Jonathan Allen

I repurpose images and materials from pop culture, current events, & everyday life into surreal dreamscapes. These dreamscapes are often fragmented & enigmatic, opening a window on our current social and cultural condition. Juxtaposition and dissonance are usually primary features of mixed media collage: the medium invites absurd jarring combinations. I'm more interested in using several media seamlessly, and emphasizing the similarities and connections between contrasted images. By rendering images in paint, pencil, ink and paper the scope of the surface and in turn its visual and thematic intricacy becomes vividly fluid—closer, I think, to our experience of the world.