User talk:Hautepanther

Christina Zifcak

THE FINE ARTIST

CHRISTINA ZIFCAK Born Christina April Zifcak, to parents, Michael James Zifcak & Inga Theresa Freyer, on March 8, 1975, in Providence, Rhode Island, USA. Christina started painting and drawing as soon as she could hold a paintbrush. Her parents always encouraged her artistic inclinations, even as a very young child. She was left alone to paint and draw for hours on end, without interruption. Christina was fascinated with all media, but especially took a liking to painting and drawing. Art school seemed a logical and natural course of study, and so she applied and attended the local and well-known, Rhode Island School of Design, where she majored in Fine Art Painting.

She was adept at figure drawing and painting, but halfway through her sophomore year in her major, she broke out of the restraints of figure painting, and started painting and drawing more abstract with each new piece. Exploring the new-found freedom of experimentation with paint, her work took on a Jackson Pollock, type of action-abstract-expressionism. Feeling confined and labeled by the association by teachers and fellow students, Christina struggled to find her own voice in her new abstract painting pursuits. She experimented, and tried to break through the constraints of the medium, and challenge herself to push the possibilities of abstract painting, until she started to discover her own voice through many, many abstract painting explorations & studies.

Her work is constantly evolving, but still remains the same in terms of her approach: There is no preconceived notion or concept precipitating the painting. The painting evolves by her constant interaction and reaction to the paint, and the evolving image. That is, she does not have an idea of the finished piece before the action of the painting has begun. She compares her process to that of David Lynch, the filmmaker: She is tapping into the unknown reaches of her subconscious, fishing for inspiration that may lend itself to a visual image that emerges through the paint texture & color, chiuro-scuro, figurative information, and anything else that emerges through the process of painting and reacting to the painting while she is engaged in the process of doing so. Each piece, like each moment in life, is unique; the only similarity is the artist painting, and the process in which it is created. This is not to say that she isn't interested in the outcome of each piece; on the contrary, she is NOT what you would call, a "process artist" only, but she is very concerned with the finished piece and does not stop working till the aesthetics of each painting satisfies her tastes. Some pieces take one siting and others take several months.

She does not have a set criteria or methodology to her painting process, and is always open to what may inspire her or catch her interest, or eye. She also enjoys incorporating collage elements into some of her works, as in: Blue City: If you look closely, you can see the Frank Sinatra stamps, and in The Christina is also very inspired by drawing and actually draws more often than she paints.Music is integral to her process, and she wouldn't be able to crate without it, she claims. "Music feeds my art, and my inspiration to create art.

I don't think I could create art without listening to music...at least, I have never tried."-Christina Zifcak

Hautepanther (talk) 10:46, 29 June 2009 (UTC)