JASON DEMARTE - EXPOSURE INTERNATIONAL OPEN CALL

I am interested in modern understandings of the natural world and how that compares to the way western society approaches its immediate consumer environment. It’s important for me to compare established idealist utopian ways of representing the landscape to the hyper-perfect way products and modern consumer life are represented in media. I’m particularly interested in the idea of disillusionment through false or misleading representation. I’m interested in creating photographs that merge simulated forms of life and colorful processed foodstuffs with idyllic pop material goods, in an effort to create a dialog on consumption, duplicity, and homogenized ecstasy.

I work digitally, combining images of fabricated and artificial flora and fauna with commercially produced and processed products. I look at how these seemingly unrelated and absurd groupings or composites begin to address attitudes and understandings of the contemporary experience. I represent the natural world through completely unnatural elements to speak metaphorically and symbolically of our mental separation from what is “real” and compare and contrast this with the consumer world we surround ourselves with as a consequence. Ultimately, this work is an investigation into the manipulation of truth.

BIOGRAPHY

Jason DeMarte is an established artist best known for his highly detailed and seductive flora and fauna photo assemblages. His work has been exhibited in galleries and museums, both nationally and internationally. DeMarte has been featured in journals, textbooks and publications including the British Journal of Photography, Huffington Post, Feature Shoot, Hi- Fructose, Oxford American, The Elements of Photography, Manifest, Photo Review, and Black Warrior Review.

Jason is a tenured professor of art at Eastern Michigan University. He received his BFA in Photography from Colorado State University and his MFA in Photography from the University of Oregon.