Jennifer Trask

Statement

Flourish is a continuation of Unnatural Histories, which delves into our precarious, at times, contentious, relationship with nature. We admire it, we collect it, attempt to contain it, and regulate it. Yet somehow we see ourselves as separate from it, beyond its reach and influence. In this second chapter, germination takes place across disciplines, as well as cross-species. Rendered in vines refusing containment, growth that confounds expectations, the jewelry object sprouts from the painting and reaches past the two dimensional plane. The ornament drifts beyond the wearable object and into the picture plane, stones are set directly into the encaustic medium and frames themselves. Flora and fauna thrive and outgrow containment metaphorically and literally. Central to all works in this series is the use of bone or ivory. Used literally to express definitive physical sensation and emotional sentiment, (e.g.: “feel it in my bones” or “bone weary”) bone is considered the absolute reductive essence of our physical selves. Bones linger, to be discovered centuries later. While bones seem immutable, they evolve like any cell and incorporate evidence of what we ate, how we worked, injuries, illnesses, and environmental conditions during our lifetime. Lead, copper and iron, among other elements, bind to our bones as obscure mementos of our experiences. Measurable amounts of these same heavy metals are absorbed by flora as well.

These are portraits of the unintended cultivars. Oddly metaphoric, the results are neither clearly baneful nor benign. The paintings and frames manifest a peculiar romanticized vision of nature at the same time betray a very human passion to possess nature itself. Flora and fauna, mineral and vegetal, ornamental and intrinsic, coalesce as hybrids that refer to the remarkable ability of nature to adapt and evolve in virtually any circumstance, manmade or natural. Branches bear fruit of bone and iron. Bones house seeds and grow leaves. My hope is that in a moment of visceral delight, or simply curiosity, perhaps one might reclaim a sense of wonder or a tangible shift in perspective.

Jennifer Trask

*** The bone and pre-ban ivory is found in my rural environment, or purchased in flea
markets, then altered by carving or inlay. The gold and palladium frameworks are made
from recycled material only.

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