LandEscape Art Review // Special Issue 2012

LandEscape Anniversary AnniversaryEdition Edition

Anniversary Edition

Performance, 2016 by Ram Somocha

A r t

R e v i e w

ICUL CTION C

o

n

t

e

m

p

o

r

a

r

y

A

r

t

R

e

v

i

e

SUMMARY

w

C o n t e m p o r a r y

A r t

R e v i e w

Angela McFall

Donald Bracken

Gabe Babcock

David JP Hooker

Christopher Reid

Małgorzata Żurada

Canada

USA

USA

USA

USA

Poland

My work questions reality, as there really are just so many questions about reality. Our world has become so visually oriented that a great deal of information comes to us in the form of pictures, and symbols. We are literally bombarded by images. It has reached a point where I think we are overloaded with visual information and this is having an effect on our perception of reality.

My work explores combinations of painting and sculpture, light and shadow, movement, and earth and other natural materials.

My view of the power of man as ultimately secondary to the power of nature has informed my art from its beginnings.

I think of myself as a painter: the gestural movements of my recent kinetic sculptures have strongly influenced the path of my paintings.

Exploring the natural world around me and focusing on my role within it, I strive to illuminate the tension bet-ween nature and humans through art. Using found materials I challenge the integrity of the materials within spatial boundaries.

Whatever the material, I find myself testing it, searching for its limits with a structural balance, much like an explorer gingerly traversing a glacier in high summer.

The idea of making work from direct experience came from reading Bourriaud’s Relational Aesthetics and Merton’s New Seeds of Contemplation. At about the same time I had an artist residency in Indone-sia. While I was there I was incredibly conscious of how radically out of place I was in that culture, that environment, and I wanted to find a way to make work that expressed that.

I am a realist painter drawing on the beauty I find all around me to create art. I am inspired by the way light falls on a form or filters through the atmosphere in a landscape. With the right light, even an ordinary everyday object can become a work of art. I want to share my vision with others.

Too many people stumble through their days oblivious to their environment.

My area of interest revolves around the notion of meaning and sense-making. I am interested in how the world seen as a set of signs is one of infinite possible interpretations, impressionable and open to reshaping. I am especially interested in visual languages connected with various belief systems and means of coding esoteric knowledge.

Special Issue

ICUL CTION

SUMMARY C

o

n

t

e

m

p

o

r

a

r

y

A

r

t

R

e

v

Donald Bracken

i

e

w

4

lives and works in Berlin, Germanu

18

Gabe Babcock

lives and works in The Haugue, the Nethelands

Gosia Mielech

32

lives and works in Brighton, United Kingdom

Elena Kholkina

46

lives and works in Moskow, Russia

Malgorzada Zurada

60

lives and works in Warsaw, Poland

Djojo & Versteeg Djojo & Versteeg

Elena Kholkina

The Netherlands

Russia

The Netherlands

Djojo & Versteeg consists of two young artists who formed a duo during time in art school. By combining forces, they found a way to complement each others skills. Working as a team of two, gives them the ability to create images that are completely formed by their own imagination, without the influence of anyone outside their fantasy world. Their images are theatrical, stylistic, aesthetic, imaginative and serene.

Doorways is an artist book of personal photographic images based on an interaction of landscapes, cityscapes and interiors. The viewer travels through the places, guided by lines and visual rhymes in the book spreads.

Tactile paper brings another dimension to the looking process.

The book is built in a complex way, the system of handbound pages brings volume and turns it almost into a sculpture.

My artwork is a fusion from light, sound and bodies in space and its all about creating a movement or moving image out of those elements, under a specific theme or concept. We were once singing in my performance Serenity from the program Mind in Motion, but that was one-time case. I am intrigued by the symbiosis between the design of the lights, the choreography and the music, merged together and used to achieve powerful visual effect.

Svetlin Velchev

72

lives and works in The Netherlands

David JP Hooker

88

lives and works in New York City, USA

Christopher Reid

98

lives and works in Wilmington, NC, USA

Angela McFall

112

lives and works in Ottawa, Canada Special thanks to Haylee Lenkey, Martin Gantman , Krzysztof Kaczmar, Joshua White, Nicolas Vionnet, Genevieve Favre Petroff, Sandra Hunter, MyLoan Dinh, John Moran, Marya Vyrra, Gemma Pepper, Michael Nelson, Hannah Hiaseen and Scarlett Bowman, Yelena York Tonoyan, Haylee Lenkey, Martin Gantman , Krzysztof Kaczmar and Robyn Ellenbogen.

