I'm an artist from the Midwest who lives and works in Los Angeles.
When I was in seventh grade I some how ended up in an art class. One day I saw a bunch of scrap metal and copper wires on a table in the class room. All of this material was pliable. I spend the fifty or so minutes of class time fashioning the scraps into a sculpture of sorts. It ended up resembling a bird’s nest with several birds sitting in it. I called it “Space Birds.†I was quite happy with it, and it was my first work using found objects. I returned to the class the next day and didn’t see it. I found it in the trash can. Dejected, I rescued it and took it home. I didn’t take another art class until my senior year in High School. “Space Birds†stayed in my mother’s living room until I took it to a drawing class across the river during my third stint in college. We were supposed to bring something interesting in to draw. The class was taught by a Master’s candidate. She went nuts for “Space Birds.†She liked it so much that she wanted to borrow it and draw it herself. I let her. Several months later she had a show on campus. I walked into the gallery and to my surprise the place was full of 48 by 72 inch drawings of “Space Birds.†She never returned it.
An eight year old boy looked through the open window of my studio at a few paintings, some finished and some unfinished. He studied the work for a few moments and before running off he crumpled his face and yelled, “You Suck!†I disagree.
www.chapmanmogridge.com
PRIZE No. 1
2007 Oil, oil stick and ink jet prints on panel construction
28" by 33" private collection
PRIZE No.4
2007 Oil, oil stick and ink jet prints on panel construction
33" by 33"
PRIZE No.5
2007 Oil, ink jet prints, colored pencil, and acrylic on wood
44" by 30 1/2"
THEY NEVER THOUGHT IT WOULD END
2006 Oil, oil stick, and colored pencil on canvas
40†by 30â€