Last Friday night, I was went to Autobody Fine Art Gallery on opening night as an artist exhibiting in a group show dedicated to the upcoming Earth Day. Artists participating had a wide range of creative expression in various mediums. I was immediately drawn to the many totem and temple style sculptures that were built from wood, glass, rocks, plastic and found objects. These were assembled to resemble a religious alter on some and a oversized Victorian Finial on others. I was introduced to the artist, Jon Kerpel.
Once I shook his hand, he and I realized we have met before and this was the first time viewing each others' art. Jon took a lot of time with me to explain some of his creative process. He pointed to one of his first pieces that explored this new direction in his sculpture. It was a small, white, wood, 6" square box with an opening on one side covered in non-glare glass, which gave it the look of a shadowbox. But, because the glass had a frosted look, the item inside , a polar bear made of plastic, was hazy and trapped in this artificial world. These constructions abandoned the a typical Joseph Cornell approach of creating found object sculptures of meaningless objects grouped together in an abstract manner. Jon had a well thought out vision and message regarding our disappearing environment, and animals. This added a dimension to his work that may resemble Pop Art and combined it with the rough nature of the found objects used to create these alter/temple structures, and backed it with an environmental message.
Jon went on to tell me that part of his creative process is 'the hunt' for found objects. He likes to walk along the shore of Alameda, and also out at the Alameda Naval Base. He picks up whatever he thinks looks cool without any intent or purpose for artistic placement in a sculpture. He just collects, and then uses these objects as ideas pop into his head during construction. Most of the time he has no idea why he picks up certain items or how he will use them. One example of this: Jon said he had a number of large sheets of non-glare glass in his studio for several years that he could not give away due to the nature of the glass making anything placed behind it very blurry, and rendering it useless for framing artwork. In these new works, Jon said the glass was perfect for the first time, because it did add a certain level of sophistication, and the message of his art can now be interpreted with many different meaningful descriptions.
The creative process for Jon is a lot of trial and error, grouping together non-traditional materials, with little meaning on their own that has a greater message when combined as a whole sculpture. His work relies on immediate creative inspiration from the objects arround him. His inspiration comes from anything,..including items that he can not find any immediate use. His found objects have become his dictionary for communicating to the public.
It was my pleasure to spend as much time as I did with Jon and hope he has continued success.
A summary of my conversation with Jon Kerpel, a found object sculptor, at the new opening of "future/tense" at Autobody Fine Art Gallery. (Friday, April 9, 2010)
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