Scott Meyer: Searching for the Personal in the Iconic

rtists usually develop their work with strategies that encompass concepts, personal aesthetics, formats, mediums, methodologies, techniques and presentations. Tactics can be premeditated or intellectual in approach. The opposite way is to generate work intuitively, incorporating improvisation and spontaneity. Of course there are a myriad number of schemes that combine these two disparate means. Following individual paths, an artist’s journey evolves and eventually produces a ’body of work’. Viewed in total, this accomplishment may exhibit distinct and particular characteristics: features are repeated, easily identified, express a personal visual language and clearly establish specific thematic territory. With a highly accomplished and consistent oeuvre, these hallmarks transcend the superficial, are not redundant, nor are they reduced to mere frivolous stylization. Occasionally, some artists create art that becomes critically embraced and universally recognized as profound. These function as symbols or emblems, becoming benchmarks in art history. Such iconic treasures are so