Final

These particular pieces have been my most successful this semester. This was the turning point in my work and overall direction for series to come. This piece is 9.5ft by 5ft on the left and 10ft by 5.5ft on the right and done in an acrylic medium.

Statement:

I am exploring the emotion of uncertainty through abstracted landscape paintings with ambiguous forms. People react to uncertainty with fear, nervousness or even a feeling of indifference. My goal is to bring out those specific emotions by allowing the viewer to experience a setting, overwhelmed with atmosphere, that will make you question possible states or outcomes. I work in washes of acrylic medium on top of partially gessoed canvas with charcoal. The physicality of my work is intended to not only create literal movement throughout the piece, but also to create an emotional movement within the viewer. By using aggressive brush strokes and the intermingling of charcoal, I create a texture that puts a weight on the viewer yet forces them to continue throughout the entire piece. I primarily referenced two painters, Dutch Romantic landscape painter Maja Lisa Engelhardt, and American landscape painter April Gornik. The physicality of Engelhardt along with Gornik’s placement of viewer in a space is where I draw most of my inspiration.

Throughout the past semester I have been more motivated than ever. I am producing at a fast pace and really feel as though I'm working through my ideas, really progressing. April Gornik and Maja Lisa Engelhardt have been a huge inspiration to my work as discribed in my statement. Having the motivation this semester I have been able to incorporate both artists styles into my own, which has not only excited me on a personal note but also has opened a new world of exploration into abstraction for me. My mid semester critic was most benefitial, at this point I had worked through the variations of this new style and really started to come into my own. In the mid semester critic I was able to really bounce my new ideas off of everyone who I have been working with for years now. I was and in many ways still am questioning how to resolve the edges of my new pieces. There where many ideas that pushed me through into my next pieces, eliminating and stumbling blocks that I usually become caught up with causing my work to suffer.

I have also been working in ceramics attempting to take my concepts that I have been exploring in painting on a two demensional field into a three dimensional field. This is where I would really like to go next semester. I am working on a solo show and can only hope to have not only my paintings but ceramic wall hangings as well. There is a new physicality that ceramics brings to the table as far as uncertainty goes, it becomes almost a more interactive experience which beyond excites me.

Final Goals:

-resolved edges and further exploration with space within my paintings

-production of ceramic hangings to show along side my paintings in a solo show

-graduate, annnnddd get into grad school. eek.