Janice Porter
completed her MFA degree in Painting and Drawing at California State University, Chico. She served as the interim director of Chico's 1078 Gallery in 2007. She is currently teaching drawing, painting, and art appreciation classes at Shasta College and CSU, Chico.
Janice was born and raised near Chicago, in Highland Park, Illinois. She completed her BFA at Kansas City Art Institute, and moved to Minneapolis. There, she painted & exhibited, worked as a graphic designer, taught workshops in drawing, painting, and book arts, illustrated children's books, served as a community organizer in the arts, and raised sons.
ARTIST STATEMENT
Low Life, High Life, and in Between
My work is an ongoing probing of where and how the physical and non-physical meet. My works serve as setups, realms, backdrops for these meetings.
I experience everything as alive, so I tend to personify every object I depict. Many of the objects I choose are man made, which I find to be elegantly simple and potent in how their form is married to their function.
I choose organic objects for any number of reasons: melons are sensual, trees are commanding while gentle, oranges are a lovely substitute for a baseball.
Regarding the visually ugly, I find it everywhere. Suffice it to say, it provokes an ongoing tragedy in my senses. What I deem ugly is never found in nature; it is always man-made. Rather than die from this, I’ve embraced it, searching out gems of form and ambiance that encompass the ugly and the elegant.
I spend alot of time drawing , entering sympathetic events between my intention, the materials, and the image. Rubbing a drawing into existence satisfies my craving for touch, and for a give-and-take, assert-and-allow experience as I work.
My newest works are becoming narratives. Vegetables and backyard objects take on the emotions, thoughts, and actions of people I know. The whole point for me is to explore the metaphysical possibilities of reality in a pictorial way.