About Me

The following is taken from my profile on the Transart website.

Robyn Thomas’ paintings are an expression of her fascination with neurological and biological processes, cellular structures, linguistics, history, music, performance and the creative process as it relates to the existential questions of mind-body . She began studying art with an emphasis on three-dimensional art and printmaking, and eventually switched her focus to drawing and painting.

Thomas received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Studio Art (Painting) from Kent State University in 1991. In addition, she has studied Art History, Philosophy and Pedagogy at the University of Karlsruhe, Germany. She is currently a student in the MFA Creative Practice program of Transart Institute, and lives and paints in Providence, Rhode Island USA.

You can also read more about me here on this website.

Berlin Summer 2015 Workshop Reading Diaries

My personal reading diaries for each workshop can be accessed directly by clicking on the course name below.

Skin

Artist as Curator

Praxis Enrichment Refresher Workshop

Alienation: We Get Brecht

Obsessions and Possessions

The menu for all summer 2015 workshop reading diaries can be accessed here. From the top navigation bar the Berlin Summer 2015 Workshop Reading Diaries can be reached via the Workshops & Residencies tab. Finally, from my home page the diaries can be accessed via Blog where you are reading this posting.

See you in Berlin!

M504 Synthesis Paper [PART A] & Second Year MFA Proposal Outline [PART B]

PART A

M504 Synthesis Paper

May 5, 2015

Die Linie ist also der größte Gegensatz zum malerischen Urelement zum Punkt” (Kandinsky 57).

As long as I recall I have wondered where the paths and streets I travel daily lead. A dozen years ago I began to trace the origins of US44. A federal road that once stretched from the shore of Massachusetts Bay, past my street, winding west out of New England into the heartland; since replaced by the monotonous Interstates along which one, as a point of “self contained peacefulness” (Kandinsky 57), can thoughtlessly speed without the distractions of the rich and varied life contained within that artificial line drawn on a map- the urban, suburban and rural route. It has been my goal to travel this route from one point to the other, traveling along the meandering line in a state of dynamic awareness. Recently, as both my forty-fourth year of life and my first year project draw to a close I made this journey by car with my two sons from its western end to the static point from which our daily life plays out, my older son gauging our progress: a dynamic, moving point along a smartphone m-app.

The discussions we had during this exploratory journey shed light on the variety of value, meaning and spirit contained within a line be it drawn on a map, a blueprint, or a painting. As Wassily Kandinsky wrote in his book Punkt und Linie zu Fläche: Beitrag zur Analyse der malerischen Elemente, the line, the greatest opposition of the painterly base element the point is formed out of the destruction of the point’s most basic nature, self contained peacefulness.1 We feel this destruction as a rupture, setting the course for the formation of the structure which will support the creation of the plane, completing the basic elements of which the painting originates.

Leaving Berlin last August I began a journey of exploration along a path titled Self Portrait of a Female with Epilepsy. It has been a winding road, much like US44, crossing rivers, leading through forests and farms, vineyards and orchards, spanning the breadth of spectacular mountaintop views, from weekend homes for wealthy New Yorkers and small working farms of a dying generation of Swamp Yankees, to pothole filled streets and crumbling facades of Hartford and Providence. Parts of the path were well known to me, being ones I have traveled daily for many years, others were lesser known, reconsidered with fresh eyes while traveling them again after an abscence of many years, and still others were brand new, never before traveled leaving me with a desire to revisit and explore as part of future journeys. The path, known and unknown, has led to unexpected stops and starts as well as the discovery of a byway along which I would like to travel during my second year.

1 Kandinsky, Wassily. "Linie." Punkt Und Linie Zu Fläche. 7th ed. Bern Bümpilz: Benteli Verlag, 1973. 57. Print.
“Die geometrische Linie ist ein unsichtbares Wesen. Sie ist die Spur des sich bewegenden Punktes, also sein Erzeugnis. Sie ist aus der Bewegung entstanden und zwar durch Vernichtung der höchsten in sich geschlossenen Ruhe des Punktes. Hier wird der Sprung aus dem Statischen in das Dynamische gemacht.
Die Linie ist also der größte Gegensatz zum malerischen Urelement zum Punkt” “The geometric line is an invisible entity. It is the trace of the moving point, therefore its product. It is brought forth by the movement, and most certainly through the destruction of the self contained peacefulness of the point. Here is where the leap from the static to the dynamic is made. The line is therefore the greatest opposition to the painterly base element to the point” (Kandinsky 57). translation R. Thomas

“I would like you to write a simple story just once more,” he says,...”Just recognizable people and then write down what happened to them next.”

I say, “Yes,why not? That’s possible.”...I would like to try to tell such a story, if he means the kind that begins: “There was a woman...” followed by plot, the absolute line between two points which I’ve always despised. Not for literary reasons, but because it takes all hope away. Everyone, real or invented, deserves the open destiny of life” (Paley 161-162).2

The absolute line between two points, like the Interstate, hopeless and monotonous, a predictable portrait of life, simple and recognizable to all who travel along it, if it truly exists. Complexity, chaos and chance are embedded in the lifepath organically evolving from the trodden trails of migrating animals followed closely by hunters, upon which the roads to move emigrants in their automobiles westward in search of a simpler life filled with hope were paved. When the reality of this nonexistent simplicity did not pan out, the slowness of winding rural routes was blamed. They were replaced by the absolute line of I-70, I-80, and I-90, mythologizing a nation rapidly speeding down that straight line, away from the point of a bygone era of the collective, gritty mills and factories of the Northeast to the point of the contemporary controlled cleanliness of the Silicon Valley selfie.

The culture of the Selfie in which we currently find ourselves is one where the individual’s complexity, chaos, ruptures and imperfections are kept hidden; an expense paid in order to reveal a controlled 'perfect me', a partially true version of the self we imagine of ourselves, or the image we are willing to share with the world. It would be nice like wiley coyotes to trick ourselves as we trick others with our perfect picture posts into believing this phenomen is a new, technology driven ideal of a narsacisstic culture; but we would be fools to do so.3 We have always hidden and revealed parts of who we are from the rest of the world, it is only the means by which the hiding and revealing are expressed which changed. For persons living with Epilepsy this hidden existence has ranged from banishment or concealment deep within one’s community to a chemical or surgical hiding through medical treatments of the disorder. At times it has led to a revelation or manipulation of the individual’s identity through a struggle for self definition and determination via the epileptic seizure.

For artists the tradition of the Selfie was not invented by Apple, Samsung, Facebook or Instagram, but it is a tradition stretching back to the first human that dipped his or her hand into a pigment and pressed it onto a surface, recording his or her prescence, existence, identity. The self portrait serves a dual purpose. On one hand it is the artist’s exploration of the various answers to the ultimate question we ask ourselves “Who am I?” On the other hand it is a projection of who the artist wants others to believe him or her to be. The act of self portrayal is a search for the truth of personal identity laying deep within, and it is an act of burying all or parts of this truth even deeper under the lies the artist wants the world to understand as the truth contained within his or her art.4 The self portrait straddles the border between private and public; created in the idealized, private, interior world of the artist it only fulfills its role as a work of art once it is pushed by the artist into the public realm, the real world inhabited by the viewer, and through the interaction and interpretation of the viewer the self portrait finds its completion.

2 Paley, Grace. "A Conversation with My Father." Enormous Changes at the Last Minute: Stories. New York: Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 1974. 161-167. Print.

3 The painter Eugene Delacroix (1798-1863) is known to have not let any representation of himself other than his own self portrait, which he gave to the Louvre, to be shown in public. In other words, the only face he wanted shown to the public was the face he himself remained in control of. “The face he turns to the world is composed, selfcontained. What he sees in the mirror is not what he is, but all he is prepared to show. ‘The mask is everything’ is a phrase and a philosophy that recurs all the way through Delacroix’s Journals, and it is in these gravely eloquent writings that one discovers the artist’s deep introversion, not in his works” (Cummings 189-190). Cumming, Laura. A Face to the World: On Self Portraits. London: HarperPress, 2010. Print.

“Art sometimes begins and ends with questions. A big question for me...was What is Art?...half accepted a sophistry floating around the studios, that art was anything! But “anything” was too easy. If anything was art, nothing was art” (Kaprow xxvii).5

I’ve been traveling along the path of the self portrait, framed by Epilepsy. My initial question was how could the impact of Epilepsy on females be shared while exploring alternative approaches to the definition and traditions of painting? With no intention of personal exploration beyond my diagnosis serving as the impetus, and despite a long standing belief that as artists our biography informs all aspects of the art we create, I have not engaged previously with the tradition or concept of the self portrait. Yet during a walk one evening in Berlin it became apparent to me that the only way I could explore this topic through my studio practice was by exploring the impact it has had on me, hence the logical approach to the topic must be the self portrait.

During this project’s gestation I have produced a number of works for the proposed series of self portraits. A journey divided into smaller segments is easier to digest and can provide insight on the route that lay ahead; therefore I will discuss the four rest areas I’ve stopped at along the way. The first stop is writing. The second consists of studio explorations which have not yet found their identities as separate works. The third stop is seven ‘finished’ pieces: Pages, Wanderland, Look In Glass,Just Between Me and You, Index, Self Reflective and Twinning. The fourth, final rest area is my explorations beyond the studio walls.

Reflecting on this past year’s work, what I believe has been most beneficial to my studio practice has been the formalization of my writing. This encompases not just required writing of blog posts, group critiques, or papers, but informal, private writings; some written only for myself, other writings in the form of email and text messages with others.6 Having had previous periods of emphasis on writing as a part of my process and practice, until this year I had not been able to connect it to the whole of the process as clearly. Aside from gaining the ability of a hopefully somewhat more concise and creative use of language, I have found the ways in which I have explored the physical act of writing, its connection to mark making and drawing, and the role it can play physically as a supporting structure within the artwork to be a tremendous addition to my vocabulary as an artist.

Initially meant as process documentation I realized I could approach the website and blog as a self portrait. There I seek to address control as related to understanding, deciphering and disseminating information about my self; a digital archive of who I am, what I am thinking, and how I am applying what I have explored in the work I create. It is a highly detailed digital documentation, continually tweaked to achieve a feeling of information overload, controlled chaos, and a paradox-like ‘full disclosure with limited access’ to the truth.

The second stop on this journey was the exploration of material processes within my studio. The predefined practical element, a loose leaf journal, was conceived with the intention to explore materials and techniques beyond my usual repetroire. Here I took a ‘stream of conscious’ approach to ideas and materials; playing with alternatives to mark making like the machine stitched line, layering, translucency and oppacity, reversal and shuffling of images and text, and elimination of front or back of the page. This was a venue in which to explore the feelings of confusion and the inability to vocalize the experience of the seizure. I began to work with imagery inspired by the stories Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland and Through The Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll.7

For Index I produced small ‘gift’ cards, a partially abridged version of the journal. The additional element of a small mirror, affixed to one side of the card, with the dual purpose of referencing the mirror in Look In Glass, offering the recipient the possibility of becoming a part of the work by viewing his or herself in the mirror was employed. The mirror’s diminuitive scale in relation to the card established a frustrating tension when viewing. Neither the card nor the reflection could be viewed as a whole, only part of the picture was ever visible, the rest was hidden in plain sight.

Also at this second stop one finds sketchbooks, in addition to the materials produced in the silkscreen workshop, and some yet to be completed pieces. A mashup of work on paper, un-stretched and pre-stretched canvases that have been cut through, painted, collaged, photos printed on canvas, and fabrics stitched and sewn as freeform drawings.8

‘Finished’ works can be found at the third rest area. Two most recent works, Self Reflective and Twinning, both series of digital photographs, are incomplete in their completion with the intent to use them as source material for further work. Like the journal pages, nothing is created one off or in isolation, there is always a connection along the path even if it eventually leads back to the main drag. The first ‘finished’ piece was Wanderland,9 an installation in a narrow, dark hallway through which a solitary viewer traveled. Space receded into an indecipherable emptiness packed from ceiling to floor with the 100 journal pages, suspended from a black tulle and red thread structure and attached with silver binder clips; an overwhelmingly tactile, sensory experience. Once through the hallway they encountered the second piece, Look In Glass.10

Wanderland was the physical, Look In Glass explored the psychological experience of the seizure. An object, Look In Glass is a mirror box, its interior and exterior sides one way mirror, the face a two way mirror. Inside the box a standard iPad slideshow film of the journal pages, titled Pages, plays on loop. Peering into the box the viewer’s reflection appeared to float amongst Pages; a psychological rather than physical distortion of space. For some a more comfortable, less threatening engagement, for others too distant, almost boring in its lack of tactility.

Wanderland was too site specific to present elsewhere. Just Between Me and You panded the possibilities of meaning generated by the elements basic to both pieces, becoming physical presentation of the pages for the individual in perpetuity.11

Index could be Just Between Me and You a smaller scale, but it is not. The greatest difference between the works is conceptual, addressing both the relationships between artist-work-viewer, and the work to its parts. Index is for the group; composed of a single part, broken into individual works through an act of sharing in compensation for the inaccessibility of Just Between Me and You. Look in Glass too was broken apart; but its shards were gathered together, wrapped in a blanket, remaining part of the object, the memory-scars of an event.12

Last stop: presentation, installation and performance. Consideration of these enriched my conceptual and material approach to painting, self portraiture, and the artist-viewer-work relationship. December 6 I hosted an ‘invitation only’ presentation of Wanderland and Look In Glass, allowing me to chat with viewers about their engagement with the work and providing me insight of what these elements can bring to my work.

