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Lynn Spencer
I work
in a variety of media. The group of works presented here are
examples of recurring themes in my figurative works. Some of
these began from dream fragments. Some evolve out of personal
observations. Some make religious allusions, though it would
be incorrect to read them as religious works. The pictorial
space is an important concern in all of the pieces. Each
provides an important set for the communication of a dramatic
moment; human beings caught in the midst of changes, some
catastrophic, some spiritual, and some whose outcomes are
unforeseeable.”
About the Series Shockwave
The pieces are small, 18” x 24” and employ oil pigments for color. A kind of sgraffito is created with an etching needle.
The first piece was just the wave.
That led to a consideration of the human consequences of the tsunami
and the unity of the natural world: the release of a purely physical
tension in the continental plates sends waves and vibrations out and
the world reels in sympathetic resonance. The sea-sky horizon line of
the first piece set up a format for the other pieces providing an
elemental visual balance.
The second piece was the wishbone,
an icon that resonates with me on sentimental and metaphoric levels but
is also a reminder of corporeality and human vulnerability. The words
came from a theater review describing the savaging effect of a
particular actor’s performance. So much of human life is theater,
artifice, and ritual yet sometimes these have the ironic effect of
stripping life to its essentials, not unlike a shockwave.
The subsequent pieces draw on and
continue with verbal and visual description related to the theme of
shockwave and vibrations, -emotional, social, sensory, primal,
periodic. Some of those descriptions are from waking life: the barrel
of monkeys that belong to my son; the osprey that share the coast with
us; the wasps that stupidly return to the same spot in my garage year
after year because they are hard-wired to do so. Other aspects come
from dream time. I use words to describe those visions as complementary
descriptive tools. Words can draw out images, too, - an idea I like.
I have continued working in the
same format on a series called “Simple Machines” -a simple 18” x 24”
format, a horizon line with color varied above and below. The images
for this series include sailboats, corkscrews, wheelbarrows, and toy
trucks.
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