Below are your Post-it notes you wrote at LEXICON, an interactive art show curated
by Jenny Lam, as well as all the artists’ original statements, which were not
revealed during the exhibition’s entire run. Some of the statements were created
specifically for this event and have never been seen before until now. (For
more information about LEXICON, visit
the official page. For behind-the-scenes looks, press coverage, updates,
and more, visit the tag, as well as Instagram, Twitter, Tumblr,
and the Facebook event page.) To better read the Post-its, click on the
images to enlarge them. For images of the pieces on their own, visit the artwork page.
Adrienne Glover
The Black Box Sessions
mixed media
“Currently my art is based
upon meditations on privacy, disruption and the black box.
Merriam-Webster defines black
box this way:
1.
a usually
complicated electronic device whose internal mechanism is usually hidden from
or mysterious to the user; broadly : anything that has
mysterious or unknown internal functions or mechanisms
2.
a crashworthy
device in aircraft for recording cockpit conversations and flight data
The concept of the black box
session(s) arrived during the course of discussions revolving around boxed
wine, recollections of dalliances, and also contemplation of the phrase itself.
A black box is many things:
an attempt to maintain order and records despite disruption. A disruptor of
assumptions. A human mind. Dictionary definitions are only a starting point.
They are not an arrival.”
Adrienne Powers
Because of My Ancestors
mixed media
“My spiritual journey was
ignited based on my unfamiliarity with African Spiritualities. Eleven years
ago, I was inspired to learn more and that desire for knowledge has inspired
the work that I create today. The African belief systems that survived the
Middle Passage and evolved with time, have been woven into my work through
figurative expression and the interpretation of patterns, symbols, textures and
colors. My intent is for the viewer is to consider the vibrant energy of the
work as it strives to communicate the spiritual wealth of the African
Diaspora.”
Agnieszka Ligendza
Untitled
archival digital
print
“My images are created through an
intuitive process, driven by an intimate familiarity with tools and medium. I
digitally manipulate found, created, photographed and scanned specimens, often
to the point that they no longer resemble their source. Sampled imagery is
placed, transformed and blended. The stacked layers, through the process of
masking and unmasking, intersect with each other’s remains to define light and
shadow. The accumulated residues expose forms and textures, persistent
artifacts of the process. Because of the methodology by which I create, I don’t
immediately know sometimes what an image specifically means or says. I do know
that these images are autobiographically driven, frequently imbued with imagery
which evokes metamorphosis, oppression, perseverance, compassion, spirituality,
feminism, resilience. Although these images are self-reflective, they are also
permeated with universal themes. And just as the process by which they are
created, these images are multi-layered in meaning.”
Aisha Yousaf
pen and ink print
“Love and Oil juxtaposes what some might deem as taboo, two female
lovers sharing an embrace, with the actual issues at hand- corruption and war
over oil.”
Alba Margarita
Luna Menguante
acrylic on canvas
“In my artwork I strive to
convey my inner reality and those thoughts I have trouble expressing with
words, as well as to exorcise anger, resentments, anxieties and even
celebrations about my experience of being born female. I am deeply inspired by
female surrealists like Remedios Varo, Lenonora Carrington, Leonor Fini and
others: I feel that womanhood is and always has been a deeply surreal
experience, rife with uncertainty, danger, witchcraft, sensuality, love,
intuition, and a sense of repressed Goddesshood. I paint primarily on black
canvas, as I feel like I am drawing out all these ideas that yearn to be
expressed out of the shadows.”
 |
| Courtesy of Aimy Tien. |
Alix Anne Shaw
Moon Groin and TRYST / TRUST / TRISTE
neon
“My work explores the
interaction between technology and our most ephemeral moments of human
experience. Dreaming, walking, markmaking—each of these small, often
unconsidered, actions conveys an essential human impulse. I seek to transcribe
these moments, to force a reconsideration of our current cultural context. As
an artist living in urban Chicago, the question I am always asking is how we
can continue to be human in the face of conditions that threaten to overwhelm
and obliterate.
I am increasingly struck by
the fact that human experience is ephemeral, our bodies are fallible, and the
language we use to communicate is imperfect at best. My work insists on small
acts of noticing and interpreting, on the primacy of physical actions. It
argues for the necessity of interjecting the human into dehumanizing
environments. Such artistic gestures are perhaps futile, but are nonetheless
vitally important. I ask the viewer to question what we think we know about
ourselves, others, and the way we exist in our collective environments.
Co-opting, disrupting, destabilizing, opposing, holding forth, building small
fires of meaning and protest in the cracks—this is what I want my work to achieve.”
Allen Vandever
Op Tower
acrylic and epoxy on
canvas
“I feel an artist’s body of work is his unwritten biography, archiving
his progress in both craftsmanship and self-discovery, all the while capturing
the most personal and essential moments in his life, and revealing his personal
reflections.
In my painting, I feel free from the jumble of words all too limited in their ability to fully illustrate an image of my sensations and reflections. Painting is a way to bypass the filter of conscious analysis by passing the point where we attempt to name and catalog our responses, which often diminishes the true glory of the moment.
I am free to
explore my dreams, very often so intensely alive that they continue to exist in
my sight in the material world. I have yet to find the words capable of
illustrating such glorious visions, so I paint them that I may relive them, and
that I might apply a pinprick into the veil between our worlds allowing a speck
of light to illuminate its existence to others. I aspire to reveal such worlds
to my son, that the images from my journey inspire him to begin his own
exploration, for a mere sliver of light is enough to bring the world gushing
forth, demolishing the walls that confine our thoughts.
Although I fail to find the words to convey my passion, I cannot deny their role in my reflection, for words have allowed me to further explore the images I have been moved to create. For when I write, I am transported into the silent realm of the mind, where the voices of human reason and passion can be heard in intimate conversation, contemplating the infinite dimensions of being.”
Amanda Mudrovich
Abraxas and A Red Breast Whir
Host or How Stars Are Birthed
collage on paper
“My main motivation for
creating art is the irresistible urge to peel back the layers and explore
what’s below the surface. More often
than not, this means dissecting my own subconscious. Collage is one of my
favorite media to work in and a great jumping off point for painting or mixed
media work for me because there is a sense of relinquishing control over the
finished product. I never begin a collage with a subject matter or set
destination in mind, but instead choose and arrange the pieces that I am drawn
to and allow it to be what it wants to be.
