We’re six days away from the opening of More Disruption: Representational Art in Flux. The show opens this coming Friday, February 23rd, and will feature work from nineteen different artists. The exhibition has been curated by the author of Disrupted Realism: Paintings for a Distracted World and More Disruption: Representational Art in Flux, John Seed.
Meet the Curator
John Seed is a painter, writer, curator, and former art professor living on the central coast of California. He taught both studio art and art history at Mt. San Jacinto College, Intro to Modernism at Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, and Theory & Criticism in the MFA Program at Laguna College of Art Design.
His writings have been featured online via the Huffington Post and Hyperallergic. Magazine features include American Art Collector, Arts of Asia, Art Ltd., Catamaran, Harvard Magazine, and International Artist. Seed is also the author of My Art World: Recollections and Other Writings, Disrupted Realism: Paintings for a Distracted World, and More Disruption: Representational Art in Flux.
Meet the Artists
Firstly, let’s answer that burning question. What is a Disrupter? Simply put, a disrupter is someone who isn’t afraid to make waves, someone who is constantly pushing the envelope to do things better, without worrying about how things have always been done. The artists underneath the umbrella of disrupted realism do just that. They use their art to create physical definitions of society, share their perspectives of the world, and call attention to life’s unpredictability.
Today, I’m going to properly introduce you to six of the nineteen participating artists: Megan Aline, Ben Ashton, Alla Bartoshchuk, Casey Baugh, Mia Bergeron, and Arcenio Martin Campos.
Megan Aline
“As an artist I spend a lot of time refecting inwardly as I paint outwardly. I like the idea that we each have an inner landscape: a map created from emotions, ideas, and sensations collected throughout our lives.”
Megan Aline, pg. 85, “More Disruption” by John Seed
John Seed: What are some of the life experiences that have shaped your art?
Megan: Growing up on the rocky shore of midcoast Maine, where the entire state is still 90 percent forest, I spent a good bit of time roaming by myself. There is something that happens when you find yourself alone with your thoughts as a child; your imagination starts to unabashedly flourish. As an adult, through meditation, painting, and adventuring into nature, I’ve found access to this same magical childhood space. My silhouette paintings embody the idea of adventuring outside yourself in order to find out more about who you are internally.
Ben Ashton
“My work relies heavily on the subversion of art history. The result can be both beautiful and challenging; a clash of past and future that merges classic techniques with new ideas.”
Ben Ashton, pg. 149, “More Disruption” by John Seed
John Seed: Describe some of your recent themes and ideas.
Ben: Inspired by the “swagger portraits” of artists such as Thomas Lawrence, I have been lampooning those dandyish, silly-looking types, in order to hold up a mirror to the pomposity of contemporary discourse. My current technique, too, is heavily influenced by Lawrence, many of whose portraits have an “unfinished” look. My subjects attempt to mimic the confident poses of Regency-are portraits – that “master of the universe” look – yet, the hues and patterns that surround them give the works a sense of chaos. British history is used as a weapon, and there’s an obsession over the time when “Britain was on top” and a desperation to go back to it. I see it as weaponizing nostalgia. By subverting those Regency poses, I hope to take the idealistically “strong and stable” part of a cultural heritage and make it unsafe and tainted.
Alla Bartoshchuk
“My work skirts the line between intangible and tangible, giving voice to my subconscious mind.”
Alla Bartoshchuk, pg. 53, “More Disruption” by John Seed
John Seed: What are some of the life experiences that have shaped your art?
Alla: I grew up in Ukraine and came to the United States during my formative years to pursue art education and establish my career. The experience of separation from my homeland and my family was the first real paradigm shift for me – many more came later – and it changed the course of my life and my thinking. Early on, I often found that words lost meaning in translation. Painting became a refuge of sorts that provided me with needed space and became my primary means of communication. Through the art-making process, I began to look for and formulate meaning out of my environment.
Casey Baugh
“I want my work to be a mirror that reflects some part of the viewer that they have been searching for.”
Casey Baugh, pg. 23, “More Disruption” by John Seed
John Seed: What are some of the life experiences that have shaped your art?
Casey: A house fire at age thirteen. The birth of my daughter. Two years of absolute solitude in my studio while living in Boston. The death of my closest friend. Reading “Leaves of Grass”. In addition to these major events, I find that even a simple conversation with a friend or the first five minutes of a certain film can have a huge impact on my life perspective and can shift my art entirely.
Mia Bergeron
“It seems to me that Disrupted Realism is an expression mirroring the multiple lives many of us lead today. Like most Americans I have an entire imaginary existence online: curated, limited and often a small fraction of who I am. We are constantly bumping into and encouraging these other ‘selves’ through social media, biased news and now the introduction of AI. We are living in two places constantly. Our minds often spend more time away from our bodies than in them. If the goal of realism is to show the power, beauty or curiosity of what is directly in front of us, then realism being disrupted is actually a more honest view of what each of us are living every day.”
Mia Bergeron, pgs. 49-50, American Art Collector Issue 220
John Seed: How has your work evolved and developed over time?
Mia: I was trained as a realist portraitist in Italy between 2002 and 2005. Although I had some of the best technical training available, I knew I would drop much of it in order to satisfy my own questions about expression. I feel my work has evolved considerably since then, both in terms of narrative and in how I am actually stating these ideas. My method of working has also evolved. Originally I worked to say something in a painting as clearly as I knew how. Today most of my paintings are questions that sometimes I ask successfully, while failing valiantly at other times.
Arcenio Martin Campos
“My art is about the figure and time.”
Arcenio Martin Campos, pg. 63, “More Disruption” by John Seed
John Seed: What are some of the life experiences that have shaped your art?
Martin: In my youth, I had a strong sense of not wanting to be where I was for long periods. I drew and painted things the way that I wanted them to be in order to drift through time expediently.
Click here to view the More Disruption Exhibition Preview!
Principle Gallery 