Artist statement: The Inner Artist 1.

I believe we have tremendous growth occurring through our activities in the studio as artists. It’s not the intention in this last chapter to go into these particular transformative possibilities, as each of us has experiences in our studios, which form our own individual transformation as artists and form our own transformation with the work. This can happen in the way of making spectacular jumps in perception, simply through being alert to the accident occurring in your work.

Art Review on John Dahlsen’s work in New York

Dahlsen, by comparison, is an optimist. To begin with, he’s already made a positive statement by clearing off the unsightly stuff that is lethal to fish and fowl. (Australia’s wildlife conservancies adore Dahlsen’s work, which was hardly his intention, but so be it.)
He wanted to impart a kind of Minimalist stability to his jumbles of deep true colours. One early assemblage of coffee lids, cooler fragments and bottle tops shared the ethereal white-on-white aura of a Robert Ryman abstraction or a William Bailey still life—only much more energetically. Piling up black combs, disposable razors and pieces of rope yielded a Louise Nevelson-like sculpture with attitude.

Artist Statement 2 on creating websites

I want to explain here, that expense and complication doesn’t have to be the case. I’m now going to teach you in the following explanation, how to set up what is known as a blog.
A blog is essentially a website. On the Internet these days, it is very easy to find blog sites that are free. One such site, which is owned by Google is called blogger.com.
There is also another one called WordPress.com, which is also a great blog facility. Follow these easy steps to set up your own site. Simply follow the prompts, which are as follows:

Artist Statement on Public Speaking 7

In one sense your topic is already defined. How do you make yourself unique given that the above is true? It is important to remember that whether you’re an artist, a student, a bureaucrat in the arts industry, everyone has their own unique story to tell, this is simply because everyone is different and has had different life experiences that brings them to the point where they are in their lives.

Interviews about John Dahlsen’s Environmental Artwork 13b

Dahlsen has collected his “found” material all along the northern NSW coastline, a latter-day beachcomber. “I’ve even been to South Stradbroke Island, where I was artist in residence at Couran Cove at one stage,” he says.
“I walked up and down the 17km of beach there, and over a couple of weeks collected 70 or 80 jumbo garbage bags full of things that had washed up on the shore.”

Interviews about John Dahlsen’s Environmental Artwork 13a

“I feel the planet is in very fragile shape. I believe it could go either way, and I felt that by joining with Big Brother I could do my bit to help,” he explains. His motives were initially misconstrued by some of his associates, who accused him of selling out to the forces of commercialism, but he claims to have won them back.
“It doesn’t take too much intelligence to see what my intentions were. Some people saw my artworks on the program and judged me because they weren’t aware of the green theme,” he says.

Interviews about John Dahlsen’s Environmental Artwork 11b

I’m constantly surprised to see the variations in these plastics, very much like how I am intrigued by the beach found objects I have collected over the years.

I imagine these plastic bags, which mostly have a lifespan of many years, are in fact on the verge of extinction, as it is only a matter of time before governments impose such strict deterrents to people using them that they become a thing of the past. A fitting end to what has become such a scourge to our environment on a worldwide scale.

Interviews about John Dahlsen’s Environmental Artwork 8

Like a Mark Rothko painting (an influence Dahlsen acknowledges), the colour combinations are at once so subtle yet so strong that they can spur powerful emotions.

The garbage offers a complex range of hues, textures, and sizes. Yet any sense of awe is tempered by the dismay of recollecting what the assemblages are made of. It’s hard not to see that it’s trash inside the frame.

Interviews about John Dahlsen’s Environmental Artwork 6

When he first started, he stumbled upon vast amounts of plastic ocean debris, collecting them in 80 jumbo garden bags full of beach-found litter. “When I first piled this collection up in my studio, I had friends drop by asking if I was okay!” he adds.
John didn’t see a giant mound of trash – rather, his unseen intelligence was at work. He saw a giant painter’s palate of colours and shapes, hues and forms: selections of yellow coloured plastics, the red, then the blues, the rope and strings, the plastic coke bottles, the thongs… the list goes on.
“As I worked with these objects, I became even more fascinated by the way they had been modified and weathered by the ocean and nature’s elements,” says Mr Dahlsen.

Interviews about John Dahlsen’s Environmental Artwork 5

My challenge as an artist is to take these found objects, which might on first meeting have no apparent dialogue and to work with them until they speak and tell their story.”??

This work was made from found driftwood objects collected from Australian beaches. ??From the artist statement; “My creative medium changed to found art as a result of one such ‘accident’ in 1997. I was collecting driftwood, on a remote Victorian Coastline, with the intention of making furniture and stumbled upon vast amounts of plastic ocean debris. A whole new palette of colour and shape revealing itself to me immediately affected me.

Interviews about John Dahlsen’s Environmental Artwork 4

Initially, Dahlsen was responding to an instinct to clean the beach as he wandered along, but his tidy-ups triggered more than a sense of satisfaction:

“I was amazed at how pristine the beaches looked each time I left a location, but it was also during this collecting time that I became more intrigued by what nature had done to the plastics,” he says.

Once his loot arrived home, the artist set about creating his first environmental work, a semi-abstract “landscape” made from abandoned plastic objects assembled behind perspex.

Interviews about John Dahlsen’s Environmental Artwork 3

While John’s art practice changes and evolves, his underlying commitment, as an artist has never wavered. He has always been motivated by a professional duty to be aware of and express current social, spiritual and environmental concerns through his art practice.

The central concerns of his work are with contemporary art practice. He has for many years been working with found and recycled objects, most hand-picked from somewhere along the Australian Coastline.

“The unabated dumping of thousands of tons of plastics has been expressed in my assemblages, installations, totems, digital prints and public artworks.

Interviews about John Dahlsen’s Environmental Artwork 1

Found Object Art:??Using other objects that are found and recycled, John creates commissioned pieces for cities, parks and businesses. The objects differ depending upon what John finds and could range from recycled surfboards to concrete and metal. Below are examples of those commissioned pieces.??The first, entitled ‘The Guardian’ is made from scraps of steel guardrails and concrete pipe. The second, entitled ‘Convention Centre Jewell Sculpture’ is created from found objects such as fibre optics and stainless steel.

Statements About John Dahlsen’s Environmental Artwork 4

Since then I’ve actually discovered that it’s right around the whole coast of Australia. These plastics are all around the coast, and it’s fairly identical all the way around the coast and it’s not only in Australia but its right around the globe.
It’s just a real contemporary phenomenon that has happened, this ocean litter that is floating around and they’ve made plastics that are lightweight and they do float around and they end up on the beaches across the globe. At that time, I picked up all of the plastics.

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