I haven’t posted in a while. Seems that I haven’t exactly done some things in a while... that was certainly how things felt a few weeks into the pandemic. Getting started on bigger work seemed like a tiny idea beyond a swirling field of thoughts with no resolution. When I finally was able to get to work it came like an onslaught. It felt as though behind my anxious and spinning conscious, my other mind had it planned. I had a small postcard I’d not been able to complete for Small Art postcard exchange. It sat on the table for weeks and then the razor came out and yes! Here are three large works that came from that coalescence. They each are different and they follow a path of my thinking, feeling and reacting through the works. There is a blurb associated with each. I have submitted them to a couple of art opportunities. Having to sort through and write about them proved really elucidating. No Outward Signs. 2020. 45”x48”x10”. Acrylic on a single sheet of paper. In “No Outward Sign,” there is at once a need to control and an inability to do so. The back and front of the painting is in play. Every time a new window is cut and the reverse side comes to the front, there is a new visual problem or challenge. The action of making this piece became a parallel action to my anxieties; sorting through the information and misinformation at the beginning of the pandemic and trying to arrive at a balance of knowledge, action and expression. Turning Joy. 2020. 48”x54”x10”. Acrylic on a single sheet of paper. As the second large piece I made in quarantine, “Turning Joy” became a record of coming to terms with enormity of the situation. The action of the painting still is a matter of digging, organizing and understanding things visible and invisible, accurate and inaccurate, anticipated and not. As with the others, the microscopic and macroscopic scale of the imagery plays to the event. During this painting I found myself surprisingly lost in the action of turning over the paper and feeling a certain growing power of clarity. Covid Conspirator. 2020. 50”x38”x10”. Acrylic and ink on a single sheet of Stonehenge paper.
As the third large piece made during the quarantine, “ Covid Conspirator” became a surrender of sorts to the conditions of the pandemic. The paper was originally a different painting that I repurposed, which felt appropriate to the insular practice of making these particular works at this time. After making “Turning Joy”, I felt a guilt for having my immersion in the work bringing me to a joyful moment. This time, I accepted the pandemic as a partner. The same visual distress of control and un-control plays here, albeit more somberly and densely.
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AuthorJoseph Castronova is an artist and educator living in Metuchen NJ Archives
July 2023
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