In this way, collage gives me a sense of excavating the subconscious and
putting what is unseen or intangible into concrete form.
Given my motivation and
methods for creating artwork, it’s not surprising that I draw influences from
Surrealism and such artists as Max Ernst, Paul Delvaux, Leonor Fini and Dadaist
Hannah Hoch as well as the literary movement of Magical Realism.
Initially showing my work to
others felt as though I was placing myself in a very vulnerable position-
exposing so much of my intrapersonal being. Then something beautiful happened-
through viewer’s reactions it became apparent that much of what I’d taken for
granted as solely my own internal experience was actually shared by
others. Though we all take different
routes and modes of transportation, we are all travelers and it feels good to
share the journey.
It is my hope that everyone
viewing my art has the freedom to assign their own personal meaning or
interpretation to it and feel connected to others through exploring the collective
‘self’.”
Andrew Ek
Blue Couch and Vacuuming
oil on canvas
“Andrew Ek is a self-taught
painter living and working in Chicago. He is known for dark, sensual figurative
paintings which could be described as Magic Realism.”
Angie Redmond
oil and acrylic on canvas; oil on canvas
“Angie Redmond uses her
personal experiences to focus her artwork on various social issues within a
culture. For example, the subject of natural African American hair is a
reoccurring theme within her art. Having natural hair herself, she has faced a
lot of ridicule and negative views towards her coils. Drawing from those
experiences she creates paintings and drawings to celebrate natural hair for
its unique distinctiveness and beauty. She also explore topics that affect her
community; such as the violence throughout Chicago and our ability to make the
situation better.
It’s the thick texture and
vibrant colors of the oil paint and the love for the complexity of humanity
that keeps the brush in her hand! She uses her personal narrative to honor her
race and celebrate all of the human spirit.”
Annette Hur
Mundane Distilled
acrylic on canvas
“My work is narrative potential: an image that visualizes
the disjunction between what we expect—or what we tend to remember-and the
reality. Straddling an irreconcilable experience in human
relationship and the act of recording it becomes my entry point. An ambiguous yet
luminous space with a pleasant urban vibe followed by marks and forms as
possible figuration leads the viewers into an immersive space-almost like a
portal—asking your personal histories to fill in the gaps. My painting gestures
focus on creating harmony to contribute a particular sensibility or atmosphere
as whole and sometimes to break it: awkwardness in poise. A pictorial landscape
is forged based not only on visuo-spatial memory in which mimicry of my
physical multi-cultural reality happens in some ways, but defies it in others
like cyber or virtual game space does. Mining the unconscious of visual and
spatial illusion, immersive but quiet color field painting of abstract
expressionism and some surrealism techniques merge together in my practice. Deliberate
distortions, traces of figures, optical illusions, and color fields yield fresh
imagery that opens up the meaning of what they are, where they are. My process
often begins with staining canvas as a limited palette, followed by gestures
that are reminiscent of Miro’s automatic drawing (or Twombly’s act of writing)
and/or Tanguy’s relinquished traditional aspects of perspective, and suggested
swelling ephemeral shapes. My work is not an abstraction of something specific
in reality. It is a poetics of forms of what we say, describe, mourn, or
cherish.”
Arturo Mazon
mixed media
“I have been drawing from
what I can remember as far back as 5th grade. Attending the Art Institute of
Chicago for summer classes as early as 15 years old, I was very fascinated with
graffiti, but not wanting to limit myself, I began doing still life drawings. I
began my studies at the American Academy of Art for 2 years after I graduated
high school. Well, at the Academy of Art I really found myself at a loss in
what I wanted to do. Times were very hard for me and I was not sure if I could
continue attending the school. I fell out of drawing after leaving the Academy
and was not really sure what I was going to do moving forward.
Time had passed and now I
have this energy to draw everything I see in my head. My imagination is running
wild with ideas, and now as a family man with the support of my wife, I’m
finding the want to do art again. I do not have a career in art and drawing for
me is not a hobby. It’s a lost love that I found again and want to share with
my wife and family who have always supported me.”
Brianna Baurichter
Capacity #2
charcoal on paper
“Procedural memory has a way of
connecting the body to the unconscious mind. By thinking through the body, we
are able to recall facets of the self buried by conscious logic, pride, fear,
and mistrust. My practice commits to trusting the body and responding to its
needs in order to realize the needs of the whole self. I employ the immediacy
and malleability of charcoal, performance, and video to express, capture, and
translate this alternative thought process. Combining this intuitive trajectory
with an open, responsive mindset, my thought process while making is a heavily
layered negotiation between myself, the work, and the environment. The results
of this layering are hybrid creations such as drawings combining textures into
hallucinatory imagery, sculptures acting as drawings and enterable structures,
and performances intermingling drawing, improvisation, and choreography. My own
diverse ethnicity has played a significant role in questioning normative
categorizations to which hybridity does not conform. Through various composites
of media and content, I explore hybridity as a potential source for discovery,
expanded perception, and empathetic capacities.”
Céline Browning
Draw
plastic, wood, and metal
“Using the vocabulary of
surrealism and pop-art, I deconstruct, combine, and repurpose familiar
functional objects, creating an uncanny visual language that reimagines what these
objects signify.”
Christine Nicklos
Hang On, Let Go
driftwood, paint,
natural found objects, and wire
“My art making is closely
tied to my identity as an art therapist and definition of art therapy; the act
of creating involves a process of communicating through images and words, which
can help individuals, gain insight into their issues and add meaning to their
lives, in turn providing an opportunity for transformation and healing.
My
work is a perpetual diary based on my experiences and observations of the
world. Nature is an important source of inspiration that helps me create this
diary and I often use it as a metaphor to help me describe my experiences and
emotions. It helps me explore the
psychological aspects in my work more creatively. My work is not about
re-creating exactly what I see. Instead, it is about reinterpreting nature to
help me explore the human condition, relationships, and emotions.
Creating
art is a very cathartic and therapeutic process, which has helped me reflect on
life, overcome difficult times and gain perspective. A lot of my work addresses
personal struggles—I incorporate aspects of nature to help me describe concepts
like acceptance and transformation, which stem from these struggles. My work
has also become a reflection of the critical issues I’ve explored both
individually and with my clients. The healing process of creating fulfills me
and was one of the key reasons I became an art therapist—to support and inspire
others on their own journey towards healing and growth.”
