Rachel Warkentin – Artist Statement

I paint figments with varied levels of connection to reality. Within that parameter I am probing relationships between connection and separation, similarity and difference, image and self. Ideas contradict each other, sometimes within one painting, and this mirrors my own thought process. I rarely find myself aligning with the center in an argument, but I frequently find myself cheering on both sides.

I am especially puzzled by the relationship between the imagined and the real. I want to emphasize similarities of foreground and background, action and in action I drop figures into environments that range from semi-familiar to otherworldly, challenging believable space, and confusing the passage of time. The viscosity of the egg tempera acts almost like an amber, holding the oil painted figures in stasis so that their efforts can be examined. The people I paint seem isolated from their own context, even as it surrounds them.

Some figures implicate friends or self, while others are fabricated. A few are composites of real and invented friends and enemies. Repeated figures, or near replicas, can function either as a barrier to individuality, or as a reiteration of a single person through space or time.

I love the idea of pageantry, the way we image ourselves, and the show we put on. I am not sure I ever outgrew my own awkwardness, so I project it into the people I paint, even the exhibitionists. Torn between the comfort of blending in and the desire to stand out, these figures are caught trying to do both at once rather than find a middle ground. Like two transparent colors overlaid, these two ideals coexist without losing their individual integrity.