Emerging from Connor’s background in philosophy, Sublime Existence seeks to depict the human perspective in conversation with the sublime experience of life itself. Works resemble theatrical stages on which figures interact with their own life experiences of love, fear, emotion, dreams, challenges, and lessons, set within other-worldly environments. Through this, there is a sense that regardless of our limitations and vulnerabilities as human, our experiences of love, freedom, and life are deeply meaningful. Living life itself, existing in itself, with all of its triumphs and tribulations, is to each of us, uniquely beautiful, uniquely sublime.
Much of Connor’s work appears as large frescos on linen that borrow from the renaissance, religious art, film, architecture, and constructivism in which figures live in dramatic surrealist landscapes and art galleries. Figures, often reclined, intimately interact with one another or act out different perspectives leant towards the same scenario or emotional expression. His sense of figure, form shadow, light, depth, and movement imbued into these statuesque-like human figures is both masterful and intriguing. His technique utilizes much of the underlying linen, allowing it to become part of his works with a meticulous and baffling level of detail. His work; however, is not confined to just these fresco like paintings but also features text, sculpture, hyper-real works and small paintings from which a greater visual language has developed.
In celebration of his experiences with both love and life, Connor’s paintings possess a sense of stoic dignity and transformation. Instead of false optimism and cynical pessimism, his work invites a surrender to the human condition. That happiness in life flourishes when we accept its intractability, and revel freely in our perfectly imperfect, Sublime Existence.
