Epic Proportions
American Art Collector|January 2025
Grrowing up on a farm in West Texas, Michael Tole was perusing his family's 1956 Collier's Encyclopedia when the color plates of Baroque paintings caught his attention. Today, he paints inventive Baroque and Rococo figurative extravaganzas that look like they could be part of a Renaissance art collection.
Epic Proportions

A solo exhibition of new and recent paintings, Pictures from the Queen's Collection, is now on view at Ferrara Showman Gallery in New Orleans through February 8.

"In my current work, I am writing letters to art history, literature and mythology in an attempt to reflect the social changes that have reshaped our society over the past century," explains Tole. "As part of this agenda, I explore the evolution of gender norms, power dynamics and representation within Western visual and literary culture, and what this implies for the negotiation between aesthetic pleasure, justice and our culturally specific discourse on beauty."

Exploring the more masculine Baroque and more feminine and capricious Rococo styles, Tole often muses about being a forger, placing paintings in collections next to Tintoretto and Caravaggio, playing with viewers’ preconceptions and making them look more closely to discover the anachronism.

This story is from the January 2025 edition of American Art Collector.

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This story is from the January 2025 edition of American Art Collector.

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