It is a digital creation containing photography, a step removed from paint on canvas. There is no sculpture, no “original” of which this is a two-dimensional representation. The image IS the art, rendered tangible by inkjet printer, ink on paper.
There is a photo in there. The eye searches for and finds it, propelled by expectation when we look at flat art that we know is not painting, drawing, collage.
There is a painting in there too, in fact, three. These are not “painted in Photoshop;” these are oil and graphite paintings on wood panel–my paintings–translated into the digital world by photography.
Together the digital materials are subjected to the same principles of esthetic practice employed by artists making things from the beginining of time: exploration, design, building, removing, reflection, revisit, at some point it’s done.
My series Tin House Cut Outs are prints on paper, entirely two-dimensional. In related series are certain Tin House Cut Out images printed on flat aluminum: not sculptural, a flat object, with the same origins as the images on paper.
This Saturday July 14, 4 to 6pm, at the Petaluma Arts Center, 230 Lakeville Street, Petaluma, is an opening reception for “Digital Mixed Media: Bay Area Artists Take Digital Photography to a New Level.” I’m pleased to have a piece in this stunning exploration of the work of Bay Area artists who alter photographs and combine images with mediums from metal sculpture to tapestry. The exhibition runs June 29 through September 9, 2012. petalumaartscenter.org