Artist Presentation -- "Transcendence"

My partner (Delisa O'Brien) and I, presented J.L Robbins & Lucas Samaras. Our ‘exhibit’ is entitled “Transcendence,” and we chose this name based off its definition and its comparison with the works our artists created. Transcendence can be defined as, “beyond or above the range of normal or merely physical human.” Our artist both altered the human anatomy in all of their compositions. Robbins creates his works of art with paint, while Samaras usually uses blurred images of himself in his modest apartment. Lucas Samaras experimented with the wet emulsion on Polaroids, and has said that his images were an exploration of the inner battle and different spectrums of himself. J.L. Robbins says, “I try with my paintings to discover and physically manifest the different layers of consciousness in myself and in turn learn more about the rest.” The works presented from him are all of exhibitions he has done in series. Majority of his presented works have been in sets of two or more, but for the exhibition, we’ve only included two of each included series. Lucas Samaras’ Photo-Transformations were a project that he was doing to learn more about himself while Robbins loved anatomy and loved painting various scenarios of an altered human body. From this exhibit, we hope that the students could appreciate the vulnerability of these two artists, and will also learn to look inward and realize their own inner battles and turmoil.