BRIAN THOMAS JONES is a multidisciplinary artist living and working in Los Angeles

 www.btjart.com

 btjphoto@gmail.com

 IMPERMANENCE

As I grow older, I’m becoming ever more conscious of mortality – my own, my friends and family, both living and dead. As such, I’ve embraced the Japanese art of impermanence, wabi sabi, as a major influence on my current work.  The three basic tenants are – nothing lasts, nothing is finished, nothing is perfect.

 Through these ideas I’m drawn to the dissonance of organic and inorganic materials juxtaposed in 3D assemblage.  The selection and arrangement of the materials is intuitive, approached with no preconceived thoughts of construction.  Each piece evolves through my joy in the process of experimentation until something resonates within me.  I don’t consider the object complete; I just feel when it’s time to stop. I’ve also added these influences to the photographic elements of my practice where content is determined by philosophy.

 Using these tenets, I am freed from the need of fetish finish since the piece is destined for eventual destruction. Therefore, the making of the art for me is a temporal experience, one to be enjoyed as an end in itself, until my own eventual demise.

Viewing art is an act of contemplative discovery. For me, it feels like being an explorer or treasure hunter, except the riches lie in unexpected meaning and beautiful form. My paintings invite viewers to spend time with them- to move about, look closely, and become active visual explores themselves.

These paintings are made entirely with white paint, but they come alive with light as it refracts over the varying matte and iridescent surfaces. As one moves in front of them, or sunlight changes the lighting in the room, the paintings vacillate between abstraction and representation, revealing scenes of liquid transformation: great waves, storms clouds, avalanches, and volcanic flows. The imagery is grand and sometimes tumultuous, but the luminescence, softly painted edges, and transient iridescence has a serene quality as well.

I am fascinated by the history of white-on-white paintings and love how white light is made from all the colors of the spectrum. It is everything and nothing all at once. I make these paintings by airbrushing white paint on a textured, silvery background. To see them in their entirety takes time. Day or night, these paintings always have something to be discovered. In raking sunlight they can feel bright and shimmering and at night they may take on a warm glow from incandescent lights. Their mood is always changing, inviting reinvestigation, discovery, and comfort with change.

My work is a non-linear narrative that focuses on the experiences of womanhood through paint, material, and sculpture. The conversation between these formal elements creates an abstract space integrating domestic structures, psychological atmosphere, and theatricality. The resulting landscape hovers between claustrophobic destruction and vast meditative expanses representing the influence of societal pressures on the psyche. Although disparate the two occasionally unite as architectural rubble and found objects are lovingly interwoven in a healing gesture. In this hybrid space characters are permitted to unabashedly act out inner fears or desires associated with the home, career, and motherhood. The paintings become facilitators for navigating the frail equilibrium of inner monologue and outer influence.