Sky Riggs
Bio: I’m an NY-based painter and songwriter with a focus on duality and bilateral asymmetry.
Thesis Exhibition
Artist Statement: I’ve started calling doubletalk the aspect of multiple values to a statement, some of which are unintented. An analytic mind can move only so fast, but makes choices which exceed that in nearly every utterance. I ask, “how are you holding up?” and its primary meaning is clear - that I’m checking in on you. But I typed that, with my hands, hence ‘holding’. And I put ‘up’ in the last place because I’m an optimist. Those choices were made without reason, they were beyond the intention of the statement.
In conversation I started noticing the second, third, fourth meanings. It is paranoia to attribute those to the speaker’s intention but foolish to dismiss them as coincidence. They are there, despite intention. And most interestingly they are often unknown to the persons uttering them. A dinner conversation analyzed through its nth meanings is usually a different flavor than at face value. And analyzed as such, usually contains very relevant, cohesive information (as opposed to, say, isolated absurdities).
The most familiar part of our mind, which we need to inhabit this treacherous world is neurotic and calculating. It is right next to us, right here - the frame of reference we see everything logical through. This is the same part which makes decisions about what primary meanings we want to express. But in choosing just the particular expression there is another set of influences, clearly. How else could “I” say something I didn’t mean to? To let on a second or third meaning which I’m unaware of?
L to R: Untitled (24 x 16”, Oil and acrylic on wood, 2017); Untitled (24 x 16”, Oil and acrylic on wood, 2017)