Art — Jordana Rubin Studio

Digital Collage Series

DREAMSCAPES

Dreamscapes is a series of digital collages I created in 2020 and spanning through today. While quarantined in my New York City apartment I found myself starving for fresh air and wide open beautiful spaces. Dreamscapes is a surrealist collection which combines digital photography and hand-drawn illustrations.

LIVING MANDALA NO. 1

Named after an interactive garden installation of the same name (at Electric Forest in Rothsbury, MI), Living Mandala takes the “landscape” out of “dreamscape”. Flora, fauna, and celestial bodies are manipulated into a symmetrical mandala shape.
(New York City, 2021)

DREAM ON

is a three-panel commission exploring sky, sea, and space and is inspired by the song “You’ve Got To Go” by Above & Beyond. Designed across three 8x10 panels, Dream On Little Dreamer is comprised of over 80 images. (Denver, 2024)

In 2022 I left New York City and spent the next 18 months traveling. I spent most my time in sleepy Appalachian mountain cities, on the beaches of Maui, and in the snowy mountains of Aspen. My collages started resembling detailed wholistic landscapes as I felt inspired by the wide open spaces around me.

BORDERLANDS

Named for my time in the American southwest and inspired by long desert drives through Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas. (Various, 2023)

PORTALS

A mini-series which explores feelings of transience. During my travel era I became obsessed with the idea of portals. I traveled intuitively, following my gut instincts. I loved waking up in snowy Aspen one day and crisp Asheville autumn the next. Exploring new cities was fun and adventurous but eventually became draining. Picking up and starting over every few months made me long for stability.

PORTALS NO. 1 (Maui, 2023)

GETAWAY (Massachusetts, 2020)

YOUR FATE IS IN YOUR HANDS (New York City, 2020)

SURRENDER

I spent six weeks living on Maui where I encountered a unique loneliness I'd never experienced before. I was surrounded by the most scenic and peaceful places I'd ever been but I felt so isolated on the island. The physical distance separating myself from my friends and family felt insurmountable. "Surrender" plays on the opposing themes of loneliness and serenity by playing with scale and perspective. Solitary animals wrap around a massive volcano, while the tiny sailboat resonates with my time feeling like a small blip on a tiny island in the ocean.

This piece is named after an important lesson I learned from the island. Surrender doesn’t mean giving up or giving in. It means letting go. (Maui, 2023)

MIRAGE (2021, New York City)

Born from a literal fever dream and created in just a couple hours frantically in the middle of the night, “Mirage” is my most illustration-forward piece. This 4-part series of semi-continuous landscapes plays on architecture, toys, and the feeling of over-crowdedness. I was newly out as queer and exploring a city I loved for years through a whole new lens. These dreamscapes have a limited palette, pulling from the colors of the original lesbian flag.

Motion Dreamscapes

I began playing with animated elements in 2021. I used After Effects to turn my original Living Mandala mini-series into motion collages. I also experimented with subtle moving elements as seen in “Concentation”