Many Statements

(these earrings.... hrm. I've been thinking about them a lot lately...)


(Amazing painting I saw this week at Speaking Volumes in Burlington. This artist is really exciting. Check out Greg Mamczak: www.gregmamczak.com)

**Also, by the way, Speaking Volumes is a magical place full of art books, treasures and records. It also has the only old photobooth in Vermont. Mikel and I had our photo taken. The four shots turned out amazing! Check out the joint! www.speakingvolumesvt.com**

As I am preparing to move to Brooklyn at the end of this month my mind and studio are buzzing with a few things:

I am very excited about my upcoming show at Firehouse Gallery. It opens a week from tomorrow on August 14th from 5-8. I have a date with my glue gun and a nice guy named Tyler who will be building me a wall this weekend. This is the first show I have not had to do/build/prepare everything myself. I'm so appreciative of the help and enthusiasm I'm getting from Firehouse folks and really excited to see how the show comes together. There are more than 20 (maybe 24?) artists in the show so it should be a well-rounded dialogue about the changing landscape of Vermont (and really, the whole country!). What a fantastic show to be a part of! If you want more details about this show you can go to www.energyprojectvt.com.

Also, I am looking through all of my stuff. I know I've written this before, but it is truly amazing how much stuff we have aquired. It's not "stuff" so much as art and supplies. I have so many bins of treasures. What to do, what to do.... There is no logic in getting rid of supplies in my opinion because they will be used someday and there always comes a time when I need a green cocktail mermaid, or gold ribbon. There's no reason so buy or find this stuff all over again. The way I work requires a certain minumal amount of bits and pieces around me to play with anyway so it makes sense to keep them. By where? Mostly storage until I have a large enough studio.

I've also been checking out my newer paintings as I find safe places for them and make sure the measurements are correct to be posted online. I can't wait for Mikel to post them on my website! They are so different from my older paintings. I'm very excited about them! I can't wait to get painting in Brooklyn!

Finally, I read Michelle Summer's blog (http://michmashceramics.blogspot.com) this morning and got really jazzed to write about artist statements. I actually really like the challenge of writing a statement and here's why: It facinates me that there is such a gap between what I understand intuitively in my studio and what I can express verbally about what I understand.
Studio practice is ephemeral. Especially if it is flowing, time no longer exists to me and I hardly remember what I was thinking about or exactly what I did. All I have as evidence that I was in there is my the artwork that comes out of it. It feel like I wasn't thinking at all (which, hopefully I wasn't-- at least not in a logical, dry way.) After the work is made, that's the time to write a statement, if not for a show or website, for myself; to try and summon the words to talk about what the heck I just did in my studio and why.

I don't believe it is productive to write any statement before work it made. Making work, to me, is not about fitting it with a statement. Statements are to be fit with work that already exists. The truth is, whether we realize it or not, we are making work for certain reasons beyond the basic image we have for our practice (ie. Just to have fun, to play, experiment, relax, etc.) If we had no specific, unique-to-us reasons, our work wouldn't be worth making to us beyond just as a hobby, because lets face it: if we were just hobby artists we wouldn't be writing statements.

The basic image we have of our practice is important to acknowledge, but this is where the interesting part (and difficult, tedious, time-to-pull-my-hair-out-of-my-head-part) about writing comes in: What am I playing with? Why am I choosing this imagery? These colors? These characters? Why not other colors/imagery/characters? What does my work remind me of? How is my work related to things in the world that I am inspired by? We are usually inspired by things that we want to put into our own work: What is that for you?

If you want to get really tricky (as I usually want to do-- in case there are still hairs left to pull out) you can ask how your work reflects the way you think about the world? For example, "turning trash into treasure" is not just a fun art practice. It is an optimistic way to see the trash around you. It summons ideas about creative problem-solving and the human potential to use trash as a resource. Another example for me is all-inclusiveness. For a long time my work was about absorbing anything that was inspiring to me; any material, imagery, technique, etc. I have shifted a bit away from there recently, but I realise that by writing artist statements about this, I am more aware of why I wanted to be more all-inclusive. It was about trusting my natural process and disabling my inner critic: if everything is included, there is nothing left out and therefore nothing to be criticized. The deeper I dig into trying to make meaning and finding words for that meaning, the deeper I am able to then go when I go back to my studio. I feel like my work is really reflecting my process as an artist and human being and on my bad days, when I look at my work and there is no magic to my eyes, my statements (or sketchbook brainstorms, etc) are like miso-soup for my sick mind-state-- nurturing, stabling and concrete.

Artist statements are ways we make our ephemeral process concrete once in a while. Like swimming and them returning to the dock. Sometimes when we stand on the dock we can see better where we've been and then get excited about diving in again.