Creating the Art Piece “Residency”

Apr 16

I recently finished a two-week residency at Snow Farm in western Massachusetts. It was my first residency and the first time since I graduated college where I had a large amount of time to create and explore.

While at Snow Farm, I continued my exploration of adding hidden messages or code into my artwork. My latest piece is a homage to my residency, hence the name.

Each morning, I would walk the beautiful grounds and take lots of photos. I loved the morning light and the architecture of the old buildings. To start, I took these photos and built a color palette. I then decided the message and began. I only plan out the message and basic grid, then fill in the rest of the piece allowing the composition to evolve.

I was inspired by the roof angles, so I incorporated my first diagonal into the color study series. For the code, I started with the Rosicrucian cipher and made a slight alteration to include color as part of the code.

You can determine the letter based on the position of the one uncut loop in the square pile. If the loop is in the middle right and in the color yellow, then the letter is “R”.