Thursday, October 29, 2009
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Artist Statement
Through my work I interrogate the “I”; within and outside of language, with my limitations, potential, barriers. I shuffle furniture within, let dust settle, play/draw with that dust, sweep it up out of sight (seemingly), and shuffle some more, always unsettling.
Dialogue starts the process, whether with theory or individuals. I ask the other, “What do you need? What is essential to you?” and reflect upon my own needs, desires. I look. I see the marks on the wall, the previous hand’s spackle, the gritted tape applied in such and such a gesture. I see the evergreen, the bursting of its bark as it fills more and more of his form. I see my reflection, my shadow, at times attached to my daughter’s hand, at moments without. I observe others’ creative process; in frustration, gentleness, peacefulness, rage-fullness, purposeful. I discuss this process, with professors, friends, artists, mothers, children, lover, Montessori teachers, the women working the cash register, every day.
In current work, Body Form, I move, photographing the movement, printing it in its stillness on paper, cutting out the silhouette, (finding my boundary), a representation of me in paper doll cutout. I cut ‘me’ out, in order to give myself more space, in any space. This does not work, as the gesture is forced. But the cutting “me” out works on many levels; I use the negative image. For now, I fill the form with what feels more like me than the superficial image. I play. I sense I need to break the silhouette, blur my boundary, my form not just to reform but to metamorphose. I am and continue to be in process.
Dialogue starts the process, whether with theory or individuals. I ask the other, “What do you need? What is essential to you?” and reflect upon my own needs, desires. I look. I see the marks on the wall, the previous hand’s spackle, the gritted tape applied in such and such a gesture. I see the evergreen, the bursting of its bark as it fills more and more of his form. I see my reflection, my shadow, at times attached to my daughter’s hand, at moments without. I observe others’ creative process; in frustration, gentleness, peacefulness, rage-fullness, purposeful. I discuss this process, with professors, friends, artists, mothers, children, lover, Montessori teachers, the women working the cash register, every day.
In current work, Body Form, I move, photographing the movement, printing it in its stillness on paper, cutting out the silhouette, (finding my boundary), a representation of me in paper doll cutout. I cut ‘me’ out, in order to give myself more space, in any space. This does not work, as the gesture is forced. But the cutting “me” out works on many levels; I use the negative image. For now, I fill the form with what feels more like me than the superficial image. I play. I sense I need to break the silhouette, blur my boundary, my form not just to reform but to metamorphose. I am and continue to be in process.
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Friday, October 16, 2009
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Monday, October 12, 2009
Done/Beginning
(with the physical)
HCG levels are at -2.
(emotional... will post tomorrow)
There is an importance in texture and color representing my insides.
HCG levels are at -2.
(emotional... will post tomorrow)
There is an importance in texture and color representing my insides.
Artist statement rough draft
There is a lot here, and many concepts that need to be consolidated, but this is what I have been working on:
My work is about facilitating contemplative spaces within the context of everyday life.
I am interested in revealing a common thread between meditative practice and everyday actions.
Working with repetition as an aspect of meditative practice, collaborating with other artists to question ideas of authorship, and illuminating the presence of absence to speak about tragedy and loss, have been predominant choices in my work. From paintings that refer to fragile layers of the human psyche, to using Morse code to translate text into highly ornamental installations, I am interested in re-thinking notions of the Everyday as it exists in relation to spirituality.
Employing a wide array of media allows me to investigate this relationship in different ways. It is my intention to work with the delicate nature of human relationships, and the transient nature of human existence. This inquiry is made visible by a painting; participating in a public cleaning performance may bring more awareness to those aspects of human nature which we tend to overlook.
As an example, the beaded installations I create, or Conscious Objects, are three-dimensional drawings that can also be worn. They are Morse code translations of poems and texts that highlight repetitive daily activities typically associated with domestic work. The nature of the chosen texts is reflected in each piece’s construction – cyclical, at times arduous – to underscore the interconnection between meditation and daily life.
This is also reflected in my paintings and performance work. I work together with another artist, and created an ongoing project called “Meaning Cleaning”, which performs public cleanings as a way to take responsibility for shared environments, cleanse spaces of past experiences, and also to play with social codes and notions of what is acceptable public behavior. Our actions attempt to activate spaces by taking responsibility for a common ground and a shared history; our focus as artists is the space that is created to allow for more natural communication of passersby. Although we work on the foundation beneath our feet, it is the dynamic that is created that reminds us of our interconnection.
