Paul Wirhun Arts
Welcome to Paul Wirhun's website featuring art using eggshells whether batiked, painted, or collaged onto found wood.
“Liberty in Ecstasy,” 2023, batiked and dyed eggshell on wood, 12”x18”
One of the many pieces you can see in this show
USA, 2022, batiked and dyed eggshell on wood, 24”x40”x4”
“Swimming is Everything” 24”x30” dyed and batiked eggshell on board
Am honored to be included in a Tris McCall article
on what a possible Jersey City art museum might contain
https://jcitytimes.com/heres-what-a-jersey-city-alternative-to-the-costly-pompidou-x-might-look-like-inside/?
Eggmananda, 2023, dyed and batiked eggshell on found wood, 36”x24”x4”
CHECK OUT the Eggman on TARIK TALK - a brand-new podcast featuring artists interviewed by Tarik Mendes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N61UpkMO9J0
READ ABOUT the EGGMAN in Sarah Griesbach’s article in Hoboken Girl
https://www.hobokengirl.com/paul-Wirhun-jersey-city-artist/
PAUL WIRHUN – ART STATEMENT
My work with eggs began by learning how to write pysanky from my mother, something typical in a family of Ukrainian descent. My life as an artist began when I realized that I had mastered this ancient form of talisman making, using the same ancient tools/techniques to create my own works. I have since experimented with these, expanding their uses (e.g. dyes as a watercolor medium) whilst creating larger pieces by epoxying broken shells to boards of various sizes.
“Ancient design for a new worldview” has been my studio philosophy (being informed by the language of symbols used in pysanky writing), allowing me to reflect on the unconscious coding found in these ancient patterns that have been absent in ours. How can I/we use these design systems to inhabit and inform a new worldview for today?
Eggshells continue to surprise and teach me. Their material qualities allow me an expansive range of tones, surfaces and textures, along with a flexibility that keeps me interested in this medium. There are many different bird eggs is use and each has qualities specific to that shell which create differing visual effects (e.g. a smooth duck shell is very different from a coarse green emu shell). My studio practice is a dance between chaos and control. Batiking on eggshells is usually a highly controlled process, while breaking them open to create a collage on a flat surface adds chaos, keeping me present and the work more alive.