AMY J. DYCK
Location:
Langley, BC, Canada
ARTIST BIO
Based in Langley, BC, Amy J. Dyck’s work is a unique mix of representational and abstract expressionism and strives to express something deeper in the human experience than can be observed on the outside. Using collage, oil paints and sculpture, and pulling from anatomical studies and visual experimentation, her work is influenced by personal struggle, psychology, and old and new artists and is always evolving. With a certificate in design studies as a foundation, Amy has pulled together an education from books and videos, copies of the masters, occassional workshops or mentorship, and a lot of practice. She has taught children and adults how to draw, paint, and find their own voice through art. Amy has won awards in several international art competitions, has been interviewed for podcasts and magazines, and has had her work shown and collected internationally.
ARTIST STATEMENT
In the mysterious internal landscape, where our experiences are not solid, knowable objects, where our feelings come and go, and where our deeper selves reside, my work explores what it feels like to be human, alive, limited, with all the vulnerability, yearning, resilience, and complexity inherent inside us. My recent work is a collection of collages, paintings and sculptural works of women, referencing aspects of their depth, complexity, vulnerability, and strength. Pulling from lived experience with disability and difficulty, the creatures in the work are nuanced and strange, broken and fierce, and filled with conflicting parts of themselves as they figure out how to move forward and fight back in a world and with a body, that can be rife with problems. Usually, I start my creative process by sitting down with photographs, paint, paper and mixed media supplies. I cut, connect, disconnect, smear and experiment until a figure with a sense of honest complexity and embodied presence emerges. These small works on paper are finished works themselves but are also often the inspiration for larger paintings and sculptures as I continue to explore.
