Wagner James Au / New World Notes

Cajsa Lilliehook covers the best in virtual world screenshot art and digital painting

Zaque Hexem’s surreal art might make you ask, “But is it Second Life?” 

He answers in the most Second Life way possible; he provides SL content credits. “Hot Toast” (above) is wildly inventive. Seriously, who thinks, “I have this beautifully engraved skeleton, I think I’ll  make some toast.”  Zaque, obviously, but who else?  

Skeletons always prompt questions such as how do they hang together without connective tissue or wires? This beautifully engraved skeleton inspires more questions. Does it hurt to get your bones engraved when you’re already dead, or dead-adjacent? Why do you need tongs if you have no skin or nerve endings to burn? How do you burn toast before you toast it? 

Anyway, for more wild SL pics, click here:

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“Nymphology” gives us a very stylized female avatar with an unnaturally long neck and hair by Aqua Net. No matter how much she used, Tracy Turnblad never matched this precision. I love how Zaque juxtaposed the hard precision of the avatar with the romanticized soft grass and sky background with fragile butterflies. If you look over his photostream, butterflies are a recurring motif.

Normally, I don’t like to see pictures on the side like “Bellyache” but this works because we are clearly not meant to take it literally. For some reason, its colors remind me of that old childhood game Lotería. Perhaps being on the side also makes it seem like a card, perhaps from a tarot deck. 

No matter, the colors are lush and as the two pictures of him merge into one, there is this beautiful symmetry. Look how his necklace meets his necklace. The kill of that blending is stunning and then, too, it’s sort of like a butterfly, isn’t it? 

Zaque Hexem is a perfect example of Second Life freeing people’s imagination. He dreams up some fantastical images  and is able to capture what is in his head. And what an imaginative head it is. 

All images copyright Zaque Hexem

See all of Cajsa's Choices here. Follow Cajsa on Flickr, on Twitter, on her blog, and on her Ko-Fi.

Suggest Flick images and Flickr feeds to Cajsa Lilliehook! Tag your picture with #CasjaNWN — or tag Cajsa Lilliehook on Flickr by adding her to the photo. 

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Cajsa’s Choices is devoted to unique, artistic, and innovative virtual world-based images and screenshots that showcase the medium as an art form and Second Life as a creative platform. (Generally not images that fit on this Bingo card.)  

Cajsa Lilliehook is a sixteen year resident of Second Life, where she owned a photo studio, spent several years as a DJ at The Velvet, and for her first SL job, cleaned up prim trash. She co-founded and runs the It’s Only Fashion blog with her best friend Gidge Uriza. She also has a book review blog, Tonstant Weader Reviews and a cooking blog, Single Serving Recipes. She spends a lot of time researching and reporting on Republican sexual predators. In her first life, she is a retired grassroots leader who has worked for economic and social justice issues most of her life. She is also the minion of a cat named Nora.