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Steven Derks
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Artist Statement
Finding and collecting curiosities in thrift stores and junkyards is a lifelong preoccupation and a passionate experience for me, rather like going to church. Three or four times a month I visit one of Tucson looking at the forlorn piles of bent, twisted and rusted metal lying all over the place. Now things start to happen very fast; everywhere I look I begin to see metal transformed into finished sculptures.
Most of my sculptures are conceived right there in the scrap metal yards where I find both the vision and the ingredients for my work. I just see a piece of metal and immediately imagine the completed sculpture it suggests. Most of the time, during one visit I am able to locate all of the actual metal parts that will be necessary to complete many sculptures, but occasionally an exciting piece of rusted metal will languish in my studio yard for months, waiting for the day I will find the piece or pieces that are missing.
I like the immediacy of welding; it is glue that sets up rapidly, in seconds. This makes metal become either plastic or rigid. But I never bend or cut the metal I use. This self-imposed limitation forces me to respond to the object as it actually is. My art lies in the assemblage, not the cutting and shaping of its individual parts.
I like my work to remain unfinished, even when I have carried out my initial vision for it. I resist signing the work for this reason. If it remains unsigned, it is a piece in process, and more things can continue to happen to transform it after it is sold.
Co-incidentally I hate to say goodbye either to my work or to people. The work and human relationships always have the potential for new life, and more redemption. I always expect that.
Making art allows me to have a spiritual and a psychological life without being directly involved in any theology or ideology. Through art I can engage my life deeply, and can impact other people
The Catholic Apostle Jude is a figure of special significance to me, and to my work. The patron saint of a small Tarahumara Indian village in Mexico, his life was the manifestation of betrayal and redemption, twin themes that are central to my own experience.
When I discard something, I betray it. When I find it, conceive a vision of it renewed, and make art from it, I redeem it. All objects have the potential to be redeemed through art, to be transformed through human vision. So do all people. If a person were to be discarded like a piece of rusted steel, it would be a profound experience. But if it happens to an object, everyone takes it to be insignificant. I can't accept that. Art makes my own personal redemption possible.
Education:
1996 Tucson Museum of Art Mentor Program
1995 Desert Crucible-Tucson Arizona Internship
1993 Tucson Museum of Art-Art Training Workshops
1992 Arizona Commission of the Arts-Arts Business Training
1979 Pima Community College-Arts
Exhibitions:
2oo4 Galleri Urbane, Silver City, NM
Liz Hernandez Gallery Tucson, AZ
Coda Gallery, Palm Desert, CA.
Hacienda Del Sol, Tucson, AZ
Tupolo Rd Gallery, Taos, NM
2003 Shidoni, Santa Fe, NM
Redeemed Art Gallery, Tucson, AZ
Dinnerware, Tucson, AZ
Galleri Urbane, Silver City, NM
2002 Dinnerware, Tucson, AZ
Galleri Urbane, Silver City, NM
Redeemed Art Gallery, Tucson, AZ
Shidoni, Silver City, NM
2001 3Falk Gallery, Tubac, AZ
