NEW YORK, NY.- Anna Zorina Gallery is presenting Tom Poelmans’ first show with the gallery, My Third Eye is My Hand. With his New York solo debut exhibition, the artist introduces his latest body of work that serves collectively as a self-portrait. Poelmans is a contemporary artist whose work is characterized by an imaginative exploration of metaphysical spaces. His creative vision casts a view into fantastical and surreal landscapes inhabited by characters that transgress the boundaries between reality and fiction. Notably, the artist employs masks as a central theme, as well as birds and other art historical iconography to imbue his paintings with a sense of familiar yet uncanny symbolic meaning.

Poelmans’ works feature masked figures engaged in a journey of self-discovery, depicted amidst various symbols of life and death that serve as a visual metaphor for the mutability of identity. The artist represents that at each stage of existence, there is a continual ability to undergo the process of identity transformation and the embrace of a new persona. The essence of anonymity offered by the element of disguise invites viewers to consider their own malleability of self and the transformative power of psychological change.

Poelmans frequently incorporates abstract, transcendental spaces into his paintings. These dreamlike realms are depicted as surreal landscapes where real and otherworldly creatures coexist. The settings intend to encourage viewers to consider the infinite possibilities of the mind. Poelmans' work is both playful and profound intended to challenge the viewer’s personal concept of reality and the vastness of possibility that it embodies.

Tom Poelmans (b. 1984, Belgium) lives and works in Antwerp He received his his MFA from the Royal Academy of Fine Arts Antwerp, Belgium, in 2010. His work has been exhibited internationally at Rodolphe Janssen, Brussels; Andrea Festa, Rome; Jack Barrett Gallery, East Hampton, New York; the White Whale Gallery, Antwerp; The Cabin, Los Angeles; SecondRoom, Antwerp; Tatjana Pieters, Ghent; Garage, Mechelen; DMW-Artspace, Antwerp; Alpha Base, Antwerp; SVA, New York and Be-Part, Waregem.