Rafael Francisco Salas

Artist Statement

11/3/10

The Midwestern landscape has come to be one the greatest influences on my artistic research. It conjures a sublime beauty, almost terrifying in grandeur.  However, it can also be pedestrian and bland at the same time.  The landscape of the Midwest is harsh, and reflects the bitterness of seasonal extremes, but displays moments of beauty to match.

My recent paintings describe the landscape and its moods that I have observed in Wisconsin.  They include natural occurrences, as well man made events and architecture which complement and conflict with the land in ways that I find interesting. The intersections of the natural and created world define contemporary life in the Midwest.  How we view ourselves and the landscape is quickly transforming as development and land use changes in the 21st Century.  Our architecture and habits rub up against what is native or wild, and those conversations become important parts of how we define ourselves.

My artwork also contains elements of abstraction, nonrepresentational moments that allude to the legacy of abstract expressionism in art history, but in a greater sense have other connections- the “noise” we see in digital imagery, or an emotional response that can be laid upon the landscape itself.  My use of abstraction can also begin to take the shape of a human presence and become a sort of universal “portraiture.”