The Ohio Artist Registry (OAR) is an exciting opportunity for artists to share their work, connect with the creative community, and establish an online presence—all on a free, virtual platform! The OAR encourages artists working in all art forms, throughout Ohio and beyond, to create a profile, which allows them to better promote themselves and their work. Being listed in the OAR provides artists with new opportunities to share their work with clients, galleries, patrons, and audiences. A listing in the OAR does not confer an endorsement, approval, or verification by the Ohio Arts Council.
For more information, contact Kathy Signorino, artist programs director, at kathy.signorino@oac.ohio.gov or 614-728-6140.
2024 Ohio Artist Registry Juried Exhibition
Nathan Gorgen
Bio
Nathan Gorgen
Nathan Gorgen, b. 1986, is a Columbus, Ohio based artist and educator. His artwork explores the space between art and design, as well as digital and traditional fabrication and recycled materials. This manifests as objects on a continuum between furniture and sculpture with varying levels of functionality. Gorgen received his BFA (2008) in Painting from the Maryland Institute College of Art, and his MFA (2012) from the Columbus College of Art and Design (CCAD). After graduation he worked in exhibition design and manufacturing before becoming the Lab Supervisor at the Studios for Art and Design Research at The Ohio State University (OSU). Gorgen has also taught at CCAD and OSU, and exhibited his work around the country, including at the Toledo Museum of Art, Inlight Richmond, and the Delaware Center for Contemporary Art.
Nate working on a custom bookcase in 2018
Artist Statement
My current work in furniture and sculpture explores surprising uses of found and recycled materials. I am interested in how the traditional use of a given product or process can be subverted while still maintaining a functional piece of design. Materials that at first may seem inappropriate in their place are found by the viewer, when they interact with the work, to be perfectly adequate to their given task. Materials may also turn out not to be what they initially seem; their original nature or purpose obscured by unexpected context.
This interest in recycled material and its context also extends to my collaborative work. My wife and artistic partner Molly Jo Burke and I use discarded and excess materials from our individual practices, urban environment, and lives as parents of two young children to create sculptures and wall pieces that reference landscape, biological systems, mechanical reproduction, and domestic material culture. This recycling allows us to make our art economically and sustainably, and provides a meta-commentary on destructive habits of consumerism and resource extraction.