I wish I could deliver my artist’s statement with paint, in the same way Cézanne was tempted to say, ‘I owe you the truth in painting and I will tell it to you.’ Despite his never being able to deliver it fully, I fear and know I will never be able to either; nor can I submit my statement in paint, so now let me try with words. If I could translate my feelings about being an artist into an image, it would look much like a tree rooted in water. This to me symbolizes the magnificence of creative inspiration and the process of growth, despite unstable foundations.

The artistic language I aim to investigate takes form in the different orientations and mediums, but primarily painting. I am currently working on a series that explore the body as a vessel and container for our experiences in the world. Predominantly that of nature. I find a certain transcendence in losing myself within the ethereal flow that painting innately represents for me. The organic movement of the human form, combined with the sensual layering of color, calls the viewers’ attention as well as my own to our juxtaposition in space and to each other.

I consider my method of working somewhat performative. My choice of the human body as a mechanism to create art is rooted in the belief that performance art offers an augmented and recursive form of everyday realism that painting and sculptures can only endeavor to attain.

Collapsing time and family tradition, I aim to create a dialogue between my family’s artistic heritage, my understanding of images and contemporary modes of representation: “Just as the Impressionists used light and real life in an attempt to capture real life, I am trying to do the same through the lenses and tools of the modern digital age.” Each piece is treated like a collage of previous experiences and inspirations. In both the digital prints and oil paintings I am a combination of images to express a new way of viewing familiar spaces ; distorted, fractured, and ultimately recreated into an organized stream of consciousness. Using photography and paintings as initial subjects, these subjects translate from one screen to another, from phone, to Ipad through various digital apps and overlaying different filters. Some images include previous works, others include previous paintings by admired artists. The pieces each hold a final layer of paint beneath layers of juxtaposed images in one flat surface. The cloud as folder, the screen as canvas and the wall as presentation are all comments on today’s digital age. I am trying to open a new world of landscapes and impressions where “ultimate freedom can be reached and where all rules of traditional painting must be broken.”

I am fascinated by this dialogue, the transformation from familiarity into something other than what it is, through (and into) art by way of the actions and interpretations. This recalls for me that what defines art is ‘the power of doing something not taught by nature and instinct, as to walk is normal, but to dance is an art’ (Johnson 1755).

I hope to continue my research into questions that have no conclusive answers, questions about the process of creativity, sustaining my resolve with Nietzsche’s observation that ‘He who has a Why to live can bear almost any How’.

           Lyora Pissarro