Christian Henry Wechgelaer, "Blossom"
2023
Graphite and colored pencil on construction paper
9 x 12 inches
BIO
Christian Henry Wechgelaer (b. 1998, in Saratoga Springs, NY) is an interdisciplinary artist living and working in Upstate, NY. Christian received his BFA in Studio Art, concentrating in Printmaking and Photography, from the College of Saint Rose, in Albany, NY. Spurred by longing, Christian engages in a generative studio practice with drawing at the core, but blending into printmaking, collage, book arts and installation. In 2023, he was included in several group exhibitions including Assemblages at Albany Center Gallery, Mirrored Enchantments at a Flush Gallery pop-up at Ed Varie Gallery in the Lower East Side, and had a public art installation in ArtStream at ArtPort Kingston. In his free time, you may find Christian at his local public library, playing the piano, or re-reading the Poetics of Space by Gaston Bachelard. Currently Chirstian is an MFA candidate at the University at Albany, pending graduation in 2025.
STATEMENT
Informed by a generative studio practice, personal memory, and theories related to poetic longing, my work is an attempt to locate the authentic self amidst images. I am propelled by an intense longing to understand the warmth I feel when encountering certain images or memories - like a tugging at my soul. This nostalgia however is punctuated by a melancholic knowing that I will never truly understand, and a guilt in realizing, such as Baudrillard claims in his theories of hyperreality, that I am building my identity by simulating images I saw as a child. This fuels my process as I work generationally from drawing to printmaking, reproducing and accumulating. In my drawing practice I blend a stream of consciousness pulled from these memories with a diagrammatic typologizing of certain symbols, to develop a personal semiotics which weaves throughout everything I make. What results are temporary altars to these fleeting spirits, as I document my search for selfhood.
2023
Graphite and colored pencil on construction paper
9 x 12 inches
BIO
Christian Henry Wechgelaer (b. 1998, in Saratoga Springs, NY) is an interdisciplinary artist living and working in Upstate, NY. Christian received his BFA in Studio Art, concentrating in Printmaking and Photography, from the College of Saint Rose, in Albany, NY. Spurred by longing, Christian engages in a generative studio practice with drawing at the core, but blending into printmaking, collage, book arts and installation. In 2023, he was included in several group exhibitions including Assemblages at Albany Center Gallery, Mirrored Enchantments at a Flush Gallery pop-up at Ed Varie Gallery in the Lower East Side, and had a public art installation in ArtStream at ArtPort Kingston. In his free time, you may find Christian at his local public library, playing the piano, or re-reading the Poetics of Space by Gaston Bachelard. Currently Chirstian is an MFA candidate at the University at Albany, pending graduation in 2025.
STATEMENT
Informed by a generative studio practice, personal memory, and theories related to poetic longing, my work is an attempt to locate the authentic self amidst images. I am propelled by an intense longing to understand the warmth I feel when encountering certain images or memories - like a tugging at my soul. This nostalgia however is punctuated by a melancholic knowing that I will never truly understand, and a guilt in realizing, such as Baudrillard claims in his theories of hyperreality, that I am building my identity by simulating images I saw as a child. This fuels my process as I work generationally from drawing to printmaking, reproducing and accumulating. In my drawing practice I blend a stream of consciousness pulled from these memories with a diagrammatic typologizing of certain symbols, to develop a personal semiotics which weaves throughout everything I make. What results are temporary altars to these fleeting spirits, as I document my search for selfhood.
2023
Graphite and colored pencil on construction paper
9 x 12 inches
BIO
Christian Henry Wechgelaer (b. 1998, in Saratoga Springs, NY) is an interdisciplinary artist living and working in Upstate, NY. Christian received his BFA in Studio Art, concentrating in Printmaking and Photography, from the College of Saint Rose, in Albany, NY. Spurred by longing, Christian engages in a generative studio practice with drawing at the core, but blending into printmaking, collage, book arts and installation. In 2023, he was included in several group exhibitions including Assemblages at Albany Center Gallery, Mirrored Enchantments at a Flush Gallery pop-up at Ed Varie Gallery in the Lower East Side, and had a public art installation in ArtStream at ArtPort Kingston. In his free time, you may find Christian at his local public library, playing the piano, or re-reading the Poetics of Space by Gaston Bachelard. Currently Chirstian is an MFA candidate at the University at Albany, pending graduation in 2025.
STATEMENT
Informed by a generative studio practice, personal memory, and theories related to poetic longing, my work is an attempt to locate the authentic self amidst images. I am propelled by an intense longing to understand the warmth I feel when encountering certain images or memories - like a tugging at my soul. This nostalgia however is punctuated by a melancholic knowing that I will never truly understand, and a guilt in realizing, such as Baudrillard claims in his theories of hyperreality, that I am building my identity by simulating images I saw as a child. This fuels my process as I work generationally from drawing to printmaking, reproducing and accumulating. In my drawing practice I blend a stream of consciousness pulled from these memories with a diagrammatic typologizing of certain symbols, to develop a personal semiotics which weaves throughout everything I make. What results are temporary altars to these fleeting spirits, as I document my search for selfhood.