ARTIST STATEMENT
As an anthropologist, my work responds to the individual and social impact of electronic screens. We enthusiastically purchase and upgrade these objects, then surrender our attention—even to the point of addiction—to content that remains outside our control. Spending hours each day working, socializing, reading, playing, and exercising in front of flickering pixelated rectangles of varying sizes is not considered abnormal, unhealthy, or excessive. We cease to notice the incidental messaging that flows from corporate power centers into our receptive minds through our unblinking eyes.
Therefore as an artist, I create visual antidotes to electronic screens. My medium of choice is mosaic, which is pixelated like hi tech flat-screens, but technologically Luddite. Regarding audience manipulation, ancient church and state powers used icon-laden mosaics to inspire obedience among the masses, garnering wealth from poor commoners to fund additional basilicas, palaces, and mausoleums. Analogously, electronic screens advertise even more gadgets (which incorporate icons) so we can field even more advertising. In contrast, I offer viewers open-ended, abstract, textural mosaic compositions that convey a sense of calm restoration. My work is intentionally, politically beautiful to balance negative messages of outrage and scarcity that corporate news and advertising promote via giant and hand-held screens.
My commitment to aesthetics doesn’t mean my process isn’t conceptually driven. On the contrary, I have received international recognition for helping move the mosaic medium out of the Iron Age and “craft ghetto” into the conceptually oriented, post-medium world of contemporary fine art. Notwithstanding, my most conceptual work is mindfully composed and finely executed with the radical intention of offering human beings—not subjects, not consumers—beautiful, still rectangles to contemplate visually, if only for a moment in passing.
WHAT'S HAPPENING
Studio: I'm immersed in a project in which I'm investigating the interstices of the mosaic medium, the spaces between tesserae. Sometimes artists refer to negative space, but I can't decide whether that term is oxymoronic or redundant, or both. I'm calling the first result of my experiment Inverstices, a collapsification of the words "inverted" and "interstice". Click Next for the detail image.
Lecture: I will be presenting a slideshow and informal lecture on the art and artists featured at RavennaMosaico 2011, Ravenna, Italy's biannual festival of contemporary mosaic art. The lecture will be held on Thursday, 17 May 2012 at 7:00 pm at Seattle Mosaic Arts. The talk is free, but space is limited, so please register by e-mailing info@SeattleMosaicArts.com, and come participate in a lively discussion.
Writing: Since launching 69 Insecurities: A Miseducation in Contemporary Fine Art Mosaic, I have received over 50 requests to turn it into a book, "with the answers." So I'm doing it. Maybe the answers won't be what my requestors expect, but then again, numerous how-to books exist already. Mine will read more like a philosophical manifesto with a practical twist.
Exhibitions: I have several exciting curatorial and collaborative projects in the works for a Spring 2013 show and more. Stay tuned.
