Abstract Portrait of Nurtured Nature

By Amalia Galdona Broche

Goat
Goat
Aug 26, 2017 · 3 min read

Set №1, cyanotype on paper and twine, 2017

This body of work personifies the existential need to understand ourselves as an embodiment of the Nature-Nurture archetype, so popular in literature since Aristotle’s time in the work of Shakespeare, Mark Twain and Mary Shelley.

Originally from Santa Clara, Cuba, I graduated from Jacksonville University with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Sculpture, and a Bachelor of Arts in Art History.

I currently reside in Jacksonville, Florida, and have worked for the Cummer Museum of Arts and Gardens, as well as The Peggy Guggenheim Collection.

I have also exhibited at the Wilson Center, the Alexander Brest Gallery and participated in the 2015 New York Academy of Arts Summer Residency.

My work started by looking back over my childhood, among the decaying infrastructure of a Cuba frozen in a Revolution long past, to understand how my generation came to its present form. But my generalized socio-political understanding of the Cuban youth poorly explained the nuances of our society, let alone an individual.

And mindful that the key to understanding myself, or anybody for that matter, is hidden in the origins of our traits, expanded my focus by looking at the big picture and then focusing on the specifics. The big picture being humanity, and the specifics the variables that impact an individual’s identity in terms of nature and nurture.

My most recent work is founded on the general understanding that both inherent, and environmental factors define an individual’s character. For that purpose, I have employed the use of mixed media materials to be proxies of these variables, adding a third element: time.

The mirrored images are a recurring theme as they are representative of the past and the future, with an ambiguous connection point as a reference to the fleeting present.

The materials used to obtain the sculptural form include but are not limited to wire, newspaper, crafts paper, burlap and jute twine. A layer of cyanotype solution has been applied to the surface and has then been exposed to the sun and consequently been washed and fixed.

This alternative photographic process contributes to the environmental variable. In its present form, Abstract Portrait of Nurtured Nature, is merely a simplified portrait of the essence of an individual, in terms of the innate and the acquired.

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Goat

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