Avatar Meets Cubism: Presenting Synthia Picassole

The avatar is a naked woman with a shapely figure, high heels, and a flirtatious smile, and she's so exotically beautiful, she'll instantly remind you of the nudes a great artist used to paint.  A possible drawback, if you're planning to seduce her: the artist is Picasso during his Cubist Period, and so the woman is an abstraction of two dimensional planes. She's "Synthia Picassole", and if you happen to find yourself at the train station of Oculea, you may find her lounging in the dubious bar across the tracks.  An advantage for her would-be suitors-- even when you walk around her in a circle, she seems to be facing you.

Synthia's the creation and product of Tooter Claxton, a surreal artist and entrepreneur of the first rank.  By making her, Tooter joins Picasso to the roster of artists who've had their works turned into avatars, now more than enough for a small cocktail party.  (Among the others: Duchamp's "Nude Descending a Staircase", by Tasrill Sieyes, and Daniel Linden's "Van Gogh Self Portrait".)

Tooter's Oculea shop-- direct SLURL teleport at this link.

Synthia isn't based on a specific Picasso painting, Claxton tells me-- instead, she's an abstraction of Picasso's abstractions. "First I looked at a lot of his stuff from this period," he explains, "and then I just started with the head and worked my way down.  As you would with a lady."

Unlike Tasrill, who describes a feeling of freedom, when he's embodying Duchamp, Tooter Claxton doesn't wear Synthia often.  "[Only] 'till I make a new one," Tooter tells me.  "But going to art shows in it is fun.  You get extra white wine just to see if they can watch it go down."

Comments

[dandellion Kimban]

Great work. Problem is, that kind of work asks for invisiprims and those are making problems with the textures behind the avatar.... but hey, nothing is perfect in this world.
Great to see people are making things that portrays their imagination rather than "the real world".

[Bettina Tizzy]

Ha! You are so right. The Mona Lisa's got nothing on Synthia... cause more than just following you with her eyes, Synthia is always facing you no matter what direction you stand around her.

Tooter Claxton's store is ultra original, too: a magazine stand, and each item for sale is portrayed as a magazine cover.

[Laetizia Coronet]

How unfortunate is it that the 'art' which gets the most attention is that which stays closest to what we know - be it the realistic statues of Statosky or this avatar with it's Picasso inspired look.
Second Life offers many possibilities for completely new forms of expression. I hope 'artists-in-residence' won't stay stuck too much in the tried and true.

[Tracey Sassoon]

Even though I love to create beautiful shapes for women in SL I enjoy seeing avatars that are creative by unique artists.... :)

[Nightbird Glineux]

That's impressive! Congrats to Tooter Claxton.

[dandellion Kimban]

Laetizia, I agree, but this one is a step out of "tried and true".

[Hamlet Au]

Laetizia, Parsec and SynthAsia were featured on this blog these last couple weeks, did you not see them?

[Laetizia Coronet]

Apparently I did... my bad.

[Bettina Tizzy]

Ah Laetizia... you will love many of Tooter Claxton's other avatars then, if what you are seeking is content creation that would not be possible in Real Life! Please take a look at a quick profile I did of him several months ago http://blog.secondlife.com/2008/02/05/new-windlight-viewer-79185-ati-talk/ and I cannot urge you enough to go to his Main Store, too. Then you will see that his Picasso-inspired avatar is only one of the several directions this brilliant and extremely innovative creator is capable of. Enjoy!

[Maggie Darwin]

Laetizia--

There's a metric butt-load of "new expression" on the grid. Unfortunately, most of it is art-school drop-out drivel.

You'd be doing quite well to encounter much work as accessible and moving as, say Starax Startowski's "Opening Up" (which fortunately can still be seen at Second Louvre.

Tooter's Synthia is a gently humorous reminder of McLuhan's observation that new media inevitably begin by recapitulating existing cultural content, albeit in new ways.

Tooter rocks...and fortunately he's still with us. Would that the same could be said of Arcadia Asylum. As for Starax, well...if you know where to look... :-)