Jacob C. Hammes

As an interdisciplinary artist my range of projects are hard to classify, but one of the unifying threads is an interest in understanding human identity from an interpersonal vantage point. Some of the work takes on the form of traditional sculpture, painting or drawing, while other projects involve digital media including audio/video, custom electronics or kinetic sculpture. I rarely use traditional materials, often instead using materials meant to evoke a connection to a specific history, often my own. My art practice is an attempt to reconcile the perception of our human place in the world with the abstract concepts we use to make sense of it. The active concepts i work with often come out of research into biology, psychology, physics, mathematics/geometry, religion and art. I'm influenced by artists such as john Isaacs and Paul Thek, artists that draw relationships between psychology and biology, often injecting moral or ethical concerns while riding the invisible line between high and low brow. I'm also interested in sculptors such as Richard Serra and Gordon Matta Clark in their various transformations of psychological space through architecture, while simultaneously twisting traditional notions of making and creating.

The exploration of human identity and sensory phenomenon has moved me towards hypnosis, a practice that in my experience points to the very location of a subject's perception and creative mind. Working exclusively with artists, writers, and musicians, the process is an ongoing collaboration, one which challenges my ability to deal with issues of control and power, while presenting many opportunities to explore deeper creativity. These collaborations often result in large scale drawings, paintings, or improvised performances.

My latest series entitled "Metatron's Roof" comes out of research into the history of geometric discovery from Euclid up to the theoretical geometry present in string theory. The resulting work seeks to investigate a possible relationship between geometry and human psychology– suggesting the presence of a roof, an attic, or an impossible dwelling as shelter.
The work shares a similar appearance with some work of Gordon Matta Clark, who's very influential to the way i think about psychological space. But rather than the pieces being a result of a destructive action, these pieces can be viewed as models of brand new homes for theoretical objects. The work was also inspired by Richard Serra's "Verb List Compilation" which outlines a list of actions that change the psychological relationship to an object. In this way i've begun composing my own list based on actions present in formal geometry (to truncate, to double, to prismatize, to stellate, etc).