Lost and Found – Objects Adrift: Art in the Found
Painting What We Find
Exploring the beauty of chance encounters with found objects and their use as painting references. By embracing randomness over digital patterns, these everyday items—whether natural or artificial—become symbols of human meaning. Reimagined as artistic offerings, they evoke shared experiences and memories, reminding us of the quiet magic in the ordinary and forgotten, and the value in repurposing them as art objects.
Take a photo of that object you stumble upon—simple, humble—yet made significant by chance. Paint it in a 4x6-inch format; let oil, with all its synchronicities, be your medium. Render its portrait to release it into the world by mail. You'll keep the experience of the object, but its painted twin will traverse distances, arriving in the hands of a loved one, a friend, or a fellow artist. It becomes an offering, an artistic olive branch, crossing metaphorical seas to connect two people in parallel worlds.
Last week, we discussed the inspiration for Lost and Found, drawn from the correspondence between David Wojnarowicz and Pierre, which led us to choose postcard-sized paintings. Found objects are our subject, reflecting how seemingly random events reveal deeper connections. Synchronicity offers a counterpoint to the algorithm-driven nature of digital spaces, where machines, no matter how advanced, will always lag behind human creativity.
There's magic in walking along a shore, where countless objects lie scattered, worn smooth by the sea. You pick one—perhaps a stick, a pebble, or glass—without knowing why, and in that moment, you are bound to it. In its simplicity, it becomes part of your life, a small reminder of nature's mysteries. These moments of discovery keep our minds curious and seeking, like waves forever returning to the shore.
We forget this instinct as we grow older. We stop walking with wonder, our eyes glued to screens, disconnected from the world beneath us. Yet, whether in nature or in the most artificial places, we can still stumble upon objects that resonate with us. A bottle cap, a feather, a wire—these items don't need to make sense; they hold significance for us because they bypass reason. This process returns us to spontaneous creativity, free from digital distractions, grounded in tactile, lived experiences.
On a recent walk, we found a screwdriver bit and a yellow lid. We didn't know why, but their shapes and colors intrigued us. Like a pebble that once was a brick, this detritus, stripped of its original function, connected with something deep inside. The inner child, it seems, never stops searching.