\u201cA boozy brunch between girlfriends, a meeting of coworkers over coffee, a couple splitting a glass of wine\u2014conversations captured around the city, all serve as fodder and inspiration for Brion Poloncic\u2019s work. In the quiet corners of Omaha\u2019s local coffee shops and wine bars, Poloncic puts pen to paper, his ear tuned into the surrounding babble, creating art that he feels represents those around him and the experiences they discuss. But don\u2019t expect a still life of women gossiping between sips of their Venti mochas. As a visual artist, author, and former musician, Poloncic is a man of many hats but always remains a creator of thought-provoking and idiosyncratic work that paints middle America in a psychedelic wash. \u201cI\u2019ve always fancied myself an artist,\u201d Poloncic says. \u201cMy art is an affirmation of my peculiar skill set, and it just so happens to make me happy. It\u2019s my own blend of therapy.\u201d It was through chance that Poloncic was first bitten by the creative bug. After he didn\u2019t make the baseball team, he traded mitts for guitars and started writing music. A fan of everyone from Pink Floyd to Johnny Cash, he parlayed his early love for listening to his parent\u2019s records into seven albums, all released under the moniker \u201cA Tomato A Day (helps keep the tornado away).\u201d A prolific songwriter, his discography is filled with character and colorful song titles, including ditties like \u201cYou Little Shit\u201d and \u201cWeirdo Park.\u201d For Poloncic, music wasn\u2019t enough. He needed to sink his teeth into his next artistic outlet. So when a friend needed help setting up an Iowa art studio, he asked Polonic to draw pieces that illustrated his career. With no formal training or experience, unless coloring backpacks with magic markers counts, he dove in. Two years later, Poloncic sold his first piece at a gallery in Lincoln. He has also shown work in Omaha and Kansas City and has a collection represented at Gallery 72, all those diploma-yielding pros be damned. \u201cMy art isn\u2019t constrained by my knowledge or training, and I think this makes me naturally less critical of my work,\u201d Poloncic says. Filled with abstract shapes, haunting faces, and stark use of color, his off-kilter yet original drawings mirror the tone of his written work. Through The Journal of Experimental Fiction, he published his first book Xanthous Mermaid Mechanics in 2012, following this up in 2014 with his second printed work On the Shoulders of Madmen. Both explored concepts of the subconscious mind, and the novel he is currently working on will follow suit. \u201cI\u2019ll be surprised if anyone can read it,\u201d Poloncic says. \u201cIt\u2019s got no characters, no story arc, and isn\u2019t about anything in particular.\u201d And he admits this is his niche, comparing his art to improvisational jazz or free-style rap where \u201cthings just happen.\u201d For whatever he\u2019s working on, he says the hardest part is just getting started. Once that happens, everything else just falls into place, and if he can\u2019t get over a block, he always has another craft to turn to. \u201cIf I stumble off the creative wagon with drawing, I get back on with writing and vice versa,\u201d Poloncic says. \u201cAs you work on one, the other comes right along with it.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Poloncic, a musician and author also, is deliberately withdrawn and elusive. Choosing not to participate in the artist talk, he lets his obscure statement and symbolic, abstract work speak for itself. He is at his most revealing when he writes, \u201cfollowing your dreams is like climbing up, hanging on, and riding the bucking bronco.\u201d And crash landing as well, as his most forthcoming trademark cryptogram, \u201cThe Journal,\u201d fairly screams its headline, \u201cSchizophrenic.\u201d True to form, as with his other pieces, the cipher for encryption remains hidden up his sleeve\u2026\u2026.Poloncic\u2019s world is puzzling, psychological and paradoxical, on the one hand Poloncic bares his troubled soul to the viewer only to overwhelm one with a myriad of iconic imagery and text messages virtually impossible to decipher in their mazelike patters\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026..Furthermore, while Poloncic\u2019s art in emotionally charged, it is also intellectually stimulating and aesthetically pleasing. His meticulous, almost obsessively drawn geometric and organic topography resemble pictographs with symbols both familiar and unfamiliar, especially in his \u201cUntitled \u201c series of two inks on paper and his four variations of \u201cXanthous Mermaid Mechanics,\u201d 1-4 which in spite of their separate iconography are united by one visual motif, a wide-eyed, open-mouthed figure in fear and pain\u2026\u2026\u2026This image dominates Poloncic\u2019s title piece, \u201cXanthous Mermaid Mechanic,\u201d split as it were into two symbolic, blue and red extremes of the same coin or personality and a lot of stream of consciousness text including: \u201cIn space lit dimly by xanthous suns and small, sallow fireballs\u2026but God is here now.\u201d This is either a mixed message or a balanced one, but not so in Poloncic\u2019s most overt piece, the aptly named \u201cThe Journal.\u201d In this darkest work, even the banner headline \u201cSchizo-phrenic\u201d is split as is what may be its muse or source, the words \u201clove-affair\u201d which are embedded in a paisley-like flower in the center of the canvas. The artist leaves little further doubt as one of the many entries in his journal says \u201cI read schizophrenia was a choice to take the high road. I feel it might be a low at best, terror at worst.\u201d And perhaps a final word, \u201cI\u2019ve been hurt,\u201d written to be legible when held up to a mirror, another sign of a doppelganger or double. Judging by the above, art is also a form of therapy for Poloncic, a way of keeping \u201cit\u201d together if not a cure-all. In \u201cThe Journal,\u201d there is a direction for the viewer, \u201cEnter here\u201d but nowhere is there an exit, presumably for the artist as well.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“The works by Brion Poloncic are very interesting visual journals. They require some time to view and more importantly to read. His art is usually black and white and are usually, large presentations. They are a pleasant addition to any collection. He has much to say and is not done yet!”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“Brian Poloncic has created a group of work which draws on the surrealism of Joan Miro and Andre Breton infused with text which serves as alternately stream of consciousness writing, journal of days, and glyph of Poloncic\u2019s own invention. Sincere and full of information, Poloncic\u2019s work is deeply personal and imaginative.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cA boozy brunch between girlfriends, a meeting of coworkers over coffee, a couple splitting a glass of wine\u2014conversations captured around the city, all serve as fodder and inspiration for Brion Poloncic\u2019s work. In the quiet corners of Omaha\u2019s local coffee shops and wine bars, Poloncic puts pen to paper, his ear tuned into the surrounding… Continue reading →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"page-templates\/fullwidth-template.php","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-14","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/poloncic.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/14","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/poloncic.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/poloncic.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/poloncic.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/poloncic.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/poloncic.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/14\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":60,"href":"http:\/\/poloncic.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/14\/revisions\/60"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/poloncic.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}