Above: Artist Lise Poulsen's felt creatures are inspired by characters from medieval painter Hieronymus Bosch. Photograph by Inga Hendrickson.
LISE POULSEN'S FELT CREATURES ($135–$185) are equal parts artist and mad scientist. After experimenting with felt vessels and kimonos, the Peñasco artist set her eyes on Hieronymus Bosch’s medieval painting The Garden of Earthly Delights. Dense with characters and scenes, the Dutch triptych sparked Poulsen’s imagination. “I stare at that painting and I get an idea for a monster,” she says. “But my own mind takes over. The monster ends up the way it wants to be.” Poulsen, co-owner of Gaucho Blue Gallery, in Peñasco, shapes her creatures from the inside out with layers of wool soaked in hot water. “I can always look back and see something new again,” she says of Bosch’s work.