This week we’re journeying into the cosmos courtesy of visual artist, Victoria Topping – an artist known for colourful and melodic works, she describes as ‘music for the eyes.’

Her new artwork, Celestial Skull is available now, exclusively at Enter Gallery. In today’s blog, we chat to Topping to reveal more about the psychedelic piece and what she hopes it makes people feel, plus the music that inspires her art.

Open your mind

In Celestial Skull, Topping borrows elements from nature to add beautiful detail to her piece. The result is a cosmic wonderland with mountainous cheekbones and the sky above used to represent the curves and complexities of the brain.

The incorporation of vivid colour – a staple of Topping’s art – is offset by a delicate monochrome crown created from exotic flora and fauna. Speaking of what inspired the piece, Topping revealed:

‘The piece is inspired by the way the world’s been of late, with all the madness and the darkness of the last couple of years, but also the hope that’s shone through even in the midst of it all.’

‘A skull is often a symbol of mortality and I wanted to invert that and create a piece that uses an image closely related to death but to flip it on its head so it’s about life, about growth, about hope.’

Music for the eyes

As an artist, Topping‘s aim is to express her feelings and experiences in a way that inspires others to be braver in expressing themselves.

Each piece is infused with a synesthetic expression of music, an exploration sparked one day while reading about Russian artist,  Kandinsky…

‘I was reading about Kandinsky’s views on music and art, and I became fascinated with how he saw harmony, form and rhythm represented in colour, texture and tone. This led to me becoming more and more interested in artists that were intertwined between music and art like Keith Haring for example and his relation to the NY disco scene and Paradise Garage.’

Topping takes music that she loves and represents it as a visual snapshot, using colour and space to represent melody and harmony.

Bulletproof Heart is an original piece created by Topping for our Sound and Vision Group Show

Topping tells us:

‘I hope the piece brings people a sense of joy but mostly that people can appreciate it, first and foremost, as a thing of beauty that celebrates nature.’ 

Celestial Skull is a giclée print is available exclusively at Enter Gallery. It comes in two sizes, both hand-finished with gold leaf and paint and signed by the artist.