Sherburne’s ongoing series of paintings entitled “PostApocalypstick” aims to challenge the viewer to consider their engagement with visual culture and challenges its participants to assess the ways in which all visual language conveys meaning. These paintings openly sample from the mediums of art, advertising, design, film and music and employ their subsequent cultures and histories to propose new narratives about the role each medium plays in society. Drawing inspiration from science fiction comic books and films, this body of work proposes an “end of the known world” scenario played out by
the icons of each referenced medium. Each large scale painting will present a surreal landscape inhabited by famous buildings, designed objects, music and film stars, but will question the often criticized vacuous nature of pop culture by empowering these icons with alternate semiotic significance. The adversity faced by the characters in the paintings will mirror the contemporary concerns around political, social and environmental upheaval and will invite the viewer to construct meaning vis-à-vis their own relationship to creative cultures expanding role in society.

*A number of paintings in this series are currently under development
and will be ready for exhibition late 2009