Going Beyond

In this thesis, I will discuss the approaches that I use in my paintings to provide a way to reconnect with our unsettled world. Using Suzi Gablik’s The Reenchantment of Art as a conceptual framework, I will review how a variety of scholars see the disconnectedness present within ourselves, our relationships to others, and the rest of the world. In doing so, I will discuss how painting can attempt to reenchant the world in order to mend our rift from it. Avenues for reconnection include practices that cultivate our own spirituality, soul, and ecstatic experiences, as well as approaches that promote beauty, interconnectedness, and ecological conversion. Referring to the history of landscape painting and abstraction, I will analyze how artists have used visual languages to respond to times of change and uncertainty. I will also explain how I have been influenced by Romantic landscape painting and abstraction to reinforce the conceptual basis of my paintings. I will then clarify how I fuse these painting methodologies with the conceptual framework of reenchantment to create paintings that provide viewers with spaces that can help reawaken the idea that their own soul is connected with their own body and mind, as well as with creation.