"My usual coping mechanism during stressful times is to detach a bit emotionally and power through, but I guess there are always cracks in the armor, and these images seem to slip out unbidden."
"I want to paint images that are, in some sense, ‘icons,' that represent something I feel I can believe in. I want my pictures to carry conviction beyond technical competence."
"My canvas portrays the different faces of the same woman. Fairy and witch are juxtaposed, there's a duel. I use women as a springboard to show that internal struggle within all of us, wrestling with feelings of happiness and yet unhappiness."
"Growing up, I was most often the first kid to fall in love with something. I felt deep compassion for what was happening around me, empathy for the emotions of others. This became one of the biggest influences on how I developed as an artist."
"Ultimately, I think the paintings are about the push and pull of predator and prey, and the way we encompass those roles within ourselves. This relates to sex, but also religion and history. The ways we justify or do not justify our own agendas to the world and to ourselves."
"There is nothing more astonishing, and rewarding, than to play through a work you've played hundreds of times, and all of a sudden discover a new hidden line..."
"This is how history unfolds, after destruction some things are forever lost, and some can be rebuilt. The result is something new, founded on the lifeline of what was before."
"Don’t forget that we are born of the same land as Ulysses, made for travels and adventures, captains and fighters and explorers at the same time. Even when events don’t provoke us, we provoke events to happen. The artist, from wherever he comes, is born much like Ulysses."
I am part of the Balkan tradition. All of these dark memories are part of me, they are inside my blood, inside my mind. They dwell inside me. And, of course, they become part of my poetry, too.
One of the gifts of Aleah Chapin's body-of-work is the idea that true intimacy is achieved first and foremost by revealing oneself honestly. That through vulnerability we are able to deeply connect. One’s imperfections can actually make connection with others deeper, stronger. More real.
I invited some of the special people I know ~ from poets whose work has appeared in Combustus magazine to a dancer friend of mine who immigrated from Hungary ~ to share with us some of the wisdom they’ve received over the years from their fathers as well as what has been passed on to their own children.
Consider the paintings of 22-year-old Teresa Oaxaca, a classically trained aritst who layers elaborate costumes onto her portrait subjects ~ as well as onto her own body. By all rights, what we take in before us ought to be thick with disguise. But are they? Or is the psyche somehow rendered even more transparent to the viewer's eye?