These images I produce, fantastic though they are, each represent fragments of a story and are metaphors for real emotional events. Specific narrative is obscured in favor of suggestion: a single image stands in for the memory and feeling of many events that have passed or that persist. Some symbols are clear (monkey, owl, ghost) but the narrative is only suggested. There is often a sense of something happening or about to happen that is uncomfortable, unsettling or even tragic. When animals appear they are often presented with an expression of naivete or intelligence and provide a character to identify with. They are cute, sometimes humorous, but other symbols appearing alongside them suggest that they are involved in very serious business.
A partially lost childhood has led me to return, at least in part, with these images to honor a feeling of loss experienced before it could really be understood. The characters – monkey, little ghost, ice cream cone – generally represent innocence and vulnerability. Their cuteness is intentional as is the danger or odd circumstances these characters find themselves in. I am in a way recreating events or the sensations of those early years of gradually increasing awareness, an awareness that grew in a confused environment. As a young adult I began with the self portrait to reveal a clear expression of self and I have retained a measure of that sentiment in a veiled form as my work has matured.
The poet Rainer Maria Rilke wrote of childhood as a precious possession. The sense of wonder changes to child-like with age but remains intact. The emotional states natural to a child leave a residue of feeling, sensations that cannot be spoken but can be suggested in image. To express that is my goal. A toy is a talisman to a child and can remain so for the adult that child becomes. The child and adult are different aspects of the same person after all and with that in mind I believe this work represents my contemporary state as well as one long past.
Stylistically, my work merges traditional academic study of drawing, painting and printmaking and the graphic appearance of comic books and commercial advertising. As a method of producing the work, printmaking has always been a compelling technique for my images with its emphasis on line to describe form. Drawing and painting enter the process when printmaking cannot create the appearance I need. I am accustomed to beginning images in etching or woodcut but find more and more that those techniques alone are inadequate.
I received my Master of Fine Arts degree in Printmaking from the University of Iowa in 1994 and my Bachelor of Arts in History from Grand Valley State University in Allendale, Michigan in 1990. I currently teach at Harrington College of Design and the Chicago Printmakers Collaborative. I have held teaching positions with the University of Iowa, the University of Michigan, Grand Valley State University and the Hyde Park Art Center. Some of the most significant teaching I have done is with children – the logic to the way children create is a source of inspiration to me and feeds my creativity as nothing else does. It keeps me mindful that the desire to create as I do is a simple and elemental compulsion that really needs no justification: it is ultimately a positive action.
Website: www.duffyoconnor.com
