Installation Artwork (War is Child's Play)

4,802
Mixed media, 8' X 8'
2012
(Each toy soldier corresponds to one member of U.S. or Coalition forces killed in the war in Iraq.)

Flag
Mixed Media, 3' X5'

2012

Indoctrination
Mixed Media, 1' X 5'

2012

Portfolio Update: War is Child's Play

It is now just about the 3rd month of 2012, and as such I am due to update my portfolio. This is convenient, as my solo show, War Is Child's Play closed this past week. There is an excellent feature of the show at Pittsburgh Urban Media: http://www.urbanmediatoday.com/Artist-Examines-Military-Bias-Through-Toys/.


And of course, the additions to my portfolio. There will be a following post of the installation pieces from the show:



War Mask
Mixed Media, 18" X 8"X 3"
2009


Love Bomb II
Acrylic on Canvas, 15" X 10"
2012

Love Bomb III
Acrylic on Canvas, 15" X 10"
2012

Love Bomb I
Acrylic on Canvas
2012

Circular Logic

LEGO bricks, 20" X 20" X 18"
2011

Small Soldiers

One of my hobbies is model building, and studying history, especially military history. I scratch built and kit bashed this micro-diorama a few years ago. It depicts a basic ship's gun on a tall ship, circa the War of 1812. Scratch building is always an interesting challenge, as it combines modeling, sculpture, and historical research to create a representational model. Kit bashing, on the other hand, it taking apart what is a commercially created model in order to use the parts to create something different. It takes patience, but I actually find it rather relaxing. It offers a respite from having to worry about being commercial, or even trying to be extremely deep.

When I create sculpture, I am constantly thinking about form, materials, how it all goes together, and how I want it to represent my concepts and ideas, and how they are communicated. When I model, it is essentially brain candy. I know historians will disagree with me, but history is history, and fact is fact. Maneuvers may be debated, motivations questioned, and decisions and their reasoning may be pondered over, but those are all human concerns. The nice thing about materials research, is that when a soldier's uniform is blue, that is just that. It is difficult to argue a point when the object you are studying is at hand. When I create models, I try to recreate a representation of the past, and the thinking is more about materials and the final aesthetics. What I am trying to represent is just that, I am making a recreation of an existing object. There is not necessarily a deeper meaning.

Until next time,

Andrew