Stacey Stormes

Letter of Intent

“How does a person see the world? The mind constructs an image of the world in a way that parallels how an artist creates a picture of it, by means of a multitude of signs and symbols that create illusions of reality,” as Lynne Gamwell states in Exploring the Invisible: Art, Science, and the Spiritual. Naturally it follows that as artists we are exploring the very nature of illusions and of reality itself. Whatever concerns are most prevalent in our lives, whatever illusions seem most real are often what we tend to depict in our work. For me, art is an investigation of the spiritual, of the balance between the physical and ephemeral, a striving to create a visual dialogue, a means of personal growth, a development of ideas and ideals. Art is a mirror of our world through which we gain deeper knowledge.      Among my influences I must count not only artists but also theologians, scientists, and writers who have imparted seeds which blossom into new incarnations in my art. As Albert Einstein states, “Science without religion is lame; religion without science is blind.” I feel as well that all disciplines are enriched by relations to each other. In my art I explore scientific, philosophical, and spiritual theories and their connections. As Minor White did, I strive to capture an image which will elicit an emotion in the viewer or spark an epiphany which need not exactly replicate my own thought process or feeling in the creation. As long as my audience receives something positive from my work, I have succeeded. Currently I am intrigued by ideas of the nature of our makeup, of what is our essence, how our physical and mental selves connect and how scientists and theologians have proposed these things, especially in their connection to art. By creating art which explores these and other ideas, I hope to open a dialogue which excludes no one, but encourages people to form a pragmatic and metaphysically enriched view accepting of others.      While I am motivated to create highly metaphysical imagery at times, I am more concerned with finding a connection with the viewer and their own process than with imparting any set of beliefs through my work. I wish for my work to affect the viewer, but just as importantly I wish for the viewer to affect the work. Interactivity in art is a strong interest of mine. Art has such a transforming quality and also is so open to subjectivity it becomes affected by it’s viewer for an artwork takes on a new life with every interpretation put to it. It is only a natural evolution to make works which are visually and physically affected through their interaction with the viewer. I wish to create works which transform the viewing space immersing the viewer in the art itself and leaving them with a sense of their own unity with the artwork.      Electronic media can easily explore ideas of space, time, and environment in ways it is more difficult for other traditional mediums to achieve. It is when the media is exploited in such a way as to elicit an interaction from the viewer rather than passive observation and when the media is pushed to actually transform or interact in some way with the viewing space when video/electronic art is most successful. Finding a way for the art to interact with the space is as essential as ensuring the art will in some way captivate the viewer and elicit a response. I hope to push beyond simple movie style presentation in artworks or at least manipulate and react to it or challenge it in some way using presentation as a strong element of the content and utilizing inherent qualities of the media to enhance the concept. The presentation must support the content, add to the viewing experience, and be a conscientious decision on the part of the artist for an electronic work to be its most successful.      I strive to eventually be able to create works which fuse multidisciplinary elements in such a way as Nam June Paik achieved in his intermedia approach as in TV Cello which beautifully brings together the organic and mechanical. The TV Cello is in itself a great feat of presentation of electronic media; yet when combined with the performance element of actually playing the cello the work of art transcends status of mere object to become an interactive melding of organic and synthetic engaging the viewers and the cellist with the technology. I hope to fuse movement, imagery, sound, and text in a similar way to transform the viewing environment with my artwork and to successfully go beyond a passive viewing response by fully engaging the viewer as an active participant in the creation of the work and allowing the viewer to affect the artwork while leaving the viewer affected as Mariko Mori has achieved with Wave UFO.      As I continue to grow as an artist I hope to achieve these goals and create art which also fuses the natural and technological in a way that transforms the viewing environment successfully utilizing the presentation aspects of the art to support its content and accentuate its beauty and elicit reaction and often actively engage the viewer in an interaction with the art rather than always remaining separate and forcing the viewer to remain passive. In my own way I wish to push the electronic media to unique manifestations of vision and prove that presentation can be more than a necessary element of viewing to become a strong conveyor of content and form.