Advanced Life Drawing : Final: Artistic statement/Bio

How Long Will You Stay Quiet?

Artist Statement:

Jade Smith’s series entitled How Long Will You Stay Silent? is inspired by recent events consuming the daily news regarding sexual harassment in the workplace. Victims are silenced by not only the perpetrators but co-workers and friends that are privy to the knowledge. These “dirty little secrets” are out in the open now and the guilty ones can no longer hide. It starts with one brave woman speaking out publicly, which gives others the strength and courage to do the same. Victims feel freedom for the first time and they can no longer be silenced or paid to keep quiet. The Hashtag “#metoo” symbolizes unity and support for the victims of sexual abuse.

This series of charcoals represent women uniting together for the empowerment of women. Their voices – and there are many – have resulted in change. The guilty are finally being held accountable for using their position of power at work to take advantage of hard-working women who remain quiet because they are fearful of losing their job and reputation. These victims have no place to go and their claims are not taken seriously. These powerful men have always been protected and never held responsible for their actions, which gives them a free pass to continue. Jade Smith’s work not only brings the viewer up close and personal to this subject matter but also asks them to find their voice, speak out against injustice – no matter how hard or how frightening it may be. Transparency is a prevalent theme in our society at the moment. This transparency allows for dialogue, which leads to action and transformation.

Jade Smith drew inspiration from several female artists whose work focuses on women’s empowerment. Dipti Kulkarni is an Indian artist who uses bold and bright colors and heavy contrast in her works, which depict a woman’s struggle for an equal place in society. She uses expressions to evoke strong emotions as a means of creating a positive change in society. Maria Maria Acha-Kutscher is a Spanish artist whose portrait series entitled Women Working for Women contains extremely powerful messages about women’s empowerment. These enormous portraits, printed on tarps and placed in public settings, focus on women as catalysts of change. Cheryl Braganza is an artist from Montreal who confronts the stereotype that women are weaker than men in her work. She draws inspiration from the solidarity of women and believes that women will be the driving force towards a more peaceful world. Katrina Majkut is a visual artist and writer from New York whose work in embroidery, painting, and writing, addresses social practices and civil rights pertaining to women. She uses her work to confront the negative undertones of the word “feminist” so it will become a normal part of every girl’s vocabulary. Anne Sherwood Pundyk is a New York City artist who uses her abstract paintings to make strong statements about women. She finds abstract painting especially liberating as a woman and uses her work to encourage other women to take risks.

Artist Bio:

Jade Smith was born in San Jose, California. She is currently a junior at Dodge College of Film and Media Arts where she is studying Digital Arts and Animation while pursuing a minor in Studio Art. She found her passion for the arts during her Waldorf education, which transformed learning into art. Every subject resulted in an artistically inspired lesson book, created by her. This style of education created the foundation for training her eye to notice the minute details of life and to see the beauty in everything. Without technology, she became an independent thinker, free of society’s influences. This allowed her to fill her mind with her own pictures.

Chapman University’s art community has been the ideal environment for her to explore and grow in her artistic abilities, independence, and individualism. Creating art causes her to see the world from different perspectives. She is always looking for new ways of to express herself and although she enjoys traditional methods of art, she is also captivated by all the new techniques available in our technology driven world. Learning to transpose her ideas digitally permits her versatility in expressing herself. Technique aside, she aspires to create art that makes an impact and evokes deep emotions in its viewers in hopes that they will keep coming back to it, day after day. She recently exhibited her work at Chapman University in House of The Arts.

Dipti Kulkarni