For Winter Residency I considered presentation approaches beyond “death by PowerPoint”.13 The nature of Epilepsy, most of the time hidden or unseen, informed my presentation as a performance hidden within a presentation; raising the question “What is happening here?” I wanted to show the work without fully revealing it; and include an expression of the quickness and force by which one’s life can change.

Although this project has continued post Winter Residency, I consider the performance-presentation to be the cumulation of the project; bringing together all elements explored in the studio and research work, the performance proved to be the most challenging piece for me to create. It pushed my artistic and personal boundaries, making me consider aspects of my practice from a different conceptual perspective while engaging at a deeper emotional level than I have done in previous work.14 The impact of the shattering of Look In Glass was an important step forward, releasing me from the framework imposed on the project by the term ‘Epilepsy’; speaking to a more universal experience of ruptures faced in life, not limited to health crises, but the impact we feel from a sudden loss of a job, a relationship, death. The performance of the work at Winter Residency was movement away from the blocks I traverse daily along Smith Street, to a journey along the whole highway, with its multitude of names, speed limits and topographies, generally known as US44.

4 The oft cited quote from Gustave Flaubert ( 1821-1880) “Of all lies, art is the least untrue.” leads me to consider how the artist’s search for the truths of personal identity through self portraiture, while most likely results in the manipulation of some if not all these truths as a means of protection and projection in relation to the art he or she makes, also serves as a means of underscoring the statement the artist is making through this art. Ultimately the truths contained within the lies the artist tells of his or herself are revealed. The act of self portraiture is not limited to the physical depiction of the self in a work of art, but includes all manners by which the artist controls the depiction or performance of self. This can be such in the case of Marcel Duchamp and the story he told the world for the better part of his life that he left the art world and had given up making art. In the case of Agnes Martin this is visible in her destruction of a large body of work predating her move back to New York City in late 1956 as well as her control of and brisk manner by which she told her story through her writings and the interviews she gave from the mid-1950s to the end of her life. As the culture of mass media has permeated every aspect and moment of our lives, not just in the Western world, this historical phenomen of the artist’s portrayal of self in relation to the work he or she creates becomes more blatantly obvious. From Warhol to Wiley, among artists of all calibers and levels of recognition, performance of the artist-self becomes all the more apparent. The notion that the art is separate from the artist becomes even less valid, less clear; instead there is an increase in the validity of the questions which arise from the triune relationship formed between the work, the viewer and the artist. These ideas were addressed in the research paper I wrote for M503.

5 Kaprow, Allan, and Jeff Kelley. "On the Way to UnArt." Preface. Essays on the Blurring of Art and Life.Berkeley, CA: U of California, 2003. N. pag. Print.

6 To all the unnamed others who have so kindly taken the time to read and respond to emails, texts and messages with me this year on all matters great and small an enormous “Thank You”; the written exchange has been incredibly valuable to the development of both my studio work and research.

7 Carroll experienced seizures due to Temporal Lobe Epilepsy, and the stories serve in part as a record of his own experience as well as a addressing ideas concerning periods of transformation and discovery of the self depicted through the character of Alice.

8 The answer to a favorite question asked by curator Hans Ulrich Obrist “Do you have any unfinished or unrealized projects?” would reveal not just within the space of my studio walls, but the far corners of my mind, projects exceeding in combined number the curator’s frequent flyer miles and publications. However because “Obrist is not interested in all art equally. He can be skeptical about painting, because at this point,..., it’s difficult to do meaningful work in that medium” (64) I will never need to answer this question for him, but it remains a good one to continually ask myself. Max, D. T. "The Art of Conversation." New Yorker 8 Dec. 2014: 64-73. Print.

9 As its title suggests, the imagery was culled from Lewis Carroll's depiction of Alice's fall through the rabbit hole.

10 Both Wa nderland and Look In Glass were part of a December 6, 2014 presentation-event.

11 The viewer’s interaction with the pages in the box was to be just as participatory and performative as the interaction with Wanderland. However the emotional response generated by the encounter was to be much less overwhelming; allowing for a time of quiet introspection in a situation where the viewer is in full control. The additional element of the viewer engaging with the piece in the presence of a group of people who themselves had no access to the box imbued a layer of exclusion and isolation of the experience for both the viewer and the group observing the encounter.

12 In this way it is similar to Paul Sharit’s film Epileptic Seizure Comparison (1976). Dir. Paul Sharits. U W E B Film & Video: Paul Sharits Epileptic Seizure Comparison (1976). Np., n.d. Web. by which the artist attempts to induce the experience of the tonic-clonic seizure in nonepileptics under controlled conditions. I find the film to be a romanticized notion considering there is no record of Sharits being epileptic or personally experiencing such seizure. And even if he did the odds of him remembering the experience in the way he has depicted it are unlikely as it is extremely rare for a person to recall the actual experience of a tonic-clonic seizure. A good example of what I am not trying to express. However the postictal state and emotional impact of the diagnosis are experiences and feelings which can be recalled and shared. Just Between Me and You and Index despite their similarities are conceptually two different works and thus are unable to replicate the experience of the other. The completion via shattering of Look In Glass during the Winter Residency presentation more accurately shared the experience and impact of Epilepsy than Sharit’s film does.

13 Thank You Dr. Laura Gonzalez for this fitting description of what could happen when a large number of people are scheduled to give presentations in a short period of time. Fortunately this was not the case at Winter Residency 2015; all presenters having approached their presentations in unique and stimulating manners.

14 I was not sure until the moment the hammer hit the mirror box that I could do it, but I did.

“To me, the grounds for hope are simply that we don’t know what will happen next, and that the unlikely and the unimaginable transpire quite regularly” (Solnit 94).15

I have traveled a major portion of US44, but I have not yet traveled it in its entirety. From my home to its eastern endpoint there is still a great deal left to explore. This past year has been a significant journey, but the road ahead still contains many unknowns. While it is impossible to know with exactitude what will pop up next along that road, it could be a deer staring at me in the headlights, or laying mangled and bloated by the side of the road, it is still wise to begin studying the map of the line I plan to follow. There might be detours or side roads that catch my eye as I drive along, in fact the likelihood is great that there will be many of these, and where they will lead, who knows.

What I do know today is the road I have just traveled and the point to which it has led me. The explorations I made this year with Self Portrait of a Female with Epilepsy have allowed me to break out of the framework of Epilepsy and address the impact of life changing instances in more general language. Ridding myself of this frame enables me to journey deeper into questions of personal identity and self portrayal via the self portrait.

Using photos produced in the work Twinning as my starting point, it is my intention to further explore the concepts and questions of personal identity and self portrayal via four abstract, painted self portraits. Building upon what I have learned about the complexities of the artist-viewer-work relationship I hope to gain further insight into this relationship when the element of what appears to be non-representational abstraction is added to it. At what point does it become impossible for the conceptual and emotional layers of the work to be readable by the viewer? When does the identity of the artist become lost to the element of abstraction? How does the viewer identify with or emotionally engage with a self portrait that does not appear to contain a recognizable self? These are a few of the questions I might find alongside the road I plan to travel this next year, however there are sure be others which remain unimaginable, I think.

15 Solnit, Rebecca. "Woolf's Darkness." Men Explain Things to Me.Chicago: Haymarket, 2014. 85-106. Print.

PART B

Second Year MFA Proposal Outline

June 2015

01 – Title of project

Self Portrayal

02 – Name of student and any collaborators and their roles

Robyn Thomas

03 – Suggested advisors for studio and for research element (first, second, third choices, if any). Explain your choices.

Studio Advisors

Dr. Laura Gonzalez- Dr. Gonzalez was my first year studio advisor. She is acutely aware of the development of my first year project and how it connects to the second year project. Her prior knowledge of my seemingly backward approach to doing and the direction I am heading will be helpful in my taking this project where it wants to go. As I move from my explorations with other media back to the medium of paint I believe Dr. Gonzalez’s understanding of the paths I have already taken will assist on the return journey. I would also like to expand on conversations begun with Dr. Gonzalez during the first year project in regards to the role of writing in my studio praxis as this will become along with the painting a key practical element.

Dr. Andrew Cooks- Through numerous conversations with Dr. Cooks I believe he is well aware of how my first year project developed and has fed into the second year project’s development, and has some insight to the oppositional approaches I tend to take and the roles thinking/doing play in my process. As the practical element of my second year project moves back to the medium of paint and goes deeper into my writing as a key element in my studio praxis I believe Dr. Cooks could provide many insightful sparks to help light fires along this path.

Research Advisors

It is my hope to continue after completing the MFA into a MPhil/PhD program therefore I wish to work with a research advisor with awareness of these programs and who can help me to further hone the skills needed for this progression beyond my project thesis. I would like a research advisor open to helping me develop my academic writing skills, understanding of the potential the non-academic writing of my studio praxis might play in the academic writing, and be willing to receive communication throughout the entire academic year on the development of the studio portion of my project not for the purpose of feedback [I understand this is only to occur in the Spring Semester], as a means of better understanding the development of the project as a whole so that the relationship of research element and studio element becomes more clearly stated. Suggestions for research advisors are Dr. Michael Bowdidge who served as my first year research advisor, Dr.Gonzalez, or Dr. Cooks.

03. A- Please check off all areas that relate to your work:

Memory, Forgetting, Trauma and the Archive; Creative Fiction and Experimental Non-fiction; Language/Image; Art and Social Technologies; Gender; International Diaspora and Post-Colonialism Role of Art in Peace, Mediation, Performance Activism; Foreignness, Otherness and the Uncanny

04 – Description of proposed project or body of work – practical element

A small group of larger scale paintings, originating from abstract photos of my body, in which I explore a truthfully dishonest expression of the theoretical space containing a multitude of identities at the intersection of non-objective painting and representational self portraiture. In addition to the paintings the practical element will include a series of written self portraits by which I will explore personal identity through lingual abstractions.

05 – Description of project report or thesis – written element

A thesis in which I will discuss the philosophical origins of the question of individual identity: Who am I? I will begin with the writings of Soren Kierkegaard, progressing through twentieth century existential and post-structuralist thought, to the numerous ways in which western society is addressing this question today; a question which has grown more complex through the intermingling of biological, psychological, philosophical, and sociological definitions of who a person might be. Along with addressing the answers, or ‘non-answers’ to this question, I will discuss the origins and significance of the self portrait in both answering and evading the answer to this question, and how this relates to issues of truth and dishonesty in self portrayal. Finally I will conclude the thesis by the contextualization of the results of my practical element to these aspects of defining the self as addressed through my research.

06 – Project results, e.g. documentation, performance, script, intervention, website, exhibition, book, journal

Detailed documentation of the process on my website and a self-published book of images, studio writings and the thesis paper along with the large paintings, small studies and writings will be the results of this project. I am scheduled to participate in a larger group exhibition in late 2015 and a smaller, 3-artist exhibition in [tentatively first half of] 2016; both will include paintings and studies done for this project.

07 – Brief description of research method

My research method begins with looking and listening. Whenever possible I prefer discussing artworks I have experienced in their actuality rather than virtually or via second hand reports. The looking and listening are the points from which I build a rather extensive initial and annotated bibliography with primary sources informing secondary sources and vice versa. These bibliographies will narrow as the research deepens, and the project transitions to the written element [thesis] and the practical element [larger scale paintings].

08 – Initial bibliography for written element

Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi. We Should All Be Feminists. New York: Anchor, 2014.

Berger, Renate. Malerinnen Auf Dem Weg Ins 20. Jahrhundert: Kunstgeschichte Als Sozialgeschichte. Köln: DuMont, 1982.

Bretall, Robert W. A Kierkegaard Anthology. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1972.

Burkett, Elinor. "What Makes a Woman?" Http://www.nytimes.com. N.p., 6 June 2015.

Coplans, John. Provocations. Ed. Stuart Morgan. London: London Projects, 1996.

Cumming, Laura. A Face to the World: On Self-Portraits. London: Harper, 2009.

Dillard, Annie. The Writing Life. New York: Harper & Row, 1989.

Eno, Brian. A Year with Swollen Appendices. London: Faber and Faber, 1996.

Five Hundred Self-portraits. London: Phaidon, 2004. Introduction by Julian Bell

Flynn, Thomas. Existentialism. New York: Sterling, 2006.

Gilligan, Carol. In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women's Development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1982.

Hesse, Hermann. Siddhartha. New York: New Directions, 1951.

Hickey, Dave. Air Guitar: Essays on Art & Democracy. Los Angeles: Art Issues., 1997.

Hooks, Bell. "Being the Subject of Art." Art on My Mind: Visual Politics. New York: New, 1995. 133-37.

Hooks, Bell. "Women Artists: The Creative Process." Art on My Mind: Visual Politics. New York: New, 1995. 125-32.

Ingold, Tim. Lines: A Brief History. London: Routledge, 2007.

Kandinsky, Wassily, and Max Bill. Punkt Und Linie Zu Fläche: Beitr. Zur Analyse D. Malerischen Elemente. Mit E. Einf. v. Max Bill. Bern-Bümpliz: Benteli-Verl., 1959.

