Shawn Serfas is a British Columbia based artist and lecturer with UBC Okanagan's Creative and Critical Studies Department. Serfas pursued a Fine Arts and Art History degree in Saskatchewan as well as a Master of Fine Arts degree in Alberta. However, he was initially drawn to an academic career in Environmental Science and that interest remains at the core of his work. "Currently, my painting practice explores the relationships between identity, place, ancestral origin, religion and the environment. The environment offers a foundation for inquiry into the human struggle with itself, our sites of experiences and our purpose. The compositional similarities I find in the physical and human landscape fuels my dissection and abstraction of information for purposes of understanding the creative-act."
For some time I had also been wanting to explore more flowing forms that would be scaled up versions of carvings and have had several of these carvings in soft firebrick sitting on a shelf in the studio for some years. In 2006 I had a three month Residency at Sturt Contemporary Craft Centre in Australia. I used this opportunity to evolve into a new way of working. Initially, moving from what I knew, I translated the forms into curved planes which I firmed up in slings and worked with them much softer than I was used to with the geometric forms. Since these initial pieces, I have developed a method of pinching together small accretions like a mud wasp and the process is much more contemplative and akin to the act of carving.
Shawn Serfas is a British Columbia based artist and lecturer with UBC Okanagan's Creative and Critical Studies Department. Serfas pursued a Fine Arts and Art History degree in Saskatchewan as well as a Master of Fine Arts degree in Alberta. However, he was initially drawn to an academic career in Environmental Science and that interest remains at the core of his work. "Currently, my painting practice explores the relationships between identity, place, ancestral origin, religion and the environment. The environment offers a foundation for inquiry into the human struggle with itself, our sites of experiences and our purpose. The compositional similarities I find in the physical and human landscape fuels my dissection and abstraction of information for purposes of understanding the creative-act."