Ian, being born in Ukraine, living in urban centers such as Milwaukee for undergrad and ending up in Chicago, gives him an awareness of not only the constructed landscape, but of the implications that developing urban environments have on the migrations of people and culture. Currently, Ian works as a real-estate agent, staying engaged with his subject of interest. The building, navigating, and processes of the assembled structure mimics the activity of his art making, and vice versa.

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Ian states, “When I get to making something, the drive is to get at and exploit the seemingly mundane quality of our collective surroundings. You either get lost in, or completely ignore your daily setting most of the time, but the visual background noise hums along. I’ve found that with time and scrutiny, our habitats can expose themselves to the bizarre mixture of influences that form them, especially in a city environment. Observational in its foundation, my work tends to shift and merge into the abstract through sampled components and hints of collage, like abstraction lite. More recently, this process has come to include the visual slang of mediation through filters and layers of various apps or programs and other methods of sharing our common, yet altered, experiences. Synthetic in their conception, my paintings are compressed compositions of disparate elements at the cross-section of the natural and the manmade, the byproducts of our constructed environments.”

 

Ian Sonsyadek is a 2012 graduate of MIAD. He has continued to hone his craft and develop his concepts while exhibiting work. Currently residing in Chicago, Ian works as an artist, real-estate broker, and teaches part time at Marwen, a nonprofit serving young people from the under resourced communities of Chicago.