Artist Statment:

Written by Mark Youngsma

The Progression>> is a collection of personal related works that summarizes the struggles I faced my first year at Western Oregon University.  It was phase in my life where I had forgotten my values, and had doubted becoming an artist. In close study of myself, I rediscovered who I was and certain drives I needed to be successful. The Great Masters Dürer and Leonardo both believed that close observation yields truth. This was not a study to idealize myself, but to bring about self-resolution, and move on to the next succession of my life in becoming an artist. The way I worked on this collection was that each design became looser and more contemporary in composition than the preceding design. It is in approximate chronological order. 

In the large abstracted self-portrait, I was greatly influenced by the Venetian style of painting known as Colorito, which expressed more of the exaggeration of color, as opposed to Disegno, which draws more heavily on preliminary planned sketches, which explains the rest of my paintings and compositions prior. I moved from grey scale studies into color and further trained my eye to see the subtle shifts in hue. In the latter, I drew from contemporary artist Willelm de Kooning for my abstracted pastel drawing. 

A fair amount of my concepts are derived by my studies in the history of the Masters, from Naturalism to Mysticism. I am also influenced by my peers, reviewing my sketches with my professors, and the everyday occurrence of running into stories in the media, and extrapolating them into carefully thought out compositions. 

A lot of my work draws upon the iconography from the more spiritual context of Hinduism.  For instance, I use the icon of the Third Eye (also known as the Eye of Wisdom, or the Ajna,), which is a symbol of spiritual enlightenment.  It illustrates one of the seven centers of the body associated with acquiring new wisdom or understanding, enabling clarity of stimuli, and other supernaturally heightened sensory perceptions.  The Ajna is an independent spiritual entity separate from the minds eye of a typical human being, just like the duality of the body from the mind.

I began my series with just using traditional mediums such as graphite/charcoal, and oil paint. Each composition is different in style, paint application, and the amount of medium on the canvas. I had experimented with uncommon materials in my later works.  I had pasted on literature or wrote directly onto the canvas conceptualizing further significance to the design of the composition.

I dedicate this show in memory of the late Ramona Tofte. 

Special thanks to: Susie Neilson, Christian Rogers, Douglas Youngsma, and Katherine Etzel. 

Show curated by Mark Youngsma, and Susie Nielson

(left) Part D., graphite, 2007. (right) Part E., charcoal, 2007