Shidoni, Santa Fe, NM
Dinnerware, Tucson, AZ
Lanning Gallery, Sedona, AZ
2000 Moxley Ross, Santa Fe NM
Obsidian Gallery, Tucson, AZ
1999 Coda Gallery, Palm Desert, CA
The Select Art Gallery, Sedona, AZ
D.C. Harris Gallery, Tucson, AZ
Tucson Museum of Art, Tucson, AZ
Tohono Chul Gallery, Tucson, AZ
1998 Phantom B. of A., Tucson, AZ
Tucson Museum of Art, Tucson, AZ
1997 Tucson Museum of Art, Tucson, AZ
Apparatus Gallery, Tucson, AZ
Dallas Market Center, Dallas, TX
The Select Art Gallery, Sedona, AZ
1996 Damian Ranch, Tucson, AZ
1996 Apparatus Gallery, Tucson, AZ
Debra Hudgens Gallery, Scottsdale, AZ
Susanne Brown Gallery, Scottsdale, AZ
Karen Newby Gallery, Tubac, AZ
1994 Tucson Museum of Art, Tucson, AZ
1993 Expo Chango, Tucson, AZ
1991 Tucson Museum of Art, Tucson, AZ
Karen Newby Gallery, Tubac, AZ
Feathers Gallery, Scottsdale, AZ
1990 Sun West Gallery, Prescott, AZ
Selected Publications and Articles
Arizona Daily Star
Arizona Illustrated News Magazine
Art in America
Art Life
Art Now Gallery Guide
Art Talk
Compendium Magazine
Desert Leaf
Gallery Guide
New Mexico Magazine
Oracle Magazine
Sedona Magazine
Southwest Art Magazine
Southwest Profile Magazine
Sunset Magazine
The Magazine
The Santa Fean
Tucson Citizen
Tucson Guide
Tucson Weekly
Corporate Collections
American Heart Association, Tucson, AZ
Big Brothers Big Sisters, Tucson, AZ
Cafe Terra Cotta, Tucson, AZ
Caterpillar Memorial, Tucson, AZ
Davis Bilingual School, Tucson, AZ
DeGrazia Foundation, Tucson, AZ
Dell Webb, Tucson, AZ
Gallery Golf Resort, Marana, AZ
Hacienda Del Sol Resort, Tucson, AZ
Mertis, Scottsdale, AZ
Microsoft, Seattle, WA
P.A.C.T. for Life, Tucson, AZ
Phantom Project, Bank of America, Tucson, AZ
Print Expressions Inc., Tucson, AZ
Corporate Collections
R.A.S., Tucson, AZ
Regal Company, Inc., Sonora, Mexico
Sterling Institute of Men
Streich Lang, Tucson, AZ
Switch and Data, Tucson, AZ
Tucson Art District Partnership, Tucson, AZ
Tucson Botanical Gardens, Tucson, AZ
Triumph Builders, Tucson, AZ
Boran Properties
Tucson Museum of Art, Tucson, AZ
UMC Cancer Center, Tucson AZ
The White House, Oval Office, Washington, DC
Private Collections
Anderson, Andy, Tucson Museum of Art, Tucson, AZ
Chambers, Susan, Tucson, AZ
Dantzler Bill, Barbara, Tucson AZ
Dashew, Linda & Skip, Tucson, AZ
Dudley, John & Diane, Creative Endeavors Fine Art, Rockwell, TX
Eglin, Evan, Santa Fe, NM & Tucson, AZ
Gardner, Nancy & Kirkland, Tucson, AZ
Gorriarena, Carlos, Zaragoza, Spain
Guerrero, Louis, Guadalajara, Mexico
Hilger, Ludwig, Frankfurt, Germany
Johnson, Peggy, Tucson, AZ
Lanning, Peggy, Owner, Lanning Gallery, Sedona, AZ
Marcus, Angelo, Eagle Arts, La Jolla, CA
Miller, John Wesley
Nathensen, Jerry & Thelma, Tucson, AZ
Nelson, Linda & Stewart, Tucson, AZ
Neyraud, Anne & Jean Paul, La Fouillouse, France
Oliver, Samual, London, England
Powell, Andrew, Ottawa, Canada
Ritter, Mel, Tucson, AZ
Redford, Robert, Sundance, UT
Robinson, Linda, Robinson Shades, Tucson, AZ
Rosenquist, Charles & Peg, Tucson, AZ
Rubin, Rochelle, Rochelle Rubin Design, Tucson, AZ
Schaefer, John & Helen, Tucson, AZ
Seaver, Douglas, Tucson, AZ
Spivac, Rica & Harvey, Tucson, AZ
Sternberg, Mitch & Margi, Tucson, AZ
Wells John, Tucson, AZ
Wagner, Karen & Ron, Dallas, TX
Wetterscheider, Larry, Tucson, AZ
Honorarium & Awards:
1999 - UofA
2000 - Deer Valley Airport, Community Foundation, Tucson Arts District Partnership,Artist Of The Year
2003 - Governor Arts Award
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