Rachel Klinghoffer
A pile of my own used incidentals—including bras, lingerie,
designer shoes, Hanukkah decorations, used paintbrushes,
souvenirs, memorabilia, and concrete blocks—that I once used
to hold up my paintings has magnetically migrated to the center
of my studio. These articles reflect my personal connection to
femininity, Judaism, romance, and notions of painting, and have
become specimens, icons, and relics that are poked, prodded,
stroked, rubbed, then pulled, torn, and broken apart. They
become the supports for new work, connecting my past practice
of painting on canvas to the more open and broadly defined notion
of “painting” that interests me now.
A laborious process of making grips me, entrances me, brings me
to the devotional. I get lost in the repetition of the act of making.
As an intermediate step, variable elements are stained, glazed,
sprayed, painted, or dipped, then at times rubbed, scraped,
sanded, drilled, or cracked open. All surfaces are covered,
decorated, and obliterated, with many being re-exposed to varying
degrees. Methodically, meditatively, obsessively, carefully, at
times carelessly but always vehemently, I make and remake.