SEEING THINGS: MELISSA ORESKY

Melissa Oresky is a painter that recently exhibited her work at Western Exhibitions from October 16 to November 14th, 2009.

What's your work about right now?

My newest paintings and drawings, the works titled Rock Gardens are,in no particular order: about prismatic color, the structures and textures of rocks and minerals, folded spaces, and they also draw an analogy between paintings as gardens — the act of painting as akin to the act of gardening. They are made in what I would describe as pairs, rather than diptychs, since they don’t need to be seen side by side. Working back and forth between 2 pieces allows two versions of an idea to play out in aparallel, asynchronous relationships. This reflects my studio practice which often feels like a conversation with myself. The pairings can agree and disagree with each other. Each painting is meant to effect multiple spaces and scales for the viewer simultaneously, so the experience of looking at them is always dynamic and shifting.

> Who/What are your influences?

I am heavily influenced by conversations I have with trusted friends- other artists. I will plug my artist friends here- some are in New York, where I spent 3 months last spring, and some are in Chicago. Siebren Versteeg, Charlotte Glynn, Jef Scharf (aka Wolfy of Kayrock Screenprinting) Nina Bovasso, Munro Galloway, Andreas Fischer, Carrie Gundersdorf, are all artists whose ideas, work, and our dialogues have affected me strongly over the last year.

When I’m making my work I think about the spaces and phenomenon that I have observed in the world, having traveled lately to Germany where I paid a lot of attention to the landscape of parks and formal gardens, and to New Mexico, where I hiked, became interested in rocks, and read a lot about geology. The pieces have come to be about comparative ideas of landscape rather than any individual landscapes or places I have experienced. Otherwise, I am a big science fiction fan. Scientific ideas provoke art ideas for me.

> Where do you go to come up with imagery?

I have a collection of my own landscape photographs that I use directly as collage elements printed simply as b&w laser prints. I also have been looking at The Audobon Field Guide to North American Rocks and Minerals, my bible for the current body of work. As well as diagrams and photographs of a variety of gardens. I also generate imagery simply through my working process, doing things repetitively, defining and refining a revolving set of of painting moves, marks, forms, and ideas, and combining and recombining them to generate new imagery. The images are formed through formal play, and through an interest in constructing volumes and spaces that are basically abstract and invented but should also resonate with the viewer’s own tactile and spatial experiences.

> and maybe tell a story if you want...whatever.

Hmm. Don’t know if I’ve got any really relevant stories…