The Artist discusses his work

Trash the Art of Recycle

 This work make a statement on the negative impact resulting from man’s pursuit of manufacturing for mass consumerism, which continues to threaten the planet. Drawing on individual shapes from all manner of metal junkyard scraps, each piece provides a metaphor on the need for recycling and reuse to reduce pollution.

Straddling a tension between finished and unfinished, each “Trash” sculpture conveys an energy that pulses through the bent and crusted metal scraps. “The sculpture is energetic, emerging out of twisted chaos into three dimensional drawings in space. Each conveys a feeling of its past life, with the metal joining together into visual excitement. This energy is felt by each object's position relative to another, often in large unified circles to illuminate the transition from junk to beauty while examining society’s demise into a disposable culture based on wastefulness and urban sprawl.

Remade in America

 Remade in America is the next step of evolution in the Broken Circles series. It further explores the state of recycling and how it can rebuild our society. People who are big on recycling take great pride in how environmentally conscious they are. Remade in America demonstrates how our society’s overabundance of waste can affect our world’s natural environments, and everyday items can be transformed into a beautiful work of art.

 The sculpture continues to convert waste into repurposed beauty. The message is to break the circle of no longer caring about how our actions affect the outside world. nIf we continue our practice of living in a disposable society a popular fear is that America is an empire in decline. One can only hope that, as the economy continues to recover or the surfeit of excited comparisons between the United States and ancient Rome will dissipate, allowing more sober assessments of America's future to take center stage.

 Our current actions perpetuates a stagnate economy. We have forgotten our past and abandoned our pride as a society. This county became great during the industrial revolution. Manufacturing allowed us to become an affluent nation with a global reach. We were respected and helped advance the quality of life well into the twentieth century.  However, during the latter part of the twentieth century we dropped the ball. As we began to outsource our manufacturing the American Dream began to disappear. As we become more aware of what happened we look at our culture and see how our once-valued traditions have declined. For those of us who have been around awhile, it is alarming the way our culture has turned back from traditional values, which we once deemed good, and now declare them bad and outdated.

Recycling old junk not only benefits the environment, it breathes new life into old objects that were once destined for the landfill. Through the collection of discarded materials and converting used or waste products into new material we create new producand reduce the need to consume natural resources. Remade in America metaphorically sends this message by creating beauty from disposed products. It’s like alchemy which turns base metal into gold, except that it turns trash into gold and junk into art.

Broken Circles

 Using individual shapes combined in positive and negative space, I have produced a unified circle that at first glance appears incomplete. This work is a metaphor of the renewal of our society. The sculpture series is comprised of various metal scraps that have been cast away after their initial use. These elements include automobile parts, parts from industrial machinery, and junkyard scraps. The pieces in the sculpture series are a statement of our society’s decent into a disposable culture. We have broken the cycle of American pride into a throwaway society of wastefulness and urban sprawl. Through the sculpture series I am trying to express our need to rethink our relationship to our possessions.

In the United States there are more of us who throw things away than there are people who save. We live in an age where everything gets thrown away. How is it that we came to dispose so readily of objects that are useful and valuable? It used to be when that we bought something and it broke, we repaired it.  Society is now consuming and disposing at a rate that would make our forefathers' heads spin. In this constant cycle of consuming, disposing, and replacing that has become the norm, many have lost touch with what it means to appreciate and care for possessions in their lives. My art is meant to recognize this problem and help us reconsider our behavior.

Since the beginning of time artists have had an intimate relationship with materials. This linking has been especially true during the twentieth century and has continued into the twenty-first century as the advent of new technologies impact our lives. As an artist I have a great interest in the materials we are confronted with as part of our daily lives. These everyday materials, taken for granted, that seem ordinary or even mundane suddenly become very precious and exciting when used in a different context. I have approached the creation of the Broken Circles’ sculpture series from a lens that is an on-going exploration to develop ideas and observations which can be brought to fruition in visual statements on the economic and social state of our society. 

The materials I use produce calculated visual and tactile effects. They focus on the properties of materials and textures that have been untreated and exposed to the elements. To help stress the message of renewal I have taken the rusted objects and refinished them with various heat-treated chemical finishes to produce juxtaposition between decay and beauty. This process in turn stresses the concept 

India: Culture and Color 

My photographs reflect India’s rich diversity of people, religion, language, and landscape. This series is my impression of one of the oldest civilizations in the world. I found India to be a living mosaic of multicultural experiences seen in the colors of everyday lives. India’s worship, dress, food and customs are all color coded. The symbolic expressions of color is known as Ramga.

In a country as diverse as India color is a symbolic agent which stands out and controls every aspect of life such as religion, politics, festivals, and celebrations. Red is associated with one of the most revered goddesses in Hindu mythology – Durga. Her scary image is enhanced by her red tongue and almost red eyes. White is the acceptable color at funerals and ceremonies that mark death in the family and is accepted as the color of peace and purity. Orange is the most dominate color in all of India. Orange stands for courage & sacrifice.  Yellow symbolizes sanctity and is an essential herbal ingredient applied on the body and face by women in India. Blue is associated with Lord Krishna one of the most favored Gods in India. Finally, Black represents anger and darkness.

Morocco: Mystery and Magic

The culture of Morocco is as diverse as it's mystical landscapes. My images combine the natural beauty of this rich and fascinating country with the native villages, ancient medinas, and breath-taking scenery. The photographs highlight everyday activity of the people in changing landscapes of this exotic country.

