Wonder w/ Everything
Wonder w/ Everything, Installation View
I make wall mounted narrative sculpture through a process of assembling and collaging character portraits and cliché expressions from my collections of ephemera.
The elements of my work are primarily carved and modeled clay, constructed through an amalgam of low-fire ceramic techniques, and post-firing painting and gold leaf. Found objects and printmaking are also incorporated.
I keep visual journals that are a chronicle of people engaged in essential tasks. I also record conversations that illustrate moments in time where we stand on a precipice. I immerse myself in these oftentimes neglected glimpses of the simplicity of everyday life, and I dwell in those moments of goodness that stand out through my personal history, real and imagined.
The Wonder w/ Everything series introduces the element of mid-century ceramic figurines. These once prized, now discarded objects reveal our natural urges to both collect and to imbue meaning. The process of making art connects me to this nostalgia for a collective memory of a utopian past, and a longing for continuity in a fragmented world.
E. L. Doctorow’s statement about writing functions as my modus operandi: “It's like driving a car at night. You never see further than your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.”
The elements of my work are primarily carved and modeled clay, constructed through an amalgam of low-fire ceramic techniques, and post-firing painting and gold leaf. Found objects and printmaking are also incorporated.
I keep visual journals that are a chronicle of people engaged in essential tasks. I also record conversations that illustrate moments in time where we stand on a precipice. I immerse myself in these oftentimes neglected glimpses of the simplicity of everyday life, and I dwell in those moments of goodness that stand out through my personal history, real and imagined.
The Wonder w/ Everything series introduces the element of mid-century ceramic figurines. These once prized, now discarded objects reveal our natural urges to both collect and to imbue meaning. The process of making art connects me to this nostalgia for a collective memory of a utopian past, and a longing for continuity in a fragmented world.
E. L. Doctorow’s statement about writing functions as my modus operandi: “It's like driving a car at night. You never see further than your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.”
Seen and Heard, 18" x 15" x 6"
|
Cart Before the Horse, 16" x 14" x 6
|
Oopsi-Daisy, 20" x 15" x 6"
Age Before Beauty, 16" x 18" x 6"
|
Out with the Bathwater, 18" x 14" x 6"
Pearls Before Swine, 16" x 16" x 6"
|
Proverbs are intended to pass on popular wisdom
and are frequently expressed as warnings.
Little girls/children should be seen and not heard.
In the original form of this proverb it was specifically young women who were expected to keep quiet. This opinion is recorded in the 15th century collections of homilies written by an Augustinian clergyman circa 1450: “A mayde schuld be seen, but not herd”.
While the expression was originally aimed at women, the Old English names denoting gender are now somewhat altered. A ‘mayde’ was normally a young female, usually unmarried, although it was also used to denote celibate men. Girls however, could be of either sex, the term simply meaning young child.
Don’t put the cart before the horse.
The word ‘preposterous’ entered the English language precisely to describe back to front imagery. From Latin, ‘Pre’ is a standard prefix—meaning it is ‘at the front’; likewise, ‘post’ means ‘at the back’. So ‘preposterous’ actually denotes the normal arrangement of things, with the front at the front and the back at the back. ‘Postprerous’ might have been a better choice of word; But it’s too late to change now.
An early reference to ‘putting the cart before the horse’ comes in 1589: “We put the cart before the horse, and shut the stable door when the steed is stolen, in defiance of the old proverb.”
The notion of things being the opposite of what they rightfully should be seems to have played on the minds of the English in the 16th century. Shakespeare’s The Tempest, Macbeth, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream all contain ‘world turned upside down’ magical elements.
Oopsi-daisy
An exclamation made when encouraging a child to get up after a fall or when lifting a child into the air.
It was difficult to choose which of the numerous variants of the expression to use as the heading of this piece. As with many words that are said to small children, it is more often a spoken term than one that appears in print and this has led to much inconsistency about how it is spelled. In fact, there are so many different spellings: ‘Upsidaisy’, ‘Upsa daesy’, ‘Upsy-daisy’, ‘Oops-a-daisy’, ‘Oopsy-daisy’, ‘Hoops-a-daisy’.