Kaprow, Allan, and Jeff Kelley. Essays on the Blurring of Art and Life. Berkeley: U of California, 2003.

Kertesz, Imre. Ich- Ein Anderer. Trans. Ilma Rakusa. Hamburg: Rowohlt, 1999.

Kierkegaard, Soren. The Essential Kierkegaard. Ed. Howard V. Hong and Edna H. Hong. Princeton: Princeton UP, 2000.

Lacan, Jacques. Ecrits. Trans. Bruce Fink. Comp. Heloise Fink and Russell Grigg. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2006.

May, Rollo. The Meaning of Anxiety. New York: W.W. Norton &, 1977.

Mirzoeff, Nicholas. "Chapter 5: Seeing Sex." An Introduction to Visual Culture. London: Routledge, 1999. 162-92.

Nagel, Thomas. The View From Nowhere. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1986.

Nozkowski, Thomas, and Sherman Sam. Thomas Nozkowski: March 31-April 25, 2015. New York: Pace, 2015.

Paley, Grace. Enormous Changes at the Last Minute: Stories. New York: Farrar, Straus,Giroux, 1974.

Paley, Grace. The Little Disturbances of Man. New York: Penguin, 1985.

Rosinsky, Thérèse Diamand. "Portraits." Suzanne Valadon. New York: Universe, 1994. 45-76.

Sartre, Jean-Paul, Jean-Paul Sartre, Jean-Paul Sartre, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Jean-Paul Sartre. "No Exit." No Exit, and Three Other Plays. New York: Vintage International, 1989. 1-47.

Schapiro, Meyer. Words, Script and Pictures: Semiotics of Visual Language. New York: George Braziller, 1996.

Schjeldahl, Peter. "Native Soil." New Yorker 25 May 2015: 78-79.

Sherman, Cindy. A Play of Selves. Ostfildern, Germany: Hatje Cantz, 2007.

Solnit, Rebecca, and Ana Teresa Fernandez. Men Explain Things to Me. 2014.

Solnit, Rebecca. "Shooting Down Man the Hunter." Harper's Magazine June 2015: 5-7.

Tomkins, Calvin. "Cindy Sherman." Lives of the Artists. New York: Henry Holt, 2008. 21-45.

Warr, Tracey, ed. The Artist's Body. London: Phaidon, 2000. Survey by Amelia Jones

Wright, Christopher. Rembrandt, Self-portraits. New York: Viking, 1982.

09 – Research question or hypothesis for thesis. For project report only if applicable.

Who am I? Where does the truth of individual identity reside if the individual is a multitude? Is there no ‘true self’ in self, only a fluctuating identity comprised of honest lies, subsequently making self portrayal an act of self betrayal?

10 – Intended audience

Persons interested in non-representational painting, self portraiture, truth and issues of personal identity.

11 – Short statement on your current practice

I am a painter who enjoys exploring the conceptual layers of painting in thoughts, words, objects, and action; but ultimately returns to playing with paint on a surface.

12 – Formulate entire project in 2-3 meaningful sentences.

From birth to approximately 18 months humans have no concept of self recognition; after recognizing the face in the mirror as our own we spend the rest of our lives asking the question: Who am I? This question of individual identity, how we perceive and project our image of self is inherent to our existence; has been explored by artists through the act of self portraiture; and has become more complex as we decipher and debate the ‘scientific truths’ of identity defined by philosophical, physiological, and psychological factors. In the studio I will continue in the tradition of the artist’s self portrait via writings and a series of paintings; explore via my research the tradition of existential thought to the contemporary debates surrounding individual identity; and attempt to connect both as a means of proving the act of self portrayal is an act of self betrayal due to the fluidity of individual identity.

13 – Technical description and production process including medium, quantity, size or duration

A series of smaller studies and larger paintings, primarily created in acrylic,and possibly including other water and oil based paints. The smaller studies will be of unlimited number, on various papers 18 inches x 24 inches/ 45 cm x 60 cm or smaller. The larger paintings may be on either unstretched canvas or paper, and expand to a size up to 5 feet x 7 feet/ 150 cm x 210 cm. The basis of the paintings will most likely be a series of photographs of my body taken with an iPhone 5 and digitally manipulated using standard photo-editing and page layout software. The photos will then be printed at varying sizes on matte photo paper. These photos may or may not become works or parts of other works, incorporated into sketchbooks, or simply remain as a source within the studio. The studio writing will be done primarily on a MacBook Air, but may also include long hand writing which could eventually find a place within the paintings. The writing will be published digitally on my website. Upon completion of the project images and studio writing will become part of a self-published book.

14 – Connect past and future project

Year One project Self Portrait of a Female with Epilepsy: Despite the openness to exploration I found within the project, the initial response to the proposal tended to be one directed to the framework, causing others to view the project as a more closed structure, which was not my intent nor my experience. Therefore one of the elements I would like to carry forward in my studio practice and my research is how structure can be used as a vehicle for enabling chance occurrence without necessitating a disintegration to chaos. In my year two project I have eliminated the framework comprised by the words “Female” and “Epilepsy”, pairing the exploration down to the ‘Self Portrait’ through which I will explore more universal issues of individual identity, a theme that continually surfaced throughout the first year project research and studio work. It is my intention in year two to take a more traditional approach to the medium of painting while bringing with me what I have discovered in the previous year’s exploration into objects, installation, performance and virtual media to enrich the viewer's’ engagement with the work.

15 – Connect studio and research project (if separate), explain how they inform each other.

My studio and research are never separate, each informs but neither illustrates the other. The‘how’ this informing can be seen at the beginning of the project can only be by trusting they will inform each other as a fact that can either be taken as the truth or as an honest lie.

16 – Brief description of conceptual motivation

Who am I?

17 – Short description and abstract (50-100 word) of written element

Perception and projection of individual identity is inherent to our existence; explored through self portraiture; and grows in complexity as we decipher and debate its ‘truths’ per physiological, psychological and philosophical factors, attempting to answer the question: Who am I? Differing factors expose the multiplicity of identities within the individual, raising the question: Where does the truth of individual identity reside if the individual is a multitude? Is there no ‘true self’ in self, only a fluctuating identity comprised of honest lies, subsequently making self portrayal an act of self betrayal?

18 – Proportion of written/practical element

50/50

19 – Possible location for the project

The images and studio texts as well as thesis will be located in the virtual realm of my website. They will also be self published in a limited edition book, available for purchase online. Larger paintings and smaller studies will be exhibited in Rhode Island/USA and Berlin/Germany with the possibility of other locations TBD.

20 – Timeline for realisation of project

June-September 2015

Reading, drawing, sketching, studying and thinking

September-December 2015

Reading, drawing, sketching, painting, writing and thinking

November-December 2015

Studies/related project paintings included in larger group exhibit Candita Clayton Gallery, Pawtucket, RI/USA

January 2016

33-50% [2-4 paintings total] of larger paintings completed; present portion of work Winter Residency 2016

January-April 2016

Reading, drawing, sketching, painting, writing and thinking; possible 3-person exhibit

October 2015- April 2016

One 3,000 word or less essay written and published monthly [6-8 total] to website

April 15, 2016

100% [6-8 total] of larger paintings completed

May 1, 2016

Self-published book completed and available for purchase online

May 2016 TI deadline

Thesis written and website as documentation/virtual home to images and text completed

21 – Budget

Most materials I currently have as studio stock; Therefore I will limit my overall expenses to US$2000, to be broken down as follows:

US$600 paper

US$400 replacement and re-stock of studio materials and supplies

US$300 photo printing, book publication and miscellaneous office supplies

US$300 website hosting annual fee

US$400 framing and presentation expenses

22 – Additional supporting information

None

May 15 Full Documentation Year One Blog Post

You might notice this website looks different then it did throughout most of this year. It is different. As part of the process of Full Documentation of Year One and my the final practical element of my first year project I undertook a complete website re-design.

Why I would do such as thing? Wouldn’t it be simpler to just do a blog post, link to the relevant pages and move on into Year Two? Yes, it would have been simpler to just do a blog post. However simple is not a part of who I am, nor is simple a part of what Epilepsy is or how it impacts the lives of those effected by the disorder.

As I mentioned in the lead off to my presentation at Winter Residency 2015, the primary self portrait in the practical element of this project, a series of self portraits, has been my blog/website. A complete website re-design at this point might appear to be just a complication of something straightforward, the intent lay more with a renewed expression of the complexity of the subject matter upon which my project is centered rather than a complication of a simple assignment. The purpose of the re-designed website is to emphasize it as a self portrait of my project, Self Portrait of a Female with Epilepsy.

Therefore, no matter how you got to the page you are currently reading this text on I suggest you click on this link to open the website home page and take a moment to fully explore the various pathways through the site on your own before reading this blog post any further.

****

Moving on, you might have thought it would have been helpful to have a few instructions, a map, to help make your exploration of the website a bit less cumbersome. Often we are thrown into a situation and we just have to find our way on our own, or at least get a sense of where we might be before even a map can help us navigate the space we are in. It is through the journey that we learn who and where we are. The thing about map making is we can only make ‘accurate’ maps with knowledge gained from the experiencing the place we are mapping.

Here are some navigation instructions which may or may not shed light on this website.

1. There is more than one path to a given page.

2. All paths leading to any given page have their own unique sights along the way.

3. Some paths are more direct than others.

4. If you find yourself lost in the website, you can always go home, or just close the

browser and start again.

Or you could follow the links to visit each cover or main navigation page of this website.

Research, Self Portraits & Writings

Proposal

To go deeper into the work and the website click on the following links.

Year One Galleries

M501/M502 Studio Process Photos

M501 Just Between Me and You

M501 Proposal Year One The Project

M503 Introduction & Outline

M503 Annotated Bibliography

M503 Draft Research Paper

M503 FINAL Research Paper

Research, Self Portraits & Writings

Research Paper

M503 Introduction & Outline

M503 Annotated Bibliography

M503 Draft Research Paper

M503 FINAL Research Paper

Essays

Just Between Me and You

Drawing Is Creepy

December 6, 2014

Writing A Self Portrait

Self Portraits

Studio Process Galleries

M501/M502 Studio Process Photos

M501/M502 Sketchbook

M501 Self Portrait Series Galleries

M501 Journal-Pages

M501 Wanderland

M501 Look In Glass

M501 Just Between Me and You

M501 Index

M502 Self Portrait Series Galleries

M501 Proposal Year One The Project

About

Critique Group

Workshops & Residencies

Summer 2014 Workshops

Berlin Summer 2014

New York Winter 2015

Before beginning this full documentation blog post I again reviewed my project proposal. The sections of the proposal I have found to be most valuable in guiding me through this journey have been 04, 05, 06, 08, 09, and 10. Despite some changes and unforeseen developments, I have pretty much followed the course I set out to explore in August 2014. This is due to the element of openness in exploration I placed within the framework of the project proposal. What I learned throughout the course of this year is that despite the openness to exploration I found within the project, the initial response to the proposal I was garnering from outside myself tended to be one directed to the framework, others viewing the project as a more closed structure, which really was not my intent. This did change somewhat over the course of the year and post Winter Residency. Therefore one of the elements I would like to carry forward in my studio practice and my research is how structure can be used as a vehicle for enabling chance occurrence without necessitating a disintegration to chaos.

Taking a closer look at section 04 of my project proposal, concerning the practical element or proposed work, a quick read of this paragraph and viewing the various galleries on this website I believe I accomplished all I set out to do: series of self portraits, non-traditional approaches which explored all material and technical elements listed, made the journal pages and incorporated them into other works, presented the work, and created separate image galleries on the website.

The final sentence in section 04 has resonated with me the most this year:

Through the self portraits and journaling I seek to open up my approach to what painting can be by exploring the possibilities of adding elements from other media in order to create different layers of meaning in a more physical, tactile manner.

Among the Year One galleries the one I recommend spending the most time exploring to gain insight into the development of my studio practice this year is M501/M502 Studio Process Photos. The website re-design led to two important changes in this gallery.

First the images no longer are easily viewed in their entirety on the average computer screen, however when viewing on a tablet, phone or other mobile device they fit the screen. In choosing the template I was aware of this difference. It was possible for me to resize each image so that it would fit the computer screen, but with the exception of the Journal-Pages gallery images, I chose not to do this. Sometimes, in certain situations, it is difficult to view the complete picture. This is the case in Index with the tiny mirrors disrupting the viewer’s focus. Sometimes when we want to see the complete picture we have to exerted a bit more effort, and even then we still might not be able to see what is directly in front of us.

Second, in the previous website design the images in this gallery often had explanatory text directly accompanying the image. In this template that text is no longer visible, but still accessible by myself on via the configuration site. I decided to use this as an opportunity to approach the text differently. What I chose to do is take those blurbs accompanying the images and use them as the basis for a new text which is found in the sidebar of the gallery page. Instead of the text integrated with the images, it runs parallel to the images. Because text and image do not align, the viewer must work harder to make the connection which enables comprehension.

The other gallery where I played with the configuration of text and image is in M501 Journal-Pages gallery. Here I wrote the titles, previously viewed beneath the image, as a flowing, free form poem in the left side of the gallery page. Again, the information about each image is present on the webpage, the order of the information is consistent, but text and image do not line up.

