Baade's paintings are oil works blending dense, imaginative contemporary and classic symbology with luminescent color, often featuring themes of mortality, sexuality, personal transformation, and the darker side of human nature. She has been associated with the contemporary surreal movement, though her work treats this in an academic manner that rewards detailed study. Carrie Ann Baade’s autobiographical parables combine fragments of Renaissance and Baroque religious paintings, resulting in surreal landscapes inhabited by exotic flora, fauna, and figures. Here are some of the Carrie Ann Baade's most interesting pieces of work:
And here's what the artist says about her paintings herself:
"Informed by religion and mythology, these paintings speak to the complexity of the human condition. Starting in the fanciful and idealized world of the mind, each is a cautionary tale of love and power. Yet, the paint is created from something that can be held in my hands. To begin a composition, I start with scissors, clipping fragments, composing from snippets of several hundred pictures scattered about me on the floor. What is created is a prototype collage of layered scraps with cut edges. Some are photographs of me while others are cut up illustrations from art history. Looking at this collage, a painting is executed in a trompe l'oeil manner showing the multiple layers with cut edges which suggest the complexity of individual's psychologies – their masks and their hidden secrets.
By studying with art conservators and looking at the old masters, I choose to revitalize the archaic traditions of both traditional oil painting oil, and egg tempera. As an artist and subject in my work, I consider myself to be the steward and ax man to art's legacy by cutting and serving up the reinvigorated past to be contemplated in context of the contemporary."
