Eli

===Personal Statement: Artistic expression, in my experience, is also a freeing experience for the person involved in its creation. This understanding has been the foundation for my entire artistic education. However, it wasn’t until these past two years that it has become a thematic focus for my artwork. I attempted to challenge my own understanding of freedom. Initially, I looked at art that dealt with political freedom, but I was quickly turned off to this clichéd concept, and instead dealing with other ways to understand freedom.=== Observing the work of artists like Marcel Duchamp and Jean-Michel Basquiat has influenced the way in which I approach my own work. In particular, through study of artists willing to challenge community standards, I have come to challenge my own previously held conceptions about art. I began by using primarily oil colors, but after half a year of oil color, I tried using acrylic, oil pastels, pencil, as well as doing 3D art. In addition, I have looked at alternative ways of applying paint to canvas, such as impasto application, or mixing paint with pure oil to achieve a drip effect. I have also changed the grounds that I have worked on, working on canvas, paper, scraps of garbage, cardboard, canvas board, and directly over rejected works. In my artistic explorations, I have begun to include text more and more regularly in my pieces, and now it is a fixture of my work. Text has a very graphic and expressive quality that artists like Ed Ruscha have attempted to exploit. Beyond simply changing media, I have tried to instill a freedom of purpose in my work, exploring for me what art and freedom mean. The works of anti-artists, such as the Dada artists, have been critical in my own development as an artist. They showed that art can be humorous and ironic in a way that was previously unexplored.

Oil on Canvas || Acrylic on Canvas Board || Oil on Canvas Board || Oil on Canvas || Oil on Canvas || Mixed Media on Canvas || Acrylic on Canvas || Acrylic, Oil, Oil Paintstik on Canvas || Oil Paintstik, Crayon, Pastel, Permanent Marker, Pen on Paper || Gesso, Colored Pencil on Used Canvas || Colored Pencil, Pencil, Mixed Media on Canvas || Ink, Pastel, Oil Paintstik, Pen, Crayon, Acrylic on Paper || Ink, Colored Pencil on Paper || Oil Paintstik, Pastel, White-Out, Acrylic on Canvas || Pastel, Pen on Paper || Pastel, Acrylic on Paper ||
 * [[image:abstractselfportrait]] || "Abstract Self-Portrait"
 * [[image:robot]] || "Robot"
 * [[image:desert_triptych]] || "Desert Triptych"
 * [[image:handreachingforlight width="316" height="597"]] || "Hand Reaching for Light"
 * [[image:mancomingoutofmountain width="316" height="529"]] || "Man Coming Out of Mountain"
 * [[image:untitled]] || "Untitled"
 * [[image:chained]] || "Chained"
 * [[image:lifeinthefastlane width="513" height="386"]] || "Life in the Fast Lane"
 * [[image:selfportrait width="515" height="282"]] || "Self-Portrait"
 * [[image:artoftenrequiresagooddeal]] || "Art Often Requires A Good Deal of Irreverence" Pastel, Block Printing Ink on Canvas Board ||
 * [[image:myphilosophyforcesmetoabandon]] || "My Philosophy Forces Me To Abandon Everything Except Snowmen" Mixed Media on Wood ||
 * [[image:bebop]] || "Bebop: Philips; Carter; BIRD; Kessel; Webster; Hodges; Shavers "
 * [[image:hospitalsremindme]] || "Hospitals Remind Me of Hospitals"
 * [[image:whatdobisonthink]] || "What Do Bison Think About?"
 * [[image:bisonbison]] || "Bison Bison"
 * [[image:landscape]] || "Landscape"
 * [[image:whitelephantuniverse]] || "White Elephant Universe"
 * [[image:gethsemane]] || "Gethsemane"