HEY APATHY! Surreal Artworks
Another attempt to explain what I do in 500 words or less, okay it's late and I'm bored but I think this will still prove valuable...
HEY APATHY! Is an ongoing artistic investigation into the metropolis, the people, and the mechanics of being. Using a combination of fine artworks and popular mass media I have developed a visual vocabulary expressing a stern yet optimistic warning towards future days. The entire project, initiated in 2001, reads as an extended narration involving ink drawings, murals, gallery installations, comic books, publications, street performances, video and animation. By way of this interdisciplinary and increasingly public process I’ve determined a vehicle for discourse suitable to both the gallery connoisseur and viewers of all ages. The validity of my life’s work will be examined through a brief analysis of the project’s history, cultural significance and current explorations.
HEY APATHY! Alternative Comics
In the initial drawings (2001) the city was announced as an ominous gear powered by an endless sea of faceless denizens. At that time I was working out an introverted artist’s studio and envisioned the metropolis as a nihilistic conglomeration of misdirected superficial and commercial ideologies. In order to better understand the phenomena in question I developed a uniquely extroverted artist’s process through which public presentations, performances, interactions and interventions would help resolve my inquiries. Since that time I have used the public forum to initiate exchanges with peoples from all over the world and of all walks of life. With each passing year I learned more of architecture and others as reflected in the ultimate progression of my works. Today the city is still rendered as a giant gear, only now it is fuelled by all sorts of strange individual rather than anonymous cogs in a machine.
The primary objective of the “HEY APATHY!” artworks is to produce a commentary simultaneously intellectually provocative as well as accessible to viewer of all ages. In order to best achieve a dialogue amongst broad audiences I have assimilated various technical approaches. Equal attention has been given to the development of sustain studio artworks and to the production of multi-media and accessible artworks. By experimenting with various presentation techniques, and one on one interactions my artwork delves into humanist themes introducing unsuspecting pedestrians to alternative ideas usually reserved for gallery walls. Through the inclusion of street performances, animations, and comics, HEY APATHY! is capable of communicating to an inclusive audience of all ages, races, and walks of life.
HEY APATHY! Public Exhibitions and Street Art
To the artist interested in initiating mass dialogue the possibilities of multi-media artworks facilitates necessity. In my most recent studies I have developing a series of videos, comics and art books suitable for both online presentation and gallery exhibition. I am currently creating a new hand drawn animation sponsored by the Ontario Arts Council in which over 300 fully rendered stills will be compiled on film. The idea being that the finished artworks will be prepared as a wall installation to accompany the film. The unique and extensive project travels through 13 short vignettes recounting the evolutionary narrative expressed throughout my art works including imagery developed between 2001-2010. The completed project will not only extend my technical vocabulary but will further my attempts to reconfigure popular culture, fine artwork as a sophisticated yet accessible conversation. The “HEY APATHY!” endeavour continually exposes a humanist ideology crossing the irrational barriers which segregate one man from another retaining much significance universally and decidedly Canadian. (Damn 541 words but close and better luck next time!)
HEY APATHY animation sample from FLIES HOLES AND ROACHES 2002
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