Through experiences of travel, I have been able to process more extensively how my work can comment on, embrace, and transform the inherited stains of the past. Being outside of known structures has afforded me the space to become more aware to a greater scope of human suffering. The fundamental elements of Meaning Cleaning were literally laid out on the studio floor at a residency in Tuscany, Italy: my task of keeping a communal area clean quickly became my artwork and subsequently helped me remove the separation in my mind between art and everyday life. In a cultural exchange workshop in Cape Town, South Africa, I was able to recognize my own marginal ways of thinking and reflect on the choice to transform personal trauma into a more universal compassion against the inequalities of human justice. Drawing from personal experience, I attempt to confront and transform my own notions of perceived vulnerability with grace, beauty, dignity, and compassion.
My work is about facilitating contemplative spaces within the context of everyday life.
I am interested in revealing a common thread between meditative practice and everyday actions.
Working with repetition as an aspect of meditative practice, collaborating with other artists to question ideas of authorship, and illuminating the presence of absence to speak about tragedy and loss, have been predominant choices in my work. From paintings that refer to fragile layers of the human psyche, to using Morse code to translate text into highly ornamental installations, I am interested in re-thinking notions of the Everyday as it exists in relation to spirituality.
Employing a wide array of media allows me to investigate this relationship in different ways. It is my intention to work with the delicate nature of human relationships, and the transient nature of human existence. This inquiry is made visible by a painting; participating in a public cleaning performance may bring more awareness to those aspects of human nature which we tend to overlook.
As an example, the beaded installations I create, or Conscious Objects, are three-dimensional drawings that can also be worn. They are Morse code translations of poems and texts that highlight repetitive daily activities typically associated with domestic work. The nature of the chosen texts is reflected in each piece’s construction – cyclical, at times arduous – to underscore the interconnection between meditation and daily life.
This is also reflected in my paintings and performance work. I work together with another artist, and created an ongoing project called “Meaning Cleaning”, which performs public cleanings as a way to take responsibility for shared environments, cleanse spaces of past experiences, and also to play with social codes and notions of what is acceptable public behavior. Our actions attempt to activate spaces by taking responsibility for a common ground and a shared history; our focus as artists is the space that is created to allow for more natural communication of passersby. Although we work on the foundation beneath our feet, it is the dynamic that is created that reminds us of our interconnection.
Through experiences of travel, I have been able to process more extensively how my work can comment on, embrace, and transform the inherited stains of the past. Being outside of known structures has afforded me the space to become more aware to a greater scope of human suffering. The fundamental elements of Meaning Cleaning were literally laid out on the studio floor at a residency in Tuscany, Italy: my task of keeping a communal area clean quickly became my artwork and subsequently helped me remove the separation in my mind between art and everyday life. In a cultural exchange workshop in Cape Town, South Africa, I was able to recognize my own marginal ways of thinking and reflect on the choice to transform personal trauma into a more universal compassion against the inequalities of human justice. Drawing from personal experience, I attempt to confront and transform my own notions of perceived vulnerability with grace, beauty, dignity, and compassion.
September/October work
I am getting my work shot later on today.
Thought I would post them here in progress/process:
Alter/Altar
Oil on Canvas
5' x 6'
I walked by this alter every morning on the way to studio. It was in a precarious state of falling over, but was still standing. I think this resembles one's own mental and physical state from time to time...
Little Bits of Domesticity
Oil on Canvas
5'x 6'
This larger work is based on a collage I did in 2005. Everything thrown up in the air, suspended, existing in the same space
Mothers and Daugthers
Oil on Canvas
44" x 42" each panel
This is the first painting I started when I got back from the Spiritual course this summer.
As I get older, I begin to think of the changing nature of my relationship with my mother. Will I become a parent and make the same choices? This piece begins to reveal the fragility of perceived vulnerability.
West Side piers
Oil on Canvas
32" x 48"
The piers on the west side of Manhattan burned down in the summer of 1977, but have never been removed completely. This is a sketch to work with the memory of destruction, the presence of absence, and a change of perspective (literal and metaphoric)
Sky sketch
Oil on paper
18" x 24"
Painting sketch for potential new (but old) series: daily meditation as sky painting. We'll see...