Cristy Corso
Broken Open Heart: United States
plexiglass, LED
lighting, 3D printed plastic, and acrylic paint
“My Valentine’s Day-like heart shaped box, broken in half,
represents the American pop-culture history of advertising & consumerism,
specifically in the 1990s, & how we interacted with it. The first heart as
a symbol, meaning ‘to love,’ hit mass populous as a logograph in NYC as part of
an ‘I Love NY’ campaign to boost tourism in 1977. It was said the layout &
heart graphic was inspired by pop-artist Robert Indiana’s LOVE sculpture, which
I would skateboard past, in the West Village also known as the ‘Heart of NYC.’
In 1994 at 16 years old I was accepted into the Parson’s School of Design’s
intensive summer art study.
Where my last Plexiglas / metal installation of similar scale was tediously traced digitally, this heart structure I created entirely by hand. The previous 48 individual Plexiglas States that made up the Continental US, I later outsource to have laser cut. In this work I drew the heart with a pencil & no preliminary design on Plexiglas. By hand I fabricated this assemblage. This process helped me see how modern fine artists, still around by the 1940s, were creating a new genre called ‘applied arts.’ This was to ascetically design products & new graphic design techniques to stimulate a new market of goods & advertising after World War II in America. My solely-for-art purpose object was built out of a fabrication shop in Las Vegas in 115-degree desert heat. This put a new spin on the word ‘sweatshop.’ Where ‘sweatshop’ could be associated with production conditions overseas, my work was conceptualized, designed, crafted, & man-made by one woman with tools in America (excluding the 3D printed stars). The florescent yellow Chinese stars were martial art weapons. There were smaller Nintendo gaming stars used in Super Mario Brother’s 8-bit gaming world. I strategically installed these ‘stars,’ & smaller melted mirror Plexiglas hearts, to symbolize major US cities—like a map across the heart. The Chinese stars, being an historic object of weaponry designed in China, now ironically became produced in America.
For the hand painted mural I used 8-bit technology for the iconic ‘I Love NYC’ logo & had it read ‘I Love Tokyo’ in Japanese. The 8-bit style was inspired by videogames I played in the 1980s like the American-made Atari, from creator Nolen Bushnell, whom I met recently during a licensing convention discussing the topic of products from overseas & marketed in America. By the late 1980s the Atari would be almost entirely replaced by the Nintendo made in Japan. Paradoxically, the 2nd time the heart as a symbol was referred into pop-culture was by Nintendo videogames like Legend of Zelda & Mike Tyson’s Punch Out. The hearts represented ‘life’ & ‘health’ lines for characters to ‘live’ & even gain stars as points. Growing up my dad didn’t mind making me late for school to interactively play with not only mine but his newfound obsession. Following the American dream, we had to get the Nintendo before the neighbors did. It was considered the first ‘Family Computer’ in America where more than one player could interact within its gaming environment.
Where my last Plexiglas / metal installation of similar scale was tediously traced digitally, this heart structure I created entirely by hand. The previous 48 individual Plexiglas States that made up the Continental US, I later outsource to have laser cut. In this work I drew the heart with a pencil & no preliminary design on Plexiglas. By hand I fabricated this assemblage. This process helped me see how modern fine artists, still around by the 1940s, were creating a new genre called ‘applied arts.’ This was to ascetically design products & new graphic design techniques to stimulate a new market of goods & advertising after World War II in America. My solely-for-art purpose object was built out of a fabrication shop in Las Vegas in 115-degree desert heat. This put a new spin on the word ‘sweatshop.’ Where ‘sweatshop’ could be associated with production conditions overseas, my work was conceptualized, designed, crafted, & man-made by one woman with tools in America (excluding the 3D printed stars). The florescent yellow Chinese stars were martial art weapons. There were smaller Nintendo gaming stars used in Super Mario Brother’s 8-bit gaming world. I strategically installed these ‘stars,’ & smaller melted mirror Plexiglas hearts, to symbolize major US cities—like a map across the heart. The Chinese stars, being an historic object of weaponry designed in China, now ironically became produced in America.
For the hand painted mural I used 8-bit technology for the iconic ‘I Love NYC’ logo & had it read ‘I Love Tokyo’ in Japanese. The 8-bit style was inspired by videogames I played in the 1980s like the American-made Atari, from creator Nolen Bushnell, whom I met recently during a licensing convention discussing the topic of products from overseas & marketed in America. By the late 1980s the Atari would be almost entirely replaced by the Nintendo made in Japan. Paradoxically, the 2nd time the heart as a symbol was referred into pop-culture was by Nintendo videogames like Legend of Zelda & Mike Tyson’s Punch Out. The hearts represented ‘life’ & ‘health’ lines for characters to ‘live’ & even gain stars as points. Growing up my dad didn’t mind making me late for school to interactively play with not only mine but his newfound obsession. Following the American dream, we had to get the Nintendo before the neighbors did. It was considered the first ‘Family Computer’ in America where more than one player could interact within its gaming environment.
By High
School some of us restless teenagers were concerned about new societal issues
affecting our humanity American mass marketing & consumerism. We would
blast out subculture views in ‘Zines’ & alternative music now hitting
mainstream such as ‘Smells like Teen Spirit,’ topping radio charts. We were
starting to catch on & rebelling against a generation who were tired of
being sold to. The reverb from the 1980s excess of optimisms & prosperity
was now a cup runneth over. By the mid-1990s many teenagers wanted to revolt
& disenfranchise this pop-culture machine barreling at us through televisions
& magazines. We felt we were walking along a yellow brick road our parents
paved for us & stumbled upon the curtain revealing ‘the Man.’ We found that corporations were behind the propaganda
that were selling tickets to an amusement park called ‘Oz,’ America’s new ‘reality’?
We felt this era was ‘manipulating’
our parents who bought stock in this pop-culture franchise. This is where
subcultures, making new neo-dada art movements, had a new political agenda
where the enemy was the corporations selling more of everything & made
everywhere.
