Artist's Statement
"I discovered through building this body of work as a whole that I, like John Ruskin, value the handmade objects of this world. The attention to detail, picking which stave would be woven to the next, reminded me of my childhood growing up on the farm working with my hands. Unlike Ruskin I also saw the value of the machine and the industrial process and how it made life quicker, faster, and cheaper. I merged these two processes: The handmade weavings and bending of wood and the industrial strength of steel fabrication into forms that reminded me of home.
The forms I built came to me twisting towards the sky like the trees and plants of my father’s farm towering over me when I was a child. The trees where picker’s ladders were placed in. I felt tied to that heritage, tied to the farm, and tied to that rural community from my past. I was not alone in leaving my farming heritage or my small community in search an urban practice, many a son or daughter has picked up and moved to the city seeking a life without dirt under their fingernails. Yet they see the earth stacked in my sculpture Monuments, the familiar rows of the farms they grew up on. Rich baskets of heritage dumped out empty around them but still chained to their pasts.
I have merged steel, wood, and some supporting elements to discuss the loss of rural heritage today. I wanted to express my own guilt for leaving the family farm and abandoning that craft, but also express at the same time my incredible pride in growing up on a farm. The intersection between rigid, straight, and cold steel and the bent, woven, and twisted wood creates forms that discuss the pride and guilt I feel over leaving the communities."
-Jonathan Forrence, 2021
The forms I built came to me twisting towards the sky like the trees and plants of my father’s farm towering over me when I was a child. The trees where picker’s ladders were placed in. I felt tied to that heritage, tied to the farm, and tied to that rural community from my past. I was not alone in leaving my farming heritage or my small community in search an urban practice, many a son or daughter has picked up and moved to the city seeking a life without dirt under their fingernails. Yet they see the earth stacked in my sculpture Monuments, the familiar rows of the farms they grew up on. Rich baskets of heritage dumped out empty around them but still chained to their pasts.
I have merged steel, wood, and some supporting elements to discuss the loss of rural heritage today. I wanted to express my own guilt for leaving the family farm and abandoning that craft, but also express at the same time my incredible pride in growing up on a farm. The intersection between rigid, straight, and cold steel and the bent, woven, and twisted wood creates forms that discuss the pride and guilt I feel over leaving the communities."
-Jonathan Forrence, 2021
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Jonathan Forrence, Basket, steel, woven pine, chain and cedar, 2020.
Jonathan Torrence, Rise Work Sleep Repeat, cedar, steel, earth, hay, and twine, 2020.
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Jonathan Forrence, Intersections II, steel and cedar, 2021.
Jonathan Forrence, Tied to the Land, steel, soil, and rope, 2019.
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Jonathan Forrence, In the Shade of, steel and cedar, 2021.
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@neff.303
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