Artist Statement
“Personification of the Modern Era” mixed media series
The modern world is a challenging place. We endure threats of nuclear war, international terrorism, economic collapse, corporate greed, rampant consumerism, governmental corruption, worldwide epidemics, global warming, and natural disasters. But we go on about our daily lives, basically pretending that all is well in order to survive with some semblance of normalcy.
The “Personification” series consists of mixed media portraits configured of imagery from this threatening world. These “persons” exhibit intense facial expressions of fear, anger, shock, amazement, frustration, consternation, disbelief, weariness, caution, or numbness. Many are screaming and yelling in reaction to the surrounding world. Many are wearing masks, goggles, visors, or helmets, symbolizing the separation and isolation they must create to protect themselves and endure this bombardment of the world out-of-control.
The imagery is over-laid on images from found papers, including scientific, technological, mathematical and governmental documents, charts, graphs, diagrams, blueprints, and maps, depicting the ubiquitous pressures of the outside world. Most pieces are monochromatic in black, white and grey, reflecting the world’s bleak and colorless prospects, with silver metallic layers emphasizing the cold, technical aspect of this world. These pieces, however, are often tempered with playful composition and imagery displaying a naïve innocence, such as retro images from the past’s vision of the future.
BIOGRAPHY
Stephen C. Wagner has studied art since the age of six, including workshops at the Witte Museum, Trinity University, and private study, all in San Antonio, TX. During his early years, Stephen showed his works in many venues, including juried shows, art fairs, coffeehouses, and galleries. He obtained his Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of Texas at Arlington in painting and graphic communication.
Stephen has exhibited and sold his artwork in galleries in London, Chicago, Dallas, Beverly Hills, Santa Monica, Laguna Beach, San Francisco, San Diego, Seattle, New Orleans, Palm Springs, and Kauai. His artwork is included in the permanent collections of the Riverside Art Museum and the Museum of the Living Artist, and in the corporate collections of Johnson & Johnson and Kaiser Permanente. His artwork has been featured in the film "Antwone Fisher" directed by Denzel Washington, and was featured on the set of the Bravo TV show "Boy Meets Boy."
He has received an Honorable Mention Award in the San Francisco ArtSpan 2009 Benefit Art Show & Auction and an Honorable Mention Award in the Riverside Art Museum 2005 Annual Member’s Exhibition.
Among artists that have influenced Stephen are Robert Rauschenberg, Pierre Bonnard, Eduoard Vuillard, Gustav Klimt, Mark Tobey, and Mark Rothko. All these artists’ works are about textures, strokes, gestures, or patterns, and thus his pieces often explore the same. Stephen feels that each artist has his own view of the world that he manifests in his work, a vision unique to him and no one else. The vision is crystallized in the art as a record of his world and allows this world to live on beyond that of the artist.