When I was attending Parson’s School in NYC I witnessed new graffiti street art popping up with curious new messages. They were in forms of stickers & stencils (which used when recently painting a car still driving the streets of Chicago) like a popular WWF wrestler’s faces named Andre The Giant with the words ‘Obey’. This canvassed streets nationwide by a new artist, 8 years older than me, named Sheppard Fairley who I also met & discussed this topic. This represented the brutality we felt needed to awaken the masses & rise against corporations holding our culture hostage. Our lack of interest in family time that involved sitting in front of a television, that wouldn’t interact back at us like videogames even, was more of a “protest” on social issues we were facing. We refused to have this object brainwash us with its flashing images & influential people selling products. We might have even skipped a prescribed Prozac or Lithium pharmaceutical drug these companies were programming our parents to use to cure our teenage angst. As a result, we would hide in our ‘Heart Shaped Box’ rooms, another song by Nirvana, why possibly ditching class & run to any hideout that screamed edifying culture or subculture in downtown Chicago. We had neither mass information we couldn’t trust nor public figures selling it to believe in. We sought shelter from an unstoppable advertising monster telling us how our lives should be & what we needed to buy. Growing up in the Midwest, an America consumer capital & near the third largest city, we were right in the forefront. The design of My American Broken Heart was much inspired by the lyrics & musical reference of Nirvana’s ‘Heart Shaped Box.’
The almost seductive swelling of the heart, which I might have only seen in a 1980’s Tom & Jerry cartoon or in comic books, seemed to be broken open & now hollowed out yet still dripping in excess. The few smaller Plexiglas mirror hearts, that was perhaps once inside, were wrapped around the walls of the 1980s that remained. I do feel the influence of the LED lighting, making this red structure illuminate like an exit sign, originated from lighting work I engineered almost 20 years ago. Where LED’s were less commonly used, I had large quantities of astonishing Electroluminescence (EL) organic light concepts (that happened to be mass-produced in a warehouse by my house). This provided a blue ray optical phenomenon big in the 1990s.
As we approached the new millennium, at 19 years old I was working for IBM Global Services summer before returning to art school in NYC. Soon after I found myself working from home where the whole downstairs of a house my father, who worked as a custom homebuilder, gave me. It was a good size painting, clay, & found object, light & wood fabrication space with tools I could make big work on breaks or after work. The lighting sculptures were made while I project managed parts of what became the first web-hosting server farm globally in the Chicagoland area. We were the first pioneering a new thing called the Internet’s eBusiness. This gave new interactive channels allowing us to make our own decisions in the new market & able to log into anywhere at anytime. The several oversized hardwood crafted installations, using dovetail joints with blue lights radiating out of routed box wall units, were already being well received. By 20 years old they were exhibited in national exhibitions, and even in a prominent gallery, where several installs & found object wood sculptures were then acquired. I found a new freedom in the work I was making at the dawn of the new generation on the rise: the digital era. All of the work seemed to be a transmittal of what my eye would see: using & wearing analog text pagers beaming blue screens, being in front of laptops, & around flashing server lights on occasion into the new millennium.
To add, My American Broken Heart as a vessel had also been looked at like a corporeal oral cavity with sharp teeth. I’ve used teeth over a ½ dozen times—from photos of angry bears & even aquatic sea creatures devouring weaker creators, several taking on the resemblance of the more traditional heart as a symbol geometrically. All & all, for the next level up of this work & game of art involving American consumerism, I would have integrated a lot more dollar signs.”
When I was attending Parson’s School in NYC I witnessed new graffiti street art popping up with curious new messages. They were in forms of stickers & stencils (which used when recently painting a car still driving the streets of Chicago) like a popular WWF wrestler’s faces named Andre The Giant with the words ‘Obey’. This canvassed streets nationwide by a new artist, 8 years older than me, named Sheppard Fairley who I also met & discussed this topic. This represented the brutality we felt needed to awaken the masses & rise against corporations holding our culture hostage. Our lack of interest in family time that involved sitting in front of a television, that wouldn’t interact back at us like videogames even, was more of a “protest” on social issues we were facing. We refused to have this object brainwash us with its flashing images & influential people selling products. We might have even skipped a prescribed Prozac or Lithium pharmaceutical drug these companies were programming our parents to use to cure our teenage angst. As a result, we would hide in our ‘Heart Shaped Box’ rooms, another song by Nirvana, why possibly ditching class & run to any hideout that screamed edifying culture or subculture in downtown Chicago. We had neither mass information we couldn’t trust nor public figures selling it to believe in. We sought shelter from an unstoppable advertising monster telling us how our lives should be & what we needed to buy. Growing up in the Midwest, an America consumer capital & near the third largest city, we were right in the forefront. The design of My American Broken Heart was much inspired by the lyrics & musical reference of Nirvana’s ‘Heart Shaped Box.’
The almost seductive swelling of the heart, which I might have only seen in a 1980’s Tom & Jerry cartoon or in comic books, seemed to be broken open & now hollowed out yet still dripping in excess. The few smaller Plexiglas mirror hearts, that was perhaps once inside, were wrapped around the walls of the 1980s that remained. I do feel the influence of the LED lighting, making this red structure illuminate like an exit sign, originated from lighting work I engineered almost 20 years ago. Where LED’s were less commonly used, I had large quantities of astonishing Electroluminescence (EL) organic light concepts (that happened to be mass-produced in a warehouse by my house). This provided a blue ray optical phenomenon big in the 1990s.
As we approached the new millennium, at 19 years old I was working for IBM Global Services summer before returning to art school in NYC. Soon after I found myself working from home where the whole downstairs of a house my father, who worked as a custom homebuilder, gave me. It was a good size painting, clay, & found object, light & wood fabrication space with tools I could make big work on breaks or after work. The lighting sculptures were made while I project managed parts of what became the first web-hosting server farm globally in the Chicagoland area. We were the first pioneering a new thing called the Internet’s eBusiness. This gave new interactive channels allowing us to make our own decisions in the new market & able to log into anywhere at anytime. The several oversized hardwood crafted installations, using dovetail joints with blue lights radiating out of routed box wall units, were already being well received. By 20 years old they were exhibited in national exhibitions, and even in a prominent gallery, where several installs & found object wood sculptures were then acquired. I found a new freedom in the work I was making at the dawn of the new generation on the rise: the digital era. All of the work seemed to be a transmittal of what my eye would see: using & wearing analog text pagers beaming blue screens, being in front of laptops, & around flashing server lights on occasion into the new millennium.
