At first glance, Tim Kent’s oil paintings appear squarely realistic. His subjects—painters and sculptors—inhabit 18th-century drawing rooms where their projects are in various stages of completion. “I picked a very traditional style to work in because I like the banality of it,” Kent explains. “And all banality leads to investigation.” Indeed, when you look closer, elements of the surreal emerge: a painter seems to dissolve into his canvas; a ghostly atmosphere fills the room; time and space are at odds. It’s that confusion that Kent is after. “It looks familiar, but it’s not. And so then you’re looking,” he has said. “The important thing is to look.” —Paulina Prosnitz