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Description
The Thesis Exhibition, 4 AM, was held between March 19th and April 7th, 2016 in the University Gallery in the School of Art and Design at San Diego State University. The exhibition is the culmination of three years in the graduate studies program in painting and sculpture. Within this report I will discuss the sources of my research and influences, along with the techniques, processes, and choices that go into my practice. It is my feeling that the immediacy and continual nature of modern society is creating greater anxiety, compulsion, and fear within; and I am interested in exploring this in my work. The paintings, sculptures, and installations are an investigation into the anxious and existential nature of the human mind at the present. My intention is for the viewer to experience and have a visceral reaction to the work. I want the light in my work to represent a manic state and the dark to represent a depressive state along with a sense of mystery. Further I want to set up a tension between the viewer and subjects in the paintings; a stage for intimacy and discomfort. I am interested in creating a familiar/comfortable space that is also unsettling and alien for the viewer. The familiar/comfortable elements can be interpreted through the objects in the work referencing the home (couch, rug, mirror), while the surface treatments and manipulations of these elements can give an unknown feeling. I also see the home as a stage/setting representation of the human mind. It is the place where I find comfort and familiarity and yet can also be the place of self-reflection, confusion, and turmoil. I continue to research the anxious and existential nature of the human mind to help visualize, portray, and make tangible the battle within the conscious and subconscious mind. And in a world that focuses on satisfying the more primitive and chaotic nature of the mind, where does the silver lining hide?
