This paper is intended to serve as a supporting document for the exhibition Collective Case Studies that was held in The Gallery, at Sheridan College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning. In Collective Case Studies, the head sculptures act as blank slates for my expression of personality archetypes. They embody a longstanding interest in the psyche, character and identity that continues to influence my art-making practice. These sculptures introduce a particular personality trait or present a case study to make human idiosyncrasies manifest in visual terms, both individually and relationally. Collectively, the works are inspired by psycho-social aspects of personality, including archetypes and stereotypes, in the past and present time. The leading sources for my work are psychological, cross-cultural and empirical.

My painted self-portraiture explores identity as changing social performance or masquerade and examines bodily flesh as the vital interface for reciprocal encounter on life’s stage. The larger-than-life sized images demand viewer attention and compel intersubjective engagement. The works also affirm artistic agency and subjective presence through gestural brushwork and the vivifying power of oil paint. Hybridity and ambiguity in the images suggest the dynamic and reflexive nature of identity. A theatrical colour palette further reinforces the notion of identity as social performance or masquerade. Conceptually the works are rooted in both post-modern feminism and phenomenology. Artistically they draw inspiration from contemporary figurative painters and portraitists who use this medium and genre to navigate the boundaries of self and society.

As found in modern art and architecture during the 1950’s and 1960’s, North Americans were conditioned through advertising and media to adopt modernism as a new and better way of life. Modernist styles such as Abstract Expressionism were promoted as leading edge ways to make art that defined American culture. In architecture, modernism infiltrated the development of suburbs and represented a way of life that promoted consumerism, leisure and the nuclear family. Much of the urban and suburban spaces we live in have been influenced by modernism. I am interested in exploring the vocabulary of modernist abstraction through the language of contemporary figuration. I am influenced by late modernist Formalism, colour field painting, gestural mark making and Abstract Expressionism.

Transitions is a three part series, examining themes which define our human condition. Utilizing traditional, digital, and interactive media, including sound, video, clay, paper, polyvoile material, and electronic devices, I create responsive installation environments that allow me to share my personal stories with those of the viewers. Collaboratively and co-creatively we examine issues of existence, self-awareness, and embodied spatiality within an arena that incorporates stories, memories and histories. As the viewer engages and participates in the work, they become the conduit between the brief moments of the present and the fragmented illusory images of the past.

This paper is intended to serve as a supporting document for the exhibition Collective Case Studies that was held in The Gallery, at Sheridan College Institute of Technology and Advanced Learning. In Collective Case Studies, the head sculptures act as blank slates for my expression of personality archetypes. They embody a longstanding interest in the psyche, character and identity that continues to influence my art-making practice. These sculptures introduce a particular personality trait or present a case study to make human idiosyncrasies manifest in visual terms, both individually and relationally. Collectively, the works are inspired by psycho-social aspects of personality, including archetypes and stereotypes, in the past and present time. The leading sources for my work are psychological, cross-cultural and empirical.

My painted self-portraiture explores identity as changing social performance or masquerade and examines bodily flesh as the vital interface for reciprocal encounter on life’s stage. The larger-than-life sized images demand viewer attention and compel intersubjective engagement. The works also affirm artistic agency and subjective presence through gestural brushwork and the vivifying power of oil paint. Hybridity and ambiguity in the images suggest the dynamic and reflexive nature of identity. A theatrical colour palette further reinforces the notion of identity as social performance or masquerade. Conceptually the works are rooted in both post-modern feminism and phenomenology. Artistically they draw inspiration from contemporary figurative painters and portraitists who use this medium and genre to navigate the boundaries of self and society.

The exhibition Is There No One in the World Who Can Fly? consists of three connected bodies of works. Life On Earth is a series of photo-performances exhibited on digital screens. Some of the images are still others are animated; they all propose that the body is a transmitter that breaths in content and breaths it out as a visual shape in the form of extensions, armatures or expulsions. Mammal is a large-scale video projection of a multi-breasted female figure projected on a free-standing wall. The breasts are animated and stretch out to explore and search the surrounding space. Worknest is a series of videos about the act of working which are projected onto the floor and appear as a community of guarded openings into tunnels beneath the ground.

The Instruments installation represents the superimposition of two systems. The marketed elements that comprise the hegemony exerted by commodity culture are placed on top of the occult qabalistic Tree of Life. This overlaying makes the commentary that the pursuit of identity through commodified objects usurps and drowns out the natural fundamental components of the human psyche. The artist accomplishes this by creating various expressive multimedia sculptures out of actual objects. Each one is given a title that references a particular sphere on the Tree of Life glyph, for each piece is meant to represent that sphere’s aspect of the human entity as it is expressed in the commodity realm. The artist begins by introducing the reader to the artistic contexts and the various conceptual structures that serve to inform and describe his mode of working and its results. Subsequently, a detailed description of each work is given, simultaneously functioning as a necessarily brief survey of the spheres on the qabalistic glyph.

The exhibition Is There No One in the World Who Can Fly? consists of three connected bodies of works. Life On Earth is a series of photo-performances exhibited on digital screens. Some of the images are still others are animated; they all propose that the body is a transmitter that breaths in content and breaths it out as a visual shape in the form of extensions, armatures or expulsions. Mammal is a large-scale video projection of a multi-breasted female figure projected on a free-standing wall. The breasts are animated and stretch out to explore and search the surrounding space. Worknest is a series of videos about the act of working which are projected onto the floor and appear as a community of guarded openings into tunnels beneath the ground.

The Instruments installation represents the superimposition of two systems. The marketed elements that comprise the hegemony exerted by commodity culture are placed on top of the occult qabalistic Tree of Life. This overlaying makes the commentary that the pursuit of identity through commodified objects usurps and drowns out the natural fundamental components of the human psyche. The artist accomplishes this by creating various expressive multimedia sculptures out of actual objects. Each one is given a title that references a particular sphere on the Tree of Life glyph, for each piece is meant to represent that sphere’s aspect of the human entity as it is expressed in the commodity realm. The artist begins by introducing the reader to the artistic contexts and the various conceptual structures that serve to inform and describe his mode of working and its results. Subsequently, a detailed description of each work is given, simultaneously functioning as a necessarily brief survey of the spheres on the qabalistic glyph.