"The imagery reflects my sense of the instability of the complex networks that we build to connect to each other. I see my work as a realm that negotiates the connections and transitions between idealized environments and an absurd messy reality." - Eva Speer

Eva Speer's Artist Statement:

THE PROCESS
I put down my paintbrush for this new series and began experimenting with various materials and textures in order to attain the layering and delicacy required to fulfill my aesthetic vision.

Through digital distortion, I use Xeroxes, inkjet printers and more to give rigid, man-made designs the appearance of organic life.

While the paintings exude a sense of their own mortality, I try to suspend catastrophe and protect the structures by interjecting playful forms and materials that negotiate relief, like figurative steam holes. Such forms acquire the characteristics of strange aquatic creatures and bulbous body parts.

The mental organization of images and the way one object refers to another, even though no formal qualities may exist between the two, exemplifies my process.

EXECUTION
I start with materials that have transformational qualities. The images result from discoveries about materials and working processes as well as a search for structures that allow me to address the mutability of form, the inconstancy of time and space and the complexity of visual phenomena.

Specifically, I am engaged with the disruption of consistent structures and the exposure of interiors that reveal not essences but doubts, wonder, absurdity and possibility.

My work revolves around a process of fracture and reassembly wherein my approximations of reality and the physical world can be set in motion and confounded.

INTERPRETATION
When complete, the works explore ongoing mutation, growth and entropy of primordial form. Others have described my work as entrapments or things being caught in nets.

I look to animal life, specifically at the deep sea and cellular level, as the inspiration for the formal qualities of my work. The similarities among organic, social and technological systems emerge from the conceptual fusion and confusion of form and function that compose my works.

The imagery reflects my sense of the instability of the complex networks that we build to connect to each other. I see my work as a realm that negotiates the connections and transitions between idealized environments and an absurd messy reality.

 

EDUCATION

2006
Master of fine arts, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana

2004
Bachelor of fine arts, University of Washington , Seattle

2001
Otis College of Design, Los Angeles


AWARDS

2006
Joan Mitchell Foundation, MFA fellowship nomination
Indiana University study fellowship, Italy

2005
Indiana University travel fellowship to Italy

2004-2005
Indiana University grant in aid of research, painting

2004
Indiana University, graduate fellowship

2002-2003
University of Washington School of Art grants

2000
Otis College of Design, travel grant to Paris
Otis College of Design, undergraduate fellowship


EXHIBITIONS

2006
MFA Thesis, Indiana University Art Museum, Bloomington
Vibrations, group exhibition, Merwin Gallery, Bloomington

2005-2006
Big Ten Conference Exhibition, Park Ridge, Illinois
MFA Painting Winter Exhibition, School of Fine Arts Gallery, Bloomington

2004
BFA Thesis, Jacob Lawrence Gallery, Seattle
Form vs. Psyche, Viveza Gallery, Seattle
School of Art Open, Jacob Lawrence Gallery

2003
Works on Paper, Jacob Lawrence Gallery, Juror: Greg Kucera, Greg Kucera Gallery