Baker Artist Portfolios

ARTIST STATEMENT
Untitled (Shadow Work) uses psychiatric techniques and printmaking methods to research and
develop healing processes and forms for communities and individuals that are experiencing grief in order
to steward collective and personal recovery.

I started Untitled (Shadow Work) in 2019 to commemorate the daily death of young Baltimore men. With
no way to appropriately express the grief and pervasive denial of the mourning necessary for our urban
community to understand or to process these continued losses - and under the added insensitivity of a
post-pandemic return to “normalcy’ - art as a mechanism to pause for protracted trauma is even more
urgent and necessary in 2025. Untitled (Shadow Work) results in a necessary engagement with the
placemaking that grief forces. A process and a product, this work engages individuals and groups who
have experienced loss or trauma while offering a safe and therapeutic space for them to share their lived
experiences. A series of drawings and monoprints documents and translates their – and my own – grief to
the page. These drawings in turn inform a series of sculptures that can withstand the weight of our bodies
when partially buried. The resultant series of objects and drawings comfort and condone a grieving that is
otherwise displaced and invisible.

Untitled (Shadow Work) aims to heal psychological wounds and resolve unattended conflicts throughout
the lifecycle of the project. Like shadow work in therapy, shadow work as art brings the repressed aspects
of the psyche into consciousness to achieve wholeness.

My research and artistic practice mirrors and utilizes that which shadow work in therapy often involves,
including the following strategies:
• Introspection: Reflecting on thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.
• Journaling: Writing down thoughts and experiences to gain insight.
• Meditation: Practicing mindfulness to observe thoughts and emotions without judgment.
• Confronting fears and traumas: Addressing difficult emotions and experiences.
• Recognizing and accepting "shadow" aspects: Acknowledging the parts of ourselves that may
have been previously rejected.

By incorporating the therapeutic process into the direct creation of the work, I approach artmaking and
the community in ways that improve self and collective understanding.

NARRATIVE BIO
David Cloutier received his MFA degree from the Maryland Institute College of Art Hoffberger School of
Painting in May 2005. Previously, he studied at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia, where he
received a BFA in Painting and a certificate in Art Therapy in 1992. He has also studied at Southern
Connecticut State University, the Massachusetts College of Art, and the Worcester Museum School. His
work has been featured in shows in Baltimore, Massachusetts, Portland (Maine), and southern New
Hampshire.