Donald Patten
Relevant art
Dear Readers,
Welcome to another week! It’s almost the end of September, time flies! We only have two more posts before we round off for the year, starting mid-October. Without further ado, we present Donald Patten’s bio and artist statement. We appreciated Donald Patten’s relevant and poignant art.
Donald Patten is an artist and cartoonist from Belfast, Maine. He creates oil paintings, illustrations, ceramics and graphic novels. His art has been exhibited in galleries throughout Maine. To view his online portfolio, visit @donald.patten on Instagram.
Almost overnight, COVID-19 had changed the way people interact with each other, and with our own bodies. We lived our lives in vulnerability during that historically significant time of disaster. The initial phases of the pandemic are behind us, but the virus remains and continues to be dangerous. The societal trauma this pandemic has caused will be remembered and felt by those who have lived through it for the foreseeable future.
In the past, master painters would depict historically significant disasters that happened to them as a way to cope. Artists of the 19th century depicted hardships and trauma in the wake of the Industrial Revolution which began the formation of our modern world. As an artist learning the techniques of masters, I have the opportunity to create long-lasting visual information that depicts the trauma of this pandemic.
Therefore, I have created a series of drawings that represent my experiences in modern COVID life by drawing inspiration from past masterpieces that depict the embodied experience of trauma.
Thank you all for being here with us through the months. We are so thankful for all the contributions we’ve received. We wish we had the means to give more than our gratitude to our contributors, perhaps something to be explored in the future! For our last two weeks, we will be having flash fiction and poetry.
General submissions and themed submissions are closed as of June 2, 2025.
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Thanks again and see you all next week in October!