Leslie Grossman, Printmaking
Feb 2008 to Mar 2008, Oakwood Neighborhood
ANONYMOUS
-Selections from a Nonexistent
Encyclopedia of Capricious Creatures
*Showing through the end of March.
For some time now, illustrated reference tools such as lithographs and etchings of flora and fauna by Albertus Seba, John James Audubon, and Ernst Haeckel have fascinated me. Works by these artists were created to expose the grand and beautiful oddities of our natural world. This body of work is essentially a wink to the art of illustrated encyclopedias of the natural world. However, they are examinations of the imagination – Uncanny, chimerical creatures enveloped by otherwise familiar patterns of the earth.
In the early stages of creating this work, I hit a roadblock in my attempts to build three-dimensional pieces and literally tossed everything out. I felt as though I wanted these imaginary creatures to have glaring identities with names and faces, but they just weren’t developing with that clarity. I felt everything around me affecting my imagination was just a layered mess, leaving the creatures empty of individuality. This experience and realization birthed the whole Idea behind this volume of unidentifiable beings. The never-ending layers of pattern, shape, and color in the natural world make up and influence everything in my creative mind. These elements directly outline and control the identity of the creatures in this series.
Each selection is one-of-a-kind with screenprinted and hand-drawn graphite elements. All are identifiable by figure numbers influenced by the image itself.