China Tradition and Change

What is everyday life like in China today? From Shanghai to Beijing, as well as Tibet, well-known Atlanta photographer and sculpture Steve Steinman chronicles the culture and beauty of this exotic and often controversial Asian land in his exhibition, “China: Tradition and Change.

 The Chinese and Tibetans view the environment as an interrelated balance where humans and nature coexist. Overconsumption of resources is discouraged, and the taking of life is forbidden by Buddhist practice. However, as traditional people meet the modern world, checkerboard patterns are carved into forested mountain slopes, pollution runs freely in once pristine waters, erosion lays grasslands bare, and wildlife is stripped from the land. While Chinese annexation may lead the list of  blame, globalization, modernization, and necessity are likewise responsible. These images explore the changing Chinese and Tibetan Landscape and the fragile relationship shared between culture and environment.

“My photographs are an observation on these changes, which have affected the social and natural landscape in China.” The images are comprised of a mix of landscapes, portrait and street photography. These images examine the fragile co-existence of an ancient and modern culture that has experienced accelerated change. 

Fine Art Photography

My digital images have their own vocabulary, conveys ideas, and aspires to be innovative, and personal. As opposed to a literal interpretation, my photographs are created in accordance with my knowledge and vision of photography as fine art.  The images reflect the odd attraction on the side of a highway to street performers; from public art to the delicate beauty found in architecture. The work captures evolving lifestyles present in the unnoticed and overlooked people, places and things that are a part of daily lives.

Did You See That? Stories of Urban Oddities 

  A break dancer captured in a gravity-defying moment on the sidewalks of Tijuana, Mexico. Bubble gum, not spray paint, creating a collage of bright graffiti in Boulder, Colorado. A man painted red with devil horns ambling down Rampart Street in New Orleans.

These were the photos in the exhibition among those in Did You See That?! Stories of Urban Oddities. This exhibition represented a freewheeling exploration of fringe culture that is hiding in plain sight. The images capture the quirky details that provide a deeper insight into a community’s multifaceted identity. 

Seattle, for example, is considered the epicenter of American coffee culture. Yet Steinman chose to depict a factory worker in bright blue gloves tending a vat of yellow curds in a cheese processing plant. Instead of the typical postcard view of the city’s popular Pike Place Market, Steinman chooses to shoot the entrance to the public restrooms there, which are framed by male and female silhouettes in tile. Between them is a portal that leads into the, inner, bowels of the facility. The overall effect is eerie and stereoscopic. These images represent sent the world according to Steve Steinman.

The Street Around the Corner

In the series Street around the Corner, I capture everyday images of the urban landscapes and the street activity which accompanies them. The images focus on perspectives and paradoxes. The series provides a window into an alternative culture which features subjects in candid situations, public places, and other settings. These images present a reflection of society. The images often tend to be ironic and can be distanced from their subject matter. They are meant to concentrate on the interactions of people and their surroundings caught at a decisive or poignant moment.

Abstract Photography

Abstract photography challenges our popular view of photography as an objective image of reality by reasserting its constructed nature. Freed from its duty to represent, abstract photography continues to be a catch all genre for the blending of mediums and disciplines. It lives in contested middle ground between material reality and photographic illusion, fact and fiction. It is an arena to test our preconceived notion of what photography can be.    

People: Urban Portraits  

While walking city streets throughout the country and abroad my aim is to shoot images that demand a response of awareness, knowledge and emotion about the people I see. My focus is to capture compelling photographs of a unique and often unnoticed view of the people and setting that have become part of our daily lives.

Landscape Photography 

My landscapes show different spaces within our country. Sometimes they are vast and unending, and sometimes they are whispering the small details of nature. These images capture the majesty of nature in rural America. The photographs document the space and convey an appreciation of the scenery, from a different perspective. The images define landforms, architecture, weather, and light in the places where we live. 

Endless Journey

Steve Steinman’s intricately textured wall sculptures line the Metro Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority’s (MARTA) Buckhead rail station and platform. Endless Journey is viewed by millions of travelers each year. The sculpture was originally created for the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. This massive site work is comprised of six basic relief patterns. They are twisted and turned and placed together into groups that are repeated throughout the station. As you travel through the station you are taken on an aesthetic journey. When you enter the station and throughout each level there are one hundred and eighty cement panels measuring eighteen by eighteen inches. When you reach the platform level you will see one hundred and ninety painted cement relief panels each measuring four feet by four feet.

Endless Journey is both a visual and emotional pilgrimage to your destination. The vivid sculptural wall reliefs are painted in yellow, red, and blue. Each panel uses a combination of curvilinear shapes and hard-edged geometric forms. By merging the art with architecture, the sculpture transmits a strong experience to viewers. The experience creates a sense of whimsy, as well as a sense of motion. The colors bring a warm human feeling to travelers. The sculpture encompasses the length of two football fields and is presently the largest art installation in any Atlanta Marta station. After five years of intense mental and physical creativity, what seemed like an endless journey to complete actually began a new adventure for Atlanta commuters.

Lyrical Landscapes

Landscape is not always a natural event but the dynamism of visual forces. The series Lyrical Landscapes represents the exploration in the study of how traditional landscape can transition into abstract landscape elements. This series is a playful dialogue about the visual paradoxes of landscape. It creates a Crique de Landscape. The work attempts to connect the seemingly unconnected by introducing the juxtapositions of natural forms and textures. This is highlighted by man-made faux finishes and color relationships that are not actually found in nature. These sculptures, like a landscape, are a state of consciousness varying with viewers. Having drawn and photographed landscape for many years, I found creating these sculptures was a great learning experience in terms of organizing visual elements and materials in the landscape of our contemporary society.