Artist Statement

Cindy Buzádi is a Toronto-based artist who works with a variety of traditional and unconventional materials.

The imagery deals with the struggle to give life meaning and living that life passionately and sincerely. It’s about overcoming obstacles and distractions like despair, angst, absurdity, alienation, boredom, pain, guilt and regret, through perseverance and conviction. The method is about working things out and discovering basic truths in the process.

The all over compositional textures are products of continual reworking. Built up cumulative effects are created by dripping on, scraping off, tearing down, and repainting the surfaces again and again, capturing a passage of time rather than a moment.

The resulting forms that emerge from the paintings vaguely suggest both landscapes and figures in an industrial/urban setting.

Bill & Cindy Buzádi Working Together

Here’s a bit about our thought process:
There are usually many layers to each work we create. The intent is to create something that has evolved over time and has a history, a story or a life of its own. We often take notice of surfaces and natural occurring compositions in the city. For example, a wall may have had water damage and then later repaired. Posters may have been stapled to it and then ripped off. A window may have been bricked up. Over time, the result of these unrelated events has become a composition that tells the story of that wall. This idea can relate to how a person becomes what they are. How life’s experiences have formed them. Through a process of building up and tearing down, the result is often a feeling of being on the brink of collapse but has a tension that holds it all together. The use of mixed media and sometimes unconventional materials furthers the idea of a series of unrelated events interacting to create a unique story. Each work evolves into a unique being, just as a person develops as an individual.

In the case of Bill’s more figurative works, usually everyday or down and out characters interact in a mundane setting. Their plight is simply dealing with life and questioning the purpose of their own existence. Although there is a strong influence of animation principles used to build the reoccurring cast of characters, the still images present a dramatic scene, like a film still taken from a crucial moment in a film, that suffice to tell the essence of the story as a static tableau. Frequently, the main character is interacting with his own psyche that manifests itself as a rabbit, or a swamp creature, or a shadowy figure.

Here’s a bit about our background:
Bill graduated from the Classical Animation Program with high honours and then took an additional year of computer animation. Cindy has a Bachelor of Arts. She first majored in ceramics in the Crafts and Design Program for two years, then switched to the Art and Art History Program, which is connected to both Sheridan College and U of T.

We have worked together for over 20 years. During that time, we have continuously discussed our ideas about art, our approaches to art making. We have had a big influence on each other by supporting each other with feedback, generating ideas together and pushing each other to take risks in our art work. We’ve used both theory and technical knowledge from all three programs. Together we have created a vision that both combines work we have done separately and work we have collaborated on into one imaginary world that invites the viewer to immerse themselves in.