To add, My American Broken Heart as a vessel had also been looked at like a corporeal oral cavity with sharp teeth. I’ve used teeth over a ½ dozen times—from photos of angry bears & even aquatic sea creatures devouring weaker creators, several taking on the resemblance of the more traditional heart as a symbol geometrically. All & all, for the next level up of this work & game of art involving American consumerism, I would have integrated a lot more dollar signs.”
David del Bosque
La tridimensionalidad de la línea #45
chipboard, high-pressure
laminated stratified aluminum, and PVC
“… It is (line) the track made by the moving
point; that is, its product. It is created by
movement — specifically through the
destruction of the intense self-contained repose
of the point. Here, the leap out of the static into
the dynamic occurs.
Wassily Kandinsky
Point and Line to Plane
Ed. Solomon Guggenheim Foundation, 1947, p.57
The most recent of my artwork evolutes forward to a
visual change, the substantial perception of my previous work. Since the colour
and the line previously absent, involve all the background with a new and
subjective personal language: I mix lines of different colours and length so
that they go out form walls and ground, creating a visual effect of
three-dimensionality not existing before.
I conceive the representation of the line as the part
that can be seen and appears in the plane _ground or wall_ the rest of that
line that we do not see, which hides even more and which looks for the way of
going out.”
Emilie Bouvet-Boisclair
Woodland I
gauche and watercolor
on paper
“Woodland was painted over the past year and
expresses the process of working through a loss/celebrating a life. The works
show nature beings, deer, flora, clouds, in a landscape which is represented in
a dream-like way, with vivid, non-representational colors. The underlying idea
with these pieces is to create an image that is not true to life, but that is
familiar. It is to seem that in another space and time, such a scene may be
possible. It allows one to re-imagine an experience.”
Emily Calvo
How We Move Mountains
watercolor on paper
“When I tell people I work in
watercolor, they often comment, ‘How can you do that? It’s so difficult to
control.’ I tell them, ‘I don’t.’
So much of life is about figuring out when to take control and
when to let go—to allow the universe to shape the next moment. Ultimately,
control yields accuracy and predictability, while letting go invites the
unexpected, the fresh stroke, the surprise of blended colors. I gravitate to
watercolors because each painting is a reflection of this exercise: the dance
of intention and accident, the choice and the discovery. And while I dip the
brush into one color, the paint pools and blends, the paper’s texture redefines
the intensities, the shifting air and surface angle the paint in unpredictable
directions. The resulting aesthetic is testimony to the unity of my vision with
the elements that surround me—making painting an act of faith.”
George Lindmark
Crossroads
oil
“My works provide a scene from a story of my own making. I am
curious to see what other tales can be spun from my images. Is it true that one
picture is worth a thousand words?”
Jamie Gold
Sugar, Melt, Thaw, and Petrichor
acrylic on canvas
“Conceptually, I have always been
fascinated by the unknown, oddities, and things that make us truly curious. I
am inspired by surrealism, questions about our world, science and anatomy, and
the beauty of all things. With light comes the dark, and a little humor and
surprise in every situation. I start by studying real life objects, scenes, or
portraits and adding in an unrealistic quality. The outcome often seems like a
dream or an alternate universe, as if an object may or may not actually exist
in our ‘true’ perceived reality.”
Jenny Lam
Night Nurse, Scruffy-Looking
Nerf Herder, AKA, and Force
graphite; graphite
and pen; graphite
Gossamer series
graphite
“Since everyone keeps asking
me to I guess I will include some of my doodles and some old sketches of mine
from 8 years ago in my own show but I’m gonna hide them in a corner by the restrooms
because yeah.”
Jessica Smit
Poison
oil on linen
“I paint portraits and allegorical figure paintings of
people and objects in slightly surreal settings that tell a story. I use symbolic imagery to tell these stories
and capture a moment and the emotion that lies behind it. The human figure is
at the center of my work, often physically portraying the emotions experienced
within.
I am interested in what lies beneath the surface, the larger
stories and deeper meanings of our everyday experience. By creating a glimpse
into another world that has elements similar to our own, I hope to bring more
beauty and meaning to our own experience.
I love exploring the rich
color, texture, depth, and form of oil paint. I experiment
with the texture and brushstrokes of the paint, wanting the surface of the
canvas to be visually expressive and interesting to look at. Some of the
imagery is highly rendered while other areas are more textural and
abstract.
I am inspired by the dramatic
figurative paintings of the Baroque artists and the mystery and poetic beauty
of the Symbolist and Pre-Raphaelite artists of the late nineteenth century. My
work includes figurative works, portraits, still life, and creative figurative
compositions.
The visual narratives in my
paintings are both personal and universal, and I hope that each viewer finds
his or her own meaning and stories in the symbolic imagery.”
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| Courtesy of Judi Tussey. |
Judi Tussey
Turkish Ship
acrylic
“When I was little my mom
gave paints and paper to my sister and me to give us a quiet project because my
dad worked at night and slept in the daytime. At age five I drew pictures to
send to relatives to share what I thought was pretty or interesting. So when
people ask why I paint so realistically, I say, because I want to share something
beautiful exactly as I see it.
Over the years I’ve been
fascinated with painting animals, the Lake Michigan shoreline, and beautiful
scenery, usually using acrylics as my medium.”
Julia Mellen
Nice Ridges
watercolor
“Julia Mellen, struggling to
make sense of the natural and her own identity as a multicultural, multilingual
being, creates landscapes and characters at once familiar yet unearthly.”
Karen Hirsch
Pi R Squared in Blue
digital art and chromogenic
print on canvas
“My imagery can be divided
into two categories—reality and interpretation. Sometimes the two intermingle.
My
work has been influenced by stellar photographers Jay Maisel and Ernst Haas,
both with whom I studied, who taught me about the use of color. The legendary
Arnold Newman, who was also my teacher, taught me how to use powerful forms in
environmental portraiture. His experiments with collage and multi-media have
profoundly impacted my work.
I
have also been inspired by my mother, a painter who used bright colors in her
abstractions, and by Jeremy Sutton, an authority in the process of ‘digital
painting.’
