Surreal Up Close [work]: Chloe

The Unbearable Nearness of a Dream

She reaches out to touch your sleeve. Her fingertip hovers one millimeter above the fabric. chloe surreal up close

You think you know Chloe from a distance. You’ve scrolled past her. You’ve seen the grainy thumbnails, the flash-frozen poses, the algorithmic glow of a curated feed. She looks like a collage—an exquisite corpse of Y2K nostalgia, brutalist architecture, and soft, rotting fruit. The Unbearable Nearness of a Dream She reaches

Her fingernails are shellacked in a color called “Mourning Dove.” But the cuticles are raw—chewed. The silver ring on her index finger is real sterling, but the stone is a mood ring stuck permanently on “anxious.” You’ve scrolled past her

She laughs, and it sounds like a slowed-down sample of a 90s R&B track. Her teeth are perfectly straight, but one canine is just slightly too sharp. When she tucks her hair behind her ear, you see a tiny, fading bruise. Not from violence. From resting her head on a speaker at a warehouse show three nights ago.

But then she steps closer.

She smiles.