The life and times of Christopher Wayne Reno, as they relate to his years at the University of Iowa, are presented within the pages of this small but potent document. Reader beware: once you've cracked this tome and experienced the wonders within, your view of the world will be fundamentally altered. Your life may no longer hold its current luster. I urge caution!

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Reflection is an artistic representation of my thoughts and experiences while attending the University of Iowa

My thesis exhibition “Mercury Express” is the culmination of my creative research and the paintings that I have created over the past three years. This body of work is comprised of fourteen oil glaze paintings on canvas, ranging in size from 16x 16 inches to 36 x 48 inches. These paintings demonstrate, through subjective color and the application of misty layers of luminous paint, my residence on the edge of moving to the future and looking to the past. Through imagination my paintings express a longing for connections and offer glimpses of happiness tinted with a pervasive overcast of melancholy. Mercury Express is a visual expression of what I consider to be ‘Kitsch’, ‘Sentimental’ and ‘Adventurous’. Through this work I salvage and renew the child-like wonder that managed to survive into my adulthood. Through the positioning of remembered objects in imaginary landscapes, Mercury Express recalls and explores my childhood memories, ideas and aspirations to reclaim the wonder I have lost as an adult. / Includes bibliography. / Thesis (M.F.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2019. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

Before I began this thesis, I examined my previous work and a consistent quality emerged. l tended to assemble (synthesize) things (entities) that were seemingly unlike (disparate). I q u e s t i o n e d my approach and its validity as a design methodology. I found, through investigation into the nature of my p r o c e s s and the process of other artists and designers that specific methods of synthesis could be defined. In this thesis I have outlined three synthesis methodologies. They are not the only methods that exist, but were the ones I focused on for my thesis project. After l defined these methods of synthesis and did visual and verbal explorations, the possibility of developing a process for generating visual and verbal content occurred to me. I was not sure what the effects of the process would be. It was not until after the thesis exhibition that I realized I had developed a process of elaboration. For the thesis exhibition I created two and three dimensional exercises based on v i s u a I + v e r b a I combinations These studies were then applied for the purposes of the exhibition.

This body of work was created during my time at the University of Iowa. The work operates as an embodiment of personal traumas and memories. Materials and processes are at the forefront of the work as they link me to my past. The scale of the work remains small not only for the sake of portability, but for its intimate relationship to the viewer.

This body of ceramic work is a visual study of cultural displacement created by a transitory lifestyle. By contrasting eroded textures with solid patterns, I am suggesting the interplay between detritus and repetitive stability. Through this interplay, I am depicting a personal identity that has been continually fractured and reassembled. / Jeffrey Thurston

A detailed account of how failure can lead to success. Through my attempts to design a chair, I developed a method of bending plywood using Computer Numerically Controlled (CNC) routing. Ultimately, I considered my chair a failure. The method I had developed to wood was not suitable for my chair because it left the material too flexible. Determined to find another application for my wood bending method, I applied it to a new series of lamps. Bending thin plywood with a similar cut pattern on the CNC Laser cutter gave the perfect balance of flexibility and strength for lamp shades. Simple as the new lamps may be, they leave numerous possibilities for development in scale and shape.

Space Camp reports back from the final frontier; sharing the memory, shaping the dream.

My individual journey as an artist has allowed me to develop in what can be considered two societal extremes; growing up in condensed suburban Southern California to living in rural mid-American Iowa. This change in settings caused me to question how the environment one grows up in influences his cultural and social perspective. Within this environment exists a support structure of family, friends, and community who also play a large role in how an individual's perception develops, including concepts of honesty, integrity, and ethics- but to what extent? This question of how different circumstances and interactions define our beliefs and values is the heart of my artistic practice.