Home
ArchiveBorn 1953 in Sacramento, CA
Conversation: Joe Amrhein and Ati Maier. July 28, 2008. (catalogue: Städtische Galerie Wolfsburg, 2008)
I used to use site-specific language, words that would describe a place. Or I would use words or letters that would be repeated. Now I'm using words I've appropriated, language that is usually from art-critiques. That hyperbole and exaggerated language is poetic in a way. When trying to describe artwork, especially out of context, it's hard to make any sense out of it sometimes. I just love that exaggeration in language. I utilize this by bringing it back into my art making. Usually art criticism has a very linear direction; artwork is made, then it's reviewed and it ends there-it becomes abstract. Some years after I started this work I read a quote by Robert Smithson that really resonated with me. He said “that writing on art replaces presence by absence by substituting the abstraction of language for the real thing.” I'm pulling it back into art-making again.
 Joe Amrhein, Detailfülle, 2008, Enamel, Gold Leaf on Mylar, 242.5 x 190 cm |