The
important lessons learned from those who have influenced me have contributed to
my continuing interest in fundamental visual properties. My work, both photography
and digital art, often features strong geometric forms, pronounced spatial
relationships, and intense colors. I like to think of the effect of these
qualities as something akin to musical rhythm.
I
often montage and layer my images using computer software, sometimes combining
digital painting with straight photographs. The digital techniques offer far
more creative control and flexibility than ever before. The technology has also
allowed me to experiment with printing on nontraditional materials such as
metal and glass.
Perhaps,
even more importantly, the new technology makes it possible to reveal to
viewers a kind of inner reality that previously was much more difficult to
translate into the language of film photography. It allows me to use the medium
to express a true personal vision—one to which I hope viewers will bring their
own experiences and emotions.”
Katsy Johnson
archival pigment
print with encaustic, oil, and resin
“Good times don’t always
last...
The impetuous from this
series, Exit from Joyland, is likely
my ongoing astonishment over Kiddieland’s demise. Six years later and I still
can’t believe that the cultural star of Melrose Park was torn down and replaced
by a Costco.
Though I’ve always felt
compelled to photograph environs undone by the caprices of fate, such as
abandoned schools, churches, and rural farms over the years, the loss of family
friendly venues like Kiddieland has left me particularly introspective.
These lost scenarios inspired
me to seek out more places like abandoned playgrounds, drive-in theaters and
amusement parks. On the surface, they can be fun to photograph as they are full
of vivid colors and nostalgic backdrops. There is a bit of melancholy
underneath the settings, though, as modern living renders these once joyful
escapes obsolete and the playgrounds of our pasts devolve into proverbial
parking lots.
I find the photographs I take
simply document, but when I layer encaustic wax and paint over them, it adds to
the narrative and helps to bind the viewer to the scene in an almost visceral
sense.”
Kelli Anthony
Just Do It
photography
“In my artwork I try to
capture the moment of exaggeration a human being experiences when they first
consume or come in contact with something or someone they want. This idea
covers the moment and only the first moment of complete happiness, anger or
disappointment etc. My theory is as humans, when our emotions are heightened
our mind produces an exaggeration of what we are actually seeing or consuming.
For instance iPhones are black, PlayStations are black but when we first
consume them or open the box our brain produces color and this color is not
color; it is actually the expectations and possibilities of what we now can do
with this material thing.
So the colors and hyper
reality in my artwork is me illustrating what we all experience for a split
second or two when making a commitment to an emotion in regards to our reaction
of a real world thing. Also, my work is produced and printed in 20x30 or 16:9
so you, the viewer, can read the image from left to right.”
Kristin Ingram
Fille
oil on canvas
“A lifelong pursuit of art,
history, philosophy, and anthropology have influenced my artwork as I capture
both the fleeting and the constant through use of 2D media and sculpture.
Primarily focusing on the figure, I strive to create images that are at the
same time vast and intimate, exploring ideas of space (2D vs. 3D) and time in a
critical and psychological manner.
While the subject of my paintings is often
figurative, the figures themselves act as representatives or totems of larger
and more ambiguous concepts that are anthropomorphized and distilled into
compelling and poignant narrative.”
Laura Lein-Svencner
Healing Circle and In the
Depth of Life
collage on canvas; collage
on watercolor paper
“My collage works are in a constant state of flux with each
papermaking session. Exposed and revealing I find myself at the mercy of the
raw torn papers edge. Visual and
physical entries grow from self-discovery, through twists and turns. New
compositions stem from the need to fine what is all possible with each element.
Fragmented stories begin to link their way to the surface allowing a natural
flow of chaos to nestle itself softly in the middle. The shapes, colors and imagery become my
characters of these abstract tales. They have me walking in rhythm to patterns
of opportunities pretending I’ve solved the mystery of connectedness.”
Lisa Goesling
clay and India ink scratchboard
“Art critic Sawyer J. Lahr
wrote, ‘The effect appears pencil drawn but has a living, breathing,
sculpture-esque dimension emphasized by the black backgrounds, creating a
positive and negative space rarely seen in life surrounding floras.’
I began taking classes at the
Art Institute of Chicago at twelve years old, spending my weekends entrenched
in painting, drawing and sculpting. As an adult, I spent years working as a
Graphic Designer and Art Director, ran my own Design Firm, always consumed by
the humble line and its relationship to the fundamentals of design. Creating
art full time now, those fundamentals continue to be the driving force behind
my art.
Magnifying glass in hand, I
capture nuances that simply don’t exist with the naked eye. After studying my
subject, I jump right in, spontaneously drawing fine lines with an X-ACTO knife
into boards made of clay and India ink.
Spontaneous Combustion creates the illusion of 3 dimensions by layering line
over line. I describe this abstract series as Lyrical Expressionism. My goal is
elicit the same magical feelings for the viewer that I get while watching my
intricate patterns emerge.”
Mairin Hartt
Repetitious Infinitum 1
India ink and
graphite on Dur-a-lar
“My work explores the uncomfortable,
sublime space between existence and non-existence through the study, tracing,
and appropriation of moments of entropy. By mimicking these processes, visually
and conceptually, the images examine the manifestations and relationships
between these forces. My practice of tracing and appropriating moments of
entropy or deterioration is an extension of the futile desire to capture life
or the sublime. I contrast colors, textures, and methods of representation to
parallel this tension. Watercolor and ink are used intuitively, while pen and
graphite provide detailed and controlled mark making. Mylar and glass enhances
the fragile and ephemeral quality of the work. The resulting images depict
unknown entities and abstract spaces.
My work is an innate contradiction, an attempt to contain the
uncontainable. In short, it is an inevitable failure. The uncontainable can
never be contained, represented, or deterred. The space between existence and
non-existence is in constant flux. The attempt to represent the elusive,
however futile, is in itself sublime.”
Michael Coakes
Human Touch – Compassion
acrylic on canvas
“Human Touch is my commentary on what I believe is missing
at this point of the ‘digital age’. It would seem that we’re all more connected
than ever via our digital devices, but instead, it seems to me, the truly human
contact is being subverted by our digital ‘connections’.
