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ARTIST STATEMENT |
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To abstract from reality is to create a metaphor. Although there are many valid systems of abstraction, those which are reflective of the human condition are of greatest interest to me in this body of work. My intention in the recent painting series, The Awakening , was to create a space which breaks from reality, constructs a new perspective, and touches upon universal human truths. Ideally, the metaphor becomes coherent only after being combined with the viewer's pre-existing library of symbolic imagery. In this realm of the subconscious, figurative and abstract elements combine with preexisting perceptions and archetypes to evoke sensations beyond that which aesthetics can provide. I'd like to invite the viewer to explore his/her own existence through the imagery depicted in these paintings. The process used for The Awakening was based on my desire to combine representational forms with abstract elements. I hired female models for photo sessions in various locations, paying special attention to gestural poses. From hundreds of references, I selected a few with strong, expressive compositions. I stretched six large canvases and primed the surfaces. On the pure white surface, I mapped out the figure. With the same hue, I grouped dark shapes together and toned the light shapes. From this point forward, many painting sessions were spent on each artwork, either correcting representational elements, or pushing the abstract through the use of hard edges, flattened spaces, and simplified forms. This dichotomy of figuration and abstraction mirrored my interest in producing provocative works which tell a story not easily deconstructed. As the paintings moved forward, I photographed the works in progress and evaluated the developing compositions away from the studio. I concentrated on supporting the developing concept, particular to each piece, and to creating formal harmony. Only when these two properties came to fruition, would the work be complete. My artistic sensibilities are informed greatly by my background in psychology and graphic design, as well as a love of the female form and a long-term interest in geometry. Formally, I am interested in the developments of the past century, which often savor the dichotomy of compositional harmony and discordance. I enjoy creating contradictory depth relationships which at once create depth and flatten space. My figures' relationship to the ground is often interchanging, as elements from the latter shift in front of the former. I am inspired greatly by the work of several artists of the Bay Area Figurative Movement, including Richard Diebenkorn and Nathan Oliveira. Early twentieth century French and Catalan artists influence my sensibilities as well, including works by Antoni Gaudi, Pablo Picasso, and Joan Miro. March 2008 Light Through A Window | Collage Series | 2007 The series, Light Through a Window , is a result of my personal fascination with pure aesthetics. By removing figurative elements entirely, I was able to explore the impact of formal elements on human sensation, unadulterated by any literary implications. These non-objective mixed media collage works on wood exclude a subject in search of a truly visceral visual experience, independent of representation. This material-driven and process-oriented series uses a direct approach to resolving a composition. Each work is taken step by step into the unknown, whereby arbitrary formations are layered to create a viable history and purpose. In time, the masses are articulated to produce an abstract yet coherent piece. The title, Light Through a Window , refers to an anomaly which exists in our natural environment. While most of what we see within the boundaries of a window frame exists beyond the window's plane, light travels through the window into our own space. The title symbolically represents the distortion of depth relationships between elements within each composition, a primary aspect of the series. Elements are pushed back and pulled forward as the eye follows the complex movement of the piece. Light radiates from the surface. I am influenced by masters of twentieth century abstraction, particularly early century Western European artists such as Antoni Gaudi, Paul Klee, and Joan Miro as well as contemporary American artists such as Robert Motherwell and Richard Diebenkorn. I am driven by my knowledge of psychology and design. My studies in the field of psychology, particularly in aesthetics, sensation & perception, and cognition as well as my professional experience as a graphic artist contribute to my artistic sensibilities. Implicit in each piece is an attempt to create a dance of dichotomies. Cool, flat grays activate rich warms. Large open spaces give breathing room to excited focal areas. Swift movement across the surface is brought to an abrupt halt. In these collage works, a step away from representation results in a step towards the primacy of human sensation. The goal of each piece is not to convey information for speculation by the mind, but to excite the eye in a pure, unadulterated visual experience. September 2007 Krakow: Faith & Fortitude | Abstract Figurative Series | 2006 The series, Krakow: Faith & Fortitude, was inspired by the culture and history of Krakow, the intellectual center of Poland . During a recent six-month stay, my creative interests bent under the weight of the reality that I discovered there. Most of the paintings from the series contain symbolic references to the city and the people I encountered during my stay. War, suppression, and lack of individual freedom are realities that I was not familiar with, having grown up in California . But the currently advancing nation of Poland is still scarred by the atrocities of her recent history, and her people cannot erase this reality from their minds. I rented a painting studio in the Kazimierz District, which is now called the "Old Jewish District." What was once a flourishing Jewish community is now a bitter reminder of the perils of war. During World War II, nearly the entire Jewish population of Poland-as well as most other countries in Europe-perished under Nazi tyranny, forced labor, and mass murder. After the war, Communist Russia occupied Poland and other Eastern European countries. The Poles faced decades of struggle to free themselves from oppression. The Solidarity Movement represented a nation of utter unity, from steel workers to priests, school children to intellectuals. Under the organization of the Catholic Church and the man who would one day become known as Pope John Paul II, The Polish nation broke the shackles of its oppressors and successfully freed itself from bondage. Whether it's the fate of the past fifty years, or a quality that has existed since half a millennium ago, the Polish people have the ability to endure great strife. By keeping the past in mind, modern day Krakow and its citizens can be seen as a natural phenomenon, resulting from a history that is as unique as the people. Their immeasurable faith and fortitude were the keys to their survival. I depict these qualities and others as symbols in some of the paintings. In the future, I'd like to focus more closely on the lyrical value of written history. My creative interest lies not in retelling the story, but rather in the expression of emotion from a foreign source. As an outsider, maybe I can contribute a unique interpretation of the past. February 2007 Essence & Material | Abstract Figurative Series | 2005 A pane of glass shatters and breaks the silence. A shard enters the skin and extracts a crimson droplet that rolls down the transparent fragment, staining it dark red. An exchange occurs. The material induces a laceration upon the being; the being paints its lifeblood onto the surface of the material. The distinction between a life being and a material object is plain to see: the former is born, develops, ages, and eventually dies; the latter is fabricated by man, incorporated into society, and ultimately disintegrates into the earth. In modern society, we share our entire existence with material objects. Be it clothing to keep warm, eyeglasses to correct our vision, or automobiles to travel, we develop so closely to materials that one can hardly imagine life without them. The term "Essence & Material" refers to a dichotomy which is at the center of my current artistic interest. It is a simple term loaded with symbolism and the potential to be expanded upon. Without clouding the concept with words, it should suffice to explain that the focus of this body of work is the impact "Essence" and "Material" make on each other; that the relationship between the two is engrained in our society and that each contributes to the other to more thoroughly define one another. December 2005
On Finishing a Piece | Alexander Rutsch about Picasso | 1952 "Picasso played a short but important moment in my life in Paris that affected my entire artistic future. I learned from him that it is not important if art is not aesthetically finished. It can be raw, uncooked, rough. If an artist feels he has said it--it is not important to polish or finish it. Because of Picasso, I learned that if I don't feel the need to finish--I don't have to."
