Abstract

My thesis works two vessels, book : 300 hours and book : terrain explore and enact states of meditation, focusing on the process of making and the specificity of materials used. The meditative aspects of my process of making correlate to an anticipated meditation in the observer's time spent viewing. I hope to spark in the viewer the same response and state that I myself was in while making. In this text I explore my artistic process and what I hope for the viewer to experience while they are spending time with my works. I discuss how spending time making the work has a direct affect on the philosophy of the finished work.

At the heart of my work is making objects. I use specific, often Japanese-made and hand-made paper as well as clay. My works often formally relate to containers. Minimalist and bare materials are meant to evoke ephemerality, humbleness and beauty. I hope to inspire a moment of pause and of hyper-awareness in the viewing process. I investigate and invite meditation through the repetitive and tactile process of making and through the use of the container as a form, to suggest containing something physical or non-physical. When I make containers, I think about boxes and ceramic vessels, but also about books and the human body.

Books are vessels for knowledge and contain textual information while the human body is a container for the mind, which holds thoughts, memories and feelings. As an artist, my mind often leads me into bouts of melancholia, striving for an unrealistic level of perfection in my work. During the process of making this body of work, I have learned to settle my mind and to make and share my meditative works with you, more freely.

Committee Chair

Ron Fondaw

Committee Members

Ron Fondaw

Comments

Permanent URL: https://doi.org/10.7936/dyvb-fh52

Degree

Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in Visual Art

Author's Department

Graduate School of Art

Author's School

Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts

Document Type

Thesis

Date of Award

Spring 5-8-2019

Language

English (en)

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