OPENING RECEPTION Friday, January 5th, 2018

ARTIST STATEMENT
‘Fathom’ examines issues related to memory by exploring its limitations and aestheticizing the instability inherent in portraiture. The work allows the viewer to enter the subconscious space between remembering and forgetting. The figures and faces, which have been distorted through a repetitive layering process, manipulate our sense of familiarity. The original image becomes fragmented through this process, a conceptual procedure that corresponds to the experience of forgetting the semblance of the face, the body, and the subject.

Through distortion and fragmentation, the figures take on a monstrous form. The familiarity of the face evokes comfort while simultaneously rousing a sense of distress. In the current series of works, multiple and intersecting figures relate to the shifting nature of identity across time and space.

The images work together, creating a cinematic effect through a sequence of progressive distortions in which the viewer’s gaze shifts from large scale to small, between the figure and the fragment. The correlation creates a dilation effect, referring back to the process of distortion inherent in recollection. In this sense the work is an intermediary between a real and imagined space. The result is neither original nor fully invented, taking form as a realistic rendering of a fleeting moment. By challenging the boundaries between representation and abstraction, and questioning the relationship between fluctuation and constancy, the works become entangled and disordered, mirroring the viewer’s innate desire for clarity and their tendency to draw meaning out of partiality.

ARTIST BIO
‘Tricia Butski is a fine artist and educator living and working in Buffalo, NY. Trained in traditional drawing and oil painting, Butski holds a BFA from Fredonia State University (‘13) and an MFA from the University at Buffalo’s Department of Art (‘15). She is currently a Resident Artist at Buffalo Arts Studio and an Adjunct Instructor at SUNY Fredonia and Erie Community College, teaching foundationl courses in drawing, painting, and 2D design.

Through drawings rendered in charcoal and ink, Butski’s recent work examines issues related to memory by exploring its limitations and aestheticizing the instability inherent in portraiture. By challenging the boundaries between representation and abstraction, and questioning the relationship between fluctuation and constancy, the works become entangled and distorted, mirroring the viewer’s innate desire for clarity and their proclivity for drawing meaning out of partiality. The work becomes fragmented through a conceptual procedure that corresponds to the experience of forgetting the semblance of the face, the body, and the subject.