Ron Shuebrook

Throughout much of my life as an artist, I have sought to develop a body of work that respects the intellectual and aesthetic legacy of early and mid-20th Century modernisms, while accommodating my own curiosities, capacities, and beliefs. These various traditions, ranging from the examples of Cezanne, Matisse,and Mondrian to Hans Hofmann, Franz Kline, Robert Motherwell, Willem deKooning, and Philip Guston, have served me as persuasive models of engagement and ambition. These rigorous artists convinced me at an early age that conscious analysis and intuitive responses could be embodied in critical, yet expressive, form.

Consequently, I have come to perceive myself, among other things, as a fabricator of what the philosopher Hannah Arendt called "thought-things". My paintings, drawings, and constructions are clearly the products of physical labour, of visual judgment, and intellectual analysis, while being guided by my ethical aspirations. These ordered and orderly objects are intended to engage perceptions and to stimulate contemplation through evocative, yet integrated, physical and visual structures. Ultimately, I seek to make art that is simultaneously a testament to human continuity and improvisation and a site of immediate sensory experience and social meaning.

Untitled (Pearl St., Monkey Rope) - 2003
charcoal on paper, 30 in x 22 in