Carlos Dye Ceramics

The foundation of my work is constructing personal narratives through popular imagery based on my dreams and life. I transcribe conflicting emotions such as angst, happiness, temptation, and sorrow through iconography and symbolism. The juxtapositions I create with contrasting icons and images create confusion for the viewer.

Growing up in the Los Angeles, California area, I was surrounded by popular culture; Hollywood icons of past and present, hundreds of game shows, ever-changing fashion trends, and an assortment of music genres shape the concepts and emotions that I transcribe in my art work. Old cartoons and Hollywood westerns are some of my fondest memories of my youth. I grew up watching the news, which brought together celebrity life styles with disasters and crime, and sunny weather reports with recurring violence. At the time, I found this normal, yet looking at it now as an adult it seems surreal.

I have become desensitized to this glorified mixture of love and violence, and transpose this feeling in my work. Taking the images of love and the macabre, then juxtaposing them on a ceramic canvas, I create stories.