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Latex Painting
Pull, poke, rip, and strip, discrete layers of translucent latex stretches across space to bridge structures of foam, wood and/or steel. Over, under and around, the layers intermingle with one another to create a web of rhythmic gesture that encloses and reconstructs the space it occupies. Upon first glaze, the sensual wet quality of the texture might strike as grotesque, as it resembles to an extent the decaying of the flesh, residues of a tragic event, or perhaps, even that of a woman's stocking viciously violated. Yet, such ephemeral repulsion will soon subside to give way to the riveting enticement of the “ugly”. Break itself away from the typical aesthetic, it exudes still a compulsion just as inviting as that of the beautiful, if not more. The ugliness, in this case, inhabits not within the object, because the object itself is abstract. Therefore, it must be a subjective reference that renders the object ugly. And if subjective, it must also involve personal reflection, subconsciously or not, which in term retains the viewer in contemplative connection with the object.
I suppose what intrigues me, is something that draws my attention, and keeps me there without me knowing exactly what I am drawn to. Why do I look at something beautiful once, but something ugly twice?
On the other hand, because the latex is coded with resin that dries to a glossy slick surface, some had also draw a more affirmative association of the translucency, often with the natural light penetrating from the back, to that of the stain glass.
“Am I making sense…?” Often I find these words involuntarily shuffled into the midst of my attempt to rationalize an explanation for my work. Is what I am saying making sense? Are there connections between my words and my visual? Can you relate to how I feel? These questions never fail to surface as rhetorical as the answers in return. Meanwhile, I am challenged with the same inquiries. Does my feeling echo with the resonance of my words? Do they align? Should they align?
Questions slowly morph into doubts, while feelings journey to examine its reflection. Like any mirror, perhaps it’s as distorted as anything else that reflects off of it. How can we describe so boldly something as intangible as feelings when we can’t resolve to stand before our own reflection without uncertainty? Maybe I can’t put it into words. Just maybe, the visual has to speak for the hands that attempt to materialize the feeling that directs them, or at least come close to it.
