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Jonathan Bechard

Biography

I may be at the outset of my career, but maybe I will be successful when someone else writes my biography Until then, I must go 'auto.' Artist statements can be misleading when they seek to qualify the person being described as unique when it sounds too much like advertising to me for a society in which art is about economics and not 'ecce homo.' I've seen people who are not artists produce great work, and vice versa no matter what their background or acclaims might have been. Art has been institutionalized, so if the work doesn't speak, then stop crowding the field, because art is a phenomenon of culture and not a career path. If I was not an artist, then I would simply be doing something else creative The fact that I am identifying myself as an artist says less about my work and more about me. Under different circumstances, my life as an artist would not have happened, therefore, my work would not exist.

What I have to say about myself is not that interesting, in my opinion. I am not a genius, and I am not afflicted. It is significant that I am from the middle class and that I grew up in a ruburban, post-industrial environment, on a family farm. I am an only child. I have some obsessive tendencies, along with a good intuition and my mind is the hyper-analytical kind; moreover, I believe that it is compulsion, and not talent, which drives me. However, the more that I say about myself, the more flawed I become, the less there is to reveal. Background is important to analyze the work according to my school of thought, but too many details drown out the participant (or viewer) in associations to my past. That kind of information should come later on in the relationship. So to speak I would like my work to stand by itself, and not next to me, yet I bare a responsibility to explain it at least somewhat:

I do not consider myself the foremost expert on how to interpret my work, but I will still concede these precepts: my art is environmental; romantic; shares much in common with landscape painting; the scale of which is determined by my own body and facilities; the tools and processes I utilize are important to me and I want them to show through in the work; and my choice of material is paramount. Also, I made a decision two years ago against the kind of academic figuration that I was seeing in the canon. In an attempt to transcend my own ego, I chose to base my work loosely on the notion of clouds. I consider what I have done to be quintessentially 'New England' in character, but I hope that it resonates with a wider audience as I continue to expound on themes and evolve. All of these thoughts rush through me

My work is.