Date of Award
Spring 5-20-2021
Degree Name
Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in Visual Art
Degree Type
Thesis
Abstract
I create conceptual drawings, collages, sculptures, and installations to humorously destabilize and ultimately question how human language, formal methodologies, and social institutions function. While seemingly embracing an aesthetic of rationality, I undermine it with absurdity. In my work, I take a fundamentally dialectical position by skewering the rational to the illogical as neither can exist without the other.
Language
English (en)
Program Director
Lisa Bulawsky
Program Director's Department
Graduate School of Art
Thesis Advisor
Monika Weiss
Studio/Primary Advisor
Michael Byron
Studio/Primary Advisor
Jack Risley
Committee Member
Richard Krueger
Committee Member
Richard Krueger
Recommended Citation
Erickson, Ryan, "The Feeling of Foam & Other Essays" (2021). Graduate School of Art Theses. ETD 148. https://doi.org/10.7936/ftbh-9s16.
https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/samfox_art_etds/148
Included in
Aesthetics Commons, Art and Design Commons, Epistemology Commons, Fiction Commons, Linguistics Commons, Philosophy of Language Commons
Artist's Statement
As an artist, I am not in the business of constructing meaning. I juxtapose signifiers and render them incoherent by maintaining a highly refined, systematic presentation in my drawings, collages, sculptures, and installations. By doing so, I disrupt the logical flow of thought with abrupt moments of absurdity. In my work, I skewer the rational to the illogical to destabilize and ultimately question how language, methodologies, and social institutions function.