|
AJ Fosik’s eclectic handmade and intricately designed wood animal sculptures and paintings, combined with cryptic symbols, intrigue and provoke. Fosik creates an experience that at first glance evokes a questioning of familiar concepts and then pushes the viewer to look and think deeper. Inspired by subversive cultural influences that shift complacency, he creates pieces that suspend comfort while offering recognizable symbols and images. In this dynamic tension, the art and the viewer, hopefully, come together in an expanded definition of culture and assumption. |
 |
Making Ends Meet – Debra Anderson
AJ Fosik’s eclectic handmade and intricately designed wood animal sculptures and paintings, combined with cryptic symbols, intrigue and provoke. Fosik creates an experience that at first glance evokes a questioning of familiar concepts and then pushes the viewer to look and think deeper. Inspired by subversive cultural influences that shift complacency, he creates pieces that suspend comfort while offering recognizable symbols and images. In this dynamic tension, the art and the viewer, hopefully, come together in an expanded definition of culture and assumption.
Debra Anderson: What inspired you to create your first wooden animal sculptures? Are your materials all found, constructed or hand carved?
AJ Fosik: I had been doing a lot of street art, using a lot of wood and found materials to make signage. Eventually the imagery and the material I was putting it on merged. I never studied sculpture, but working three-dimensionally comes very naturally to me, I turn wrenches to make ends meet and I find that this employs a lot of the same type of problem solving and skills that sculpture does.
DA: Your work possesses the evocative qualities of American folk art. In what ways were you exposed to this kind of imagery? What is it about these cultural icons that most intrigues you?
AF: For me, for the most part, the only parallels between my work and folk art are strictly about process and methodology. I think that, because I use really simple and familiar materials, people make that connection, but I don’t ever actually ever set out to mimic folk art.
DA: Most of your animals appear threatening, and this is mostly evident through your synthesis of vibrant colors, patterns and toothed shards of wood. Do you consider your paintings and sculptures of animals to be alarming creatures? Do you create your sculptures with the desire to elicit specific reactions from the viewer? Is the theme of fear a central part of your work?
AF: I don’t think they’re threatening. They are more about struggle and resilience to me. Animals are powerful and loaded images, the viewer can’t help but anthropomorphize them, and especially when they’re rendered in an unnatural way and put in the context of human situations. I find it’s a really effective way to get the viewer to start to identify and engage with a group of icons and symbols that might otherwise be too overwhelming or cryptic.
DA: Can you describe some of the kinds of symbolism that you weave into your works? Are your anthropomorphized beings a façade for more literal symbols and messages for the viewer to interpret, or are they intentionally cryptic?
AF: They are intentionally cryptic, but only because I’m not trying to hit anyone over the head with my point of view. I don’t even think it’s necessary for the viewer ever to solve the puzzle; it’s more important that they engage. I’m perfectly fine with the viewer interpreting his or her own narrative, as long as I’m steering, in which case that narrative ends up as secondary.
DA: Your reference to American cultural icons and technique lends itself to a distinct, contemporary handcrafted art form—do you see your artwork as a combination of cultural, personal and traditional aesthetics?
AF: Absolutely. I wouldn’t begin to know how to divorce myself from that.
DA: Signage and letters are an integral component of your artwork. How do language and metaphor relate to your use of narrative? Where did your interest in signage begin and how did your unique style of bold, blocky lettering develop?
AF: I love using words and lettering, and this is probably a result of my graffiti background. For a lot of artists involved in graffiti, I think exploration into areas where words and pictures intersect, signage being one of those, is just a natural progression.
DA: Can you describe your background with street art and graffiti? How has it shaped your style?
AF: I was involved with graffiti as soon as I was allowed to stay out past the street lights came on, and I think that creating art from such a young age in such a marginalized form (much less nowadays) gave me the freedom to comfortably move outside traditional channels. Also, now whenever anyone I know needs patio furniture or a bookshelf spray painted, I’m the first guy they come to. It’s a blessing and a curse.
DA: I understand that you are an avid traveler, how do your experiences and constant change of environment influence your work?
AF: Yeah I have a touch of the ramblin’ sickness, being somewhere unfamiliar is a bit of an addiction. Now that I’ve found out this Epcot center place has almost every country in the world (at least the important ones) represented in one magical park, though, I don’t really see the need to travel anywhere else ever again.
DA: What are your main influences today? What inspires you?
AF: Just the day-to-day struggle of existence, and Andy Rooney. That guy can complain like nobody else.
DA: What are you working on at the moment?
AF: Bigger pieces, I’d really like to move towards larger, room-sized installations, and my truck.
