Some Newer things

Ah, fully wearable wood. Sort of. Like the below pieces, these are sort of studies for some future work I plan on doing. I'm fascinated with how people consume "folk" or "outsider art". It seems a little silly to me. I tend not to place values on art based on the background of the maker, and I see the marketing and consumption of this work as a fabrication. It seems like people overlook the inherent value as the work as a innocent, undeterred creativity, and instead focus on the supposed "otherness" of the work. The recent obsession with folk and outsider art seems to pre-suppose that every person who makes work for the sake of the work instead of for the purpose of installations or gallery exhibitions is some sort of back-woods idiot savant or tortured soul, a la Daniel Johnston or Henry Darger.

Thus, my purpose with these pieces and others forthcoming is to attempt to turn this idea on its head - to make work that looks simply, roughly made in the folk tradition, but reflects the values and accoutrements of a supposed higher class. Photo by Kevin Andrew Jones.

This little has been pretty important in terms of testing out some new design techniques. It's also a last gasp effort to use bloodwood/exotics as something more than just an accent.  Again, picture quality is kind of shitty, but hopefully you can tell the bottoms of the triangular drawers are a heavy watercolor paper than has been sewn to the sides.

 I've since used this technique twice more. One of my current projects is exploring paper as a structural material, so it should be fun to chart the evolution of the process. Oh, and pay no mind to that conspicuously placed copy of Bruce Springsteen's "The River" in the background.