Details of a Bigger Picture

Up until a few months ago I was very focused on an "end goal."  I wanted so badly to grow up, to have a finished product etc. that I did not care what details led up to it.  I forgot about process.

In these pieces that live in my studio, the details, not the finished product necessarily are what is most beautiful.  

The way the wax melts and drips is by far the most important part of the whole piece.

Both things, the product and the process, the "finish line" and how you get there are important.  All of these components are necessary for a healthy, happy life.

Before Portfolio Day

Here are some pictures of some more of the pieces that are going into my mini gallery show.

The ripped piece of paper says:

Make a mark.  And react.  Make another mark.  React.  Step back.  Gaze.  Make a mark.

Make a mark with your palms, with your feet, with your forearms.

Make a mark with anything you can.

Continue this process until you have a rhythm in place. 

Feel your way.

Trust your gut.

On this board people may draw with water and paint brush onto the board.  

The marks will erase as they dry.

This next piece was made with melted beeswax and green embossing powder.  

The piece to the left is a piece I call Liberation.  it was the first piece I had made all semester. 

 

There is a maze on a plexiglass floor.  There is one way out of chaos.  But there are many "dead-ends."

 The final piece on the right is a large piece made of wood, melted beeswax, and house paint!

Something Out Of Chaos

Recently I have been very sick and thus unable to use my hands.  I have however used painting with my palms, forearms and fingers as a form of healing.  

I am very excited about my new pieces and the process I have been using.  Though very unknown to me I have tried to let go of pre-covnceived notions of a "finished" piece and just follow my gut.  

Act. React.

Here are some pictures of my new process.

This turned into...

Which turned into:

I am very excited about this mode of working.  

Though I have nowhere near mastered anything I can add reacting to my repertoire of processes.

Artist Statement #2

 I have a need.  A need to contemplate, manipulate, generate, and most importantly to create; I need to make something that speaks.  I have a need, a need to create something, anything that makes me feel; I need to feel.  To craft something that makes me feel like jumping and singing and crying and shouting and going into a rage.  No, no a frenzy… of emotion so powerful that it is ineffable.  I have a need to make things, to play, to mold, and to craft an art that I do not quite understand.  I may never understand.  I have a need to believe in the power of something that I, and only I can create: myself.  I believe in this need, and I indulge in this need because sometimes I do not know what else to do to keep from imploding, except create.  I have this need to create because if I didn’t have this need u would live in fear.  Fear of the funny, the stoic, the silly, the odd, the messy, the unknowable, because why shouldn’t we try to describe the indescribable.  I believe in this need to create and know that this need, this ongoing, aching need, forces me to see color in a world that appears readymade as black and white.  I have this need, this need to create, because when I create no matter how ugly, or bad, or despairing it may be I satisfy my need.  And thereby I am self-actualized in a technicolor world.  Lately, this need to create has rampaged inside of me, bubbling to the surface like an angry pot of molten water.  Recently this ability, this need, to create was lost, taken away; it was absconded not by choice, but by surprise.  Now my physical body rises to say, “enough,” and it makes me feel.  I feel as though I am impotent, my precious power hides in the darkened corners where shadow allows no light.  But, through this loss of mobility, through this act in which no one is to blame, I have discovered my need to create even more clearly than ever before, and that to me is beautiful.  The loss is a discovery, a necessary one that sheds a bright beam, because when I return I will fulfill my need and once again craft an art that is my blinding truth.  Now, I create need more than I create.  

A-Maze Me

I have been thinking for a while about how to start my newest set of work for my junior year.  Though I feel like I am starting from scratch I have eliminated some ideas, which in turn gets me a few steps closer to a finished product.  

Below is a 4 by 4 foot white frame.  It is filled with metal rings.  Inside the rings are pieces of black or white paper.  I was going to add a colored collage behind the black and white paper, however the idea of a white frame began to bother me.  It seemed to clean and less organic than I had originally hoped for. 

 And so my journey to a piece continued.  I have tentatively decided that I would like to make a maze along the left wall of my studio.  This maze will be made out of the wooden planks seen below.  The planks have borders in order to contain the metal rings I had originally intended on using.  The wood will show through and the rings will have 3-D collages within them.    

Wish me luck friends!

The Calm Before the Storm- An In Progress Piece

I started this piece with the idea of a safe place in mind.  Inside the coil of wire are a few pieces of lavender.  The lavender represents the calming experience that is being in the womb.

The "Inner Box" represents the comfort zone people have once outside of the womb.  Once outside of the womb, I have found that people try to stay within a comfort zone.  However this place is often lacking in excitement and is very black and white.  This is why I am planning on making the "Inner Box" with black, and white geometric shapes, in order to convey simplicity and the dihcotomic nature of the thought processes within this comfort zone.

I have cut out triangles in some of the black shapes.  These represent different ways to go about seeing things.  When looking through the cut out triangles I see things differently, it gives light which sheds through to the other side of the paper.  I have also made the shapes bend and curve, in order to give dimension to this piece.

This "Inner Box" will go inside a much larger, and much more colorful frame.  The color will represent the beauty and chaos that can be found outside of the comfort zone.  I believe in the ability to make this a successful piece!


                                   A Detail:                                                     The Inner Box:

                  

Artist Statement

I believe in a truth.  A truth so powerful that it stems from my toes, rises to my gut, tingles my spine, and comes out of my mouth like a force to be reckon with.  I believe in a truth that hurts my teeth, makes me clench my jaw, and tighten my fists.  I believe in a truth that makes me look past all of these things in order to help me feel truly alive.  I believe in a truth that brings tears to my eyes, touches my heart, hurts my soul, and gives me an emotion, any emotion, so powerful that I can no longer breathe from excitement.  I believe in a truth, a truth so strong that I can be knocked down with a feather, because that is the core truth of art.  Good art.  Bad art.  Odd art.  Amazing art.  Funny, silly, stoic art. Overly priced art.  Under priced, grab it for a steal art.  Art that moves me when I hear it, when I smell it, see it, touch it, taste it.  I believe in art I can swim in and run over and gaze at; art that I can walk through and come out the other side knowing that I have changed.  And though not all art is going to belong in a museum, and though not all artists will have autobiographies written about them when they are dead, or alive, I believe in art and its makers’ combined power.  The power that can communicate, emulate, imitate, and show me, and all others who are willing to see, the human condition.  That is an art I want to see, and that is an art I am hoping to make.  This feeling, this lifestyle, this ability to forever impact and change a person or people, is why I do what I do.  This is why I am an artist.