Saints and Sinners

SAINT JOHN THE MOSAICIST

 

(C) JOHN FANSMITH 2020

Saint John the Mosaicist, one of the more obscure members of the pantheon of Saints, is known primarily for never having been observed or heard to have sworn or blasphemed despite spending his entire life gluing small pieces of glass, stone or ceramics to wooden boards. Although most historians believe that he worked in northern Italy during the period 1358 – 1387 AD, no one has been able to authenticate any mosaic pieces from that time and place as having been the work of Saint John the Mosaicist. There are no known images of him and the Church’s canonization records are surprisingly vague. While SAINT JOHN THE MOSAICIST is composed of a hand built, raku fired paper clay “mask”, a border of stained glass strips left over from a prior project and a background of glass tiles and stained glass pieces liberated from the mosaic shard pile at the Abington Art Center, the story of Saint John the Mosaicist has been woven from whole cloth. (2020) (24” x 24” x 1 ½”) ($275)

SELF-PORTRAIT # 6

(c) JOHN FANSMITH 2020

SELF-PORTRAIT #6 is a wall sculpture consisting of 20 hand sculpted and hand glazed paper clay tiles which were then fired to cone 04 and mounted on an MDF backer using Thinset. Like all of the other pieces in the IRIAAM (It Really Is All About Me) Series – with the exception of the photographs – there are large measures of both artistic license and artistic ineptitude involved in SELF-PORTRAIT #6. It does illustrate why I don’t consider myself to be a painter and thus may be , by some measure, considered to be an accurate, if not particularly flattering self-portrait. I could have subtitled it PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A PAINTER. It was, however, fun to make. ($669) (2020) (15 ½” x 19″)

Saints and Sinners

(C) JOHN FANSMITH 2018

SAINTS AND SINNERS is a new collograph print series which uses a complex and layered, but nevertheless, monochromatic palette throughout relying on the interstices to carry the image. SAINTS AND SINNERS #1, the first print in the series (and like all the others) leaves the viewer to decide whether it is the image of a saint or a sinner. While each piece in the series can stand alone, they are intended to be viewed in groups of at least three. Hand inked and hand pulled and matted and framed to 24” x 10”.