Thomas Deininger graduated with academic honors in art and immediately after graduation, he was selected to execute two large commission for a local church.\n
He started creating work from found objects in 1994, when he was \u201cexperimenting with the physical qualities of paint and abstraction in both material and imagery,\u201d he told Colossal.\n \u201cMost of the content I was exploring involved mass consumerism, pop culture and environmental concerns. So really the medium easily became the message. I question beauty, value, and perception and how the three concepts do this little dance that changes how we all relate to the (physical and spiritual) world and how reality is just an illusion we all settle on for a time,\u201d he added.\n The Rhode Island-based artist also experiments with two-dimensional paper collages. He uses photos and materials from popular culture throughout his various mediums. So far, he has re-created iconic paintings by Vincent van Gogh and Diego Vel\u00e1zquez. Scroll down to see some of his amazing sculptural assemblages.\n