Contemporary Art
James Thurman
Artist’s Statement“Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.” ...Picasso once said, and it speaks the truth. When we are children, we draw, paint, and sculpt to our hearts content without any worries about the world. We put our emotions and our situations into the stick people’s family that lives in the multicolored house, the portraits we do of our parents whether they are good or bad. And if our mothers won’t give us cookies that day, we draw a bad representation of her and then squiggle out her face with a black crayon. Our feelings are transferred to our art. In a sense that is what I’m trying to accomplish with mine, a return to the inner child. I like to imagine my canvas as a scrap piece of paper from which to express my feelings to whoever views it. The bright colors and lines depict something that is going on in my life at the time. I take my little characters and cut them up, twist them, and morph them to my liking. They tell my story for me. My artwork can be admired by anyone, children and adults alike. Children enjoy it for the funny shapes and colors. Adults enjoy it for the subject matter. I use mostly acrylic paint, but will sometimes stick other things on there to create texture. My ceramics follow the same principle only in three dimensional forms. Their bodies are very expressive and they begin talking to the viewer. The glazing adds to the conversation, which consists of low fire stains and high fire glazes. The texture that I decide to use adds extra elements to the piece, and furthers its vocabulary. I use white stoneware, but have used porcelain and low fire clays on occasion. I really enjoy making my artwork because it helps me to express myself and to tell my story to the public without just coming out and saying it. I like the idea of something being cute and cuddly, but at the same time someone being afraid to pet it for fear of being bitten. There are hidden messages underneath the cute little characters, sometimes buried deep within the piece, but they’re there. The viewer might see something different from what I had in mind and if that’s the case then that’s what the art world is all about, interpretation. - James Thurman Works by James ThurmanClick any image to view a larger version. |
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