Artist's statment
I define much of my work as drawing in the immediacy, the rawness, the intimacy, and the exploratory way in which I try to solve visual problems using line. My goal is to generate the essence of the image with a minimum of marks, establish a relationship between the ground and the object I’m pursuing, and locate the object in space.
The element of animation increases the challenge. How do I communicate this object’s motion, what is my spatial relationship to the object and how does it change as the object moves, how do I communicate the object’s thought/emotional trajectory over time.
I turned to animation when I found myself intrigued by that magical moment between the frames, the moment of motion. To paraphrase Norman McLaren: What happens between the frames is more important than what happens on each frame.
But how do we draw for that moment between the frames?
The strongest animated sequences in my films often consist of almost unrecognizable images. Strung together sequentially they reveal in motion a complexity of information - for example gesture, attitude, or emotion - that would be impossible to duplicate with consciously motivated, precisely drawn forms. It's fascinating to see how far from a figurative image I can get and still have the animated frames communicate something fresh, something that wasn't apparent while looking at the stills, something in which the viewer can find a wealth of resonance and meaning.
For a more in depth essay on my current work, please see
Motion Made Visible
Bio
Sharon Katz is a visual artist working in still and animated imagery. Her award winning animations screen at art and film festivals around the world, and her drawings and paintings are held in art collections in Canada and abroad.