Grad Show Art Exhibition
for jonathan from TORRES, is an attempt to speak about the traumas that I suffered throughout my childhood, and as a queer/gay man living in a heteronormative society. Using a variety of creative processes, I undertake to weave my past, present, and future together to create a narrative throughout the exhibition.
As a child, I always knew what to do whenever I picked up a crayon, a pencil, glitter, jewels, or any arts and crafts materials. I let the act of drawing, painting, or being crafty help release and express whatever I had inside of me. As an adult, having gained graphic design knowledge and typographic sensibilities, as well as a love for topics of sex and gender in Renaissance art history, I was provided with the structure and clarity I needed to inform the subject matter in this body of work. My queerness and sexuality had always been made fun off, criticized, taken advantage of, oppressed, and violated throughout my childhood and adolescence. Along with my tumultuous upbringing, these traumas began to damage me, physically, mentally, and sexually. They molded, distorted, and made up the entirety of my identity: Jonathan the inner child, and Torres the adult I have become.
These pieces acknowledge my hardships, and enable me to tap into a visual queer vernacular that I have always loved, but not been allowed to use (glitter, gems, pink, sequins, and discounted Michael’s craft supplies). The show contains many pieces with dense, repetitive, and rough layers, using a variety of different materials and methods including illustration, scanning, collaging, digital imaging, photography, typography, drilling, and sanding to create a cacophony of visuals that express my emotions, thoughts, and experiences as a queer, gay man.
The body of work in this exhibition takes the form of rocks, gems, suns, and hearts, with many of them quite big and free-flowing, the larger pieces speak about specific emotions that built up over time, some resolved, some that still linger. The smaller framed pieces highlight individual moments in my life that made me who I am now. Altogether, the works in this exhibition were made to acknowledge Jonathan, the little kid that had to deal with all the trauma and all the baggage growing up. I know that 10-year-old me would have loved seeing all the glitter, gems, and sparkle embedded everywhere in this body of work. I dedicate this show to you and to me, to jonathan & to TORRES.
