About
KAITLYNN WEBSTER is a multidisciplinary installation artist from Fresno, California, USA. She received her BA in Art with Honors from California State University, Fresno in 2017, and is currently pursuing her MFA at the Burren College of Art/NUI Galway. Her award-winning work has been shown in various galleries in California and Ireland, and featured in several arts and humanities journals. She uses mark making and sculpture to visually represent various psychological states and explore the way these states reverberate through the physical body. Her work is an attempt to map out her own psyche and create a contemplative space to encourage her viewers to do the same.
STATEMENT
My work is an exploration of identity through increased awareness of self. In my focus on sculpture, the contact I have with my media has become a metaphor for the exploration of my identity and beliefs. My background in the foundry casting bronze, as well as in kiln-casting glass, fostered a fascination with process and material. I work primarily in sculpture and installation. In my installations, I create a dialogue between two- and three-dimensional pieces. The installations I create function as psychological spaces I invite my viewers into, both to experience a different psychological state and to question and explore their own. The sculptures within this space function as representations of the effects that psychological states have on our bodies. These bodies invade the viewer’s space and encourage them to consider the manifestations of their own mental states on their physical selves.
My practice revolves around deepening my understanding of the human mind, by first deepening my own self-knowledge. Although the specifics of each human experience are diverse, there is so much about the general human experience that we all share – experiences of love, friendship, jealousy, loss, and so many others. My work is an attempt to delve into and map aspects of my own psyche. The concepts behind my work are personal, derived from my experience with religion and secularism and the process of re-learning myself after jumping from one to the other. The ideas of self-knowledge and being willing to look at things with a different perspective are vital to me. My own experience makes it clear to me how easily we allow ourselves to become trapped in the comfort of the things we believe to be true. My work seeks to push against this trend, and push towards open-mindedness.
My work is an exploration of identity through increased awareness of self. In my focus on sculpture, the contact I have with my media has become a metaphor for the exploration of my identity and beliefs. My background in the foundry casting bronze, as well as in kiln-casting glass, fostered a fascination with process and material. I work primarily in sculpture and installation. In my installations, I create a dialogue between two- and three-dimensional pieces. The installations I create function as psychological spaces I invite my viewers into, both to experience a different psychological state and to question and explore their own. The sculptures within this space function as representations of the effects that psychological states have on our bodies. These bodies invade the viewer’s space and encourage them to consider the manifestations of their own mental states on their physical selves.
My practice revolves around deepening my understanding of the human mind, by first deepening my own self-knowledge. Although the specifics of each human experience are diverse, there is so much about the general human experience that we all share – experiences of love, friendship, jealousy, loss, and so many others. My work is an attempt to delve into and map aspects of my own psyche. The concepts behind my work are personal, derived from my experience with religion and secularism and the process of re-learning myself after jumping from one to the other. The ideas of self-knowledge and being willing to look at things with a different perspective are vital to me. My own experience makes it clear to me how easily we allow ourselves to become trapped in the comfort of the things we believe to be true. My work seeks to push against this trend, and push towards open-mindedness.