she paints; she is a painter

The Fall 2012 session of Project: Art has been an exciting one! Ewa Stryjnik, our director (impressario, teacher, magic wizard!) presented us with an interesting challenge. “Let’s explore Post Modernism!” She went on to explain that she would provide for each class a   4 ft x 4 ft canvas on which we as a group would make a painting. As an exploration in an art expression, our end product would be an “anonymous” collective effort to which we all contributed our individual strengths and styles, thus removing the concept of artist as individual. Preconceived ideas and barriers should be shattered! Emotion and sensation should replace planning and deliberation, resulting in a spontaneous, anarchical painting. Keep reading to see how this process led us to the paintings above …

At first we proceeded in an orderly fashion. The first person (we’re all women as it happens) applied anything she wanted to the blank canvas and then drew a name randomly for the next person to “have a go”. If you didn’t like what the previous person added, you just painted over it. We all knew that whatever we added would  probably be submerged into the greater scheme. Eli added the gauze for texture; Lizzie, strong graphic lines in ink. Sometimes you would love an area that was added and then be disappointed when it was gone! It really was an ongoing performance, a living dynamic! … Sometime in the middle of the 10 weeks, I asked Ewa to re-state the original goals, as I had rather lost sight of the process. She gave us a chart that she had in her days at OCA (Ontario College of Art). And then I started to try to find a definition of Post Modernism, which apparently is not easily definable and adds to the mystique of the movement. It is almost defined by what it is NOT! Here is a simplification of Ewa’s chart:

If you read through these words, on some level you’ll become aware of what post Modernism is trying to communicate. (I do sort of get it!) There are many more word pairs on the list, but you get the idea. And now I’m going to show you how the painting developed over the weeks:

This final painting will be seen and will be for sale by auction at the Project:Art reception and sale on Thursday, December 13th, from 6 – 9 pm. The entrance to the Studio/Gallery is on the 2nd floor of the  El Mundo Gift Shop on 230 Queen Street W, Toronto.

If you would like to further explore the meaning of Post Modernism in its broadest sense, I’ve attached the 4 minute YouTube video below, which will either further confuse you or maybe give you more insight into the complexity of the movement.