Loren Gomez

Statement

My first memory of art creation is at age 5.  I was painting at an easel in kindergarten.  I used a huge brush and dipped it into thick green and red paint.  The paint spread satisfyingly on the large paper, and made huge drips down.  Tempera paint smells musty, and in the corner of that small crowded room, I was entranced with the whole experience of it, not hearing the busy children around me.  I painted four straight lines, three green and one red, on a circular green wreath.  Mrs. Hoyer, my teacher, came over to see, and said “Oh, Lori, you’ve made and Advent wreath!”  She smiled, expressing her delight with me.  In response, I was intensely proud of my work and of myself.

Later in elementary school, colored tissue paper was my medium of choice.  I loved the beautiful rainbow of hues.  Tissue paper could be bunched and glued into any shape, or left flat, like a graceful ribbon in the breeze.  In third grade, I won first prize in a castle-making contest, where I used tissue paper to make my creation.  The prize was a great one: lunch from the local White Castle burger restaurant.  White Castle featured tiny, square, oniony hamburgers on doughy rolls.  They were delicious.  For the contest, there were to be two prizes, one for the most beautiful castle and one for the tallest.  At first I tried for the tallest castle, and mine almost reached the ceiling, but it kept falling down.  I could see the determination on the face of my classmate, James H, whose castle was so much sturdier than mine.  I went for the beautiful category, making a castle of oak tag cut to turret shapes and stapled together.  I then swathed it in whole sheets of transparent tissue paper with the colors overlapping and blending into new shades.  I remember looking at that castle, pleased with my creation, gratified, and with disbelief that I could have made something so truly beautiful.

Recently, I looked through a long window into a snowy field and saw peaceful shades of blues and greens next to each other in many layers.  Although I was at a party at the time, I really felt like stopping everything and painting right then!  I have so many images in my head.  I hope I have enough time to paint them all.