Amelia Shipman
Do you remember yourself as a child? Would you twist and turn around every corner, or were you the one who’d rather sit and daydream? Amelia’s work seems to explore that world but is doused by reality. Maybe once you twisted and turned throughout a wide-open playground, now you twist and turn around the daily grind of the human condition. What carries you through?
“Art Candy for the Dysfunctional Soul” she calls it. Exploring vibrant colors that express an almost bubbly child-like quality. But that’s not all there is to this work. It’s also rich. It’s animalistic. It explores what it’s like to grow.
Amelia Shipman began painting at the age of fourteen, and met with success, her journey had just begun. Though like many of us, her work was halted. Meaning her passion was halted. Her success was shortly met with an allergic condition that prevented her from pursuing what she felt to be her calling. Though like her work, she always came back to exploring what it’s like to grow.
Amelia describes her creations as being among the likes of unique mixes of abstract, surrealistic, and pop art. Being that of deep personal symbolism with child-like wonder. Why do the simplest even aloof things tend to have he deepest of meanings? A type of untouchable purity, yet it’s so fleeting. One wrong twist, one wrong turn and we’re transforming our growth once again.
Where would we derive inspiration if not ultimately from ourselves and our experiences. One thing we can learn from Amelia’s work is perseverance. Never give up on finding a way back to your calling, even if you’ve changed. Even if your calling has transformed in some way. In a way it’s coming back to yourself.
There’s often two opposing sides depicted in Amelia’s work. That which represents conflict, and an awakening at the same time. Where do you see struggle in her work, where do you assume awakening appears? Where some elements in her creations may appear squished or stuck, there is also always expansion. We believe that is the true definition of transforming oneself.
“I create unique and out-of-the-box artwork that has taken shape over the course of 25 years of exploration in myself and in turn my creative work”
–Amelia
It was mentioned earlier that some of Amelia’s inspiration is derived from an animalistic nature. Though animalistic doesn’t always mean loud, energetic, and feral. It can also mean our core needs for comfort, safety, and sameness. We are all so different and yet alike. When you say you feel angry, someone else can identify that emotion. When someone else says they feel comfortable with you, you know that feeling and so receive their words as a compliment. That safety is what allows our child-like wonder to come back to us, and that becomes the gateway to discovering the richly symbolic nature of our existence.
