James Erikson is an artist and librarian from Philadelphia. He makes paintings, prints, artists’ books, drawings, and sculptures. Born in Plainfield, New Jersey, at an early age he moved to rural Central Pennsylvania. There he spent a childhood immersed in the fields and woods that have influenced his paintings ever since. He has shown his work in galleries in Pennsylvania, New York, and Ohio. Erikson received his MFA from SUNY Purchase and his MLS from CUNY Queens.

Statement

For over 25 years as an artist, I have been exploring a connection between light and space and the emotions they evoke. I’m interested in the evocation of memory of time, place, light, color, and scale. Considering the architecture and craft of ancient cultures enables me to ruminate on those huge human experiences of life and death and memorial.

Collage is a medium I return to again and again. It is often a catalyst for growth in my development as an artist. Many times there is a struggle with finding clarity in a collage, other times I might deliberately make things more difficult for myself with the ultimate goal of finding something new. Working interchangeably between collage, watermedia, pastel and oil, the last couple years have been focused on color and light exploration using the structures of ancient time and culture with the principles of nature as a guide.