J.K.Ward
About
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Working artist statement
I was born and raised on a Southern Alaskan archipelago. The main town was built on commercial fishing and is populated by around 6,000 people, with an additional 7ish scattered across the borough of villages and neighboring islands. The people are resilient, hard-working, and authentic.
The world-class wilderness is an endless playground in which to hunt, fish, kayak, backcountry snowboard, surf, hike, mountain bike, camp, ride ATVs, and vandalize WWII bunkers. The ocean, mountains, and forests provide endless adventure, humbling majesty, and plenty of opportunity for shenanigans. .
One of the happiest summers of my life was spent rolling around with my dog, scavenging junk lots and back yards for decommissioned nets and trampolines, hauling them out to a circle of trees at the end of a trail, and stringing them up into a multi-story bouncy castle complex high in the spruce trees. Common criticisms that I hear about my hometown is that there isn’t anything to do. No there aren’t shopping malls, night clubs, or live music, but if you have the right gear, you can spend your whole life getting lost in the sticks.
For almost as long as I can remember, in stead of restlessly tossing and turning in bed at night, I would pull my boots on and walk through the woods. The grizzly bear population is rather large and encountering them at short distance is not irregular, however, they generally have an abundance of food are therefore no interest in bothering people. Night walking was a sacred, solitary ritual until high school when other kids’ parents would let them out at night.
I met my art mentor Brendan Harrington sophomore year as a school teacher. He demonstrated a successful career in the chaotic, uncertain, pathless art industry. He saw my interest and gave me his extra time to share history lessons, display my work, and encourage me to continue.
I clearly love about my hometown. However, I feel the need to test my view against what the rest of the world has to offer. I graduated High school one semester early in 2024 with a 4.0gpa and began searching for evidence which would confirm or deny my suspicion that coastal Alaska rules. I am now studying Fine art at Bath Spa University in SW England in order to obtain a BA degree as the first step toward potentially becoming a teacher. Proximity to Bristol and London airports grants the ability to visit the entirety of Europe via $20 long-weekend flights.
(April 11, 2026)
I create in an attempt to return value to the world. Non-reciprocally pulling from a world which provides air to breathe, creatures to eat, and people’s creations to experience, feels wrong. For many, experiencing human creations plays a large role in bringing their lives meaning. I hope my creations may be similarly experienced by others and contribute value to their search for meaning. My practice is primarily focused on the human condition, our relation to nature, and the often overlooked depth behind mundane aspects of reality. I direct attention to beauty found in common life in order to share wonderment, provoke thought, and inspire perspective reconsideration.
Thus far, I am without evidence that my artworks produce valuable affective responses within viewers beyond simply impressing time devotion or medium control. An impressed feeling is a response to the creator rather than the piece’s inherent provocative qualities. While prolific displays may inspire an audience to work harder and compete, I doubt their lives become more fulfilled as a result.
In order to work towards creating pieces which invoke meaningful thoughts and emotions, I now often create semi-improvisationally. I maintain a minor spark of intended significance while procedurally generating mostly ambiguous forms in a method or direction which I believe leads to a captivating piece with great potential for a diverse audience to bestow an equally diverse multitude of meanings. This approach differs from my previous practice which conceived through meticulous planning and an incomplete thesis that successful art must resemble the artist’s intended vision.
People are often looking to be emotionally moved, inspired, or otherwise provoked when visiting a space dedicated to art display. This recent dedication to abstraction is partially an experiment which observes how viewers may project meaning or significance upon ambiguous images which fulfill their original desire to feel something powerful or inspiring. Additionally, creating abstract art partially alleviates me of the responsibility to formulate representative, unavoidably-opinionated work, and also provides me with insight into common responses and interpretations of my abstractions which can be used to inform future, more representational work.
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