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Precious Cargo
15 years ago
Thursday, March 19, 2009
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Stephanie Jung
Artist Statement
My paintings are born out of conversations with the unknown. It is stimulating to me that as an artist, I am a conduit for a visual conversation exploring the nature of the high-tech world's chaotic relationship with wildness and spiritual longing.
My paintings are populated by both natural and spiritual specters. The deer, crocodile, swan, mouse, songbird and the Virgin Mary are frequent visitors to my work. The crocodile and the swan are associated with water as both element and animate spirit. The mouse, particularly the OncoMouse, a genetically engineered rodent used to test cancer drugs, has become a signifier of the tension between human concerns and inhumane actions. The birds are impassive observers to the age-old story of man versus nature. The Virgin appears primarily as a compassionate, even heartbroken, witness. The deer is my muse.
In my most recent work, I discuss the widening gap between intellect and embodiment, between who we are and who we think we are. Recent imagery in my work depicts hybrid beings, joining animal and human elements in unexpected ways. My work also takes on gender issues, deconstructing sexual identity with headless figures of dual gender. These representations appropriate historical paintings of the Rococo and Enlightenment periods, and comment on our efforts to deny our instinctive selves.
No matter how we intellectualize, we cannot think our way out of the wild, out of our animal nature.
