Description
‘You are Ignorance’ by Stephen Koharian
Artist: Stephen Koharian
Title: ‘You are Ignorance’
Medium: Oil on canvas over panel
Dimensions: 36″ x 24″
Framing: Unframed
Year of Creation: 2021
About the Artwork:
In the early weeks of the pandemic my neighborhood was the epicenter of the epicenter in the US. After five months of being trapped in my apartment in Queens, New York I finally fled.
Having the space and distance to contemplate that traumatic experience, I have reflected on the behavior of those around me in real life and in social media. The animalistic, tribalistic, narcissistic characteristics of our society have always been bubbling beneath the surface. But in the wake of disease, confinement, and violence it boiled over, amplifying the behavior of the hysterical masses. The deeper I dive into this series of paintings, the more vitriolic I am towards humanity.
These pieces are the beginning of a significant shift in my work. The themes I’m exploring as well as the style and execution. I am focusing on building texture and impasto, using palette knives almost entirely to create the work instead of brushes. The paintings are nearly monochromatic with one area of concentrated color used as a point of entry into the piece. Utilizing less light that in past works, I am obscuring the figures as much as possible to create an illusion of dissolving into nothingness.