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Outdated is an investigation into just that... Blazina casts and repurposes various tools, objects and ephemera that are no longer useful in our current world. Reviving these once common items with a visual nostalgia, one questions the ideal of these once cutting edge inventions. The works described below explain further...
Reflection is a series of cast glass cameras based on my grandfather's collection of vintage cameras. My grandfather was an amateur photographer who obsessively photographed important moments in my family's visual history. From taking the photograph to developing the film and images, he found joy in each moment of the process. Reflection eludes to the families' generational growth by the variety of models of the cameras rather then the actual evidence of that moment. 8mm is a deconstructed vintage movie camera in cast glass and then placed again in its original housing. The video, which is projected on the wall, gives the illusion that the camera is active while in reality is not functional. Found in a dump yard, this piece examines how our culture throws away antiquated technology for the next best product. Correspondence is based on letters written from my great-grandfather when he was working in the United States to my great-grandmother who was still in Italy. Although the letters were written by hand, the typewriter symbolizes a communication method that has been long forgotten. The screen-prints on lead are portraits based on the couple.
Jen Blazina resides and has a studio in Philadelphia where she is a working artist showing in solo and group exhibitions nationally and internationally. Some highlights of her solo exhibitions are: A Remembrance, Koelsch Gallery, Houston, TX; Watches, Paxon Gate Gallery, San Francisco, CA; Bittersweet, Affordable Art Fair, Represented by Divergence Fine Art Gallery, NY, NY; Garden of Decadence, Pictura, Dordrecht, Netherlands; Oracle, Kunstoffice, Berlin, Germany; The Bridge International during Art Basel Miami, Represented by Marx Saunders Gallery, Miami, FL; and Bittersweet at Scuola di Graphica, Venice, Italy. She has been awarded numerous residencies including: European Ceramic Work Centre, SG's-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands; Djerassi Resident Artists Program, Woodside CA; The National Endowment for the Arts Grant to fund a fellowship at the Women's Studio Workshop, Rosendale, NY; Toos Neger in Dordrecht, Netherlands; Frans Masserel Centre, Kasterlee, Belgium; Scuola di Graphica in Venice, Italy; Kala Art Institute in Berkeley, CA; The Creative Glass Center of America's Residency Fellowship in New Jersey; Millay Colony for the Arts in New York. She has also been awarded numerous grants including the Leeway Foundation Grant, the Maryland State Arts Council, and the Independence Foundation Grant. Jen Blazina received her M.F.A. in printmaking from Cranbrook Academy of Art, her B.A. from Sarah Lawrence College in New York and her B.F.A., cum laude, from the State University of New York at Purchase College. She is a currently a professor of Fine Arts at Drexel University.
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