Artist’s Statement
As
much as contemporary art is about commentary on art itself, some of its
fundamental intent remains: Art is about reflecting (in some cases even
defining) our times, values and culture.
When
one looks back at the legacy of art and the timeline in human history it
represents, you become aware of our ever growing, ever expanding visual
language: our ability to continuously develop new modes of expression and our
capacity for and vigour in constantly creating new visual metaphors,
incorporating imagery from an ever-changing world in new and innovative
reflections of that world. Today more than ever, a good level of visual
literacy is as important as a higher education in navigating a culture that is
visually driven in every aspect.
It
is this highly developed visual language of the 21st century, with
"dialects" of symbolism, iconography and branding that serves as
primary reference for this body of work. Our visual culture is largely driven
by technology. Much of our everyday experience of the world is now
filtered through a screen of some kind. Our technology is not flawless and
often presents us with "glitches" or visual malfunctions.
As
a starting point I am ‘capturing’ and incorporating these moments of
malfunction, both accidental and intentional in the creation of a new series of
portraits. Using these imperfections as a vehicle for social commentary and
commentary on art itself.
Works
in the series explore the polarities between the controlled and unpredictable.
It focuses on the repurposing of intentionally corrupted imagery and questions
what it means if we reclaim the “errors” in our technology and use them as
tools in representing and defining ourselves.
Artist’s Bio
The
interplay or relationships between gender and identity, gender and sexuality
and the contradictions between the physical and emotional world, has been some
of his major fields of exploration.
His
work is visually confrontational, but most often serves as a simple “question”
posed to the viewer. He has presented images of castrated men (La Mort, 1998),
confronting notions and understanding about gender by beckoning the viewer to
confess “who they are without their genitals” He has combined the faces of male
and female sitters into a single androgynous portraits (xx=xy, 2015) asking the
viewer to identify the gender of the image and in so doing to expose their own
gender bias understanding of the visual world.
