UTOPIA PRINT SERIES, 1998-1999

This print series was done in graduate school at the University of Cincinnati. They were the beginnings of understanding why I make images and what I wanted my imagery to speak about. Even as a young child, I can remember having a feeling that things were wrong. My pages in elementary school were covered with monsters and I was reprimanded for letting them eat my vocabulary words.

During graduate school, I was required to write a thesis, like most graduate students, that would explain what I was doing visually. I struggled with the questions of motivation and result, but knew that my gut instincts were honest about how I saw the world and how I was trying to portray my worldview. I felt a sense of guilt that the imagery I was creating was pessimistic or dark in content and that I wasn't really trying to show a more optimistic view. It was in that sense of guilt that I think I began to discover what I was connecting with in my own work.

A professor told me once that art shows what is, not what should be. A representation in art is a summation of 'what is', not a speculation, for we can only imagine in our mind's eye what should be. Once it becomes an image, it is.

My own worldview, as best as I could describe it, to a panel of judges, was a worldview closer to Star Wars than to Star Trek. This meaning, that I envisioned there would always be smugglers, rebels, power struggles, renegade governments, gambling, etc. as opposed to the 'federation', a utopian society that no longer had need for money, recognized equality among all living things, etc. etc. etc. My prints began to focus on the idea of utopia (perfect society coined by Thomas More) and the dark subject matter that I associated with that concept. This, I was basically saying, is what I think of 'our utopia'. I think it is just as violent as 1,000 years, just as intolerant as 2,000 years ago, and just as unequal and uncompassionate as 3,000 years ago. Where is this progress everyone keeps talking about?

My thesis became a story about a metaphysical society existing within our own, the Angst Machina, which has caused us to split off from true Homo Sapiens; living in fear since they knew they were 'human' and 'different'. Fear, I thought, was the reason, the fall of humanity into sin, the breaking of humanity into imperfect pieces that needed fixing somehow (through religious salvation I had supposed).

I feel many of the questions I was asking during graduate school and making images about became more clear the year following graduation when I read the book Ishmael, by Daniel Quinn (www.ishmael.org). That book gave a perspective on what I was feeling was a damaged and broken world, that my previous experiences with fundamentalist christianity had not been able to adequately address. I still think fondly of this print series as it is a culmination of ideas and concepts that became more solid when researching their purpose for me.