Demerest-Smith, studio installation

Artist’s Statement: These Abstractions evolved out of and are linked very closely to earlier landscape, still life and figure paintings. However, the forms have become their own entity created from spontaneous movements during the process of painting relating to organic rhythms found in billowing smoke, ripples on water, curves of exotic flowers, or movements of the human form. My process begins very quickly with house paint rollers and sponge brushes approaching the canvas with high amounts of energy. I cover the entire canvas in a matter of just a few minutes with two or three basic colors mixing paint as I work. After my initial bursts of energy and excitement have faded I allow myself a reprieve from the painting. I leave the studio walk around, eat, rest, and relax. When I am satisfied I return to the studio with a different set of emotions, thoughts, and visual sensations. I analyze what I have already created and begin mixing paint. I give myself time to consider the effects of the last burst of energy. I then approach the painting in a different state than the preliminary attempt with an air of patience and thoughtfulness taking the time to edit the painting. I repeat the process of editing three to four times with each painting so that very little of the initial painting remains, creating a condensation and simplification of the first gestures. When I have come to a place of satisfaction with one painting I will turn it toward the wall and let it rest while I start another painting. I begin in a similar process but forcing myself to choose different colors and change my physical motion and handling of the brushes so the resulting painting is different. With each separate painting I have brought a different complex array of emotions excitement, anger, sadness, fear, and immense joy, then through the editing process I bring kindness, patience, and love so that the canvas obtains a certain duality. It is where the lost memory turns into reclaimed happiness, as if the paintings are a reflection of the moment when one forgives someone who has wronged another, or when one realizes that there is more to life than what is in the here and now. They are paintings of the light bulb moments that occur when a thought has eluded us for so long is finally seized, and yet, they are just paintings, just objects.https://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/enigma/1025/thumbnail.jp