My work shows the expression of ideas or emotions through the flow of color and energy. Every piece has its own specific implications and ideas, but I choose to express the content behind each work through the depth and movement of color.
I was originally inspired by my love of outer space. It’s the vast, unexplored, almost inconceivable expanse of what’s out there. I’ve always loved science and been inspired by the ideas of cosmology. There’s a distinct beauty in bright nebulae, in the fundamental elements running through our body originally forged in the hearts of stars, or in even humanity’s insignificance on the astronomical scale. At first, I painted with acrylic but when I finally switched to watercolor, my content emerged even further. Acrylic paint was solid, unchanging, masking. Watercolor is fluid, mutable, constantly changing. It easily layers without destroying or covering up what’s underneath. Watercolor to me is undefined, it lives between real and abstract. I pull in both objective and non-objective forms in my pieces, and often like to blur lines in reality. Painting with watercolors makes my process flow as much as the aesthetics of the final product. Furthermore, the use of figures and figurative elements in my work is always based on human interaction with the content of a piece. A figure, or part of a figure, is never fully objective or defined. Although it can be based on a certain idea, my figures are purposefully vague to create a reaction in the viewer. I want the viewer to project their own feelings and ideas onto my work and feel the flow of energy through any figurative elements. Since much of the work is often abstract and nebulous, using figures or symbols gives a piece a focal point so there is a path for the color to move with. To elaborate further, color is crucial to my work. I draw inspiration from impressionism and post-impressionism; artists like Monet, Renoir, Cézanne, and van Gogh all inspire me to use colors that convey a mood or tone, and that interact with each other to further the flow of the overall piece. A contemporary trend that captures my love of color is “Intense Impressionism” or “Extreme Impressionism.” Paintings often have bold brush strokes and, the namesake extremely bright, saturated colors. I love how they can give paintings almost an absurd tone, and how these artists emphasize color and its interactions with the scene. My work also seeks to show how color, and the changes in hue or value of color, create movement and pull the viewer along with the meaning of the piece. Overall, even though the individual meaning of each piece changes based on personal experience and inspiration, I always express the content through the fundamental flow of color and energy. These ideas took me years to realize and develop into a cohesive body of work; I understood how to paint long before I understood why I paint. In the future, I want to keep pushing my bounds both technically and theoretically, to push my understanding of the medium and of the message. Art has been incredibly important to me throughout my life. I look forward to continue interacting with my own ideas, with other people, and with the world by being immersed in art. |