E.V. Meksin

Swimmers and Shores II
acrylic, oil and collage on wood panel

I seek to resuscitate the hieroglyphic qualities of a written language. My letters often takes on a figurative, gestural connotation. For instance, in my piece Swimmers and Shores, I try to confront the viewer with a many limbed, faceless creature that spreads herself as a simultaneous target and aggressor, while calling attention to the emblematic quality that words have. My canvases and installations are filled with letters. Made of curves, angles, lines, and holes, letters inevitably invite personification. I highlight the gendered spaces of lettering: the slit that is the “I”, the legs that are the “M.” How we use language, and how we manipulate letters, is obviously inflected with gender specificity. I hope my work offers another pathway into the implications of form, and the blatant sexuality of any worded proclamation.

© E.V. Meksin