Special Issue

Donald Bracken Lives and works in West Cornwall, Connecticut

M

y work explores combinations of painting and sculpture, light and shadow, movement, and earth and other natural materials. My view of the power of man as ultimately secondary to the power of nature has informed my art from its beginnings. I think of myself as a painter, but any such designation has become unimportant. The gestural movements of my recent kinetic sculptures have strongly influenced the path of my paintings, and my paintings have made my sculpture painterly; each, in collaboration, complements the other.

Donald Bracken

Vestiges of Occupation, beaver sticks, root, wire, 13x6x3 ft left, Wind Over Water, polymerized clay on canvas on panels ,6.66 x 19.5ft right, Inner Urge, vines, acrylic wood, wire, acrylic, 5x 4.2ft

Marsh pastel 24�x18

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

LandEscape meets

Donald Bracken An interview by Katherine Williams, curator and Josh Ryder, curator landescape@europe.com

Donald Bracken accomplishes the difficult task of establishing an effective synergy between painting and movement, creating an area in which emotional dimension and perceptual reality coexist in a coherent unity. Unlike artists such as Carsten Höller, he does not let the viewers in the foggy area of doubt: his evocative and direct approach invites us to investigate about the relation between reality and the way we perceive it.

One of the most convincing aspects of Bracken’s practice is the way he creates an area of intellectual interplay between perception and memory, contingency and immanence, that gently invites the viewers to explore the crossroad between human emotion and Nature’s power: I'm very pleased to introduce our readers to his refined artistic production.

Hello, Donald, and welcome to LandEscape: To start this interview, would you like to tell us something about your background? You have a solid formal training and you hold a Bachelor of Fine Arts that you received from the prestigious University of California at Berkeley. How did these experiences influence your evolution as an artist, and how does it impact on the way you currently conceive and produce your works?

Imagine going from a politically conservative fundamentalist Lutheran family, and ending up at Berkeley during the height of the ’60s counterculture, the Vietnam conflict, war protests, and the era of drugs, sex, and rock ‘n’

22

roll. As much as anything, aside from purely academic pursuits, what going to Berkeley did was free me from the constraints of a religious, politically conservative life. I was involved in political activism and protests against the Vietnam war and the political establishment. And I have to say, it was there that I discovered magical realism as a way of seeing things when I create art. Part of what I learned at Berkeley was freedom to experiment with the boundaries of perception, and because of some of these experiments I began to see nature in a totally different way. So oddly enough, much of the work I do now harks back to my time at Berkeley, during which I started to contemplate the physics of life on a molecular level, and the fact that we’re composed of more space than anything else. And and like in music the most important thing is the space between the notes.

At Berkeley I got a very strong background in world art history and gained a great appreciation for Asian art and ancient architecture, which continue to be strong influences on me today. I also greatly admired William Turner for his later pre-modern paintings and his philosophy of Nature as being the all-powerful force on Earth. So during that period of experimentation and observing microcosms, fractals, and repeated patterns in Nature, I largely was drawing on forms in nature as my primary influence and inspiration then, as it is now; because there is no bad form or bad color combinations in nature. I suppose you could say I became a bit of a pantheist.

But I’ve never had any real desire to be part of a particular school of art; I’m more of an opportunistic predator of visual and auditory information, eating what I like and leaving the rest behind. Although I grew up in San Francisco and worked and later spent a great deal of time in

Christopher Reid photo by Kimberly Brandt brandtphotos.com

Land

E

scape

Donald Bracken

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

Invasive Species beaver sticks , bittersweet vines,wire, 7x6ft left: Wings Over Water,polymerized clay on canvas on panels 6.66x 4.5ft top:Frozen Moment In Bark, 5x3ft right: Fire Flies In A Grey Field, 5x 4ft 22

