If you walk into The Sentient Bean right now, you’ll see the walls covered in bright splashes of color. The colors pull you to look closer until you see the brightness hides monsters.
The artwork is the result of the brilliantly strange mind of Maxx Feist.
“The ‘Out of the Mouths of Madness’ show is based on experiences around COVID,” said Feist. “I felt like I should paint something that was really bright but also portrayed that we’re still dealing with monsters.”
Those monsters hide in our day-to-day lives as anxiety and fear of the unknown. It’s something we’ve all felt over the past year.
“I feel like everybody was struggling during COVID, and I didn’t want to just paint what I had been painting before.”
While much of Feist’s previous works featured skulls and grim reapers and other things we might classify as monsters, they leaned more heavily into dark themes. “Out of the Mouths of Madness” makes use of the monsters to highlight that we all have trials in our lives that we need to deal with, but we aren’t defined solely by our personal monsters.
“I want to show that there’s always a bit of hope when we’re dealing with our darkest times," Feist said.
“Even in contrast to all the COVID days and all the darkness that was being thrown at us by the media and just reality, and we were all having to deal with what was happening, you can still hold onto some sort of hope and some kind of optimism in the face of monsters.”
Feist said this artwork is for all of us who have had serious and sometimes traumatic experiences over the last year. It’s been a rough time, but they hope their artwork shows that we are still resilient.
Feist’s work also unintentionally resembles their experience leaving their home in Asheville and moving to Savannah in January. “I’ve never painted more in my whole life,” Feist said about the pandemic.
“I had more work and more inspiration during COVID than I’ve ever had in my entire life. And my whole life was upended. I had to make giant shifts and changes, and I still painted the entire time.”
It’s hard for an artist to leave their community and start over somewhere new. They can view themselves as these strange monsters stepping into a bright, new realm. Much as people in Savannah are embracing this show, they are also embracing Maxx Feist.
“I did not expect so many people to be interested in my art. But people [in Savannah] have been overwhelmingly kind and nice and interested and friendly, and this town is kind of amazing.”
Savannah may not be Maxx Feist’s home community, but it certainly seems that the Hostess City is ready to welcome them in.
Sulfur Studios arranged the exhibition at The Sentient Bean. It will be on display until Sept. 14. There will also be a reception and artist’s talk on Friday from 5 to 7 p.m.
This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Maxx Feist — with their latest work displayed at The Sentient Bean — is embracing the madness
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