Bio: I am currently an applied design major focusing on ceramics and jewelry, and I am also a philosophy minor at San Diego State University. My work is informed by the lack of individual identity growing up in a collective culture. Originally starting as a painter, I use expressive lines and colors on the surfaces of my materials to liberate myself from the ongoing struggle of self identification in a world in which societal pressures attempt to dictate individual identity. Artist Statement: I am interested in the materials and objects that hold personal significance to us. I am attracted to the objects that we wear or keep that reflect our own identity and how our individual selves can be personified through these objects. Personally, the art I create is fundamental in understanding my individual self. The reactionary and spontaneous process of deconstruction and gestural painting is a meditative process that allows me to transform the surfaces and forms of the materials I work on, along with being analogous to my personal identity. As a result, the sculptures I create studies abstract notions of identity by transforming traditional craft objects with gestural painting techniques that I identify with. My work takes an interdisciplinary approach combining varying craft techniques, such as pottery and jewelry; with haphazard sculptural techniques, like found object sculpture, gestural abstraction, and wire art. Because of this, the process of creating my work is very nonlinear. My work is always in flux in which I work to construct some traditional form, then I either deconstruct the object or make marks over the surface of the object. Through this body of work, I study how everyday materials can be suddenly transformed to have meaning to the wearer. Even something as simple as compulsive scratches that damage the surface of materials adds value since they leave behind evidence of one’s hand on the object. Overall, my work serves as craft objects that are distinct moments of personal identity. Contact: email: [email protected] insta: tcyoung51 |