Handheld Cemetery with Autumn Tree

Original Artwork by Michael Flores Measures approx. 4" diameter “My name is Michael Flores, and I am an LA-based scale model artist. I find inspiration in decrepit buildings and fragments of deterioration, taking what some may see as unsettling decay and honoring the beauty of imperfection. My work explores themes of loneliness, nostalgia, memory, and the uncanny. I am interested in creating what feels like a daydream, an old photograph discovered in an attic, or a place recalled from memory but no longer entirely recognizable. Rather than depicting entirely imagined worlds, I work with recognizable spaces and objects, allowing them to exist somewhere between reality and fantasy. I am drawn to the tension between recognition and uncertainty, when a space feels familiar, yet something within it resists a clear explanation. I am less interested in recreating a specific place than in recreating a feeling. I hope to invoke a sense of cautious curiosity, a desire to look closer, even when something feels slightly out of place.”