John Dillemuth
www.dillyjohn.com
I was born in 1956 and grew up in a large family in Pocahontas, Iowa. My parents were both hard workers. There was always food on the table but nothing for frivolities. When the church bells rang on Sunday morning, all of the Dillemuth kids were seated with their shirts and blouses ironed. While rural Iowa offered wide horizons and room to roam, there was less to experience on the cultural front. A thirty-foot sculpture of Pocahontas was the only art in miles. Just as in much of rural America, culture was what was playing on T.V. I grew up on Leave it to Beaver, Batman, and Bonanza. It wasn’t until high school that I discovered through literature that there was more to life than what meets the eye. About the same time I became interested in art. I went to college at the University of Iowa for two years, and then moved to New York City and finished my B.A. in art at Hunter College in 1982. I received my M.F.A. in art from the University at Buffalo, (Suny) in 2001. Although I have tried my hand at writing poetry, my talent and energy lies in art. I can’t help doing it. I have exhibited my art in New York, California, and Mexico. For most of the last twenty years I have lived in San Diego. California is my home. I especially love the high Sierras, tall trees of northern California, and the evening light of San Diego. In the future I hope to do more traveling.
"Bachelor’s Bride"
The idea for this work was in part a response to the gallery space.The large windows open to the street and narrow space seemed perfect for a show room. I first built the pup tent ‘camper’ and then discovered I needed something to pull it. While this work shares similarities to my earlier domestic contraptions and playgrounds, it suggests movement and travel outside of the home. Play is an element in all of my work, with the art object functioning as a toy or other contraption. For these particular toys scale is very important. They begin to operate in our space rather than just an imaginary space.
In much of my work I like to mix the feminine with the boyish, exploring issues of identity in relation to the body, often the mother’s. Depending on the interpretation, these explorations can be revealing and disturbing narratives, feux Freud stories, or just wacky juxtapositions. I also like to mix the fantastic with the ordinary, the crude with the sophisticated, the immediate with the conceptual, and the visionary with the comical.
Most of my recent art has been interactive. The car is a good example. One can take it for a spin without leaving the gallery. The interactivity allows the viewer another level of intimacy with the work beyond the visual.
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