jsloanearts - paintings and mixed media collages
Your Bio
"I subsist, however, and cannot help myself
subsisting. I am still there, with the organic
sensations which come to me from the surface and from
the interior of my body, with the recollections which
my past perceptions have left behind them, nay, with
the impressions, post positive and full, of the void I
have just made about me."
- Henri Bergson,"Creative Evolution"
There was a time when a work of art was an extension, in some ways a prosthetic, of the artist. Incorporation of personal and environmental detritus into artwork embodied the physical, emotional, and spiritual presence of the artist (e.g. Picasso and Braque, or Schwitters and Rauschenberg used items like newspapers, coke bottles, beds and/or clothing). Yet in recent years the idea of manifesting ideas, emotions, sensations, mythologies, and/or experiences through the creation of an object became an outdated and remote concept. "Media" has quickly replaced "medium", and art as we previously knew it has become something of a phantom. Video, photography, and digitally produced works offer much, but they don't carry the stains and scars of our uniquely human experience.
My artwork looks back, in many ways, to a time when an art object retained a talismanic quality. Processes such as tearing, burning, staining, and hand-stitching all reflect the tactile nature of our human experience and the sometimes unexpected, imperfect, developments of time and nature. I combine traditional art materials with vintage/used fabrics and found objects, collected from our shared environment, as well as from my personal history. In this way, I create pieces that are culturally meaningful and relevant, while also extremely intimate. My paintings and collages are investigations of my external and internal worlds, incorporating visceral, psychological, and mythological influences. The relationships between these influences continuously shift, interact, and ultimately integrate. My constant search for meaning amongst these elements and integrations, requires perpetual change and fluidity, which is reflected in the organic feel of my work. I combine subtle shifts of color and shape with a personal repertoire of symbols and words, such that my images often look as if they were still growing, developing, "becoming", or possibly deteriorating, much as we as individuals and a culture do perpetually.
My artworks are documentation of the transient nature of our existences, our cultural and environmental surroundings, perceptions, mythologies, and identities. l create aesthetic hybrids - reliquaries of our history. While being distinctly self-referential, my work is necessarily also subject to the ever-shifting currents of the collective consciousness.
subsisting. I am still there, with the organic
sensations which come to me from the surface and from
the interior of my body, with the recollections which
my past perceptions have left behind them, nay, with
the impressions, post positive and full, of the void I
have just made about me."
- Henri Bergson,"Creative Evolution"
There was a time when a work of art was an extension, in some ways a prosthetic, of the artist. Incorporation of personal and environmental detritus into artwork embodied the physical, emotional, and spiritual presence of the artist (e.g. Picasso and Braque, or Schwitters and Rauschenberg used items like newspapers, coke bottles, beds and/or clothing). Yet in recent years the idea of manifesting ideas, emotions, sensations, mythologies, and/or experiences through the creation of an object became an outdated and remote concept. "Media" has quickly replaced "medium", and art as we previously knew it has become something of a phantom. Video, photography, and digitally produced works offer much, but they don't carry the stains and scars of our uniquely human experience.
My artwork looks back, in many ways, to a time when an art object retained a talismanic quality. Processes such as tearing, burning, staining, and hand-stitching all reflect the tactile nature of our human experience and the sometimes unexpected, imperfect, developments of time and nature. I combine traditional art materials with vintage/used fabrics and found objects, collected from our shared environment, as well as from my personal history. In this way, I create pieces that are culturally meaningful and relevant, while also extremely intimate. My paintings and collages are investigations of my external and internal worlds, incorporating visceral, psychological, and mythological influences. The relationships between these influences continuously shift, interact, and ultimately integrate. My constant search for meaning amongst these elements and integrations, requires perpetual change and fluidity, which is reflected in the organic feel of my work. I combine subtle shifts of color and shape with a personal repertoire of symbols and words, such that my images often look as if they were still growing, developing, "becoming", or possibly deteriorating, much as we as individuals and a culture do perpetually.
My artworks are documentation of the transient nature of our existences, our cultural and environmental surroundings, perceptions, mythologies, and identities. l create aesthetic hybrids - reliquaries of our history. While being distinctly self-referential, my work is necessarily also subject to the ever-shifting currents of the collective consciousness.