Saturday, March 8, 2014

New Mixed Media Pieces for "Home Art Explosion!" Art Show




I was recently in another art show of the Bagavagabonds. Their theme for this "Art Explosion" was HOME. This was an interesting theme for me because we just recently purchased our first home.

I decided to take some abstract photos of items around my own new home but magnified and at interesting angles so that most are indiscernible except to me - a curtain's pattern, a small portion of a chandelier, blinds, part of a lamp base, and part of a door handle made interesting subjects. I printed my photos on transparent acetate.

I wanted to juxtapose two different types of "home" in each of my pieces. Besides the physical dwelling, I also wanted to suggest our body as the most important home - the one we will never move away from as long as we are on this earth. I found a vintage book on immunology with drawings and photographs of lysosomes, cytoplasms, blood vessels and cells. I then combined my photos with these pages in interesting ways and framed them. I love utilizing vintage books in my photography work because I feel that photography in the present day has become so duplicable. I like to create work that is one-of-a-kind so that it inherently maintains its' integrity and specialness.

I then took some vintage keys I have collected over the years and dipped them into matte black paint. When dry, I dangled them with invisible thread in the front of each piece to convey the idea that we all have the power to unlock ourselves if we just realize that the key to understanding ourselves is within reach.

To see photos from the art opening, check out this page of my website.