Date of Award
Spring 5-8-2024
Degree Name
Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA)
Restricted/Unrestricted
Restricted
Abstract
Perpetual is the product of “Liminality,” a series of paintings exploring space and motion framed to speak about the sensations of the experience of moving. Made up of a series of paintings, the work facilitates spaces for audiences to reflect upon their own life and consider the variety of perspectives to be interpreted of a static image. Through the use of a visual language defined by boxes and deep one-point perspective, viewers can relate and project their own experiences onto the depicted ambiguous spaces. In their ambiguity, an individualized meditation is proposed in order to question the emotional connotations that accompany transitions.
Throughout “Liminality,” painting strategies such as the use of unconventional color palettes, disorienting perspective, as well as the removal of context and of clear subject matter come to a point in the work “Perpetual”. “Perpetual” is an arrangement of three paintings that work to synthesize and exemplify what the greater series stands for– the disorientation of movement and change. Altogether, the statement provides an examination of the process and motivations that led to this work and what other works and ideas inform it.
Mentor/Primary Advisor
Heather Bennett
Recommended Citation
LaFollette, Margaret, "Stuck in Motion" (2024). Bachelor of Fine Arts Senior Papers. 120.
https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/bfa/120
Artist's Statement
Liminality is a word used to describe spaces amidst a transitional process. Hallways, abandoned buildings, airport terminals, and lobbies. The effort to capture the enigmatic feeling and experience of ‘liminal spaces’ has always appealed to me in my artistic practice. The portrayal of cardboard boxes and of forward motion and their connotations have proven to be of great value in illustrating transitional periods and the spaces between. I’ve found that these two motifs are best depicted in settings of one-point perspective for my paintings, to imply a linear movement– whether it is headed forward or backward is unclear.
To experience a liminal space is to be unable to name what is happening in its entirety, as the definition of ‘liminality’ relies on the state of being in a state of change or motion between one thing or another. A liminal space is a place that is normally crowded but is now empty, a place that is rushed through but never occupied, a place that reminds an individual of somewhere they were long ago when it is actually entirely new, a place that invokes a nostalgic sensation that is almost desolation, as it is a remembrance of a place one has never before visited. Recently, I’ve been painting spaces based on my feelings of displacement and how they relate to the idea of forward motion and transition. A lot of my life has consisted of moving around and traveling– which has inspired my curiosity in the histories, as well as the possibilities of places and spaces. The feeling of unrest of the liminal is a theme I’ve worked to incorporate into my painted pieces. For my time-based work, I’ve enjoyed hinting at more of a narrative behind the series of enigmatic spaces depicted on my canvases. My art’s purpose is to raise a sense of unease and disorientation with these spaces that are vague and strange while keeping them still somehow relatable.
These depicted spaces are what we know but do not know. These spaces are what once was, but are not yet.
With my work, I intend to keep the painting’s cryptic nature intact so that the viewer may ponder questions like: ‘Where are these spaces?,’ ‘What are these spaces?’ ‘What’s at the end of the passageway?,’ ‘Does the passageway ever end?’