work in a variety of media from the newest members of artspace:
Jingjing Gong, Jo Anna Hickman, Louis Joyner, Dan Mouer, Elaine Rogers, Robin Ryder, and Inge Strack
February 22 through March 23
Entire Gallery
Artists' Statements
JINGJING GONG My interest lies within the desire to transform everyday environments into images that invite contemplative response, thus Spy Series I and II reflect this theme. Through framing, perspective and juxtaposition, my photos attempt to present beauty and design as existing within everyday objects and architectural spaces. My intention is to build a visual relationship between my audience and my work to intentionally disrupt the audiences' preconceptions surrounding everyday objects and environments, transforming his/her conceptions into finding beauty within these seemingly mundane objects/situations.
JO ANNA HICKMAN Throughout my work, I use many personal experiences as a catalyst to express my thoughts and emotions. Painful or anxious, resolute or determined, many of these pieces are related to body expectations or personal perceptions. Through texture and surface, thickness and thinness, density and rhythm, I try to make inner vulnerability speak.
All of my pieces are primarily textiles, made from weaving, sewing, embroidering, or working with fabric design. Using these techniques, specific details and embellishments enhance overall compositions encouraging an audience to come in for a closer look. I believe this media manipulation and theme, in addition to the traditional woman's work of textiles, compliment each other to make interesting and thought provoking pieces.
LOUIS JOYNER Paint peels and flakes, wood rots, iron rusts, stucco and stone weather away. Slowly, over decades, manmade objects are transformed by nature. Material Changes explores the effects of time and weather on the works of man. This photographic series focuses on small-scale decay as a metaphor for the larger erosion of our civilization.
DAN MOUER My profession is anthropology-the observation and interpretation of human culture using the tools of ethnography and archaeology. The camera and the printmaking process are natural adjuncts to that profession. My typical subjects are people or their creations.
Houses, buildings, city streets and human faces and figures are the stuff I make most of my pictures from. My earliest photographic influences came from Henri Cartier-Bresson's 35mm "street photography" of the 1940s and 50s. The color works of William Eggleston and Joel Meyerwitz in the 60s and 70s have also been greatly influential in my approach. I've had training and experience in cinematography and film production, and it's fair to say that film-especially the "art film" of the 1960s and 70s-helped to shape my approach. [read more ...]
ELAINE ROGERS I use color and gesture to find meaning and build form. The paintings happen in layers, over time. I usually begin with a small model that becomes an opening to a larger work. Some of these begin with a collage and recent pieces begin with a small watercolor study. My subjects are quite varied but usually involve other people, current events, and other "realities" as filtered through my experience. My process is abstract and somewhat reductive. I am looking for an essence. Personal and political coincide in the layering of experiences.
The process of painting sets up an area in which these different "realities" bump into one another. My challenge is to create a unified painting from conflicting and contradictory elements. I am striving for unity and pictorial wholeness in painting as a way to hold on in a world that seems ever more fragmented.
ROBIN RYDER My artwork is a reflection of my experiences traveling through Peru, India, Mexico and the US while working as an archaeologist and anthropologist in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. As an anthropologist, thus a student of people and material culture, I have always been interested in how/why we assign value to certain objects. For me, objects that are well worn, or perhaps in various stages of decay hold intrinsic worth and beauty in the information they may contain and the history they evoke. Another person may find that same object worthless, even disgustingly ugly. As an archaeologist I have always been drawn to the visual and tactile qualities of the small fragments of objects which we recover from archaeological sites, whether a sea-tumbled shard of once fine china recovered from a shipwreck site, or a clay marble left behind by an 18th century child. These things have an embedded history that gives them content beyond their materials and they wear that history on their worn surfaces. [read more ...]
INGE STRACK My paintings consist of bold colors and a deep sense of emotion. I often paint with a limited palette, rather focusing on brushstrokes, texture and form to find a balance. I am drawn to the drama and the pain connecting us all in our humanity and strive to create beauty out of the most difficult circumstances.
I am not attempting to abstract the physical world; I am trying to get to the person behind the mask. Edvard Munch said: "Nature is not only all that is visible to the eye. It also includes the inner pictures of the soul." I draw my subject matter from inside of myself hoping to create a constant conversation between the viewer and the painting, especially since abstracts do not seem to answer but ask.
|
Opening Reception
Fourth Friday
February 22
7-10 pm
Free and Open to the Public
INGE STRACK
Transformation
ROBIN RYDER
Shadow painting from Teotihuacan series
ELAINE ROGERS
Cinnamon
DAN MOUER
Photo from Downtown series
LOUIS JOYNER
Porch Chairs, Eliza's House
JO ANNA HICKMAN
JINGJING GONG
Spy Series II [detail]
|
