SIMONA CANDINI 'ALICE IN PUMPKINLAND'- RACHEL BENSIMON 'PORTALS OF AWAKENING' - MATTHEW KIRSCHT - EGO - SHANE PIERCE

WHERE: Copro Gallery - Bergamot Station Arts Complex
2525 Michigan Ave , Unit T5, Santa Monica , CA 90404 
Ph: 310/829-2156 
E-Mail: CoproGallery@Live.com
Web: www.CoproGallery.com

WHAT: SIMONA CANDINI 'ALICE IN PUMPKINLAND'- RACHEL BENSIMON 'PORTALS OF AWAKENING' - MATTHEW KIRSCHT - EGO - SHANE PIERCE
Simona Candini Web-Preview
Rachel Bensimon Web-Preview
Matthew Kirscht - EGO - Shane Pierce


WHEN: Exhibit runs October 11 – November 01, 2025
Opening Reception: Saturday October 11 , 2025 - 6:00 – 10:00 p.m.

Contact:  Gary Pressman, Gallery Director - Copro Gallery

Simona Candini 'Alice & Dracula's Chess Game at the Crimson Hour'

SIMONA CANDINI 'ALICE IN PUMPKINLAND'will be Simona's 3rd solo exhibition with Copro Gallery. For the hallowed season of October, Alice steps beyond the fairytale and into the gothic. She encounters shadows and legends meeting dark literary icons including the infamous Dracula and Frankenstein amongst others. A world of wonder and dread where magic and darkness entwine.

BIO: Artist Simona Candini graduated at the Academy Of Fine Arts University of Bologna and currently based in Italy.Her works, showcased in galleries around the globe, embody a beautiful yet sometimes dark world inhabited by big eyed girls and improbable creatures. With a stirring of emotions translated onto each new work of art, Simona brings her love of the old fairytales and childhood imaginings to us in a unique and poetic way. She is a traditional artist and enjoys using oils, watercolor, acrylics, graphite and pencils on paper, canvas and wood boards. "My goal is to apply old master techniques onto my doll-like subjects. I’ve always worked in this direction, but now I feel I’m on the right path more than ever".Simona hand paints and personalizes most frames to match her artworks and to make them unique with her signature style.



Rachel Bensimon 'Born in Winter, Carried by Spring'

RACHEL BENSIMON 'PORTALS OF AWAKENING' In Portals of Awakening, Rachel Bensimon presents five new paintings, each embodying one of the elemental forces represented by the pentagram: earth, air, fire, water, and spirit. This series is both intimate and archetypal, a visual journey through personal transformation, symbolic storytelling, and emotional alchemy.

“As I created each painting,” Rachel shares, “I moved through memories, dreams, and personal mythologies. This has been one of the most meaningful projects I've worked on, and I'm so grateful to offer these portals to you.”

BIO: Toronto-born, New York based artist Rachel Bensimon creates evocative figurative paintings that blend memory, psychology, and the metaphysical. Her work explores the thresholds between the physical and spiritual worlds, where transformation, emotion, and symbolism intertwine. Through young female figures, animal archetypes, and elements drawn from nature and myth, she translates personal experience into visual poetry. A former fashion stylist who lived and worked in Paris, Rachel  brings an intuitive sense of composition, color, and texture to her art. Influenced by Balthus, Mark Ryden, and Leonardo da Vinci, she merges classical craft with dreamlike surrealism, cultivating a visual language that feels both intimate and otherworldly. Her paintings invite viewers into realms where emotion becomes atmosphere and the unseen comes to light.



EGO "They Looked Backwards and Said Goodbye'

EGO 'Face Your Fears' is EGO's latest series of small works. He continues to investigate transitional states of being that border on the edges of this reality. The figures in these paintings are seemingly solitary outsiders, representing ghostly apparitions that may not exist, or barely glimpsed visions of the dead. Yet seen another way, these works may highlight those who are considered unimportant and/or overlooked by society.Using classical painting techniques to conjure intricately crafted portraits of macabre yet whimsical solitary outsiders, Ego feels a kind of kinship with these characters, as a socially-awkward extroverted introvert himself. The seemingly melancholy, yet somehow also charming figures he dreams up appear to dwell in the spaces somewhere between the natural and metaphysical worlds. In his work there is often a juxtaposition between the grim and endearing, the modern and classical, the real and the surreal.
BIO - A self-taught painter, Ego's distinctive style is informed by a lifelong fascination with popular culture (movies, music, comics, skateboarding, etc.), as well as a profound appreciation for the work of classical masters. From the masters he's adapted the nuanced rendering of light and shadow, as well as the study of anatomy which he bends to fit the uniquely distorted nature of the denizens of his imaginary world. Living in the Pacific Northwest also influences the tone of his work. For a large portion of the year it’s dark and rainy. While many find this depressing, Ego feels the gloom contributes to a lush and hazy landscape that seeps into the colors and subjects of his paintings. Through experimenting with different mediums, the technique which ultimately developed emulates the smoothness, depth and richness of oil paintings, using acrylic paint. Ego has shared these specialized techniques by teaching classes and workshops, as well as mentoring aspiring artists.

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Matthew Kirscht The Grove'

Matthew Kirscht 'They Will Steal Your Candy ' includes themes of self sabotage and paranoia in a series of spontaneously composed scenes that draw on subconscious emotions. Features a handful of paintings on panel and canvas in the spirit of the season of Halloween!

BIO - Matthew Kirscht is a self taught artist currently living in Richmond Virginia. He has shown work in New Orleans, Philadelphia, New York, California and Missoula. Apart from his own line of Halloween themed artwork that began in 1996, he has illustrated dozens of Wacky Packages stickers for Topps, and explores themes of anxiety, paranoia, self sabotage, and neglect in paintings featuring storybook style anthropomorphic animals and food.

Shane Pierce 'Skeletia, A Midnight Roam'

SHANE PIERCE will continue the narrative theme of Shane's dark travelers, night watchers and passengers. Evan Senn - "Traveling all over the United States, carrying with him his own personal baggage of memories and experiences, he paints a different world into existence. Dark and ominous creatures, emotional weight, honesty and experience ring loudly throughout his paintings. Dark traveling characters bombard his imagination and his artwork, angels and grim reapers haunt his creations in subtle ways, while the rough and raw American landscape keep his nomads company on their seemingly lonesome and aimless journeys. His artwork is as unique and haunting as he is. A storyteller at his core, his creations are hypnotic, drawing the viewer in and plaguing them with interest and intrigue. A cloaked man, with determination and fury across his brow, often paired with a suitcase and a pipe, ventures to the dark and unknown places of his imagination. Constantly followed by the shadows, Pierce’s nomads travel with fervor, unafraid of what lies ahead, or behind them#

Bergamot Arts Complex, Copro Gallery, 2525 Michigan Ave T5, Santa Monica, CA 90404 - 310-829-2156 CoproGallery@Live.com
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