Spencer Selby's Art Site

containing info and new work completed 2006-09

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My art began (and continues) as visual poetry, a natural offshoot of the experimental writing I had been doing since college. For many years I made image/text visuals in black and white, publishing pieces in little magazines and in three book-length compilations. In 2003 I switched almost entirely to color, developing new methods that incorporated techniques used in the past. My color work is created following a unique and somewhat complex process, which may involve manipulation of found or recycled material, mono copy art, scanography and various kinds of handwork.

I have called myself an intermedia stylist. The term intermedia comes from Fluxust Dick Higgins (1938-1998), who asserted that the best modern art occurs between, rather than within, established categories. True creativity is ever-changing, and one of the highest goals of art is to propagate new forms. Higgins was careful to point out that intermedia is not a genre or specific form in itself. His theory stressed the importance of hybridization and cross-breeding, how types of art intermingle, making descriptive distinctions increasingly problematic. In my case this thesis is particularly fitting because each step of my process involves a different medium of focus. No label is ideal, but for me intermedia is generally more accurate than recognized types I borrow from, including digital, mixed media, painting and collage.