Anastasia Ruiz – Untitled from Escape series (2015)

I LOVE the way it’s both flat–the subject in the foreground and the blue-white gradient of sky in the background–at the same time there is this weird dimensionality to it. (I mean look at her right elbow blocking her left forearm and how that suggests spatial cues that contribute a palpable sense of her right nipple, right breast and upper body all offset by the hair trailing down her back behind her.

It’s the same thing with her overlapping hands-right over left (and oh god look at her left thumb against her neck!) Her lips nostrils and earlobes backed again by her trailing hair.

And the way the tippy tops of beach grass stalks at the lower right frame edge render the space between her body and the right edge of the frame a sort of neither positive nor negative space that perfectly balances the extensive negative space within the frame.

Also, the composition moves the eye downward and subsequently pushes it up again.

As an image maker, Ruiz is all over the place. She studies fashion but pursues interests in practices as diverse as 3D printing, video, graphic design and illustration.

It’s easy to see the influence of Lina Scheynius and Traci Matlock on her work. (Interestingly: I always see correlations with Benoit Paile–as far as scale and perspective go; and Matthieu Soudet as far as scene manipulation is concerned.)

And as much as these are sort of secondary influences (from an art history snob standpoint), I don’t hold it against Ruiz because her work is interesting and she knows how and way to employ vertical frames that are not #skinnyframebullshit.

As far as that goes: she’s already better than ¾ of the image makers out there today.