Along with the series of self portraits anticipated as part of the resulting practical element I mentioned at various places in my proposal the possibility of a book documenting the results. While I have not created a book, I have created the website. The website is the primary self portrait in the series as well as the project documentation in a format beyond a blog post. It contains all the elements and information that would have been in a book…but it isn’t a book, it’s a website. I never felt comfortable with the idea of making a book in the traditional sense, anymore than I felt comfortable with making video or film, or taking many of the performative approaches to presenting my work which I have taken this year. Yet a key part of my practice I have explored these areas this year by challenging definitions through the exploration of their fluidity. This is something I will no doubt continue to do.

In addition to the required blog postings, critique group and advisor meeting responses, M503 Research Paper, and the M504 Synthesis Paper, I have written a number of essays as part of my own process of deliberation. In section 05 of my proposal I suggested the possibility of these writings forming along with the self portrait images the basis of a book. Again, they did not, but they do serve as a basis for this website, and as written self portraits. I recommend reading the text which is Part A of my M504 Synthesis Paper as it will provide the best insight to this year’s work and the paths which lay ahead of me in Year Two. The writing I have done this year, required and out of my own need has leant a lot to the development of my studio practice and become a more integrated part of it. I am positive this will continue.

There is more than one path one can follow to arrive at the same point. The avenues I have explored conceptually and materially this year opened my studio practice to areas of consideration and approach that had over the years become cut off. This clearing of path ways will enable me to move forward in Year Two refocusing on questions of self portraiture and identity from a painterly perspective minus the Baroque framework of Epilepsy. I am looking forward to a more focused engagement with painting, knowing that these re-opened pathways are at any moment still accessible to me.

All of the pages documenting Self Portrait of a Female with Epilepsy and everything that fed the project is here on this website, this self portrait.

MCP503 FINAL Paper

Please click here to view MCP503 Research Paper.

150 Word Response to Skype with Laura Gonzalez April 10, 2015

We reviewed deadlines, the project summary blog post and second year project proposal/synthesis paper. Discussed MCP502 Twinning and MCP502 Self Reflective. Questions the path work might take: ‘How do we encounter the images? What kind of body is this? What is the content?’ Questions for the second year project: ‘What am I trying to capture in with the self portrait? How might self portraits be painted today? Who do I see as my peers? Where are the overlaps?’ Possible structure of second year project proposal: challenge the ways I work through the establishment of a contained hierarchy, a focused production addressing a broader thematic content; reverse ordering of how I tend to work, from specific to broad, working from broad to specific. This conversation has left me with many questions to consider as I formulate the second year project proposal as well as prepare for Berlin Residency.

Blog Update for April 15, 2015

Since my mid-March blog update I have added the following studio and research work to this site.

The first draft of my MCP503 Research Paper can be found here. I am in the process of completing the revisions for the final draft which will be posted by April 15.

I wrote an essay-sketch posted on this page titled Writing a Self Portrait. The impetus for this piece was writing an artist statement and bio for an upcoming exhibit, and how these, which we often dread having to write but must write quite frequently. By re-framing the process of writing the artist statement and bio as a form of self portraiture I hope to lessen that dread. The essay served as a good starting point for the discussion of my recent work in my crit group Skype session on March 29.

MCP501/MCP502 Gallery updates can be found in three of the galleries: MCP501/MCP502 Process Photos,journal, Sketchbook, etc by scrolling down to the images beginning with ‘Something else on the easel’. The two new works featured in this gallery are still in process. Text discussing the pieces is included with the photos. A few other works in a similar vein have been started in the studio but are not yet ready to be documented on this month’s blog posting. MCP502 Self Reflective includes approximately sixty new iPhone photos using mirrors, reflective surfaces, paintings from previous years, photos, objects and spaces of personal significance. This is an area I am really playing around with and still unsure of where it is going; if the photos will be left as photos in a digital space, become prints, or become part of other works in a still unknown form. Perhaps they will become all of these. MCP502 Twinnings is a new gallery added this month, and similar to the works in the MCP502 Self Reflective gallery consists of photos I have taken of myself using my iPhone and a mirror. In these photos it is a single mirror hung on a wall against which I have pressed various parts of my body. Like the other photos I am not sure at the moment where these photos are leading, or how they will fit into the work. I did print all the photos on 4 inch x 6 inch glossy photo paper. These photos I have sorted and glued into two sketchbooks. One book primarily has the photos of the face with a few pages using two or more photos featuring more recognizable body parts. The other sketchbook consists mostly of multiple photo pages of more abstract images. In that book I have begun drawing on some of the pages and photos. As this work is fleshed out in the next few weeks I will begin posting images of these pages in the gallery. I have also finally filled the sketchbook I began in Berlin, which for me is quite an accomplishment as I have always been very inconsistent working in and filling sketchbooks. I have posted the additional images in the MCP501/MCP502 Sketchbook gallery.

In addition to the studio work and revision work on the MCP503 Research Paper I have begun thinking about the MCP504 Synthesis Paper and Year Two Project Proposal I will be writing next month. My thoughts have been leading me towards further exploration of self portraiture and with a decreased emphasis on, if not elimination of the word ‘Epilepsy’ from the project title.

This past week I traveled to New York City for a couple of days where I attended a lecture given by Rebecca Solnit at City College which was centered around her two atlases, and mapping space and place from feminist perspective. I spent some time looking at a few shows in Chelsea, including Joseph Beuys at Mitchell-Innes & Nash, Thomas Nozkowski at Pace, Etel Adnan at Galerie LeLong, and Ke-Sook Lee at George Billis Gallery. I also had the opportunity to add to my bookshelf after a trip to Strand. Among my finds were A Face To The World: On Self-Portraits by Laura Cumming and Essays On The Blurring Of Art And Life by Allan Kaprow. Unfortunately they did not have Richard Schechner’s book on Performance Studies as I had hoped, and I still want to look at. On that note, I am currently participating in the virtual version of the Performance Anxiety by my fellow Ti student and crit group member Claire Barratt on Tumblr. Finally, while in NYC I was able to visit the Met with fellow Ti student and crit group facilitator Mark Roth to experience his project- AR exhibition of his work at the Met. This was a great opportunity to not only begin to experience the work as it is meant to be, but to discuss and provide feedback on all the possibilities the project contains. And it is always enjoyable to walk around someplace like the Met with another artist, look at and discuss works that he or she find interesting and inspiring! In general I have had a great experience with my crit group both in written and Skype crits, and have been fortunate to be able to interact with various members beyond the given crit group structure.

In all the past month has been filled with many opportunities to think, explore and write, both formally for the research paper, and less formally in the studio. I am looking forward to seeing how the studio explorations of the past two months begin to solidify and take shape between now and the Berlin residency. Flights and accommodations have been booked and the Panke is calling!

March 29, 2015 Skype Critique Response

My response to the March 29, 2015 Crit Group critique via Skype can be found here.

Writing a Self Portrait

This post, like the "Drawing Is Creepy" post from October 28, 2014 is an example of part of the thought process behind my approach to the art I create. This writing, like most of the blog posts, has not been highly edited and should be read as a sketch which might feed into further explorations.

The other day I sat down at the keyboard to do that thing all artists do now and then, or at least whenever external forces press upon them to do it: re-write, edit down, expand upon, or just start writing an artist statement and bio. It is something all artists have to do at some point, there is no way around it. But we torture ourselves with us. And the only torture worse than writing an artists statement is reading one; you can just feel the pain and agony the artist felt having to not just write about her or his work, but to also write about his or herself. Usually I try to avoid reading an artist statement when I go into a gallery, at least until curiosity gets the best of me. Then if the work piques my interest in some way that I think “maybe this person has something in the artist statement which will give me a bit more insight to what is happening here”, I saunter over to the reception counter to see what papers have been laid out to provide the validation needed to accept “this is art”. If I am lucky, beyond a price/title list, some reviews both recent and distant, and a formal curriculum vitae, there won’t be an artist statement amongst the offerings. Considering not every gallery or exhibition space can be a mini-museum wanna be, hosting exhibition events with viewers brought in by the bus load on a Saturday afternoon to gaze in wonderment whilst they extend their selfie sticks into the crowd; who needs to know what the artist has to say about the work in that milieu? Reality is that in most galleries and spaces where art is exhibited you will find an artist statement, so you better begin writing one that not only myself but hopefully the hundreds of others who will encounter your work and have their interest piqued enough to want to know more about the work and about the artist behind, will want to read. It is a necessary part of what we do, and we need to stop allowing ourselves to play the victim to its torture, and begin writing the artist statement we want to read about our work and about ourselves. Its time we begin understanding what artists statements really are and writing them in the way they deserve to be written.

What is an artist statement and bio? Sure, it is a couple of paragraphs an artist writes about the work she or he is exhibiting, either specific to a particular body of work or to the work in general. It might talk about the thoughts and process, both material and conceptual, from which the work evolved. Unlike the artist bio, the artist statement is often written in the first person, whereas the bio might be written by the artist about him or herself in the third person, as strange as that might sound. To sum it up, the artist statement and bio provides the reader, who is hopefully also the viewer, a written image of the work and the person behind it. They are in this sense a self portrait.

How can an artist write a self portrait of his or her art? Doesn’t there have to be some ‘self’ to go along with the ‘portrait’? Let’s face it, not every work of art an artist creates embodies his or herself. Does it? No, it doesn’t, and I don’t think it should. How bored we would all become if all the art we experienced was just about the artist. However just as it is the natural inclination of humans to put a name to a face, so to is it the desire of most viewers of art to put an artist ‘behind’ the work. Therefore what and how an artist writes about the work she or he creates begins to form an image of the artist behind the work as well as the work itself.

As an artist one of the most frustrating moments I ever experienced was in an art history seminar I was enrolled in whilst studying for a degree in that field after finishing up my BFA in painting. The postdoc leading that seminar on the European Avant Garde of the 1950s-1960s in prepping us on how to work with sources for the presentations and papers we would be delivering stated: do not use or trust anything an artist has written or said about his work. It is almost always untrue. I was personally offended by this statement. Not that it is false to say much of what an artist might write or say about his or her work is possibly untruthful or misleading, after all most of those whose work has had a lasting impact in the Twentieth Century have been coyotes whose work has been built on a precipice of manipulation and self-mythologization. But to say because of this fact of known obfuscation on the part of the artist scholars should dismiss what an artist has to say about his or her work is wrong. Often the best way to get to the whole truth is to first sort through all the halfs.

Does this mean as an artist it is okay to write about your work in half truths? No. Willful ambiguity that is genuine and supports the work and the image the artist is attempting to convey are justifiable, as long as it is genuine and integral to the work. The artist as creator, initiator, is intrinsic to the work; abstrusity in biography can be tolerated too, when it is genuine. In the words of Gustave Flaubert “of all lies, art is the least untrue”. Therefore within a genuine artistic half truth lies the potential of a whole truth.

As artists writing about ourselves and our work it is at times better to leave a door unlocked or slightly ajar, rather than wide open with a flashing arrow pointing the reader/viewer the way down the path of full comprehension. He or she might decide to try a door handle or take a peek behind to see what else might be discovered beyond the path the artist has seemingly laid out to the work. Or the reader/viewer might decided to stay on that path, ignoring what might branch off in other directions; that is for him or her to decide, not for the artist to dictate. Creating this space for the reader/viewer to choose for him or herself, surrendering control of interpretation, opens up a space for the reader/viewer to engage with the art on a more personal level. Both the reader/viewer and the art are enriched by this openness; the biography of the artist, the biography [statement] of the work and the biography of the reader/viewer are given the chance to combine in ways a directed telling of the work and the artist’s biography otherwise constrains.

Back to my own adventures in writing, rewriting, editing my artist statement and bio. Spurred on by a deadline to provide one for an exhibit I am having this June, and seeing how the various statements I had on file no longer seemed to fit with the work I am planning to show, I produced the following:

I make art as a means to explore existential questions of the mind-body relationship as they relate to neurological and biological processes, structures, language, and the understanding and expression of the self and all that is beyond the self, the other. I am a painter and it is as a painter that I approach all I create regardless of the final form a piece may take. At times these forms occupy a place between that which we think we know should be and how we are physically experiencing a place in the moment; a morphing occurs driven by both the concept, its manifestation and how the viewer stands in relation to the work.

The paintings exhibited here are part of an exploration of the image of self, embodied by the painting and subsequently fractured by the mirror frame.

Robyn Thomas received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Studio Art (Painting) from Kent State University in 1991. In addition, she has studied Art History, Philosophy and Pedagogy at the University of Karlsruhe, Germany and was a guest student at the Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design/Staatliche Hochschul für Gestaltung Karlsruhe in the Institute for Art and Media Theory/Institut für Kunstwissenschaft und Medienphilosophie. She is currently a candidate in the MFA Creative Practice program of Transart Institute/Plymouth University[UK]. Robyn Thomas has exhibited her work in solo and group exhibitions throughout Germany and the United States. She currently lives and paints in Providence, Rhode Island USA.

