Well I am posting here cause I need your help. I am an international student applying to art school for graduate studies. I had to really first write it in my native language and have it translated. If you could please read it and give me any feed back would be appreciated. Thanks.
Here it is:
What I want to express through my paintings is a special space in which I am conscious of my existence. This space accidentally appears to me while I am concentrating on my painting. When I am absorbed in my painting, I feel as if I were sliding into a different world where only the canvas, colors and I exist and everything else around me fades away from my consciousness. During this moment, I hardly hear familiar sounds, such as a car horn or human noises and it seems that everything is separated around me. During this moment, I experience silent enthusiasm and my consciousness of my existence reaches the pinnacle. I get crazy about this separated space and time, which I desire to visualize in my paintings.
As a way to express this moment in my paintings, I try to embody this moment in the shape of a crack, because I feel as if I were entering my own world through this tiny crack, which isolates me from the outside. As a result, that crack becomes a route for me to travel between reality and the other world. I always wished to draw this 'crack' which guides me into my consciousness of my existence. For articulating this crack through my paintings, I attempted to create an empty space on canvas, by covering the canvas with melted paraffin and carving it. However, it failed to satisfy me. All these attempts were not the direct reflections of this crack itself, but metaphorical expressions of comparing it to similar materials. Then, how can I describe this ethereal feeling?
I wanted to express the space in itself rather than to create a metaphor of it. I wanted to portray my experiences within that space as they were. I believe the most critical element of influencing the entire mood of paintings is its colors. Ratio, density and arrangement of colors determine the ambience of the paintings. Therefore, I use primary colors with heavy tones for expressing my solitary feeling within that space. Then, by ways of instilling, flowing out and leading colors in one direction, I try to visualize this space through the expression of my feelings separating from the real world.
However, these days, I am bombarded by a new challenge, to express a surreal characteristic of that space. On one canvas the arrangement of two contrasting things make each stand out in bold relief. In addition, a distinct boundary appears between these two things as when complementary colors are arranged next to each other. Therefore, in my works, I try to present distinctly contrastive factors; in and out, top and bottom and two dimensions and three dimensions. Then, I find boundaries between the two opposing descriptions and try to blur the boundary lines to make them indiscernible. I thought that by blurring boundaries, blending unmixable contrasting elements, creates a rather surrealistic space for symbolizing my own space. Which was what I intended to express. I am in the attempt of making the boundaries hazier. All of these processes give me a feeling of excitement and surges of energy. I would like to develop this subject in graduate programs.
As “my own separated space” reveals, my work is separated from my daily life. Even though I try to find commonality of these two different worlds, I have to discard many things among my normal life. Doing so, these inner conflicts are reflected in my paintings. I abhor my works, which do not genuinely present my thoughts as they are, but to which are camouflaged with just showy images of little meanings. Therefore, my goal as an artist will be to dismiss unnecessary things and express only a core value of my subject. I will try to figure out the exact scope and purpose of what I want to express and I will pursue to express only that subject without any affectation. In art, eighty percent of the expression is not acceptable. It is either a total success or a total failure. Even if my painting may be treated as a poor, I should not succumb to temptation of cheap images and should maintain my bold willingness to express my own thoughts as they are. I have decided to come out of my cave where I used to stay for my work and I would like to continue this attempt in graduate school.
I have an unshakable passion as an artist and I realized that I had this firm passion while I was in America studying English and traveling neglecting my art. During that time, I came to the desire to burst my continuously rising thoughts and emotions through my art work. Although more often than not, the work as an artist drives me into severe despair, I realized that the void caused by lack of thinking and expressing, discouraged me to the degree that I wanted to give up on life. Once I realized this, I restarted my artistic work and dedicated a whole year to my work after I came back home. I secluded my self and spent my solitary times asking questions to myself and finding the answers for myself. I always wanted to achieve a perfect completion of my work first before I let them be critiqued in public. However, I found that the time of “perfect completion” will never come and my works will always be flowing on the streams leading into certain places, embracing their incompleteness and endless doubts.
In December of 2007, I found that it is time that I faced criticism even if I were still on the incomplete stage. In addition, I realized that I needed to be exposed to an ever so inspiring environment where I can be stimulated by colleagues’ diverse attempts through daily contact with them. These motivations caused me to apply for a graduate program and I am sure that graduate school will make me more competitive before setting out to sunset in an ever so challenging world. I expect the education at a graduate program to play constructive functions in realizing my dream as an artist and I believe that I am qualified to pursue the graduate study based on my experiences and passions.
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