‘Whoops-a-daisy’, and the shortened forms ‘whoops’ and ‘oops’, are all American in origin.
Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.
Throw the baby out with the bathwater is a German proverb; The earliest printed reference to it dates from 1512. The expression was part of everyday German language but didn’t emerge in English until the 19th century.
The Germans say, “you must empty-out the bathing-tub, but not the baby along with it.” Fling-out your dirty water with all zeal, and set it careening down the kennels; but try if you can to keep the little child!
Age before beauty. Pearls before swine.
Older people should be given precedence over the younger and, by implication, more beautiful. This is normally used jocularly, often by the older person in order to flatter the younger.
This expression was certainly in use by the mid-Victorian period; it is recorded in print from at least as early as 1869 and is probably significantly earlier than that.
The phrase is often given as part of a supposed exchange between the U.S. writer, politician and diplomat Clare Boothe Luce, and Dorothy Parker. It is said that, in the archetypal circumstances for uttering the phrase, that is, while holding a door open for Parker, Boothe Luce said “Age before beauty”. Parker’s reply was “Pearls before swine”.
In the original form of this proverb it was specifically young women who were expected to keep quiet. This opinion is recorded in the 15th century collections of homilies written by an Augustinian clergyman circa 1450: “A mayde schuld be seen, but not herd”.
While the expression was originally aimed at women, the Old English names denoting gender are now somewhat altered. A ‘mayde’ was normally a young female, usually unmarried, although it was also used to denote celibate men. Girls however, could be of either sex, the term simply meaning young child.
Don’t put the cart before the horse.
The word ‘preposterous’ entered the English language precisely to describe back to front imagery. From Latin, ‘Pre’ is a standard prefix—meaning it is ‘at the front’; likewise, ‘post’ means ‘at the back’. So ‘preposterous’ actually denotes the normal arrangement of things, with the front at the front and the back at the back. ‘Postprerous’ might have been a better choice of word; But it’s too late to change now.
An early reference to ‘putting the cart before the horse’ comes in 1589: “We put the cart before the horse, and shut the stable door when the steed is stolen, in defiance of the old proverb.”
The notion of things being the opposite of what they rightfully should be seems to have played on the minds of the English in the 16th century. Shakespeare’s The Tempest, Macbeth, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream all contain ‘world turned upside down’ magical elements.
Oopsi-daisy
An exclamation made when encouraging a child to get up after a fall or when lifting a child into the air.
It was difficult to choose which of the numerous variants of the expression to use as the heading of this piece. As with many words that are said to small children, it is more often a spoken term than one that appears in print and this has led to much inconsistency about how it is spelled. In fact, there are so many different spellings: ‘Upsidaisy’, ‘Upsa daesy’, ‘Upsy-daisy’, ‘Oops-a-daisy’, ‘Oopsy-daisy’, ‘Hoops-a-daisy’.
‘Whoops-a-daisy’, and the shortened forms ‘whoops’ and ‘oops’, are all American in origin.
Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.
Throw the baby out with the bathwater is a German proverb; The earliest printed reference to it dates from 1512. The expression was part of everyday German language but didn’t emerge in English until the 19th century.
The Germans say, “you must empty-out the bathing-tub, but not the baby along with it.” Fling-out your dirty water with all zeal, and set it careening down the kennels; but try if you can to keep the little child!
Age before beauty. Pearls before swine.
Older people should be given precedence over the younger and, by implication, more beautiful. This is normally used jocularly, often by the older person in order to flatter the younger.
This expression was certainly in use by the mid-Victorian period; it is recorded in print from at least as early as 1869 and is probably significantly earlier than that.
The phrase is often given as part of a supposed exchange between the U.S. writer, politician and diplomat Clare Boothe Luce, and Dorothy Parker. It is said that, in the archetypal circumstances for uttering the phrase, that is, while holding a door open for Parker, Boothe Luce said “Age before beauty”. Parker’s reply was “Pearls before swine”.