While I wrote the first draft of this I did not think of it as a self portrait. Placing the writing into the context of a self portrait came to me in the wee hours of the following morning, as I awoke to my usual mid-life, mid-sleep insomniatic moment with the understanding ‘this is what it is’ in my head. Later that morning I sat down with the previous days writing, and severely hacked away a significant portion of what I had written, hopefully leaving doors unlocked and ajar for the reader/viewers to try opening on their own. Could I have said more? Could I have said less? Yes. Am I being willfully ambiguous for the sake of obfuscation? Or is the beclouding a pick-axe I am generously offering the reader/viewer with the genuine intent that should he or she decide to take it into their own hands and apply it to the words and works, they will find the whole hidden amongst the halfs?

This remains to be seen. For now the statement and bio have been written and sent off to the gallery director’s email. This version has taken its place not only in the file with those that came before it and where it will undoubtedly be joined soon by others, but also amongst the self portraits.

MCP503 Draft Paper

Click on MCP503 Draft Paper for first draft of paper.

Blog Update for March 15, 2015

This posting will shorter than usual, linking to galleries with recent explorations in the studio which contain texts discussing the processes behind those works in progress.

The past month in addition to the studio work and contemplating work I will be exhibiting in June I have been focusing on my MCP503 research paper. I had a brief Skype call with both my research advisor, Michael Bowdidge, and my studio advisor, Laura Gonzalez on February 20.

The blog post immediately preceding this posting is the response/documentation of the Skype meeting I had with my studio advisor, Laura Gonzalez, on March 6.

To view what I have been exploring in the studio since mid-February please go to the MCP501/MCP503 Process Photos Journal, Sketchbook, etc. gallery. This gallery is ordered chronologically, with the most recent additions to it at the bottom of the gallery, therefore please scroll down through the gallery to the image with the title "Self Reflective" to begin viewing the recent work. The explorations added to the gallery this month are: Self Reflective, Boxed In*, On the easel, and Twinning. I have also created a separate gallery for Self Reflective.

Response to Skype meeting with studio advisor, Laura Gonzalez, March 6, 2015

We began our conversation discussing the presentation of my project work from MCP501 at Winter Residency. Most of the presentation along with the question and feedback portion was documented in video, photos and audio and can be found in the gallery section and served as the basis for our discussion of the performative angle, set up and visuals of the presentation, tying this into both Duchamp’s as well as Agnes Martin’s approach to art and life. Richard Schechner’s Performance Studies: An Introduction was suggested as a reference to further explore methodologies of theater and the exploration of different ideas about performance in various non-theater situations. The idea of the performative was also addressed in direct relation to my recent series of self-portrait photos, Self Reflective. Laura suggested that I look at the work of the artist Fiona Jardine, specifically regards to her use of transitions within a PowerPoint presentation/lecture, the performative aspects of the presentation, and in general the approaches she takes in her paintings and the incorporation of work with textiles. We discussed the use of chance and method in my work; how chance and methods have been more commonly applied/explored in the non-visual arts, and the possibilities of their applications which I am exploring in my work. We discussed the painting currently on my easel which I am working on as part of an exhibition involving paintings framed with mirrors as a means to expand and create new spaces which the paintings can occupy. The question arose how the scale of the paintings influences the perception of a more expansive, narrative driven space; a space less fragmented and more sentence like in structure. We discussed this relation to narrative, space and scale as it also appears in the Self Reflective photos, and how Laura has used this in her work, as well as how it begins to address the idea of the hidden/revealed- game of hide & seek as used by Tarkovsky in Stalker. This led to a discussion of the idea of the loop, the “where do you start? where do you finish?” play between subject/object which I use in my painting and how it occurs both within the picture plane as well as beyond it. Laura encouraged me to consider the possibility of going larger, “territorial”, and how this might be done beyond the canvas. We discussed the return to the palimpsest with the layering of the written text in the painting, and how the relationship of voice and language fits into this when the voice goes beyond language (the text) and becomes tone and rhythm. Alvin Lucier’s I Am Sitting in a Room was suggested as a reference point/pioneer of sound art, to explore this movement. This led into a conversation on the nature of the push-pull/limit-limitless explored in my work. We discussed the nature of limits, for the work from a technological-material standpoint, from the view of the maker, as well as for the viewer. The question arose: “the work has edges, but does it have limits?” We discussed how the digital limits the individuality/expression of the individual nature which I explore in my work. We ended with a discussion of the piece Look In Glass and its completion in the presentation at Winter Residency, the relationship to Duchamp’s Large Glass [along with the box], the shattering nature of glass and mirrors, and the logic behind the breaking of glass both physically as well as metaphorically in regards to mental breaks. In the metaphorical sense a psychological shattering has often been misunderstood a being of an illogical nature, when really the nature/pattern of the shatter is quite logical both in the reality of the glass’s shatter as in the psychological shatter of a mental state. And this brought us back to the metaphorical relationship of this to my project’s exploration of Epilepsy. We briefly discussed the next steps I plan to take in the studio both towards our meeting in April as well as the Summer Residency. And we ended the conversation with a short discussion on my interest in pursuing research beyond the MFA; the steps and possibilities to consider as I move into my second year with the MFA program.

MCP503 Intro to Paper, Outline and Annotated Bibliography Links

Please click on the following link to access the MCP503 Intro to Paper and Outline

Please click on the following link to access the MCP503 Annotated Bibliography

Scroll down to read the most recent blog post, follow links in that post to view galleries with recent work images and text.

January-February Monthly Blog Update - A New Year: Transitions, Breaks and Snowed Under

This is the first post for 2015 and covers the two month period from December 12, 2014 to February 12, 2015. Although officially there was a month "break" and a month of independent studio work and study- it was a very busy time. In addition to the break, the new module of study began during the one week Winter Residency in New York City January 12-17, 2015. This module, MCP503, is focused on the research paper which I am writing, and is a transition from an almost exclusive focus on the studio portion of my project to the consolidation of the studio, research , and writing portions of my project. Because of this transition I have made some slight changes and updates to this blog site to incorporate the new module, the completion of a number of pieces I worked on this Fall, and to gain some space for future posts and pages on the website. Therefore this post will be for the most part a summary of these changes, updates and additions with links to guide you to the pertinent pages, but I will also include a brief reflection of the Winter Residency and what I have been looking, thinking and doing around the studio and research despite the exorbitant amount of snow which has made my studio a cold, dark space and cut into my work time in numerous ways.

Website Changes and Updates

Beginning in the navigation bar I have updated and slightly changed the titles of the headers. To Year 1 and Gallery I have added the prefix MCP501/MCP503 in order to differentiate the work and Year 2 modules which will eventually be added. When I reach that point all the work, posts and images from Year 1 will be consolidated into a single, archived header with streamlined pages. Currently under the MCP501/MCP503 Year 1 the header Monthly Blog Update MCP501/MCP503 remains the home page. In addition for the February 15, 2015 dealing I have added under this navigation bar the pages MCP503 Annotated Bibliography and MCP503 Intro Paper & Outline.

Under the MCP501/MCP503 Gallery header I consolidated the separate monthly documentations of the Journal pages into a single gallery MCP501 Journal Pages Gallery . The photos of the two pieces I created in Berlin that were in the August-September gallery have been relocated to the Berlin Summer 2014 gallery located under the Workshops/Residencies header. The gallery containing sketchbook pages has been renamed MCP501/MCP503 Sketchbook and I have added the top nine images to it with this posting. The gallery in which I have been posting general process documentation has been renamed MCP501/MCP503 Process Photos Journal, Sketchbook, etc. to reflect the ongoing addition of processes not necessarily specific to a single project but needing a place to be documented. To this gallery I have added a significant amount of new information, which is added somewhat chronologically. It is necessary to scroll through the gallery, the new information begins with the posting of my presentation notes-binder images. This gallery also includes a video of the first 5 minutes of my presentation at Winter Residency, as well as images of some newer, uncompleted works I have been playing around with since returning from New York City. All of the galleries documenting the process of Self Portraits completed during the MCP501 module have had this added as a prefix to their name. New images and text concerning the completion and presentation of both Look In Glass and Just Between Me and You were added to their respective galleries, MCP501 Process Photos Look In Glass and MCP501 Just Between Me and You . Again, these galleries are arranged chronologically from start to finish, so you must scroll through to get to the most recent image/text postings. The Look in Glass gallery contains 17 new images and two videos. Just Between Me and You contains 4 new images and two videos, of which the Pages video I consider a separate piece/self portrait in the series. Finally, under this header I created a new gallery for the piece Index which was made specifically for the presentation I gave at the Winter Residency 2015 in NYC. MCP501 Process Photos Index contains 49 images and text of this project.

The only other slight changes made to this website were changing removing the year from the Critique Group header to allow for growth, and to retitle the header Workshops/Residencies for the same reason. I did create in addition to the Berlin Summer 2014 a photo gallery New York Winter 2015 which contains a few fun photos, mainly of me in one of Claire Barratt's stripy tubes!

Winter Residency 2015

As expected it was an intense, full and stimulating week. It was very cold outside, but the scheduling meant that not much time was spent outside of the efa Project Space; and fortunately the massive amounts of snow arrived in the Northeastern US after and not during the residency. Despite the moments of chaos leading up to the residency, I would say things worked out in the way in which they needed to. It was a great opportunity not only to present the work, and for myself this is a large part of what I am considering in my first year project, but also to see how the work and ideas of fellow Transart students have developed over the past six months. In contrast to Berlin where the presentations were split up and we did not have the chance to experience everyone's presentation, it was beneficial to have that opportunity in NYC. I also found it enlightening to be present for the PhD candidates presentations as this helped to broaden my thinking at a personal level. What I did find to be unfortunate was that because it is one week and so much is packed into the day, the time to contemplate, respond to, experience and provide really thought out feedback to the work is insufficient. However, because of the nature of the program and the online communication networks we have established I have been able to have very insightful conversations via email and social media messenger/texts with numerous Ti students about their presentations and my own. So, in a way it is good that the time for immediate and direct response is limited, it allows for a more in-depth, distanced discussion. One email conversation I had with fellow student and crit group member Gabriel Deerman regards to the Look in Glass and its shattering during my presentation was very insightful. Gabriel and I have given each other permission to share this conversation, however I have not posted it here- not sure under which header I wish to include it- but I am willing to share via email with anyone who might be interested, send me a request via email.

Looking, Thinking and Seeing

Despite the snow, residency, holidays and deadlines I have had the opportunity to look at a lot of art the past two months. I was finally able to visit the exhibition She at the David Winton Bell Gallery, Brown University on its final day. Although a small exhibit, it was very thought provoking in regards to how women have been portrayed in the visual arts over the past 15 years. Shortly before the new year, while I delivered Look In Glass and Just Between Me and You to NYC, I took my family to see the Matisse: The Cut-Outs exhibit, along with The Forever Now exhibition of contemporary painting at MoMA. My one comment on The Forever Now is that it could have pushed so much farther, but in light of the sponsoring institution it probably took it as far as was comfortable for itself.

In order to get myself settled and ready for the residency I arrived in NYC the Saturday afternoon before it began, and immediately headed over to the Morgan Library to see Cy Twombly: Treatise on the Veil. I admit that I have always found his paintings somewhat inaccessible for me on a personal level, but have been trying to give them a chance more recently as I have begun exploring my own use of text in my paintings. This summer my 'local museum' rehung their contemporary gallery, and brought out an Untitled Twombly blackboard painting from 1968. And they conveniently placed a bench directly in front of it where I have spent a number of hours this Fall sitting and looking. During my years in Germany I did have numerous opportunities to see Treatise on the Veil (1) at the Museum Ludwig, in Cologne; it was a great opportunity to see not only how he revisited this painting in Treatise on the Veil (2), but also the drawings working up to it. After looking closely at the drawings on the three surrounding walls I spent a considerable amount of time moving along the benches set up in front of the 30+foot painting, looking and thinking. And I suddenly began to feel myself led into his language, but in a way I was not expecting. It was much more personal than I had expected, in large part I believe to my personal autobiography. Twombly's re-consideration to Treatise began with the drawings he created in the last days of May 1970, just days before my physical birth. The painting, essentially a record, a timeline, of a life-journey was painted in those first few months of my life. As I moved along the painting I finally felt a connection to the language, similar to that moment of learning another language and you wake up from a dream and realized you dreamt it, and understood what was being said.

While in NYC I also had the chance to visit the Metropolitan Museum of Art to see not only the Twentieth Century collection before it is relocated, but also the Pieter Coecke van Aelst exhibit which included one of my favorite altar pieces, with a great depiction of God, Jonah and the whale, from the collection of the Staatliche Kunsthalle Karlsruhe. It was a good reminder of how artists historically were not defined, categorized or pigeon-holed by the media they worked in and that this is a 'modern' phenomena. On the Saturday after residency I was able to attend both the studio visits at the efa and the Chelsea Gallery Walk Jean Marie organized. I especially found the visit to Katinka Mann's studio and hearing her speak of her process inspiring. A few of my fellow Transart students who were unable to attend asked me if I would take notes and send them an account of the visits, which I did. Again, I am more than happy to share, but not quite sure under which header to place this, so send me an email if you are interested in reading more about that day.

