Dustyn Bork, originally from Monroe, Michigan, is a visual artist and serves as Professor of Art at Lyon College. He earned his Master of Fine Arts from Indiana University and a Bachelor of Fine Arts from theUniversity of Michigan. Bork won the prestigious Visual Arts Fellowship for Painting, the largest individual arts award given by the Arkansas Arts Council. His work has been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions nationally and internationally including at Site: Brooklyn inNew York City; Czong Institute for Contemporary Art in South Korea; Manifest Gallery in Cincinnati, Ohio; the Torpedo Art Center in Alexandria, Virginia; and the Hunterdon Museum of Art in New Jersey among others. Bork has participated in artist residencies in Argentina, Latvia, Belgium, Italy, and in Bulgaria. His work was published in New American Paintings Southern Issue no. 148. Bork is married to artist Carly Dahl, the executive director of the Batesville Area Arts Council, and has two children: Paige and Aiden. More of his work can be found on his websitewww.dustynbork.com
Artist Statement
I am interested in the contrast between old and new structures. It is a curious fate for the life of a building. Some go through many visual iterations and renovations while others will not stand the test of time. I want viewers to make connections between the colors, lines, textures, and forms in my artwork and those found in their interactions with the constructed environment. My paintings and prints focus on the built environment and architectural forms are extracted from my surroundings. The paintings quote building facades, they remove the compositions from the traditional rectilinear picture plane, often shaped to reflect architectonic forms and spatial relationships. This process allows the artwork to become a surface as well as an object. Each composition reflects the beauty implicit in every day surfaces and structures in various levels of decay and renewal.
