Josh Boehm

My artwork, “The Power of Now” is about the painful and rewarding processes of boxing that I experienced in the lead-up to my first competition fight. "The Power of Now" gives the person a single focus where the mind wipes out negative thoughts in order to have a positive outcome. These thoughts interpret pain as the mind being seduced into an alternate reality where nothing else exists apart from the thought of survival and ultimate success. This is a mindset that I am practicing as a boxer and as an artist!

My coach always tells me before my fight to just think of this boxing bout as a normal night sparring. This is meaning that sparring is usually with familiar faces and is relaxed and friendly. I also get told that the more active I am in the ring the more chance that I will win, so the point is to throw punches and punches so you can outbox your opponent. Moving freely helps you not freeze up because once you freeze and stop throwing punches you will lose.

The crudeness in my work has been influenced by the paintings of the German expressionist Oskar Kokoschka and the politically charged and passionate charcoals from the drawings of William Kentridge. Each artist’s work depicts a strong flow state and time-based quality that communicates the power of the embodied moment.