Thought I would post them here in progress/process:
Alter/Altar
Oil on Canvas
5' x 6'
I walked by this alter every morning on the way to studio. It was in a precarious state of falling over, but was still standing. I think this resembles one's own mental and physical state from time to time...
Little Bits of Domesticity
Oil on Canvas
5'x 6'
This larger work is based on a collage I did in 2005. Everything thrown up in the air, suspended, existing in the same space
Mothers and Daugthers
Oil on Canvas
44" x 42" each panel
This is the first painting I started when I got back from the Spiritual course this summer.
As I get older, I begin to think of the changing nature of my relationship with my mother. Will I become a parent and make the same choices? This piece begins to reveal the fragility of perceived vulnerability.
West Side piers
Oil on Canvas
32" x 48"
The piers on the west side of Manhattan burned down in the summer of 1977, but have never been removed completely. This is a sketch to work with the memory of destruction, the presence of absence, and a change of perspective (literal and metaphoric)
Sky sketch
Oil on paper
18" x 24"
Painting sketch for potential new (but old) series: daily meditation as sky painting. We'll see...
Saturday, October 10, 2009
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
(a) If revolution - in other words, the radical transformation of society- cannot have as its goal and end either faster growth or a mere change of political personnel, it can only have as its goal and end the transformation of daily life.
(b) As has already been established on many occasions, this implies not zero growth or reduced growth, but different growth - that is to say, qualitative development, and hence a greater complexity, not a simplification, of social relations.
(c) This equally implies a different way of living, extending to the creation of a new social space, a different social time; the creation of a different mode of existence of social relations and different situations, liberated from models that reproduce the existing order.
(d) This also assumes a different form of thought, to be defined later. Let me say straight away: to be defined while taking account of the negative. The project is thus not to know or recognize daily life, in order to accept or affirm it as such in the name of positive knowledge, but on the contrary, to create it by controlling its ambiguity. Thus the project no longer consists in unfolding daily life to disclose what is concealed in it (first version of the Critique); or in an effort to transcend it (second version), but in a metamorphosis through action and works - hence through thought, poetry, love. Once we have obtained knowledge of it and defined it, we must leave it without hesitation before the risk we face: the risk of involvement. Daily life is simultaneously the arena and the total stake.
Excerpt taken from Henri Lefebvre's Conclusion of the 3rd volume of Critique of Everyday Life
(b) As has already been established on many occasions, this implies not zero growth or reduced growth, but different growth - that is to say, qualitative development, and hence a greater complexity, not a simplification, of social relations.
(c) This equally implies a different way of living, extending to the creation of a new social space, a different social time; the creation of a different mode of existence of social relations and different situations, liberated from models that reproduce the existing order.
(d) This also assumes a different form of thought, to be defined later. Let me say straight away: to be defined while taking account of the negative. The project is thus not to know or recognize daily life, in order to accept or affirm it as such in the name of positive knowledge, but on the contrary, to create it by controlling its ambiguity. Thus the project no longer consists in unfolding daily life to disclose what is concealed in it (first version of the Critique); or in an effort to transcend it (second version), but in a metamorphosis through action and works - hence through thought, poetry, love. Once we have obtained knowledge of it and defined it, we must leave it without hesitation before the risk we face: the risk of involvement. Daily life is simultaneously the arena and the total stake.
Excerpt taken from Henri Lefebvre's Conclusion of the 3rd volume of Critique of Everyday Life
Monday, October 5, 2009
October
Thinking of you, Tereza, and also my thoughts surround the transient nature of life.
I sit on an aero bed, in another temporary apartment, before launching into the world for the day - to transport my paintings and begin work on new ones today. This new environment is nice and quiet - we're in Jackson Heights until we leave for the Bay Area in two weeks.
I'll post some images of works in progress shortly.
My thoughts to you
x
A
I sit on an aero bed, in another temporary apartment, before launching into the world for the day - to transport my paintings and begin work on new ones today. This new environment is nice and quiet - we're in Jackson Heights until we leave for the Bay Area in two weeks.
I'll post some images of works in progress shortly.
My thoughts to you
x
A
Thursday, October 1, 2009
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