The painting is
large, representing the huge and fundamental issue I feel this has become. It
is executed with coarse tactile strokes representing the unperfected and
un-retouched surfaces of our pre-digital age before sincerity and authenticity
were overshadowed by false ‘perfection’ and pretense.
Life’s truly
valuable commodities are the bonds and true sharing, the hugs, the handshakes,
the kisses and caresses that come voice to voice and flesh against flesh
without judgment or complacency for one another. We need more real human
contact!
I invite viewers to
touch and feel the surface of this painting. Hopefully we can regain some sense
of the human connection with each other through art.”
Olivia Shih
Let’s Be Friends! and Value Building Blocks
fabric, stuffing,
Velcro, and recording device; wood and Masonite
“Olivia Shih’s artwork often investigates gender
issues through wearable sculptures and use of alternative materials.
In her studio work, Olivia often uses restrictive metal armatures and
sterile bathroom tiling as points of conceptual departure to examine the
internalized habits of women. Her work physically manifests the damage of
gender inequality, repeatedly imprinted on the subconscious of women. Humor and
commodification also play essential roles in her work.”
Peggy Shearn
See
acrylic on cradled
board
“When we communicate with each other
about art, we use WORDS—but how do those words then define and delimit the art?
Do those words become the art; does the art become those words? Can any
work of (visual) art be called complete before it has been translated into
language, expressed and interpreted verbally? Do words subvert or strengthen?
Am I the only one who hates exhibit wall tags that tell you what the piece is ‘about,’
robbing you of the chance to play with the image in your own imagination?”
Peyton Michelle Rack
Night Vision
oil on canvas
“I’ve always been in search
of answers. I think that exploring new theoretical ideas in the realm of
science and technology by the application of creative visual thinking can
really help with our overall awareness of existence. But what happens when you
apply mathematics to art? My answer to that is patterns.
I discovered a beauty and
appreciation for the visuals that can be revealed under microscopes, through
telescopes, and other forms of imaging. Equally, I see beauty in the
technological and mechanical structures we build in order to study and try to
understand these mysteries. Additionally, the action of exploring the way
materials react with each other on a canvas and observing the intensity,
dissonance, and harmony of color can help us to understand and experience,
firsthand, the physicality of life.
With my work, I explore
different ways of building images with patterns that I have created. Recently,
I have been exploring color combinations which blur and vibrate together to
achieve a glow effect – much like a technique that can be seen in the work of
various Chicago imagists. A metaphysical idea that I have applied to this
vibrational effect, is that the source of a vibration is perfectly still
because it is balanced and at the center—and my visual representation of this
is pure solid color.
I have a theory about
patterns that I discovered through painting. The complexity or length of a
pattern has a correlation to the hindrance of our understanding of it. In other
words, how can we predict the ending to a pattern if we do not know where the
end, or beginning, lies?”
Rachel Dennis
Life on Mercury
colored pencil
“My art is deeply rooted in the
study of parapsychology, cultural mythologies, alternative communication
methods, various genres of occulture, the physical world, and metaphysical
world. I weave my experiences together visually in order to create a new and
personalized mythos to contribute to my culture.
Cultivating integrity in academic study and expanding awareness
through travel nurtures my artistic process. I unabashedly follow my curiosity
and let it lead the way towards new concepts and imagery. This helps me to
better express my immediate and visceral experiences of day to day life with
greater richness and complexity.
I also intuitively work with the influences of nature. I believe
that ‘nature’ exists in all things, and it is my job as an artist to explore
and display this inherent spirit. This allows me to explore and play with my
own ‘nature’, and its connection to the world.”
Rita Grendze
Lamella yellow
grosgrain ribbon,
thread, and shelf
“Using abundant materials, I
investigate the stuff of our lives. I actively look for truly mundane
collections: books, sheet music, denim, neck-ties, even chairs. I don’t want
things that are precious, but prefer to look at the things others discard. Over
a period of months, sometimes years, I sort and categorize, recognizing the
visual properties of the materials at hand, but also trying to get a better
understanding of the material’s social significance. Doing so I have learned
things about the collections that I didn’t know would ever interest me:
percentage of red versus brown book bindings, history of a family-run textile
mill, or even density of decorative marks on mid-century sheet music. My
research is informal, but intense. Once I have satisfied this curiosity I begin
my experimentations with physical properties: breaking points, saturation
points, edges and even scents are manipulated until I have a tactile
recognition of the objects. While not every experiment results in finished art
work, I allow myself to wallow in the task at hand. I build my visual
vocabulary in this way, a layered process that pulls from both the chance
encounter, and from the directed study in my studio.
My current research: physical
and conceptual strata. In Lamella, I
am loosely referring to the gill-like membranes on the underside of mushroom
caps-an ingenious natural engineering feat to help the fungi spread their
spores (mine are made of ribbons and aren’t spreading anything). The materials
used are not happenstance: silk ties imply a level of maturity and material
wealth, while the ribbons remind me of girlhood, gifts and awards. I am working
towards understanding this controlled experiment, towards a moment to reflect
on natural beauty pulled from man-made materials.”
Russ Revock
The Habits of Simulacra
alkyd and oil on
polymer panel
“Occasionally challenging
traditional notions of beauty, my images—with hints of existential despair,
psychosexual conflict, and an avoidance of literal or rational
narratives—typically aim to pose questions rather than present answers.
To some extent, most pieces begin as a portrait of sorts, albeit a
metaphorical rather than literal one. An entire world—figure, environment,
space, and atmosphere—is devised within the borders of the image, all for the
purpose of creating a distinct psychological setting. Every aspect of the
subject matter is indirect and suggestive. Ambiguous biomorphic and
architectural elements appear in a symbolic or metaphorical way to suggest
various fears, temptations, anxieties, and turmoil imbedded in the human
psyche. Anatomical forms introduce a human presence without literal
representation. Figures and elements sometimes appear solitary or isolated,
implying alienation and disaffection, while at other times they interact in
uneasy
communion.
My choice of media depends largely upon which aspects of the piece
will be most critical in setting the psychological tone. When the physical
character of the objects is essential, I paint the image in alkyd and oil,
which allows subtle color transitions and the layering of glazes to reveal a
subject’s texture and material structure. When the general mood calls for a
grittier contrast and an emphasis on light and shadow, I work monochromatically
in drawing or printmaking media, striving for a visual atmosphere akin to
German Expressionist cinema or American film noir. I occasionally use
digital processes to explore these same moods, using the computer as I would a pencil
or brush to create, blend, alter, combine, and suggest forms.
