Rachel MacFarlane
Rachel uses maquettes made of found refuse to serve as references for painted worlds that fall somewhere between mimetic representation and abstraction. Through a two-step process of translating and transforming, materials that are considered unattractive and unwanted become the basis for imaginary painted spaces. In the illusionary settings, materials transcend their original capacities, sometimes becoming weightless, anthropomorphic, and grandiose.
She is interested in pushing the tension between illusory surface and corporeal material present in a painting and uses this tension as a metaphor for the concurrent oscillation between the transcendent and temporal. She frantically records the concrete forms in these pathetic models that surround her and renders them impressive, arcane, and rhizomatic. By using these objects as references for painted spaces she becomes master of an imaginary domain that is rooted in the current and tangible.
