2019 - 2020 Painting — Cristina Marian

With any new encounter I have in the U.S. people ask me, “Where are you from?” For most people that would be an easy question to answer. For me, I find that I reside between two realities: in Romania, I am the person that used to live there but moved here, while in the U.S. I am the person that moved here but am actually from there. A recent investigation into my transitional life experiences, including the one of being an immigrant, brought me to examine mental and physical liminal spaces. Immigrants or not, we all have transitory experiences. Some of these experiences come naturally when passing through different stages of our lives, either by choice or through unexpected yet inevitable events. Liminal experiences are shaping our identity because they inform our response to the world and the way we interact with each other.

My experience of liminality is a tormented space in which I lost my power and control. I float between two or more places, feeling marginal and inferior, while searching for stable ground. I live in between different social structures, political regimes, cultural habits, languages, and various expectations. Drifting from place to place has meant internal confusion and continual self-assessment and renegotiation of my identity, both past and present. However, drifting has its advantages. It has offered me unusual points of view, widened my understanding of life and the world we live in. It has offered the feeling of infinite possibility, and it has helped me sharpen my instincts while learning new skills. In this space of in between, creativity, flexibility and resilience are activated and established.

NEITHER HERE NOR THERE series of paintings is the result of this reflection. With a play between representational and abstraction, unfixed and concrete, confusion and wonder, I seek to chronicle different liminal climates. My aim is to create environments as visual embodiments of liminality and hybridity. Through a range of media used in the paintings, I create an unstable, ambiguous atmosphere that reflects and reminiscences upon my transitional experiences. There is no linear narrative in the work, but an intermingling of empty or chaotic surfaces with recognizable elements that emerge or submerge from these fields, incorporating a feeling of perpetual motion. Electric poles, industrial machinery, a building, a boat, a tree, or a fire, could be landmarks, or they could be elements that marked moments in my life. For the viewer, they are visual and/or narrative points of departure, or perhaps arrival. I often use the de-collages technique, a tearing down action that can be related to the separation, isolation, and negotiation occurring in a transitory experience. By channeling the same enthusiasm as a child has when discovering new things, I seek to combine media in innovative and unconventional ways, to diversify the materials used in my practice and learn what each one of them has to offer.

TURNING WORLD

TURNING WORLD

FROM HERE, FROM THERE

FROM HERE, FROM THERE

IN PROGRESS

TEMPER

INVENTORY

CIRCUMSTANCES

YESTERDAY WAS A BETTER DAY

YESTERDAY WAS A BETTER DAY

TALE FROM THE ROAD

TALE FROM THE ROAD

VAGUELY FAMILIAR

VAGUELY FAMILIAR

WANDERLUST

APPARITIONS

WHERE PAST AND FUTURE ARE GATHERED

WHERE PAST AND FUTURE ARE GATHERED

TURNING WORLD

TURNING WORLDacrylic, pencils, image transfer and ink on canvas, 20ft x 5ft

TURNING WORLD

TURNING WORLDInstallation shot from “The Space of Hope: A Collective Response”, Missoula Art Museum. (Sculpture by William Carson, other paintings by Kathryn Schmidt).

FROM HERE, FROM THERE

FROM HERE, FROM THEREacrylic, pencils, image transfer and ink on canvas, 60 x 48”

IN PROGRESS

IN PROGRESSacrylic, pencils and ink on canvas, 60 x 48”

TEMPER

TEMPERacrylic, ink and pencils on canvas, 84 x 66”

INVENTORY

INVENTORYacrylic, pencils, image transfer and ink on canvas, 24 x 24”

CIRCUMSTANCES

CIRCUMSTANCESacrylic, pencils, image transfer and ink on canvas, 60 x 36”

YESTERDAY WAS A BETTER DAY

YESTERDAY WAS A BETTER DAYacrylic, pencils, image transfer and ink on canvas, 60 x 36”

TALE FROM THE ROAD

TALE FROM THE ROADacrylic, pencil, image transfer, ink on canvas, 48 x 48”

VAGUELY FAMILIAR

VAGUELY FAMILIARacrylic, pencil, image transfer, ink on canvas, 24 x 24”

WANDERLUST

WANDERLUSTacrylic, pencils, image transfer and ink on canvas, 24 x 24”

APPARITIONS

APPARITIONSacrylic, pencils, image transfer and ink on canvas, 24 x 24”

WHERE PAST AND FUTURE ARE GATHERED

WHERE PAST AND FUTURE ARE GATHEREDacrylic, pencils, image transfer and ink on canvas, 60 x 48”

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