OOTHECA
An Exhibition by Jason Potter
Exhibition Dates: May 13 – May 24
Location: Provincetown Commons
46 Bradford Street
Provincetown, MA 02657
Opening Reception
Friday, May 15
5 PM – 7 PM
Artist Instagram
Gallery Hours
Monday – Friday: 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM
Saturday & Sunday: 10:00 AM – 2:00 PM
ARTIST STATEMENT:
My studio practice is expansive, embracing installation, assemblage, welding, casting, neon, photography, fiber, and performance. I create artifacts, feral species, vortexes of dialectics, and experiences that investigate the forces behind metamorphosis, voice, and resistance. I work at the intersection of queer bodies and ecology, Constitutional theory, mutagenetics, and public health to illuminate the diversity of human needs and capabilities.
I draw from a patchwork of life experiences: son of a mathematician and a musician; stage performer; attorney and academic; advocate for queer health and dignity; addiction survivor; and interdisciplinary visual artist. My experience navigating growth zones allows me to surf the vulnerability of learning new materials and techniques, and helps me maintain inward, outward, and upward curiosity as I work.
My artistic practice is the denouement and ongoing synthesis of my experiences: I createlike I have nothing to lose. Although research plays a major role in my process, I thrive at the nexus of studied investigation and improvisation. I am a ferociously curious solution seeker who transforms objects, environments, and myself by finding emergent functionalities, properties, and syllogistic potential. My materials work is restless and recursive: I gather, research, play, suture, remove, and press forward. After canvasing and scavenging, I sit with materials in the way one eats a gourmet cupcake—by slowly peeling the lining, testing precious bits, savoring one half, then skulking down at night to devour the rest, like some Lazarus species. I tend to resist the sleekness and severity of minimalism and focus on creating hybrid forms and providing a container for energy bursts and optical respites.
My work is frequently grounded in normative theories of justice, the upstream determinants of capability, and how bodies—especially queer bodies— navigate systems of power.