In his current exhibition, “Lost at Home, Found in Garden”, Ben Hunt continues to explore sculptural forms in relation to our fabricated landscapes, found objects, and the phenomena of the environment. As a Southern California native, Hunt has been struck by this region’s urban forests, agriculture, and industrial areas. As many visual artists do over the development of their creative process, Ben has developed a personal visual language that creates a relationship between mundane found objects and organic patterns found in our environment.
Of his work, Hunt says, “I am very interested in our relationship with nature. My work is an attempt to create a harmonious tension between the space we occupy in the manufactured world and the spontaneous organic patterns derived from light and space.” He states “My creative process is relatively simple in that I do a lot ‘scanning’, scavenging and fabricating. Looking and observation is a skill and discipline that many artists develop over time that helps to informs their visual aesthetic decision making. Art is a visual language, and the recognition of form, color and the physical relationship between objects becomes unique to each person. I am drawn to objects lost, discarded or have been left to collect dust due to obsolescence. Solitary objects have inherent meaning, but when connected to another object, or placed in juxtaposition with another object or group of objects, the meaning changes, creates sentences, stories or poetry. If I find an object, like an old bottle or light bulb that has some interesting characteristic, I will dip the object in a thin layer of wax to soften its detail and remove it from the original form. Then I will make a plaster or silicone mold of the object and reproduce it in either resin or wax (that will eventually become cast aluminum or bronze). Over time, I have developed a small mold library that I can pull images from to create sculptural compositions. I liken it to the “Cut-up Method” technique of writing contributed to the Dadaists in the 1920’s and popularized by William Burroughs in the 50’s and 60’s. I found it to be a way to free associate on a formal visual level and create new narratives through sometimes very disparate and conflicting images.”
Artist Bio:
Ben Hunt is a visual artist and fabricator. Born and raised in San Diego, CA. He received his Master of Fine Arts degree, in Spatial Art, from San José State University in 2008. He has exhibited both regionally and nationally and has taught sculpture at both Idaho State University and California State University, Sacramento. Currently, Ben works at California State University Sacramento as instructional and technical staff in the Art Department. He is an active member of Axis gallery in Sacramento where He lives and maintains an art studio practice.
