 |
|
|
 |
 METAL PAINTINGS
Historically, a two-dimensional painting has concentrated on either the inherent nature of illusionistic depth or the extreme literalness of the object. Since modern art must always move ahead of the accepted position, my work seeks to synthesize the complexity and contradiction of these opposing approaches. The three-dimensional painting-sculpture will attempt to resolve the problem of simultaneous visual reciprocation of pictorial depth with literal surface by balancing the acutality of the projecting planes with the depicted interior geometry. Thus the slanted plane, so necessary to the perception of depth in painting, assumes a sculptural reality, while the depicted back plane becomes the essentially familiar, flat, rectangular picture plane.
Although classically trained with such instructors as Edwin Dickinson and Walter Murch, I began using transparent colors to explore spatial depth soon after graduate school. I experimented with a wide variety of modern materials, including plexiglas, acetate, enamels, lights, resins, etc., until I discovered the potential in the use of airbrushed lacquers. For the past eleven years I have been spraying transparent nitrocellulose candy lacquers and urethane on aluminum. These new and sophisticated painting mediums afford the artist unexcelled clarity, intensity, and permanence. I have developed a system that layers these mediums with brushed artist polymers, colored pencils, metal flake and pearl powders. The final smooth highly polished finish reflects great depth while retaining all visible expressionist process.
Other artists have achieved success in altering spatial planes through the application of color, but because of the limitations of traditional mediums, their efforts appear somewhat restricted. It was thus the inabilty of oils and acrylics to reproduce extreme depth and the sophisticated geometry related to depth, that led me to experiment with lacquers and urethanes. By incorporating a lacquer medium and mastering the dexterity required in the use of hand-held spray guns, I have been able to achieve significant results in expanding spatial depth from behind and in front of the picture plane without impairment to the frontality of the minimal formation.
In the process, I have developed a deep interest in 'Public Art' since lacquers, urethanes, and aluminum are ideally suited for use outdoors. Although sculpture with its wide variety of available materials has long been a complement to architecture, only recently has technology provided advanced painting mediums with ultraviolet screening agents that will not fade or crack when exposed to the elements and an aggressive general public.
In 1976, I began a series of drawings, and two-and three-dimensional paintings which attempt to visualize the interpenetrating planes of various natural mineral formations. The mineral series evolved because similar physical qualities exist in both lacquers and minerals. Both share the same characteristics of transparency, flake inclusion, pearlescence, and surface lustre. I have also perfected the use of two-tone prismic pearl powders that have the ability of transmitting two different colors under changing light conditions. These qualities allow me to duplicate a phenomenon occuring in minerals called pleochroism, a spatial happening attributable to the crystal's unequal absorption of light vibrating in different planes. However, my main objective is not to duplicate or render any one mineral, but rather to explore space and its dimensions by utilizing products of modern technology. The completed constructions will thus reflect nature in its most basic state but at the same time allow the viewer to perceive a new art form created through the products of our time, a goal that truly relates to art history.
|
|
|
|
