About the Artist
I grew up on a ranch in rural Northern California during the '50s and '60s. My childhood experiences were incredibly mixed, falling somewhere in the range including "Leave It To Beaver," Gary Larson's "Far Side," and a stint of playing out the American Cowboy Myth.
Amidst it all was the common thread of connecting deeply with the natural environment, more and more so as the years passed. My nature connection became a healing tool for working through the common, less healthy belief systems of this culture, and a powerful teacher about reality, self-empowerment, and creativity. As I spent more time in the mountains, I also became a more astute observer of the shapes and forms of natural objects, and fascinated with combining them into abstract expressions.
My high school excursions into welding and metal fabricating gave me more skills to start working with found objects, both from nature and the ranch workshop. Everything from horse shoes to manzanita burls became art materials for me.
My post-college years were consumed with a series of business adventures, fueled by classic workaholicism, and strong but undirected youthful optimism. My art work was mostly put on hold during these years for several reasons. One reason was that I was so "busy" in general, and the other was the common, but absurd, idea that I really wasn't capable of any "serious" artworks. Seeing how freely a number of other artists' creativity flowed, and manifested their wonderful works, I had become intimidated into the notion that some people are born quite creative, and the rest of us simply aren't. Over the years, I have become increasingly amazed at the prevalence of similar naivete in so many Americans regarding the true nature of art and personal creativity. In this young culture of ours, few people seem aware of what their true creative potential actually is. This seems to me to be a vast, and yet untapped, resource in America, this potential collective discovery of how creative we humans can actually be. I find this very encouraging and uplifting, relative to the possibilities it presents for our future human evolution.
So, as for my sculpture, I will share that my deepest desire is that my art be a catalyst for fellow human adventurers, a catalyst for them to cultivate their creativity. And within that creativity, for them to find tools for cultivating their own growth, self-discovery, true Personal Power, and place in the collective evolution of humanity.
Explore!
Jared Hendricks