Imagination Unbound
by: John O’Hern
Santa Fe Editor
American Art Collector
Debb VanDelinder is fond of quoting Chuck Close who said, “The advice I like to give young artists, or really anybody who'll listen to me, is not to wait around for inspiration. Inspiration is for amateurs; the rest of us just show up and get to work.” Debb has shown up and worked, “flitting from medium to medium and subject to subject” until she found her “authentic voice”.
Long into digital media, she discovered Scanography (scanner photography). In the beginning (and it was a new world for her) she created images of flowers, often in startlingly large scale but always with a sensuous subtlety. Divine Beauty and One True Light, although small in scale, are larger than life in their impact and emblematic of her spiritual, intellectual, and artistic method.
Describing herself, she says simply “I’m mindful, contemplative and somewhat driven to create.” But that is only after having said “I’ve always felt the work comes through me, not exactly from me. I’m not sure if that makes any sense but I feel like I’m channeling a higher energy and I’m just the vehicle it’s pouring through.” She shows up as Close advises. Then she opens up.
Debb is intellectually curious. “I’m really into symbolism. I’m always looking things up to see what meaning they have, what they’ve been used to represent and, of course, to consider what they might be able to say if used in a new way...There are apples representing knowledge and fertility, pears symbolizing immortality, a golden pear of femininity and there is even a lemon representing fidelity.”
Then there’s her artistic method. After the inspiration and the research and noodling ideas while out on the road on a distance run, she assembles her materials. “Sometimes I think I might actually be a frustrated sculptor,” she says, “because I am always building things for my work. Many of the works actually require me to construct a temporary sculpture before I scan the image.”
Often, people respond to her thought-provoking images with interpretations that are different from her intention. “It’s fascinating to hear about what someone else sees in the work. It can be very revealing for me.”
Her images reveal her, our responses reveal ourselves. As she says, “The images I make represent pieces of my own personal history, and echo the story of a collective humanity.”
It may take a second look (at her work and at life in general) to realize that there is always hope. The pear is only loosely bound in I Will Break Free. The apple in Shroud of Secrecy “hangs in all its tension, concealed and ominous,” she says. “Certain belief systems would prefer to keep us all in the dark. It’s another way we can be restricted.” But it’s only shrouded in paper.
The collective and the individual are concerns for her in her life and subjects for her in her art. “My work explores the human experience. I’m fascinated by the human condition. To be human is to experience common transitions, emotions, archetypes, patterns and cycles. How we react to these situations is what makes us uncommon and individual.”
Debb VanDelinder’s artistry takes the common and makes it uncommon—only to reveal what is common.
John O’Hern
Santa Fe Editor
American Art Collector
Santa Fe Editor
American Art Collector
Debb VanDelinder is fond of quoting Chuck Close who said, “The advice I like to give young artists, or really anybody who'll listen to me, is not to wait around for inspiration. Inspiration is for amateurs; the rest of us just show up and get to work.” Debb has shown up and worked, “flitting from medium to medium and subject to subject” until she found her “authentic voice”.
Long into digital media, she discovered Scanography (scanner photography). In the beginning (and it was a new world for her) she created images of flowers, often in startlingly large scale but always with a sensuous subtlety. Divine Beauty and One True Light, although small in scale, are larger than life in their impact and emblematic of her spiritual, intellectual, and artistic method.
Describing herself, she says simply “I’m mindful, contemplative and somewhat driven to create.” But that is only after having said “I’ve always felt the work comes through me, not exactly from me. I’m not sure if that makes any sense but I feel like I’m channeling a higher energy and I’m just the vehicle it’s pouring through.” She shows up as Close advises. Then she opens up.
Debb is intellectually curious. “I’m really into symbolism. I’m always looking things up to see what meaning they have, what they’ve been used to represent and, of course, to consider what they might be able to say if used in a new way...There are apples representing knowledge and fertility, pears symbolizing immortality, a golden pear of femininity and there is even a lemon representing fidelity.”
Then there’s her artistic method. After the inspiration and the research and noodling ideas while out on the road on a distance run, she assembles her materials. “Sometimes I think I might actually be a frustrated sculptor,” she says, “because I am always building things for my work. Many of the works actually require me to construct a temporary sculpture before I scan the image.”
Often, people respond to her thought-provoking images with interpretations that are different from her intention. “It’s fascinating to hear about what someone else sees in the work. It can be very revealing for me.”
Her images reveal her, our responses reveal ourselves. As she says, “The images I make represent pieces of my own personal history, and echo the story of a collective humanity.”
It may take a second look (at her work and at life in general) to realize that there is always hope. The pear is only loosely bound in I Will Break Free. The apple in Shroud of Secrecy “hangs in all its tension, concealed and ominous,” she says. “Certain belief systems would prefer to keep us all in the dark. It’s another way we can be restricted.” But it’s only shrouded in paper.
The collective and the individual are concerns for her in her life and subjects for her in her art. “My work explores the human experience. I’m fascinated by the human condition. To be human is to experience common transitions, emotions, archetypes, patterns and cycles. How we react to these situations is what makes us uncommon and individual.”
Debb VanDelinder’s artistry takes the common and makes it uncommon—only to reveal what is common.
John O’Hern
Santa Fe Editor
American Art Collector
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