I always feel that whatever I say about my practice or work today will make me seem like a fool tomorrow. I feel like I am always in flux, being affected and altered by life and so my thinking about my work will always be in flux with me. It makes my seem wishy-washy perhaps, but I feel that I am more like a blade of grass, rooted in my core beliefs and fundamental practices, while my concepts and intentions move in the wind. They are affected by new understandings and events, making me aware of different things, hopefully growing taller and stronger along the way.

These core beliefs and fundamental practices that ground me in my practice, deal with the physicality of sculpture and the embodiment of the viewer and how they inform and enforce each other. To begin, the physicality of sculpture would not exist without the necessary embodiment of the viewer. As human beings, our ethereal minds are dependent on a physical body loaded with sensing organs. Our physical body give us a perspective of the world around us. Because of this, a person’s state of mind, their emotions and thoughts, can drastically change depending on the stimuli of our physical surroundings. This gives me the ability to create sculptures and objects that can alter this state of mind and change a person’s understating of their position in space. For example, where a small object might make a viewer feel big, a big sculpture or object can make them feel small.

The work I am making now is about re-adjusting our world perspective. Our intimate daily interactions are with technology that is small and commands little energy. Relative to our bodies, this technology feels powerful, yet to the scale of the universe is laughably inconsequential on an individual basis. My sculptures are intended to remind the viewer of their place in the bigger universe. I wish to destroy the dream that our situation and technology is the pinnacle of creation, and introduce humility into our relationship with the world around us.


CONTACT
jmccoy@ualberta.ca