Michael Willett

Region: South

Website: http://www.michael-willett.com

City / State: Birmingham, AL

My current body of work consists of mixed-media paintings created from an often indistinguishable combination of acrylic, screenprint, and collage on canvas. While reflecting on the broad history of abstraction, I’m interested in appropriation as an approach to nonobjectivism. Reproductions and advertisements of works by other artists are meticulously dissected and reconfigured into repetitive patterns and dense structures. Fragmentation, intricate layering, and the juxtaposition of textures and rhythms help produce these complex compositions. While my studio practice centers on process, it is also informed by ideas of excess, questions of authenticity, and the collaging techniques of various sample-based musicians. On the whole, I am interested in how samples of existing works of art can be combined, recycled, and reinterpreted to create a new visual experience.