A transition which occurred at the residency, and which lead in turn to a weekend journey to Philadelphia and Beacon, NY was the selection of three artworks different from the ones I had selected to discuss on the final submission of my project proposal in Berlin. The selection process of those three works I found tossed upon me in Berlin. My solution was to randomly choose what I thought might be good for discussion. However time has shown me that really the selection of the works I should be and need to discuss has grown out of the months of reading, reflection and studio work. Therefore in my meeting with my Research Advisor, Michael Bowdidge, in NYC those three works were tossed aside in favor of more pertinent works. In our discussion it was clear that Duchamp was a must in the paper. I had begun taking a new look at his work upon returning from Berlin, reading up on it, and agree that there is a lot I can address here in the paper as he was in my thoughts a lot this Fall. Other artist who came up in our conversation were Ellsworth Kelly, Bridget Riley and Agnes Martin. I responded most to Agnes Martin, as I have spent a number of years looking at and considering her paintings, though in an informal fashion. The Duchamp piece suggested was With Hidden Noise, which I serendipitously ran into the following day at the James Cohan Gallery .

Returning home I did more research and re-encountered an Agnes Martin painting in the collection of Dia:Beacon which I always found intriguing, because it didn't "fit" with the others as readily. This piece I selected is Untitled from 1956-57 and is a transition piece for her as she moved from New Mexico to NYC where her 'mature' work began in 1960. She was also the age I am now when she painted this piece. For the third piece I knew I wanted to choose something more recent, and a work which has or had limited possibility of direct experience. I had recently begun thinking again about the work of Ann Hamilton, and looking through her oeuvre I came across ghost...a border act from 2000. This piece seemed to have the elements I was looking for which could add to the contextualization of my work, relates to the works of Duchamp and Martin, is a work I have not and cannot directly experience. But I still wasn't sure about With Hidden Noise. Having read more, thought more, I began to have my doubts that this was the Duchamp piece I needed to write about, discuss. So I packed up my car and between snow storms took a trip to Philadelphia to visit the museum and all the Duchamps. I knew I needed to see Large Glass and the Green Box in its display case to verify the feelings I had that this is the piece for the discussion. And it is. On my way back to Rhode Island I stopped in Beacon and spent a few hours visiting Dia:Beacon and confirming my choice of work.

This brings me up to date, and the end of a very long and drawn out blog post. It was a very busy time, although last week I thought to myself "what have you done? you haven't done anything!". Writing this out I can see that doing takes many forms, part of which is reflecting on all that has been thought out and experienced. Just like Duchamp's notes on the glass, and Martin's numerical analysis of trying to capture on paper the 'exact' image she saw in her head, writing and creating these blog postings are a part of my process, a portrait of my self which is more for myself than for anyone else.

Wanderland and Look In Glass: Report from December 6, 2014 Installation

Photos and videos of the process and installation of these works can be found in the gallery section. Follow the links provided in the work titles. The images are in chronological order, so please scroll through to see the images and video from December 6.

Essential to the realization of Wanderland and Look In Glass was their presentation on Saturday, December 6, 2014 at my home-studio. For Wanderland it was the cummulation of its existence, it is a site-specific installation bound both by concept and aesthetics to the ground floor hallway of my home. Look In Glass, while not a site-specific piece, is nonetheless eternally tied in its conception to the physical presentation of the journal pages, the main component of Wanderland. Wanderland cannot exist without Look In Glass and Look In Glass cannot fully exist without the journal pages, but it can exist without Wanderland as long as the journal pages are physically present in some form.

Despite the existence of Look In Glass as a transportable object, conceivable as a ‘stand alone’ work of art; despite the possibility of the journal pages slideshow being presented as a film or video independent of the mirror box, either of these presentation formats would result in Look In Glass loosing much in way of its intended meaning. Look In Glass is an alienated, virtual, passive, cool and controlled experience of the journal pages. Yes, it would be possible to retain these characteristics within the context of a stand alone object or film, but the point is not the characteristics themselves, but the juxtaposition of them to the actual, real, warm and textured, out of control, ‘in your face’, ‘up close and personal experience’ of the journal pages, as the viewer experiences them in Wanderland.

I invited twenty-eight people to come to my home and view Wanderland and Look In Glass. Twenty responded and sixteen were able to come. The viewers’ ages, socio-economic, and professional backgrounds are varied across the arts [performing arts, visual arts and design], sciences, business, humanities, journalism, theology and service industry. All had previously been to my home and walked through the hallway. Two of the viewers are family members and live in the space. Most were familiar to some degree with my paintings, a few knew of my health history, and three knew of what I am trying to achieve in this project. Except for those three, the viewers did not know what to expect when they opened the door and entered Wanderland. The three who knew about the project were still unsure of what to expect behind the door.

Wanderland and Look In Glass are intended to be experienced by one person at a time. They are not meant to be viewed in an open, public space, with other individuals physically present. [This will prove a challenge when presenting Look In Glass and the companion piece, which will take the place of Wanderland, titled Just Between Me And You at the Winter Residency, but I am currently in the process of developing another presentation format that maintains the desired experience.] The experience of the work as a personal, solitary experience is important because it mirrors the experience of a seizure which can only be fully understood and experienced personally and in a solitary manner. The way the works were installed on December 6 enabled me to control to access to the space, limiting it to a single person at a time. In the invitation I sent, I requested the guests to RSVP with a time they would like to visit. This was meant to help maintain the sense of an intimate experience even when the viewers were outside the space waiting to travel through it. Some visitors did do this, with just one or two people other than myself present in adjoining rooms while an individual visited Wanderland and Look In Glass. However there was a moment when about seven of the viewers who did not state a time arrived simultaneously. This meant there was a longer wait to view the work. It also prevented viewers from providing much feedback in the first moments after viewing because they wanted to keep what they experienced a ‘secret’ from those who had not yet traveled through Wanderland and visited Look In Glass. Feedback has trickled in via email, phone and social media messaging.

The voices of those seated, waiting in the living room, drinking mulled wine, tea, and eating German holiday cakes were kept low and conversation to a minimum; like most wood framed American houses, the walls are thin and sounds easily carry. Although my original intention was to make the experience as ‘sound free’ as possible for reasons mirroring my own seizure experience, about four of the viewers mentioned the experience of the sounds carried through the walls in relation to their viewing of the work. None of these were mentioned negatively or as being a distraction, instead they all mentioned how it added to the sense of isolation- solitary, inside space versus a space outside occupied by other individuals in conversation. Some found this comforting, reassuring that they were really not so alone. Others felt that it made the solitariness of the space more special, as if it was created just for them and the people outside the space were being excluded from experiencing it. Some mentioned being able to identify the voices, but not really understand what was being said. Much of what was said about the sounds reflects my own experience during a seizure, but it was not something I directly referred to, stated, or even intended to do. I did not reveal to these viewers how accurate their understanding of the sounds in relation to the experience were for me. All understood the sounds as chance occurrences, perhaps not intended as part of the piece. They all began to question if perhaps by not including another type of sound in the space the chance sounds coming from outside the space were really, in an unplanned way, intentional. It was encouraging for me to hear the direction this feedback took, and has made me consider how much the work, when pointed in the right direction, on its own can develop pertinent layers of meaning.

This larger group of coeval viewers consisted primarily of people least familiar with my work, the project, and my personal health history. While they were waiting I quietly provided a bit more information to the viewers about why I had invited them, as a means of gathering feedback outside my Crit Group on the works which in an altered form would be presented at the residency next month in New York City. I told them the title of my first year project: “Self Portrait of a Female with Epilepsy”. I did not go into details about the project other than the title and that I was planning a series of self portraits, contemplating various approaches to “painting”, and had worked on a loose leaf journal which is incorporated in various ways into these works, and the pages will be addresses in the paper I will write this winter about the project. Most of this group was fine with waiting, and when it came time for their turn they took their time going through the pieces. A couple of the waiting viewers were more noticeably agitated by having to wait, and both went through the pieces at a much quicker pace than other viewers did. This could have been because they might have had other plans that evening, they were receiving text messages and left quickly after viewing the pieces. In other words, they seemed personally distracted and unable to fully engage with the pieces, which might not necessarily be just attributable to the work. The only feedback I received from one of these viewers was, that not being an “object” person, the viewer would have preferred more text telling what the piece was about. This person is an academic with a background in art history and cultural studies, and writes a lot in these areas; a person who self-identified as “needing the text”. However this person was not the only academic, writer, or “word person” present; yet the only one that had this type of response.

Most of the feedback provided focused on the contrast between the intensity of the experience of Wanderland during the first walk through towards Look In Glass. Then the calmness of the space Look In Glass occupied and of the piece itself- especially after the revelation that the images were ‘the same’ source they had just navigated through was mentioned. Finally how the viewer experienced a change in feelings on the return journey back through Wanderland to re-enter the more ‘public’ space of the living room.

A number of viewers mentioned the concept of intimacy that was being expressed in both pieces and by the event in general. The invitation which I sent out echoed an invitation to a private party. The event was held not only in the space which houses my studio, but is also my home. It was a cold, rainy December evening, but I had a fire burning in the cast iron stove in the living room, mulled wine, hot tea and cakes. The overall atmosphere exuded ‘intimacy’. To this another layer of intimacy was added by limiting access to the artworks to one person at a time. Some of the viewers said this made them feel “special”, as if it was only created for them, I was only allowing them to be privy to something. On top of this layer was yet another intimate layering, the artworks were not located in what one would consider ‘public’ space in a family home, but in a hallway leading to the bedrooms and bathrooms, the ‘private’ spaces; and Look In Glass occupied a bedroom, with a bed and heavy black drapery over the windows keeping the space intensely private, intimate. One viewer found the experience to be quite sexual.

The initial entry into Wanderland was quite overwhelming for almost all of the viewers, especially who were taller and those with a tendency towards claustrophobia. Navigation of the passageway was another central theme mentioned. Some realized immediately they would need to find ‘alternate routes’ through the space, which meant they got down low, walking hunched over or crawling on the floor beneath the pages. Others, usually those most overwhelmed with feelings of claustrophobia or being under attack by the pages, were unable to look for the logical way through the maze, so they tackled it head on, pushing through the pages to get to the door at the other end of the hallway. Interestingly the only person to mention feeling “attacked” by the pages is a curator who puts together ten exhibits a year at a local university. He mentioned thinking “You’re not suppose to touch the art, but it’s touching me!”. Despite having known the before entering the space that the piece was part of my project “Self Portrait of a Female with Epilepsy” he was unable to retain any of this information upon encountering the pages because at that moment his ‘learned’ behavior of how to interact with art came to the forefront and the internal conflict created by the situation overwhelmed him. He still journeyed through the space, and even on his return journey from Look In Glass was never able to feel fully comfortable in the space because of the taboos he felt he was breaking, but he was able to then handle the pages and examine them more closely. On the other hand, when a painter with whom I’ve been involved in an art group and exhibited with numerous times in the past ten years entered the space, her initial thought was “You’re not supposed to touch the art, but wait, if Robyn hadn’t wanted me to touch it, she wouldn’t have hung it this way” so she grabbed hold of and examined each piece; she is a very physical person by nature. She did not stay long at the Look In Glass because in contrast to the pages with their tactility, she found the glass “dull” and distant, so she went quickly back to Wanderland and spent more time with the real things.

A couple each separately found their way during their journey to the bathroom located off the hallway, and sought a few moments retreat in order to regain their composure in that banal space. They both said they found as soon as they re-entered the hallway the overwhelming feelings came back, but they knew they had to get to the other door. Both mentioned how the bedroom in which Look In Glass was placed had the calming effect they had sought in the bathroom, but had been unable to find. In that space they were able to regain their composure, and not only spend time with the images in that space and become comfortable with the pages through the distancing which occurred through the glass, but they were able to re-enter Wanderland and begin the return journey through the passageway without the fear and anxiety they had experienced on the way to Look In Glass. As one visitor put it, he had been through it once before, survived, and realized it was not going to hurt or destroy him, he could now go through it again, look at the work, and he’d be okay. One visitor, who did not feel the same anxiety on the initial journey through the passageway, but rather experienced a sense of enchantment, still had a similar response to the second space, the bedroom and Look In Glass. After the calmness of that space and spending time looking at the images of the pages inside the mirror box she was eager to re-enter Wanderland and look at, touch, and hold the actual pages again in person. But she said she did receive a shock when she opened the door because at that moment she first noticed the sparkle of the floor covering which she was not aware of on the journey to Look In Glass. It appeared to drop away beneath her feet as she stepped onto it. Unlike the viewers who experienced the hallway as ‘claustrophobic’ she was one of about half the viewers who experienced the space as endless, open and filled with potential, not an anxious, narrow space. She gladly stepped out into “outer space” as she described it to further explore the pages. On a similar note, the viewers who I would say tend toward a self image of risk taking and openness towards life in general tended to find the space expressed in Wanderland most constrained. The viewers who tend to be more closed, conservative, and passive in their daily approach to life tended to find the space most open, unconfined, and freeing.

A final bit of the feedback I received and wish to share is from my 13 year old son who was present at various stages of the installation and creation of the pages. Upon experiencing the completed installation he was amazed at how spaces which he otherwise takes for granted, in fact hasn’t ever considered them as meaningful spaces, could be transformed by things as simple as paint, fabric, pieces of paper, a mirror, and a few lights. His relationship to the space prior to the installation was different from the other viewers, yet the other viewers were also familiar with the space somewhat as a central hallway connecting the front of the house, the upstairs, the guest bedroom, bathroom and kitchen. For those viewers the space itself gained additional layers of meaning; for my son the space not only gained new meaning, the ability to transform space through such basic measures has [hopefully] altered his perception of spaces in general. It makes me think of how it would be to go into the homes of others and transform their living space. Often when people purchase a painting to hang on their wall they let the artist know how much it has “made” or “transformed” the space; and usually when purchasing a work of art it is because at first sight the buyer “knew” where it belonged. I have also had people not buy a piece because as much as it “spoke to them” they could not picture where it belonged. So how would it be to go into their private space and transform it without them having a preconceived notion of what that transformation would entail?

