Modern Living. Leonard Koscianski, 10.5″x16″, oil on canvas, 2009.
Modern Living is a small painting in oils on canvas. It features three animals in aggressive conflict. Two dogs are confronting a red boar. It is a surreal painting, the colors are symbolic, the animals idealized. The title suggests that it is not about animals, but about people, and their interactions. The tone of the interaction is fierce and aggressive. It is a painting, not an illustration, so we are asked to contemplate this fierce energy as a thing of beauty. Living in an increasingly feminized world, masculine expressions are increasingly rare and valuable, we are asked by this painting to value them. Many of our greatest achievements as humans began with expressions of frustration and anger.