Chroma Nominalism - mixed drawing media on Coventry Rag

I do few drawings anymore, but I executed this one as the first in what I hope to be a conceptual triptych about metaphysics. Prior to the production of this piece, I was blessed to have Terry Penner, professor emeritus of philosophy at UW-Madison, admit me into his final graduate seminar on Plato before retiring. The seminar focused on interpreting Plato's metaphysical theory in relation to modern language theory and how analytical philosophy is carried out in general. This seminar, and Penner's lectures overall, had a tremendous impact on how I view philosophy and art, and served as foundational springboards from which I have embarked on many conceptual works. For anyone who has studied Plato, you certainly have come across his Theory of Forms, a metaphysics in which beyond the particulars in the world there exist abstract objects, or "forms." These are thought to be more "real" than material objects, and exist behind and beyond physical objects, regardless of them. Nominalists, on the other hand, refuse to admit of any such entities, insisting all there is to what we call, for example, "orange," is all the particular orange things. We just use the term as a convention of language, but it refers to nothing. I am not advocating nominalism here, but it just happens to be the first in the series of drawings I choose to work on. I gathered orange drawing media - a pencil, cray-pa, pastel, pen, marker, and crayon to make the drawing. Since language is instrumental in the concept, I insisted on using products specifically labeled "orange." A number was assigned to each drawing media, and a dice was rolled to determine which item would be used to draw a freehand vertical line. The process was repeated until the page was filled. Through this piece, I wanted to reference this metaphysical debate and propose to the viewer to inquire whether each of these markings are a particular orange, or whether this can facilitate our seeing through the individual marks to what might be referred to as "orange itself." 25x38".

In My Mind, On My Lips, And In My Heart - screen print

This print was completed with both a conceptual and technical goal in mind. The latter was to convince myself that I could still draw representationally, since I had not so in a long period of time. I was relieved to discover I still could. The former was an examination of the short prayer said during communion proceedings during Catholic mass. I am interested in how science has historically disenfranchised religion, and this print is meant to examine how spiritualism is being eroded by materialism. This work does not advocate either position, but rather serves as a reflection on personal history. 26x13", edition of 6.

Untitled - porcelain tile, underglaze, mdf, acrylic

This piece is another aleatoric tile work, and an attempt to take advantage of the tendency of porcelain to warp during quick drying. For this piece, porcelain tiles were again cut out and allowed to dry by the whims of the environment. Each tile was then striped using the linear curve created by warping on one of the four given sides of itself. The tiles were mounted on dowels, alternating the line position. I expected this piece to be Op-Art-ish, but I certainly did not foresee the extent to which it would be caffeinated and buzzed. Subtlety be damned with this one. Exact dimensions unknown, but about 24x36x5".

A Documentary - Twenty Games Of Simon At Skill Level Four

Plainly and simply, my memory is terrible. I can barely remember last week, and I have to write everything down, making lists upon lists just to function in everyday life. This print attempted to follow the subjectivity thread from the Cheeto print, but with an emphasis on the relativity of memory. While I wanted my prints to be mere documentations of a series of events I did not control, they were in actuality nothing of the sort. For instance, consider the percent error I likely attained in "documenting" the either/or coin flips 11,935 times in the print below. So this print is something of a confession and recognition of the element of human error, using a favorite childhood toy, Simon, as the medium. I played twenty games at the most difficult skill level, and as you can see, did not do well. Each game was recorded with the given light-ups in their respective orders. So, this print in a way memorializes both the effectiveness and shortcomings of memory. 19.75x30", edition of 6.

A Documentary - The Existential Relevance Of One 13.5 Ounce Bag Of Cheetos

This print was a departure but also an extension of the abstract randomly generated work I was producing. After fabricating a fair number of the aforementioned prints, I began thinking more about the documentary nature of these works. To me, they had a very existential feel - the prints were merely the representations of a series of mundane events, and only referred back to their own processes and history. However, the same series of events could have been represented infinitely many ways. While we strive for objectivity in documentation, it is ultimately steeped in a subjective point of view, simply as a result of perspective, the limits of language, and our unavoidably separate consciousnesses. This may seem like excessive philosophical drivel over Cheetos, and it likely is, but I became fascinated with the mundane, completely benign elements of everyday life, and the subjectivity with which we approach them with. Consequently, I set out to create another random print, but to document something utterly pointless, elevating it to something gravely important through the absurd action of art-making. I bought a 13.5 ounce bag of Cheetos, and methodically removed each morsel, one by one, and traced it on a piece of paper. I then rated its cheesiness on a scale from 1 to 4, which is reflected by the colors in the print; the deeper the orange, the greater the cheesiness. 20x26", edition of 8.

Untitled - porcelain tile, colored slip, mdf, acrylic

Unfortunately the lousy quality of this image really does not do this five-paneled tile piece justice, as the depth is completely indiscernible. The chance processes in relation to ceramics are much more visceral than in the more abstract realm of screen printing, given the physicality and plasticity of the material. I attempted to take advantage this characteristic while executing this work. I assembled a small tray of various sized porcelain spheres I rolled and fired to harden. Thin porcelain tiles were rolled out and cut, and each tile was dropped from a height of a few feet atop the spheres, the still-plastic tile registering the impact. The tiles were then dried, sprayed with colored slip from the side to accentuate the bulbous forms, and mounted. There were many variables set up to arrive at this end object - the layout of the spheres, the color, direction of mounting, height of mounting, etc. I still have notebooks full of incomprehensible rows of numbers which are essentially the raw "code" from which this work came to be. Dimensions variable depending on mounting, but about 48x48x6".

Double Latte Via Quantum Construction - screen print

I am a complete coffee junkie, and the nerdy title of this print reflects that. While standing over the finished print in the studio, waiting for it to dry, all I could see in this busy, jittery mess was little espresso molecules crashing around with little milk molecules, so I went with it. Slightly reminiscent of that great scene in the film Pi, where the cream is dumped into the cup of coffee. 21x30", edition of 4.