The weird and wonderful biomorphic art of Nicholas Di Genova is being featured tonight at Magic Pony, where the Toronto artist will be signing his new book from Belio Magazine, DY:005.

DY:005, the fifth in Belio Magazine's 'Die Young' series, is 192 pages of painstakingly detailed animalistic biomanipulated monstrosity from Nicholas Di Genova - and it's AWESOME. Previous collections have been done on mylar, giving his work an animation-style quality, but the new collection done on paper takes Nicholas' intense level of detail to the extreme.

In speaking with Nicholas it's easy to see why I like his work... influenced by anime, monsters, natural sciences and also a self-professed Geek, Nicholas is an artist after my own heart. He's also got a serious following, particularly in Toronto where everyone passing us on the street seemed to be an old friend or fan of Nicholas' art. Having done several shows around the world and with a new collection opening at Fredericks and Freiser in 2009, he's also gaining popularity in the art business. Nicholas however, seems more excited about some of his side projects, particularly his monster comic book collaboration.

Despite his humility, Nicholas must have felt he'd 'made it' as an artist when his artistic mentors began to take notice of his work. Earlier on is his career he was contacted by one of his favourite artists and taken on as a prodigy of sorts. Now he and Nicholas, along with another artist, work on a 'just for fun' comic with talks of potentially putting it to show - the goal of the comic being simply to outdo each other in gory monster decapitations. This is Nicholas' favourite type of project, where he and his friends can take a 'happy go lucky' approach to the work.

That's not to say they aren't serious artists. Nicholas and his friends have been trying to find a name for their quality of art and have come up with 'TLC'. I really agree, and feel this speaks perfectly to the essence of Nicholas Di Genova's work: art that is produced with extreme detail, precision, passion, creativity, excellence... and gives a sense that the artist truly poured himself into the piece. This is obvious at first glance of any Di Genova work, but is even more pronounced when speaking with the 27-year old. He's a very passionate and very genuine guy, who truly loves to create; which can be quite rare in the accomplished art world.

But Nicholas freely admits he doesn't quite fit into the norm; I think in a fantastic way. Come meet him in person, be inspired by him and his work, and get a signed copy of his new book DY:005 tonight at Magic Pony, 6-9pm.