Bryan Fellenbaum creates abstract artworks using found objects, painting, drawing, and collage that incorporate recycled materials and aged ephemera. His pieces have a three-dimensional quality and verge on sculpture. The subject matter varies between works, incorporating text, quotes, or obvious recycled materials. Fellenbaum is drawn to creating works with an appearance of beauty, age, and history through techniques like image transfers, mark making, and incorporating objects with patina. His process involves playfully arranging parts and reacting to compositions as the pieces evolve over multiple iterations.

1. Bryan Fellenbaum
My work hinges on found objects and various ephemera. It has a three-dimensionality
about it, which sometimes verges on the edge of sculpture, but it still makes use of the
wall as an integral structure. Through the use of these objects, along with the acts of
painting, drawing, and collaging, I create abstract works based on formal principles
and design.
The subject matter varies widely from piece to piece, because my work incorporates
parts of other objects. For example, my book covers employ text and quotes as the
subject, and my larger works rely heavily on more obvious, recycled material. In this
way, the subject can be bits and pieces of something small, or the subject can simply
be the end result, where the viewer is meant to view the final piece as a whole.
I am drawn to making attractive works of art. I often search for found beauty, such as
the patina on an old book page, stained by ink or coffee, how it has aged over time. If I
am not able to find something with this aspect, I create it. Spilled paint; rubbed, eroded
charcoal; image transfers; expressive mark making; all of these are ways in which I
bring beauty to my images. These artifacts I find, and make, all evoke a history. They
are meant to look as though they’re from another time.
The process of making these works is largely based in play, in placing one part against
another part, and reacting to all of these things over the course of creating the art. I
spend a long time looking for old objects to incorporate into my work. In many cases,
the parts of the final artwork have been built up, torn off, reapplied, or even covered up
from the beginning to the end of the creative process. This part is important for me
because I enjoy seeing it evolve and change over time, something which the viewer
does not get to see.