Los Angeles native Mike Stilkey has always been attracted to painting and drawing not only on vintage paper, record covers and book pages, but on the books themselves. Using a mix of ink, colored pencil, paint and lacquer, Stilkey depicts a melancholic and at times a whimsical cast of characters inhabiting ambiguous spaces and narratives of fantasy and fairy tales. A lingering sense of loss and longing hints at emotional depth and draws the viewer into their introspective thrall with a mixture of capricious poetry, wit, and mystery. (Photo by Mike Stilkey)

A tomtit bird flies past a squirrel running on a fence after a snowfall in a park in Almaty, Kazakhstan, January 12, 2016. (Photo by Shamil Zhumatov/Reuters)

A visitor takes a selfie with “The Breach” by Leandro Erlich, during a photo call for Kew Gardens' forthcoming “Food Forever” exhibition, examining the fragile future of food and the impact of our day-to-day eating habits on the planet, at the Royal Botanic Gardens, in Kew, Richmond, Surrey on Thursday, June 16, 2022. (Photo by Dominic Lipinski/PA Images via Getty Images)

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Brad Snead walks past melting ice on the Cook Inlet beach, Saturday, March 26, 2011, in Kenai, Alaska, while looking for agates. (AP Photo/Peninsula Clarion, M. Scott Moon)

A dog named Yoda looks on during the 23rd Annual World's Ugliest Dog Contest at the Sonoma-Marin County Fair on June 24, 2011 in Petaluma, California. Yoda won the $1,000 top prize as the world's ugliest dog. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

People experience INTO SIGHT, a large-scale installation by Sony Design, where audience behaviour influences the visuals and soundscape in London on 16 September 2022. It combines Sony's Crystal LED display systems, which recently replaced green screen technology in one of the biggest developments in film production, with generative sound, see-through glass walls and mirrors. (Photo by Stephen Chung/Alamy Live News)

American rapper Cardi B poses for a photo during Hot 97 Summer Jam 2021 at Met Life Stadium on August 22, 2021 in East Rutherford, New Jersey. (Photo by Johnny Nunez/WireImage)