What insight into Wanderland and Look In Glass have I gained by this showing and the feedback I received? First, that I was able to achieve the emotional responses and understanding I sought through the work without having to explain anything in advance. For me this is a pretty big step. Second, although everyone who viewed the works are personal acquaintances, some closer friends, others less close, there was already a certain level of familiarity with each other which allowed me to gauge their responses to the the work in a way I could not do from a stranger. And yet, at the same time, the work by which they have known me to create would appear to them to be very different from that which I was presenting to them on this December evening. In the last hours of installing the work I decided to include five canvases which I had painted in the past 18 months. These not only helped define the space and the context, but for a couple of viewers they literally served as buoys on which they could grab hold of what they knew to be “Robyn’s painting”. These viewers found it difficult to talk about the other parts of the pieces, aside from references, red threads, that they found connected the canvases they knew me for and the rest which was so foreign to them. Knowing their biographies I did not find this shocking, I was more amazed by the viewers I thought might do this and did not, but became incredibly erudite when speaking of the whole experience.

As I mentioned at the beginning these pieces are unable to travel in this form to New York for the residency, so I will be making a new piece and presenting Look In Glass along with it in a slightly altered form. Hopefully I will be able to attain similar results. It would be nice to be able to present Wanderland and Look In Glass to viewers completely unknown to me and I to them, but this is not something I would want to do within my personal living space, mainly because it is also the personal space of three other people. At the same time I feel that the context of presenting the pieces in a personal living space is vital to the overall concept of the work. Wanderland and Look In Glass [in this form] are well documented, and in the right context could be re-presented. But at this moment they are done for me and I am ready to move on to the next iteration of the Series of Self Portraits of a Female with Epilepsy.

Response to November 21, 2014 Skype call with studio advisor Laura Gonzalez

During this Skype session Laura and I discussed the work I am preparing to bring to NYC in January. Regarding the journal pages Laura brought up how she was struck by their relationship to each other as being cinematic in nature, like film frames. She mentioned the possibilities of working with time, varying the duration of the viewing of the images, and the possibilities of working with the images as film frames to achieve this. Laura suggested I check out the films of Paul Sharits and Martin Arnold, specifically Sharit’s Epileptic Seizure Comparison (1976) and his flicker films, as well as Arnold’s Passage a l’acte. Although I had forgotten both of these filmmakers, upon seeing the films again I recalled seeing and being influenced by the films in the early 1990s when I was taking filmmaking classes as an undergrad [though I was more familiar with Arnold’s Piece Touchee (1989), than Passage a l’acte].

Response to November 28, 2014 Critique Group Feedback

Full Critique Group Presentation, Question, Feedback and Response can be found here.

THANK YOU! Although I phrased the question in a way to make it appear a quick and easy task, I was aware asking you to look through 116 images and chose just one to talk about was not quick or easy. Claire wrote, and O’Neill, Lindey and Gabriel echoed this sentiment “Only one?...this is proving to be an impossible task!”

The reason behind the question was to test a hypothesis I have about the pages and their role as part of a whole within other pieces rather than individual pieces. My hypothesis is, when viewed together it becomes difficult to separate out the individual, not just because of the sheer volume of images, but because as one looks closer at the pieces the realization that there are connections, maybe not always clear and obvious, but nonetheless an apparent connectedness, between the pages creates an inseparable whole. You wouldn’t abridge “War and Peace” to a single page, would you? Still, when asked to select one to talk about, you were able to do this. And yes, it would be possible for me to break the journal apart, it isn’t “War and Peace”. It is a formal possibility, but contextually it is not, and you proved this to me with your comments. Although Mark and KJ did not directly address the difficulty, Mark began his feedback mentioning both sides of a page before focusing his feedback on one side, and KJ chose to talk about two pieces- which do not share the same page, but are next to each other in their placement on the website, both showed the difficulty of the task.

Interestingly no one chose the same piece. Claire mentioned this, and I agree, it is very important to what I am trying to do with the pages and how they will continue to work within the Self-Portraits: “i love that we have all picked out different pieces - it shows that there is, in fact, not any one particular piece that universally stands out - but that the work allows an individual resonance in its relationship to the viewer.” I am sure there are those who would argue that because of the ratio, 116:6, it was highly favorable that a page would not be chosen by more than one person. However I like to believe that our response to art is not something that can be explained by statistics, so I am gladly willing to follow a more psychological explanation that the viewer can find amongst the masses those images which resonate with her or him on an individual level while remaining a part of a larger work. It is possible to find resonance with a single sentence, phrase or word in “War and Peace”, yet “War and Peace” is still the whole novel.

Finally, I want to mention how each of your responses to the pieces you wrote about have helped me understand the many ways they might speak to the individual. Getting to know each of you the past five months and reading the “why” you chose to talk about a certain piece I felt that whether the response was emotional or aesthetic in origin, it was in all cases a reflection of what I have learned through your posts and our conversations what you are thinking about within your work. This has helped shed some light onto the possible answers within my own work to one of the questions I proposed addressing in question 10c. of my project proposal, How are they able to dissolve borders between what they are depicting [subject] and the viewer [object], so that the roles reverse and the experience of the once subject and now object becomes experienced by the viewer? Thank you! Now I am really excited to hear your response to the work in person in NYC!-Robyn [BTW, I’ve never read “War and Peace”.]

October-November 2014 Monthly Blog Post

New images are posted in the MCP501 Gallery section of this website; bold titles link to the specific gallery page being referenced. New image galleries have been created for October-November 2014 and Just Between Me and You. New images can also be found in the Sketchbook, Process Photos Journal and Sketchbook, and Process Photos Look In Glass galleries.

Mid-October to mid-November was a month of exploring the act of writing as a vital part of my studio practice. The writing I did has taken numerous forms. I have written feedback for Crit Group presenters; my own Crit Group presentation feedback request and response; response to last months Skype session with my studio advisor, Laura Gonzalez; a description of an alternate, portable presentation format for the journal pages I have produced in the studio this Autumn; and a sketch-essay on the relationship of drawing and painting from my personal viewpoint. In addition to these public writings I have also written a few, personal poems and thoughts which, along with bits and pieces of the other aforementioned writings and the writing of others I have been reading, have been incorporated into the journal pages.

Critique Group

Critique Groups began this month so I have written two feedbacks per week for my colleagues, with the exception of the week I was presenting, when I wrote a presentation and response. I have created a section on my website in which my presentation and the groups’ feedback can be found. My response to their feedback can be found posted in my Monthly Blog under the heading: Response to October 31, 2014 Critique Feedback.

Before beginning the Critique Group I was a bit unsure how I would feel about having to write about each person’s work and the areas they requested feedback for based on the online depiction of their work. I am surprised by how much I am enjoying the process. Taking the Crit Guidelines on the Transart website as the starting point, I decided to focus on the language the presenter uses presenting his or her work on the blog and in the project proposal, and then analyzing it for how it relates to the actual work she or he is presenting. I have avoided focusing on the technical or formal aspects of the work presented because I feel the format of the website/blog is very limited in what it can actually convey of most work [6 of 7 members are ‘painters’ in our crit group], which tends to be very ‘painterly’ in nature or not at a stage in the process where technical and formal feedback would be that helpful, in my opinion. Therefore I am focusing on the language. In my feedback I am trying to use as clear and straightforward language as possible; emphasizing the conceptual questions the language the presenter is using raises [for me] about the work rather than a personal, descriptive response to the formal elements. Approaching my colleagues work in this way has helped me reframe how I think about and use language in relation to my project and the pieces I am producing for it.

Drawing Is Creepy

As a response to questions that came up in the previous Skype session with Laura Gonzalez I wrote out some of my thoughts on the nature of drawing and painting, and how they are connected for me in light of my own work. I then posted the essay to my blog as an example of part of the thought process behind my approach to the art I create. I did this for myself, to clarify in writing my own thoughts and have a more ‘formal’ record of these; but also for my Crit Group, so they could get to know my process and what floats around my head and makes its way into the art I produce. I also sent the essay to numerous people of various backgrounds, some of who have been kind enough to provide feedback of their own. [I did give recipients the option of ignoring or deleting it.] Although I am not a writer, I decided to share this essay to a diverse group of potential readers to see how the language I used in it made the subject comprehensible beyond the world in which I wrote it. I see this as being analogous to gathering the responses of persons outside ‘the art world’ to a piece of art I have created, as a means of gaging how I am or am not achieving communication goals I set for myself within a particular piece.

Just Between Me and You

For my first year project I proposed to create a series of self-portraits exploring my personal response to my diagnosis of Temporal Lobe Epilepsy; taking a nontraditional approach to the traditional materials and techniques of paintings. The first steps in the self-portrait series has been the creation of ‘loose-leaf journal pages’. The reason for choosing these pages as a starting point for me in this process has been that it has allowed me to give myself permission to ‘play’ with various materials and techniques in the studio in a manner I have been less likely to do in recent years. It has provided room to explore not just the materials and techniques, but also the language and the symbolism I am using to relate to my diagnosis. Most importantly, the creation of the pages has provided me a means through which their presentation and incorporation as visual components I can create the series of self-portraits. The pages alone are not “self-portraits”. They are elements, marks, cellular structures, bones, dabs of paint, pixels, and pages which help to form the bigger picture of who I am. Wanderland, Look In Glass, and Just Between Me and You are the self-portraits, the pages are steps in the process of creating these self-portraits, and the self-portraits to follow. I created Just Between Me and You as an alternative, physical-based presentation of the pages to the viewers, into the piece Wanderland, which at this stage is site-bound, because it is my intention to bring both Look In Glass and the physical pages [Just Between Me and You] to the Winter Residency in New York City this January.

The Act of Writing

This past month I have noticed a shift towards the physical act of writing as a means of creating layers of both physical marks and conceptual meaning within the journal pages, and a movement away from creating text through collaged words and letters. While I am still incorporating some collaged text, I am using more the physical act of writing, making the mark, placing the story onto the page while simultaneously obscuring it, making it understandable to myself but incomprehensible to the viewer as part of the creative process. Similar to last month, I thought before I began documenting the recent batch of pages that I hadn’t been very ‘productive’ this month. My mind was again elsewhere. Not focused on the pages I was creating, but the writing that was going into them. Personally it was a very ‘distracted’ four weeks, and there were about ten days where I was unable to get into the studio and paint. Or when I was able to get to the table and easel, I could not paint. Instead I wrote, when and where I could. When I wasn’t writing, I was thinking about writing, or when I wasn’t thinking about writing, I was reading. When I began painting again, I put the words I was writing, thinking and reading into the layers. Unlike the sketch-essay on drawing and painting that I posted and emailed, these words I needed to put outside of myself, but not necessarily share publicly. Because they are a part of the pages of the journal, pages which are intended to be held, touched and looked at intimately, the viewer might gather bits and pieces of the story, but never the whole story. Whatever the viewer takes away from this intimate encounter will be just between myself and the viewer.

Radical Touch

One point of feedback I received not only from within my Crit Group this month, but from others I’ve discussed the three projects with, has been the radical nature of the invitation to touch the journal pages in both Wanderland and Just Between Me and You. As Mark Roth stated in his feedback to me: “One of the still pretty much intact boundaries for painting is that it is not to be touched.” Numerous people have stated that the invitation to touch the pages makes them uneasy, knowing the fragility of the page and how through their touch they are contributing to the destruction of it. Oddly, when I thought of how the pages must be interacted with in such a physically intimate manner, despite knowing the taboos associated with ‘touching’ the art, I did not find it a personally radical notion. I simply thought, this is how it has to be. This came in great part as a juxtaposition to the unphysical nature of the encounter with the pages which the viewer has in Look In Glass. The distance to the page is so great, through glass, mirrors, pixels, and algorithms, the viewer must travel to the experience; holding the page in his or her hand the viewer is as close to the experience as he or she can be. Both pieces are stating a part of the nature of the experience to the viewer in diametrically opposing ways, but it is the same experience.

Going Forward

My goal for the next month is focused on finishing up the three pieces in preparation for the Winter Residency. I plan to present the Wanderland installation along with the Look In Glass on December 6 to a number of invited viewers at my home-studio. This means I will finish the journal pages by the first week of December in order to have them documented and part of the slideshow for Look In Glass, and to be ready to hang as part of Wanderland. I will document the December 6 installation with both photos and videos of viewers interacting with the pieces, post them on my blog, as well as include them in my presentation at the residency. After the December 6 event I will complete the Just Between Me and You box, covering it in fabric, printing the notes, wrapping the pages in tulle, and placing them along with the notes in the box.

On November 23 I will be participating in a one day silkscreen workshop at AS220, a local artist space with print shop here in Providence, Rhode Island. My intention is to expand my knowledge of silkscreen techniques and familiarize myself with their facilities which I might use this winter to create elements for further self-portraits.

