Artist’s Statement: Gay Bullying

April 4, 2011

My current abstract paintings are inspired by the suicides of several teenaged boys in fall 2010, who were bullied for being gay.  The multi-layered paintings use a colorful but unsettling palette of yellow-greens, pinks, purples, reds, and blacks.  Some figurative elements emerge, particularly spindly or cartoonish legs which suggest vulnerability. Expressive bursts of drawing come from a personal sense of urgency and upset over the suicides; many pencil marks are not drawn lines at all, but desperate and furious tracks carved again and again through the paint. Dripping, dangling shapes conjure anguish and heartbreak suggestive of the bullied teens, but also of viewers who may look on these stories from a place of adult wisdom and, perhaps, shared experience.

It Gets Better, Acrylic and mixed media on panel, 6 x 6, In the private collection of Dan Savage

Fragile, Acrylic on panel, 6 x 12, SOLD

Encounter, Acrylic and pencil on panel, 24" x 24", $1500

In Secret, Acrylic and pencil on panel, 36" x 48", $3000

Yellow, Acrylic on panel, 8 x 10, SOLD

Five Boys, Acrylic and mixed media on panel, 48 x 48, $4000

Bridge, acrylic and pencil on panel, 36 x 48, $3000

Twitt
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Related posts:

  1. Thank You, Mr. President
  2. Maura McGurk, International Women Artists’ Salon Member Spotlight
  3. Maura McGurk’s First Solo Show: Pride and Prejudice, An Exhibition on Gay Bullying
  4. Pride and Prejudice
  5. Vermont Studio Center: Artist’s Statement
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