I have been making art my whole life, but decided to call myself an artist in 1993.

I was active in the mail art community from 1990-1993 and creating tapes and mail art under my name and the name Pain Clinic. It was a good way to begin doing art, because the people I came in contact with encouraged me to keep doing art despite my lack of a formal art education. I felt at one time that a formal education in art is detrimental to an artist, because it molds the actions of the artist, making the output of the artist less pure. I don't hold that opinion any more, because an artist, or anyone, or anything, is molded my all the forces that can touch it. Art school is just another force. I do believe one can be an artist without formal training. I guess I have to, since I fall in that category.

In 1993, after I had lost a number of my mail art contacts due to my own negligance and neuroses, I began painting. I had always been afraid to start painting because that's what real artists do. The materials are expensive, the expectations on a painting are somehow much higher than that of the small collage and sound things I was doing in mail art. I would have to find places to exhibit my work, meaning I would have to find people that found my work worth showing.

So far, I have not had a show in a place that is a commercial gallery, but in alternative spaces. The reception to my work has been good.

I don't really limit myself to medium, since I am still learning, and finding pros and cons in each. I have a preference for painiting on collages of various debris that I find. In doing this I feel I am analyzing the process of living, where we take the things around us in, play with them so we can understand them, and then put them on display on our minds so we can reference them. I find the interconnectivity of things fascinating to no end.

I realize this sounds very bombastic and pretentious, but I don't mean to imply that I am some revolutionary genius that has discovered the secrets of the universe. I am more interested in creating and doing art than creating masterpieces. I am usually satisfied with my work when it looks finished. There is no set criteria for "finished" but I can tell when a piece works to me, and can only hope that a piece works for someone else.

Alex V. Cook

December 27, 1996