As I wrap up the three self-portraits created this Autumn, I have begun to shift my focus to the piece I mentioned last month, which I will exhibit at AS220 as part of a two-person show in their Main Gallery in June 2015. I have acquired the hexagonal mirrors I plan to use in the work, and have begun to think of ways in which I can replicate the canvases in a scaled down way, so that I can work on various configurations. I should have more to report on this if not next month, then in January. In addition to this piece I have begun thinking about the possibilities which are presenting themselves for the direction the self-portrait series might take. I should also have more to report on that in January.

Finally, I intend to continue reading and writing, partially in preparation for the research paper I will formally begin after the Winter Residency, and partially as part of my studio process.

Response to October 31, 2014 Critique Group Feedback

Thank you for the careful consideration, feedback and suggestions.

Mark’s feedback on “Drawing Is Creepy”: The brushstroke is a line. It is the “marrow filled line” of Van Gogh and Rouault, whose acknowledgement and consummation provided fuel for our artistic growth. Verification of an equal standing between abstraction and representation hinges on development of our deconstructive understanding between ‘structure’ and ‘flesh’ relationship. Their symbiotic relationship acknowledges this equality. Perhaps De Kooning's late paintings reveal more about this relationship. Kinnell’s ‘plainspokenness’ is something I strive for in my work. If honesty can only be achieved by breaking the law, break it!

Clarification: “Wanderland” and “Just Between Me and You”[JBYM] will never be presented at the same time. JBYM is a portable format replacing “Wanderland” which was conceived as an idea independent from a specific site. For practical reasons and the desire to create the piece this Fall, I chose the hallway of my home. I will document a person in the installation with photos and video.

KJ’s concern on the placement of “Wanderland”: my studio is in my home. My painting space is relegated to specific areas which are shared with other members of my family. Reading and writing occurs throughout the house. If I had a separate studio space, I might have constructed a structure in which to install “Wanderland”. I built many forts as a child; Alice is a child. Fort building as a form of play informs the development of our sense of space, our occupation of it, and its relation to our personal identity. I view this as an additional access point, not barrier.

Thank you Gabriel for your good suggestion on the moveable clothesline and off-stage-hand. The internal relationship of the experience and the individual is the emphasis, so I prefer keeping outside forces out, for now.

Lindey’s wanting to see the presentation formats combined to one, as well as Mark’s AR “Look In Glass” are responses I’ve received from outside the crit group, too. Possibilities, but given my current boundaries of space, time and resources, only possibilities, for now.

Claire mentioned the temporal as well as the solitary nature. I believe all encounters with art are temporal. I’m just slowing it down and making the viewer more aware of how she is in control of the time invested, or not. I believe all experiences are solitary, even those we believe are shared. This is the nature of Epilepsy, a highly individualized disorder, making it harder to understand and treat, leading to fear and misunderstanding. Societies, despite saying they value the individual, really do not; instead they fear the individual and value conformity.

Thank you O’Neill for suggesting O’Connor’s “The Nature and Aim of Fiction.” Your assessment of the important relationship between the symbols in the pages and the installation is accurate. Installation for me is an extension of the picture plane, therefore the elements flow between.

Finally, to touching the pages: I realized by your responses I did not personally recognize the radicality of this notion; touch is a given for what I want to express. Regarding my art, I tend to not fixate on traditional ideas concerning conservation and preservation of the object d’art, despite having training and knowledge of them. I do hold onto these belief systems regarding the art of others. A painter recently suggested handling the painter’s paintings in a manner that I found cringe inducing. Despite my understanding of the artist’s concept and agreement that the very radicalness of this is was what made it effective, I had reached a personal border, or was I convinced to transcend it?

Drawing Is Creepy

This post is an example of part of the thought process behind my approach to the art I create. Often when a question or thought enters my head I deal with it first by way of an internal conversation which might last for weeks, months, or even years. Eventually I might even begin writing out those thoughts, in a notebook I am keeping, or even in a document on my computer. Sometimes the notes are incorporated into an artist statement, essay for an exhibition or a blog post such as this. But mostly I keep what I write to myself. The thoughts I am presenting here are relevant to my First Year Project because the question I am addressing came up again recently, this time during my most recent Skype conversation with my studio advisor, Laura Gonzalez. I began to think again about how I define myself and my work and why I chose this definition. As I explored the Drawing Research Network’s website and the journal TRACEY I asked myself, how do I respond to drawing that is only drawing? This modifier, “only” is not meant in anyway as a negative or value judgement of drawing as an art form. In fact, this blog post and website documenting my process can be seen as a drawing.

The “question” came up again recently. It is a question I’ve been dealing with as long as I have been making art. What are you? Are you a painter, sculptor, or do you just draw? It is not a question that is just asked of me by another. It is a question I have spent years asking myself. It is a question I often think the art I make is asking me. Who are you and what am I?

Looking back, each time I believe to have answered the question, it rears its ugly head once more. If it had been answered, it wouldn’t always keep popping up, right?

Well, yes, and no. The thing is, there is no clear or obvious answer. Even when I believe that I have answered it for myself, deep down I remain an atheist artist. To the one “god” who is painting, the one”god” who is sculpture, the one “god” who is drawing, or video, or new media, or performance, or text, or whatever: sorry, for me you just don’t exist. For me there is no council of creative-gods seated on Mount Olympus to whom one must dedicate oneself, one’s art.

That said, I will contradict myself by declaring “I am a painter”.

Let me explain. It is not necessarily that I am denying the existence of the gods of paint, sculpture, drawing, new, performance, time-based, and text-based media; what I am denying is a personal belief in a hierarchy of the ways in which we view, talk about, approach and make art. Instead of building a temple on a hill and worshiping one god, or twelve gods, I have chosen to worship no gods. Instead I’ve chosen to destroy the temples that others have built before me, declaring them uninhabited and the deification of specific art forms obsolete. The walls that close off and separated one sacred art form from another have been torn down- and not by me, others have been doing this for a long time, perhaps for as long as humans have been creating art. In place of the walls remains only space, space in which a fluidity exists. One form flows into, interacts with, and responds to another. Reality is fluidity of definition. There are no gods of any one form, and there is no god of all forms. There are only forms, unconstrained by boundaries, by which the artist chooses to express herself.

This fluidity of terms and definitions, denial of a hierarchy of media and forms does not exclude the possibility or existence of self-definition by the artist in terms of a single art form. Existing forms are unconstrained by boundaries, but the boundaries do exist. However, the role of the artist is to choose to interact with those boundaries, form a relationship between the boundaries and her art either through transcendence or by remaining within. This is much like the discussion today in the area of gender identity. Biological genders do exist. And within those biological genders there is at times an unspecific biological gender which occurs. In the past when this “unclarity of gender” arose others, doctors and parents, would decide which biological gender would be medically assigned to the child. In recent time we have begun to understand that gender is something quite complex, composed of many factors beyond the mere biological, factors which an infant and sometimes even an adult cannot express or share with others outside of the self. We are opening ourselves to a discussion and understanding of what gender identity means. Transcendence of the traditional definition based upon biological “norms” is becoming the norm. Fluidity of identity based on self determination has entered the picture and destroyed the plane on which it was formed.

Some people declare their gender identity as it is expressed by the biological/physiological gender closest to their hormone levels or sexual organs. Others declare their gender identity as it is expressed by the gender closest to what is felt in their “hearts and minds”. What we understand as “gender” is something very individualized and personal despite the boundaries placed on it by biology, because it is determined by factors within the mind. When an artist choses to define herself as an artist of a particular media, she does so not just based on criteria which traditionally define a particular media, she does so based on criteria which defines the term within herself, within her art.

For me this means I call myself a painter because within my heart and mind the manner in which I approach the art I make I do in terms of what I consider “the painterly”. The painterly is within my frame of reference one which involves a layering process. This does not mean that all painting requires a physical layering of traditional painting media in reference and relation to traditional painterly themes of color, brushstroke, form, or tone. Those things are a part of it, but only one aspect. Painting and the “painterly” for me refer to an approach to other media, other materials, to concepts, forms of art, even to life. An artist can paint with words, musical notes, rhythms, movements. This is not a new idea, and definitely not original to me. Does it lessen the value of painting by opening up the definition of “painterly”? I do not believe so. By opening the definition, one opens painting to other media, materials, art forms and influences beyond art. This expansion in the terminology, this evolution is what keeps painting a living art form.

Does this mean that the painter who choses to work within the boundaries of the traditional definition is working with a dead art form? No. The opening of the definition gives the artist the freedom of choice, and choice is what invigorates life. I chose to work beyond the traditional boundaries of painting by focusing on the approach I have to looking at, thinking about and describing what it is I am working with. In exercising my freedom to choose, using the approach of painterly layering within my work, I am staying within the definition of “painter” even if my materials, techniques and media go beyond the traditional boundaries. The boundary that I am often crossing tends to cause the aforementioned question of identity to be raised It is the boundary that traditionally separates painting from drawing.

Are you a painter, or do you draw? The traditionally drawing is seen as the simplest and most efficient means of visually communicating an idea. It isn’t about the materials or techniques, it isn’t about the mark. It is about the simplicity. It is about the efficiency. I do use materials and techniques traditionally associated with drawing. I do make marks in a manner traditionally associated with drawing. Perhaps there are times when what I am doing is the simplest and most efficient means by which I can communicate an idea, and at those times, yes, I am drawing. Most of us do draw at one point or another. As children we draw first, painting comes much later in our development. The finger and tempera paints used by a five year old seldom result in a painting, they remain drawing done in a painting medium. Whatever media or techniques I am using, rarely is what I am doing about simplicity or efficiency.

Drawing is the skeleton of the creative process, and skeletons are complex structures. Drawing provides the bones, the structure that holds everything together. Painting is the cells, building up layers upon layers, simultaneously the building blocks of the bones and material which clings to that structure and creates form. The relationship between form and space, including the relationship between cells, between cells and bones, that is the area of the sculptural. Together they form a body called art.

At times I find myself looking at drawings, defined as such either by tradition or by their creator and I think: “that is creepy”.

Why is drawing creepy?

One of my favorite films is An American Werewolf in London (1981). It is the retelling of a classic, simple story. What makes it stand out in the history of filmmaking, and for which it won an Academy Award is the make up. Throughout the film the main character’s [David] friend Jack shows up to warn him that unless he kills himself he will turn into a werewolf and kill others, turning them into the “walking dead” just like Jack. With each visit Jack’s body progresses in its decay. At first we are only shown Jack’s injuries sustained by the initial werewolf attack. But then things begin to get gruesome when he shows up and the flesh has begun rotting from his face. A State of creepiness is reached when that flesh has fallen away, revealing the bones, his skull, beneath the skin. When people break an arm or a leg we usually are not repulsed by the break, unless the bone breaks through the flesh and reveals itself. Then we might say: “that really creeps me out”. And so it is with drawing, when the bones are revealed things get “creepy”.

This is what makes drawing at times uncomfortable . It might be the simplest and most efficient way to communicate an idea visually because it shows us what the world is made of, but it can show us more than we want to see. Drawing gets to the bones of the matter. It does not wrap the idea in a protective layer one must carefully peel back. It does not sugar coat the idea. It presents it in a straight on, head forward manner. And just like it is possible to paint in any media, technique, or material; it is possible to draw in any of these too. Drawing slithers its way across the creative spectrum, creeping its way into the work to provide the supporting structure for the ideas being presented. Without the creepiness of drawing, the layers of painting, the relationship of space in sculpture, the language in text, the pixels of video, the space between seconds in time-based work, the relationships between movement in dance would fall into a pile of goo just like Jack’s flesh. Drawing is always a part of all creative endeavors.

So why don’t we all just call ourselves draftspersons?

Just because drawing is in all we do creatively does not mean it is the defining element of what we do. For me the element of layering, both physically and conceptually is a determining factor of all I do, and it is what I consider to be the elemental factor in painting. That’s why I call myself a painter and not a drawer. I do draw. I draw a lot. Sometimes I make things that are drawings, not paintings. These things, whatever they may be composed of technically, are drawing because the emphasis is on the structure, and not the layers. From a personal viewpoint while I tend to pick out the structure supporting a work, and often find myself analyzing the drawn elements in any given creative work, the element which makes my heart sing, which keeps my attention and makes me want to fall into the work of art, is the painterly element, the layering. Bones are hard, and sometimes they can be sharp. Who wants to fall into a pile of bones? That would be kind of creepy. But the layers of fleshy, soft cells, squishy and warm, inviting like a pool of warm salt water, now that is something to fall into!

Just as in all areas of study there are specialist, we need specialists in drawing. We need the draftspersons to focus on the structure behind the art. Therefore someone working with materials and techniques that might traditionally place the art she creates in the realm of sculpture in a way where the structural element is the focus, the subject of the conversation, can call herself a “drawer” or “draftsperson”. A filmmaker, dancer, playwright, composer, musician, etc. called such by traditional definition can be by personal definition a “draftsperson”. This does by no means destroy or negate the traditional definitions of these art forms, but expands the possibilities within them by opening the definition to recognition of the role drawing plays in every artistic practice. I’ve identified the role drawing plays in what I do and I have found a definition of who I am and what I make that suits me. Now it is just a matter of waiting for the day the question will come up again, because I am certain it will. And I won’t let the question creep me out.