My Father, and his Father were photographers. My Grandfather had a little dark room where he developed his work and was a photographer during WWI in France. He worked for Iowa Lithographing all his life except when he was in the war. He was an Artist, Inventor and avid Outdoorsman. My Father and he taught me all I needed to know about photography and I’ve had one all my life. Thousands and thousands of photos are stored in albums and boxes and on cloud drives, flash drives and external hard drives. It would take years for me to catalog all of them. Here is just a teenie tiny miniscule fraction of a drop of DNA for your viewing pleasure. By the way, in “no” way am I a professional, I just use my camera as another medium, like my mechanical pencil or Micron Pigma ink pens.
Look at the little things in life and you’ll see more than you can ever imagine. – vlvh
Artivism is a portmanteau word combining art and activism. … In many cases artivists attempt to push political agendas by the means of art, but a focus on raising social, environmental, and technical awareness is also common. – Wikipedia
99 to 1 : Women and the 1%
Gender and Income Inequality
Through extensive online research I found photographs of 99 women not known to be wealthy using random search words. These women represent the 99%. I printed the photographs, traced their faces, and researched royalty, aristocrats and socialites that might be of their ancestral lineage. I create new portraits of these women incorporating clothing, headdresses and jewelry from possible royal, aristocratic or socialite ancestors and shift the 99% into the 1%.
During research and production new areas of interest arose which lead to writing fictional descriptions based on real facts and adding women who committed crimes and women known to be wealthy.
Education doesn’t stop when you leave school and it doesn’t just happen in the classroom. My Artist’s Soul has an endless thirst for knowledge and I feel empty if I’m not learning something new everyday.
Continuing education, film, books and experiences are a constant source of inspiration and I can not say enough how important education is to all of us. Never stop learning. Never.
Two books in my studio library that changed the trajectory of my work over the past twelve years are “The Artist’s Way” by Julia Cameron and “The Mission of Art” by Alex Grey. “The Artist’s Way” was a turning point when I was stuck and by gathering a small group of others to go through the process with me, I changed the way I thought about my art. Journaling “The Mission of Art” embedded Alex Grey’s concepts in my psyche and expanded the way I look at the world and the innate truth behind the Artist’s spark and reason for being. I highly recommend these two books.
From 2010 to 2018 I made a lot of my own art! I hadn’t made that much art since leaving Iowa State and it was a magical period filled with ideas and inspiration in many mediums.
Work Doodles
In the Spring of 2018 these images were drawn during a stressful period in my day job life. They were a type of medicine I injected into my soul as a way to escape from an environment of negativity. I called them “Work Doodles”. They helped alleviate my suffering tremendously.
My hand moved on scratch paper. I started with a line not knowing where it would take me then took a picture secretly with my cell phone so I wouldn’t get caught. When I got home, I corrected the lighting using Photoshop
This short notice digital residency has forced me to take a fast and hard look at my Life’s Work. Thank you Rachel Buse for the push. The timing couldn’t have been any better as I move into a new phase of my life. Everything happens for a reason, and this is one of several positive things that have happened since my INK365Draw show at Five Monkeys was cancelled (rescheduled to Sat. Nov. 20th 6-8 p.m.)
This residency has pushed me to reflect on the past, today and the future. Long ago I started my Artist’s Journey with a scholarship at the art center, then aced every course in high school and the one year I spent at Grandview majoring in Art. However, as I’m sure many of you can relate to, life gets in the way and can change your journey. That’s what happened to me.
Art has always been with me and used “alot” in other ways, but many times my own art was not a priority. Sure I rolled all those credits at Grandview and the University of Chicago into a Minor in Design Studies at Iowa State, but I knew at the age I was when I returned to my studies that I couldn’t live on an Artist’s salary, I had to be smart to put a roof over my head and went with my second passion, hospitality, which I knew I could make a lot of money doing.
Fast forward, the 60+ 365/7, high paying career is gone, and it took forty three years to get back to where I left off, spending the past eleven years fully immersed in my unconventional art practices mostly part-time, but now full time with a side job. Complete reversal and I cannot put into words the feelings I have about coming back to where I’m supposed to be. I have always been an Artist, since I was six years old. It’s about time I returned home and share my work with you.
Valerie Van Horne 