Collage was born when Picasso, extending the picture plane surface in his experimentation with early Cubist devices, discovered that foreign material introduced into the picture produced pictorial enigmas which would eventually lead to radical changes in our visual perception of reality. The term 'collage' is derived fro, the French verb coller meaning: to paste, stick, glue; it relates to the technique of cutting and pasting natural or manufactured materials on a surface which could be painted or unpainted. Cubism produced abstract patterns which increasingly departed from, previously recognized representations of reality. When Picasso and Braque superimposed words and letters on paintings, along with tromp-l'oeil wood grain effects, they provoked questions about the nature of 'reality' and its representation. Des reality differ from, illusion, and in what respects? Does reality assume identity only in the cerebrations of the beholder? Is reality the logical absolute of the canvas? Foreword What the introduction of non-art materials meant to the Cubist painters was real planes to ply against the illusionistic planes of their compositions. Picasso's initial use of a section of oil cloth that simulated chair caning and Braque's use of wood-grained paper suggested a world of creative possibilities. Of one non-art material could be introduced and truly incorporated into painting and drawing, why not any and all non-art materials as potential elements of art. Introduction
'It is not their intention either to create or to emphasize a formal color-space arrangement. They depart from natural representation only to intensify the expression of the subject.' Mark Rothko, p15 'The term 'abstract expressionism' points to the essentially synthetic character of this art-to the extent to which it is itself an energetic synthesis, summary and elaboration of pre-existing styles. For the New York School came into existence at the end of the modernist era, when each of its separate styles and impulses was in the state of exhaustion. The American painter in the forties was free at last to create his own amalgam of modern European styles precisely because none was any longer vital enough to command his absolute loyalty. The result was a series of inspired refinements on the inherited vocabulary of modernism.' Hilton Kramer, p16 And while Rothko, Newman, and Smith also made works in the early 1940s in the surrealist manner, nevertheless it was ultimately surrealist ideas-rather than their particular results in pictures-which were primary. On the formal level it was the surrealists' concept of automatism which was of crucial importance. Abstract expressionism is often described as a 'painterly' style: 'loose, rapid handling, or the look of it; masses that blot and fuse instead of shapes that stay distinct, large conspicuous rhythms, broken color; uneven saturation or densities of paint; exhibited brush, knife, finger or rag marks' are the characteristics cited by Clement Greenberg for the movement. While not all of these features fit all the painters (Pollock's works do not exhibit directly the tools of their making, and Motherwell's shapes generally stay quite sharp), nevertheless it is a useful description. Greenberg is certainly correct in viewing this style as 'a reaction against the tightness of Synthetic Cubism, [although] it used the same vocabulary at first.' But there is another factor as well: that the looseness of both definition and structure could create a form of picture making that was more spontaneous or automatic. This side of painterliness would allow for a wider latitude of personal invention of the one hand, and the enrollment of broader aspects of the modern language on the other. This same automatic flexibility is found in works of a less painterly nature as well-say those of Rothko and Newman, where their more reductive styles place greater emphasis on nuances thereby opening possibilities of expression. It is important to distinguish the surrealists' imaginal automatism from the abstract and synthesizing variant we discover in the painterliness of abstract expressionism. For surrealists, as in the works of Miro and Masson, for example, automatism consists of beginning the picture with random, non-descriptive markings. But as the surrealist artist finds figures suggested in these markings, automatism is replaced by more traditionally oriented practices of description, which are used to articulate the images. The abstract expressionist's variant of automatism is not used to create figuration-or even create a situation of finding figuration-out of random markings. Rather it is confined (generally) to abstraction and plays a more continuous role in the work. E.A. Carmean Jr. and Eliza E. Rathbone, p17 From "Real Social Realism", Vision: Eastern Europe | Crown Point Press, Oakland | 1976 The artist spends his time taking in information. The artist spends more time looking and listening than the layman, and is a trained observer, a private investigator. The artist translates what he sees around him in to a form, which in turn becomes part of the culture it defines. The work of art communicates for the artist his intelligence through the visual craftsmanship of the activity or the object. The work of art is not the object; the work of art is the information that is communicated, a stimulating experience that awakens the intellect through the senses. Tom Marioni, p7 |
