Auden McCaw














Auden McCaw

        My art focuses on the complexities of the human condition, more specifically feelings of love and pain as it pertains to the phenomenon of intersection between the two vastly separate and yet so intrinsically intertwined emotions. The torment of love is frustratingly powerful and overwhelmingly unrelenting, and yet because we are complex creatures shaped and molded by every minute occurrence in our lives, every emotion has billions of combinations and differences, therefore, love can be so singularly pleasurable and pain can be quite so exquisitely powerful. I explore the ethereal, uncanny, and sublime aspect to life and darkness, and of course how they relate to love, pain, and time. Each piece embodies aspects of the tumultuous ideas that are made up by these most primitive feelings.

       I want to tackle the intricacies of the mortal coil that renders us inches away from the breaking point of humanity, and at other times is debilitatingly beautiful and ever multiplying until it's so much that it is totally and utterly unbearable and the passage of time becomes nonlinear and the world blurs around your thoughts and desires. This dichotomy is where my art lies and where I search for the meaning within my pieces.

        For me, the sublime and the hauntingly beautiful and strange are quite appealing. I think it’s something that I do actively search for within my everyday life and such things often inspire the creation of my work.

        My sculpture leans towards these themes. I find that the tactile nature of the piece and my ability to physically create something seems to allow me the freedoms to express some of the ideas that painting, or drawing, or even other media might not be able to capture. The tape recorder fully embraces the inhuman and uncanny aspects of humanity and pain. It’s purpose is twofold, one, to illicit as much intriguing disgust and hesitant wonder within the viewer, and two, to blur the lines between the waking reality, our mortal world full of technologically depressed human beings that lack the aspects of love that are so uniquely beautiful and human, and the subconscious mind where our darkest and truest desires reside.

        As for the painting, it represents the embodiment of a particular feeling that seems to itch and claw its way out through my fingertips and onto whatever surface it deems somewhat fit. The surface and tactile nature of the painting is an exploration into the almost pharal fluid-like visual representation of the emotions that inspired the piece. The painting and the sculpture play off similar values and dilemmas. They both hold the fear, anguish, and lament that bubbles and boils leagues and leagues below the surface facade that we show to the world