May 16, 2009

Wow, it's been awhile since I've written on this blog! My graduate work has been very time consuming but it's been a good experience overall. My thesis has been discussing my art practice as a form of research in which I discuss the concepts of hidden and revealed and adoption and redemption. I've spoken on redemption a bit but not so much about adoption. This topic is very close to my heart for I was adopted at birth and lived the majority of my life knowing this fact. My adoptive parents gave me a good home and cared for me greatly but there was alway something that nagged at me regarding my biological parents. Why did the give me up? and Will I ever meet them? and sometimes especially when I was younger, Who am I? These questions I may never know the answers to but I believe that I have been given a special gift knowing that I was loved enough from both sides of the adoptive parties.
Since I collect objects from the ground or where ever I find them, there is a correlation between the collecting, selecting, cherishing, and integrating the objects in my art work and my physical adoption. There is something that speaks to me when I find an object that I want to use within the art I create. Something about the physical appearance strikes me as I am compelled to take the object home. This finding of the object and the selection process are very ingrained within my being. I cannot help but collect - I have done it since I was a child. I'd find rocks, wood, feathers, metal - anything that revealed to me a history or a past. These revelations were very much unknown as far as any details were concerned but the physical presence of the object spoke of some type of past or part of their story, if you will. I cannot resist collecting or giving meaning to these objects. It is as if their voices are crying to be heard and through the art work, I can give them a platform with which to speak for these objects each have something to say. They speak with quieted voices, subtle references to the things of the past. There story is partially unknown just like my story is partially unknown. I adopt them to give them significance, to give them a place where they are cherished, to give them redemption through the act of creation.
The selection of these objects is a very intuitive one for I know immediately if I will use the piece within a work of art. I may not know exactly how or when I will use the piece but I do know if I will use it. The pieces are then chosen, selected and transformed within the work of art. Something about the physicality of the surface, or the color or texture of the object draws me to it and I select it for my studio. Their voices are not silenced but given new meaning through the creative act. Within the selection process, I find myself seeing the preciousness of the object for it is not something that should be discarded but listened to and heard. The object becomes cherished for it is sometimes a reference for redemption and sometimes it is a type of self portrait. This personification of the object helps me create the symbolism that I use within my art work. The integration of the object into the art work completes the adoptive act. The work houses and gives the object its new context and its new meaning and validity.
Well, it's getting late and I've talked enough! So until next time, take care, enjoy, and God bless!