"The dignity of the artist lies in his duty of keeping awake the sense of wonder in the world."
- G.K. Chesterton
"I have been interested in the imagery of fantasy since early childhood and all my artwork is, at its most fundamental level, about creating a "sense of wonder". In my illustration, my primary concern has been to create a window into the themes and story elements of a particular book. My non-commissioned work, on the other hand, is concerned with more personal themes. Stylistically my art is best described as "Imaginative Realism". Most closely allied to the scope and feeling of what is referred to as contemporary "Visionary Art", my non-illustrative art is intentionally imbued with a strong sense of the mystical or dreamlike, and is suffused with symbolic content. There is a deliberate attempt to invest the image with layers of meaning while having an immediate initial subjective or emotional impression. The majority of my work falls into one or another series of related paintings, which share common themes and symbols. In general terms, my "Faded Star" series deal with the struggle against despair and hopelessness, humanity's instinctive striving against what Barbara Tuchman calls the "burdens of modern man": loss of faith in religion, progress and the perfectibility of the human species. My "Passage" series is concerned with a personal investigation into metaphysics, religion, and near death experiences. My "Lumen" paintings are about the quest for inner revelation and meaning, of finding one's true self, among other concerns. Other series of works in progress (e.g., "Virtues", "Meditations", or "End of Nature" series) are about various other issues both subjective and objective."
- Michael Whelan
From
Naomi Bardoff's Artist Statement:
My work is about fairy tale magic. In fairy tales, unlike the more narratively familiar and internally consistent fantasy magic, there are no rules; this is the point of magic, and possibly the capriciousness of fairies. In fairy tale magic, things simply happen. Eating a magic talking fish causes a woman to give birth to triplets, her dog and horse to have triplets, and a large tree to sprout from where the fish's bones are cast...
In drawing a world of fairy tale magic, animals are characters, the tongues of dragons must be collected, drawings cast magic spells, animals and people are friends, dresses fit in walnut shells, and visual and poetic logic overrides formal logic.
