ARTWORK BY JOHN RAUX @johnrauxart-blog - Tumblr Blog

Serious or silly. Sacred or diabolical. My pseudo symmetrical rorschach mural on Do Good Co in Kansas City brings forms and viewers alike into a dialogue about the interconnected and woven nature of urban life, the hidden symbols right in our face and the semantics involved to share the interpretations of what we see and how it reflects our different views.

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Topography of the Spirit.

The seven woodblock arches hold space for us to contemplate what is essential in our histories (like fingerprints), in our wanderings (like topographical maps), in our hidden depths (like oceans), in our formation (like woven fabric), and in our transformation (like carved wood). They hold space for us to meditate upon the mysteries of our faith, on the work of our hearts, and the prayers of our hands and feet. They make room for our imaginations to linger, for our senses to attune and for our walls to have windows into the unknown.

These pieces were created in 2018 for Jacob’s Well Church’s contemporary hospitality and multipurpose expansion, designed by BNIM.

“Clothing Identity in Relationship”

Community is a conversation between diverse personalities, life experiences, and cultural backgrounds. It’s woven together by shared streets, language, food and time. Every individual is a knot of things done and left undone whose memories and unique story are indeed a part of the larger conversation unfolding.

These two figures are neither male or female, black or white. The personified forms reference twisted clothing while the wood carved texture mimics fingerprints. The two comic bubbles between the figures contrast our internal thoughts and ideas with our external words and conversations. Clothing and Community are action verbs.

This woodblock mural was commissioned and completed at the end of 2017 on the particle boards protecting the windows of the building being remodeled into the Troost Market Collective.

In 2017, while in New York, I explored the textures of the built environment through this series of (200+) graphite rubbings/ drawings. A publication of this work will come out in the winter of 2018.

When I was young I moved around a lot....as in the places that I’ve lived outnumber my age. Adaptation is the critical life skill that you learn when navigating new spaces, communities, and cultures. Without routine, memories blur. Normal is illusory. Everything is contextual. Photos and objects collected become the mementos of time, process and experience.

These small sculptures are both an exploration of process as well as a record of it. The work developed intuitively in response to discoveries made along the way. Individually the pieces range in form, texture and design when collectively there are many ways to navigate how they correspond to one another. There is a playful prompting of not just what we see but how we see it. Our unseen states of mind largely inform our context and perspective. Sometimes the best things to share with the world are the objects of our experiences that create space for the views that they evoke.

I exhibited the “Leçons d'objet” series at Weinberger Fine Arts in 2017.

In 2016 I started modifying my tools and manipulating my drawing surfaces to create the graphite drawings in my Formational Movements series.

In 2014, while in residency at Takt in Berlin, I exhibited my Creatures and cultures series of figurative graphite drawings. I was referencing the alien “cultures” of gut bacteria while reflecting on our sense of self in relationship with the unknown.

Passages

In the summer of 2009, I moved to Asia (Nepal, India, Bhutan, and Thailand) for a year. After starting a series of 8″x 6″ acrylic paintings in Kathmandu, my visa expired and forced me to quickly pack my bags, strap them to my mountain bike and take the long way across Nepal into India. Two years later, while in residency at BNIM, I discovered the half finished paintings and decided to complete them in America. In 2012 I exhibited the series, revisiting and contemplating the passages between time, experience and cultures.

In 2013 I made a series of 75 paintings on 13″x 19″cardstock exploring mark making, layers, and lines over time.

Riding the Lines

In 2011, I spent two weeks doing portraits on Etch-A-Sketch in the subways of New York. The performance documented and provoked the sleepy, distracted and disconnected cultural mechanisms within the closed doors and lives of the daily commute. The work aimed to be a subtle catalyst of surprise, interaction, and childlike curiosity through the medium of a recognizable toy. Finally, I presented each drawing to the subject/s inviting them to erase themselves.

Wholes In 2011 I created a series of double-sided acrylic paintings exploring boundaries, limitations of view, and the spectrums of seemingly dichotomous relationships.

In the spring of 2010, I created and exhibited a series of 11″x 16″ acrylic on paper paintings while in residence at JAAGA in Bangalore, India.

The Journey of Home

Before moving to Asia in 2009, I exhibited a series of 16″x24″ oil paintings reflecting on my relationship with home in America and the expectations of midwestern urban culture.

Meandering Conclusions.

In 2007 I backpacked from Mexico to Canada on the Pacific Crest Trail. These 6'x11' oil paintings on canvas are how I processed the journey and return to the city from the wilderness.

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ARTWORK BY JOHN RAUX