My art is not self-referential (i.e. ‘painting about
painting,’ ‘art about art’) and does not rely on arcane art theory for its
conceptual strength. Nevertheless, I attempt to challenge the viewer by combining
non-literal and symbolic imagery with universal human concerns in such a way as
to ask rather than answer. A piece that merely provides answers
is dead, stagnant, unchanging. A viewer has but to glance, then move on. A
piece that asks questions, however, never stops changing and invites the
viewer’s emotional involvement. The relatively small size of the works helps
ensure that this involvement takes place within the viewer’s personal space,
making each willing individual a participant in the psychological setting. Even
if no ‘universal’ answer is obtained, the intellectual and emotional journey
has been mutually beneficial for both the viewer and the artist. My ultimate
intent is always to engage the viewer without oversimplifying, to challenge
without alienating, and to seek common emotional ground.”
Sandra Bridges
Grandma’s Hands
oil on linen
“Sandra Bridges is a fine art oil painter who has reemerged
after retiring from the Chicago Public Schools after 35 years teaching
Kindergarten children. With the same passion she brought to her classroom
pupils is the diligence invested to create works of art proposed to inspire and
educate the viewer. She brings all things simple into the complexities of human
relationships and our shared experiences through representational depictions of
characters often forgotten at best or overlooked. One is drawn into the
circumstances presented and left to wonder, suppose, accept, or neglect, but
the voice resounds nonetheless.”
Scott Fincher
Puzzle (Winter’s Meditation)
photography
“So what differentiates a
portrait of a person from a picture of an object? Essentially nothing. A
photographer’s purpose is revelation. In the street or in the corporate suite
the imperative is to take surfaces into the interior so that the viewer comes
to understand something about what has been presented. This could be an aspect
of personality or the structure of a design.
In
short, one can say no more than one can see.
Early
in my career, I used to fantasize that I could be a Beethoven of photography.
The idea contradicts the central principle of the medium. What distinguishes
photography from the other arts is time. Unlike music, which takes a single
idea and expands it, photography interrupts the continuum and digests it into
an exquisite moment where understanding, composition and action intersect.
All
this is expressed succinctly in poet e.e. cummings’s introduction to his volume
‘Is Five’: ‘I am abnormally fond of that precision which creates movement.’
In my
eyes, photography also adheres to Francis Bacon’s maxim, ‘The contemplation of
things as they are without error, without confusion, without substitution or
imposture is in itself a nobler thing than a whole harvest of inventions.’
That
is why I love both nature and the street, and I quest for the image that sits
on the cusp of the real and surreal. For the most part, I do not manipulate the
images in the digital ‘darkroom’ any more than I would have were I using
techniques of the old ‘wet’ darkrooms. Mostly, I adjust luminosity.”
Shane Small
Mona
chalk pastel
“Shane Small took interest in
drawing and painting as a child. He enjoys working in acrylic, oil paints, and
mixed media. He is in the process of launching an online business whose mission
is to inspire and encourage self-confidence. It strives to promote
individuality with its artistic design.”
Sheila Arora
acrylic on canvas
“My work reflects my busy and
active mind. I have a deep curiosity to look and explore. As I walk around the
city, I absorb shapes, colors and spaces. I collect those little fragments of
life and tuck them away. My paintings move with line and color, just as I move
through this world. The lines are wandering, and the colors are bold. Like a
risk-taker. It’s the excitement and joy of seeing everyday things one more
time. It’s what I see, how I move, and how I think. I go for another walk. I
see the world again. And then I let those fragments explode onto the canvas.”
Stuart Hall
Reformat the Conversation
acrylic and Styrofoam
on corrugated paper
“fleurs
de guerre is an army of guerilla artists engaged in the War on War. By
mixing metaphors of flowers and weaponry, it is the mission of fdg to
provide a constant reminder that our world remains in conflict and at war, and
to require the public to realize the costs of those wars and conflicts.
The
preferred medium of fleurs de guerre is mixed media on up-cycled corporate
litter. Bombs are fabricated from toilette paper tubes, and hand grenades are
manufactured from beer bottles with a base medium of paper bags generated by
the fast food industry.
5% of porceeds are donated to
the veteran's organization of choice: Wounded Warrior, National Veteran's Art
Museum, Iraq Veteran's Against the War, USO or Navy Relief.”
Su Yin Zhou
Revisitation I and II
oil on panel
“Using familiar color palette
on unfamiliar surface and boundary. Something familiar and unfamiliar all the
same.”
Zachary J. Williams
oil on canvas
“My work is an exploration of the
many absurdities of modern American political and social life, spanning
religious and economic motivations underlying aggressive American nationalism,
to the numbing epidemic of gun violence, to the hypnotic cacophony of the real
and the imagined. The works I have submitted here illustrate a literal
fragmentation of societies. With each painting, I confront and plead with my
viewers’ emotional state, to provoke a dialogue surrounding the obstacles,
illusions, and uncertainties of our environmental future.”
 |
| Courtesy of Aimy Tien. |
 |
| Courtesy of Aimy Tien. |
Zoe Beaudry
Deathless Gods, Remember Me I and II and Smartmouth (American
Rosary) ft. Ace Da Vinci
oil on canvas
“My work is inspired by a
fascination with the medium of painting and the implications of its content. I
enjoy questioning the illusion inherent to the craft: the
way two-dimensional art can act like a window into another world, and
conversely, how painting can attempt to avoid illusion.
Stylistically, I am attracted
to literal, visceral imagery. Clean lines and solid colors can evoke mood in an
intuitive way. Stripped-down compositions attempt to isolate and
illustrate ideas derived from history, literature, journalism, or theory. In
this way, I enjoy making connections between current events and classical
thought.
For every recognizable allegory
in my paintings there echoes a private reference as well. My current work
focuses on the symbolism of gesture, and how we use our
hands as universal tools for expression—whether it be affection,
violence, greeting, worship, or dismissal.”
“Lost” notes: Post-its that fell during the exhibition’s
first weekend and were gathered into one pile before they could be rescued by your
devoted curator. (If you see yours and remember which piece it was about, email.)
