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I am from Chicago and obtained my BA from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale in Cinema and Photography and went on to get my MFA at Savannah College of Art and Design. I showed an early curiosity for the mechanical. At an early age I was known to take my toys apart studying the inner workings and from they’re making something new. As I grew older I began to combine this curiosity with an artistic aesthetic that has since fully shaped itself into something quite magical. I pride myself on the craftsmanship evident in my work. With a unique talent for expressing the peculiar I can be found working for Hollywood as an art director and production designer. However, I am most at home in my studio creating my “little cabinets of curiosities” and the photographs that often occupy them. I find the process of developing these works to be the perfect culmination of artistry in construction and an expression of the fine line between reality and the fantastic. Walking this tightrope is the very stimulus for the magic that is created in the construction of these pieces. When I consider my influences I think of Copernicus, P.T. Barnum, even a more hygienic Rasputin. I build these pieces that incorporate photographs, mostly of myself, which deal with inner demons, relationships, the usual poor artist angst and loneliness, all of which are hidden by smoke and mirrors. My work, at its most distilled level, is about art laced with a trickster mentality and fooling the senses of the viewer, but at the same time letting them in on the trick.
Q&A with Kenn Coplan, the Local "Quack Artist" Showing at the Smithsonian this Summer By Niki D'Andrea Tue., Apr. 27 2010: Self-described "Quack Artist" Kenn Coplan is like a futuristic carnival sideshow barker from a parallel universe, driven into the Arizona desert on an endless quest for trash. The 39-year-old transplant from L.A. (not quite a parallel universe) treasures our ravaged beer cans, discarded car batteries, and sun-bleached bicycle seats. Because in his hands, they become laser guns, angel sculptures, and even a ghoulish, fully functional fortune telling machine called "CYTON." Coplan's shown his artwork and pseudo-science contraptions locally at places like Evermore Nevermore in Mesa and Artspace in Scottsdale. This summer, his work will also be featured in the "Revealing Culture" exhibit at the Smithsonian Institution's International Gallery in Washington, D.C., opening June 9. Not bad for a guy whose influences are "Copernicus, P.T. Barnum, and a more hygienic Rasputin." We recently caught up with Coplan to talk about his art, his learning disability, and his worst week ever.
Why did you start hunting
trash in the desert to make art?
Tell us about your learning
disability and how it affects your art. I have dysgraphia. It's a neurological
disorder that affects spelling and grammar. I was also born with a club
foot. Anyway, [dysgraphia] made it hard for me to communicate verbally
and on paper, so I expressed myself visually. My learning disability is
not a disability, it's a tool. I can't communicate in written word, so
I manipulate things in my physical world. I consider myself an instrument
maker, like Frankenstein.
Education: Master of Fine Arts, Savannah
College of Art and Design, 1995
Selected recent exhibitions: Alchemy, California Modern
Art Gallery, San Francisco, CA, 2009
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