Michael Alan

Artist Statement

To create something beautiful, and then disfigure the dynamics of the structure. Go back in and recreate the system of drawing by finding the opposite. To distrust what is easy.

I'm interested in dissecting and amplifying pieces, sampling and distorting with a touch of pretty. My work is a combination of aggressive action, harmonious opposites, close observation, agitation, mutation, crossbreeding, and undetermined hypotheses.

I question history and time, warping understandings, cutting, pasting, arranging and pushing all media. I'm interested in psychological, rhythmic lines, overlapped. Each piece has a concept. I think before I act, and act while I think. The studio is flooded with strange sounds; my neighbors grow inquisitive.

I'm working on The Destruction of Travel. It's a confusing time period, artistically, socially, financially. Time is speeding up; inward struggle is at a hyper state. Change creates ambiguous actions, arriving at a new platform. I use many materials to convey a dialogue of visual change. In 2008, I originally conceived this body of work as a critique of the progression of art history and time - the Chronic Time Exaggerators - that now has expanded to question everything.

My performances are an extension of these ideas, and a reaction to tradition; a restructuring of how we attend a performance. My drawings come to life, working through performers. I turn them into sculptures, the same way I create a painting. Essentially, my drawings get a chance to live 3-dimensionally. I return to my studio and build sculptures that are based on these performances.

I start my line drawings at the performances; the motion and energy is what interests me. My paper is the emotional reader. If I do not capture motion or emotion, I destroy it.

I want to capture the radiating energy of the performance rather than the look of the artist, sampling a piece and then building a whole: microcosms of action. Click here to view my Drawings