Galen Cheney

Lives and works in North Adams, MA, USA

Artist statement

The creative process and the exploration and manipulation of materials are what drive the work. They are the engine and the fuel. Experimentation and pushing boundaries are ongoing concerns. The work I am currently making is a furthering, a deepening of work that I started during a residency in China in 2015. There I was working with accumulated papers, building them up into multi-layered constructions. While I continue to work with paper, I have also shifted a similar approach to using canvas and more durable materials. The process is additive and reductive. I use fragments of past paintings, old receipts, used airline tickets, remnants of past experiences and work them into the surface of the new painting. They become one with the new surface, imbuing the painting with memory, history, a sense of time, and an accidental quality, which I find beautiful and compelling. Paintings made this way, constructed really, have a distinct object-like quality, which is satisfying. Working in this physical way allows my mind to stay open and present in the process. It keeps me from becoming too tight and closing down the creative possibilities of a painting before it is finished. I strive to keep the painting as open as I can for as long as I can before finishing it. It is the opposite of planning a painting and then executing the plan. The magic can only happen when I don't try to overthink or control the process. I prefer my paintings to have a raw, open quality. More recently I...

Artwork