Artist statement

Across various mediums, the work of Kevin Link represents both exploration of and inspiration by specific states of cognition.

With the help of electroencephalography (EEG), neuroscientists have identified six dominant rhythms that our brains produce throughout the spectrum of human experience. Among these is Theta (4-7 Hz), a curious brainwave pattern that teeters on the edge between the conscious and the subconscious. Through the use of mediation, music, and brain entrainment techniques, each piece in this series was designed in the Theta brainwave state.

The majority of our childhood is spent in Theta—a fertile, dreamlike domain of possibility, intuition, and wellspring of imagination. Upon entering adolescence, however, this realm retreats, emerging for adults only during transitional moments between other brainwave patterns—on the threshold of wake and sleep, perception and hallucination, conscious action and subconscious fixation.

The series presented lends form and contemplation to wanderings through this lost wilderness of the mind. Layer by layer, each shape is drawn, organized, and combined with forms culled from topography, sacred geometry, ink blots, Lichtenberg figures, and fractals to create a bizarre bricolage of the natural and the imaginary.

Much like the experience of Theta brainwave pattern itself, the result can be hypnotic yet foreboding. Multifaceted forms loom frozen in space simultaneously recalling the intricacy of biological systems, celestial bodies in collapse, and occult ideas inflicted upon the land through symbol and symmetry.

Each piece attempts to bait the viewer to linger, gaze, and engage in a moment of meditation on the state of their own waking consciousness—and the shadowy abstractions that lurk beneath.