DVAA Member since 2016

Aaron Kalinay

About:

I grew up in a small town in Northeastern Pennsylvania and have always been interested in the world and far away places and people. As a child and to this day I love the process of problem solving, constructing, and bringing a physical object to life out of an idea. I like learning and experiencing a wide array of things. This ultimately led to me becoming an art teacher. Although it wasn’t until college that I become so enthralled with art specifically. The passion of people in the art world really inspired me and the the power for art to be what you make of it enabled me to explore my many different interests.

The straightforward and simple joy that my students exhibit in art making is a true inspiration to me. Also the work and opinions outside of the “art world”. These perspectives as well as travel and exploration of new things often reinvigorate my work. I love dreamy atmospheres, moody portraits, and beautiful objects of an abstract vein.

The beauty and empowerment of art making and experiencing is something I can not imagine living without.

Artist Statement:

“My work is inspired by things I find beautiful, my feelings, and my longings. I thoroughly enjoy the process of making things, specifically painting and drawing. I am fascinated by the connection that can be made between people, places and objects of disparate time, space, and context. Playing with traditional structures of landscape, still life, and portraiture creates my abstracted paintings that contain the concentrated essence and energy that I am feeling at that time. I love the moods and memories created by moody sky, atmospheric natural and artificial light, flowers, the flow of fabric, the pattern of branches and nature, the strength of landscape and the melancholy of portraits.

Working with the natural qualities of the material I become absorbed and obsessed. A give and take occurs with the materials and I love and preserve the natural qualities of the paint and hand drawn line in combination with the manipulation of the material into my loosely envisioned plan. I love the back and forth of active engagement and pause for reflection. With a painting I am generally exploring a loose plan and vision and problem solving the entire time so that the formal and aesthetic qualities look and feel right.

Right means something that reflects my feelings or reaction to an experience in the world. My ultimate goal is that it is strong enough to evoke these feeling and experiential connections in a viewer. The power to make something that strong, desirable, and entrancing from raw materials and imagined ideas is beautiful and empowering and something I can not live without.”