from her pen: “Keep the Faith, don’t lose Hope, Love is the answer…” The women in this triptych are at home in their own bodies, aware of their souls, and connected with Life.
In Datura, Wang Xiao Bo paints a woman sitting on the neck of a man. He’s muscled and can easily carry her on his shoulders, yet his hands are grabbing his lowered head in, what looks like, confusion or despair. About their relationship? His own life? This Masterpiece was named after a flower known for its beauty and thorns.
Abundance to what end? The space in Avilleira’s Masterpiece is vibrant and intense. Filled with an abundance of props from Antonio’s personal life, the models seem very much aware of being watched and engage the viewer with confident, direct eye contact. White Rhinoceros is Antonio Avilleira’s first work that he wholeheartedly admits fully identifying himself with.
Nobuyuki’s One Side Wing talks about human life and death, as well as the uncertainty within it. He says that looking at life beyond his 50s, “I came to realize that things in the world do not flow as I thought, and many things that I do not know can suddenly come from one side of life and change our lives completely.”
In his IBEX Masterpiece titled A Portrait Of Time, Osamu Obi again endeavors to incorporate the past, present and future into one canvas. The young woman gazing at us is quite obviously present, alive and alert, while the tree trunk lying on the floot speaks of old age, but in a homey matter.
At first sight, the male figure here seems the more powerful of the two. He’s older and wears gold chains around his neck. He is in decent shape and looks well groomed, an indicator of privilege. The woman, reclining, is in sublime shape by the mainstreams norms of our society. Even when she’s lying down, she’s actually the one in control. Desirable, confident and with a mix of indifference and haughtiness.
The Three Graces is a departure from HyungJin’s previous work in more than one way. For starters, the work features multiple characters, in interaction, rather than single doll-like girls staring at the viewer or into the distance. The skin tones have intensified from pale to bronze, and the overall color palette has darkened too. Through this work, the once-Greek Graces have reincarnated in Korea, as if to underscore their universal and timeless qualities.
Is the couple in-love? Have they just been in a quarrel? Javier Arizabalo’s Masterpiece is not a novel, nor a philosophical treatise. Rather, in this deceptively simple IBEX Masterpiece, he connects the classic experience with the world of today: an idealist with contemporary resources and mise-en-scene.
This Masterpiece was painted in 2018, when a new period started in Timofeev’s life. This work is kind of an allegory, a farewell to those things that will never come back. In this life, everything – including life itself – has limitations. Some things die, feelings become numb and emptiness creeps into our souls as years go by.
Hae-Kwang portrays his muse of ten years floating in mid-air. This work is the upside-down version of the original portrait photo, and the rotation highlights the rapidly changing role of women in Korean society. Korean women once sacrificed all for the future of their children in the country’s notoriously competitive education and career tracks. But the younger generation is coming into its own—building lives to satisfy passions and realize dreams.
“Morning Dew” is a brilliant Masterpiece from Philipp Weber that immediately raises more questions than it answers.
is the woman lying down after a night of partying? Perhaps it was her wedding day? Was she the victim of a fatal act of violence – is she even alive?
Philipp Weber often tells stories about life and death, despair and hope, tragedy and inner strength.
But he never spells it out completely, leaving room for the viewer to challenge their own imagination while observing the work in all its intricate detail.
This Masterpiece celebrates beauty, beyond and free from the male gaze. It celebrates love, life and freedom, embraces life’s beauty in all its forms. Amid the current debate surrounding gender issues, this painting breathes strength and optimism about gender relations and life in our times. Arantzazu spent the first year of her masterpiece project just painting roses every day, to familiarize herself with their textures, their translucence, colors and hues.
The vessel with pharaoh Cleopatra is floating in mid-air, yet perfectly still as a rock, like the center of the universe, or a version of the universe. Amid the golden glow of a setting sun, the vessel and its passengers and cargo seem to advance or be directed toward a solemn destination/ destiny. The cornucopia of carefully chosen and placed urns, fruits, statuettes, and goblets lend themselves for many types of readings from specifically Egyptological—a helpful start—to universally symbolic, psychological, and spiritual interpretations.
The decadent, cabaretesque scene amusingly depicts group dynamics and power imbalances in a group of characters that are, quite certainly, one-of-a-kind. There is clearly more female power than male power present here, in playful harmony. The scene delights the viewer with its exquisite rendering of physical detail but above all the all-pervasive softness of the light, the carpet, the curtains, and the overall atmosphere, down to the fluffy cat.
This IBEX Masterpiece by Martin Llamedo provides a richly layered philosophical commentary on modern society with a focus on the roles of women in it, as an indicative minority, presented in an alienating atmosphere coming from a place of mourning and melancholy, with a good pinch of irony. The two picture-perfect women look dehumanized, possibly cloned, or otherwise evolved into automatons. They do not seem unhappy, likely leading mindless and soulless, painless, and pointless lives.
In the triptych, the left figure arises from the depths of the Sea breathing vigorously as if it was the first breath she took. Symbolically, this represents the birth of a newborn and also our origin on African soil. The male and female figures on the central panel embody masculinity and femininity, love and sexuality, which lead to procreation. The figure on the right looks into the future far away, toward a new life in a bigger world.
Emanuele Dascanio works from a spiral based upon the Golden Ratio flowing out from a central circle, which is deliberately bounded by the square of the canvas. The spirit dominates the immense space of the work and leads the viewer to Life, to Light, the ‘One’ Creator, capturing everything and everyone in a vortex, a nearly hypnotic spiral. The Majesty of his primitive and creative spiritual force is both ‘One’ and the richness of the ‘Everything’.
We stand at a crossroads, an exhilarating moment in our evolution: Can we transition to a healthier paradigm and ensure our survival? Nuclear risk and ecological and climate crises are yet to awaken us. In his IBEX Masterpiece, Marco questions a self-centered and arrogant humanity set apart from the physical world and nature— to engender conversation about changes and choices we face.
What a party with such glorious strength and diversity. Eighteen women of varying shapes and shades looking us directly in the eye. These women are all previous models that have posed for Hubert’s works in the past. The posing session for his IBEX Masterpiece was a joyful reunion and one where the women were in charge. They decided what to wear, or not to wear.
