David Linneweh

My work investigates perceptions of landscape and how we create meaning from our surroundings whether suburban, rural, or urban. Most recently I have explored these ideas through a series of paintings which deconstructs/reconstructs familiar settings which at one time felt new but over time have become stale. Central to the themes in both bodies of work is the idea of questioning the idealism of contemporary American Landscape.

Public buildings inform who we are and who we were, in this way they act as mementos. Through their decayed or shiny surfaces we consider their projected significance. The transitory nature of these sites means that sometimes they are maintained or refurbished while at other times they are abandoned or demolished. By taking notice of these subtleties we might then question the history of our sprawling culture specifically examining which ideas of the past have survived and which have disappeared. To help illustrate these ideas my work is somewhat saccharine in nature through the use of flat colorful paint, wood veneer, and unfinished graphite drawing.

It is from these pieces that we can share dialogue regarding the relationships we have within our communities and the landscape they inhabit. It is as if these relationships are part of an un-ending cycle within our culture, always seeking out new prospects while abandoning old ones. What seems ultimately forgotten is that idealism is passed on though generations as it appears to transform the status quo but will one day simply act as a remnant of the past.

My most recent paintings begin to explore ideas of signage and formal properties of consumerism through the use of abstract shapes throughout the works. Typically the scale of my work over the past year during multiple short-term residencies has been rather small and I am interested in having the time and studio space to explore my current work on a larger scale. I believe that the abstraction present within the representational and formal aspects of my work will become more interesting along with the idea that a viewer would be enveloped in a large painting rather than the way they relate to the smaller scale images of my more recent work. During the residency I plan on using images sourced from my experiences driving across country and through American towns and cities.