Donald Bracken

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

New York City, I have spent much of the last 35 years living in rural Connecticut on the Housatonic River. I’m not fully aware of what’s going on in the contemporary art world and what other people are doing. The political atmosphere at Berkeley, along with my newfound freedom, made it hard to focus on my studies in a traditional way. In general I worked very hard at what interested me, but I was rebellious and did not paint during painting class because I wanted to free myself from the limitations of rules, so I worked at night instead. I took great pleasure in spraying silhouettes of organic objects on canvas, a process that formed the basis of my desire to incorporate organic elements that I find interesting in my art. I’ve always thought of myself as a painter, so even when I’m doing sculpture I approach it as a threedimensional form of painting. At Berkeley I was probably most influenced by George Miyasaki, a well-known lithographer, who was my lithography teacher. He did his own work at night, too, so we would work together. I tend to paint as though I’m making prints, working with one color at a time in layer upon layer, and to me creating sculpture and mixed-media pieces entails the same process.

Back then students were not taught about how to make a career—the word “networking” didn't exist. The best career advice I got from George was to learn how to live cheaply on rice and beans, and just work hard and figure it out. Music and playing guitar also became a vital influence and inspiration to me at that time and has continued to be a source of creative vision. I had Jim Melchert as a conceptual art teacher, and it is curious that at the time I was a bit dubious of its relevance, but as time goes on it has become more and more what my work is about.

Now let's focus on your artistic production: I would start from Calligraphy Reclining that our readers have already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article: and I would suggest to our readers to visit http://donbracken.blogspot.com in order to get a wider idea of your artistic production… In the meanwhile, would you like to tell us something about the genesis of this interesting project? What was your initial inspiration?

I’m a process artist—the art of process is very important to me. One thing leads to another; often

I start with an idea, and as I start to work on it, it evolves into something else and often totally different than my original idea . Calligraphy Reclining emerged from a series of evolutions in my work that I can ultimately trace all the way back to that early fascination with organic forms and materials at Berkeley. More recently, around 2007, after I started painting landscapes using earth from the fields I was painting, there was a natural progression toward incorporating other organic materials. I was particularly drawn to the bittersweet and grape vines that drape local woods with gestural, calligraphic, sometimes suggestively anthropomorphic figures.

The first big vine piece I did, Floating Brain, is composed of large swirling synaptic shapes with a suspended brainlike shape floating in the middle.

The piece lives on the side of a barn. But when such pieces are removed from their original context and put in another place, such as an enclosed space, they become something different entirely. In 2012 I had a show at New Arts Gallery, a cavernous barn with some ancillary rooms. I filled the space with installations of vine sculptures, beaver sticks, and clay paintings. Will You Still Love Me When I Am Gone, a large hanging vine piece suspended from a swivel that lets it spin in the ambient air currents, was installed in a smallish room. The piece had one association when it was constructed outdoors at my studio, but when put in the room with evocative lighting it spoke to me of my feelings of a dystopian isolation and the disconnection of a doomed long-term relationship.

At first I incorporated vines into dirt and clay paintings, then around 2011, I started wanting to work with them as a material unto themselves, in fully three-dimensional form. I started using tetrahedrons made from rebar a few years ago as a means to suspend the vines so they could twist and turn in the air. Last summer I started employing repeated tetrahedrons with the idea that I could make a sculpture as long as I wanted.

Calligraphy Reclining in particular is from a series of sculptures that explore what essentially amounts to scribble drawing on a canvas of air.

The material itself, an abundant—and, by humans, abundantly unwanted—intruder in the local landscape, also comments on purpose and perception. I should add that the piece is installed

22

Land

E

scape

Donald Bracken

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

outside my window; I am looking at it as we speak, and one aspect I like about it is how it changes with the light and how new forms are revealed in changing conditions, as when it has snow on it. As time goes on I have been increasingly documenting outdoor installations and the process of their entropic deconstruction as they sustain the effects of varying light, weather, and seasons. Since the tetrahedrons that form the base can conceivably be repeated endlessly and there seems to be no shortage of unwanted vines around where I live, at some point I plan to make a very long Calligraphy piece.

A relevant feature of Frozen Moment that has particularly impacted me is the way you highlight the inner bond between Man and Nature: You invite the viewer to appreciate the intrinsic but sometimes disregarded beauty of geometrical patterns, bringing a new level of significance to the idea of landscape itself. In particular, the evolving nature of the installation offers a multilayered experience... Like Jean Tinguely’s generative works, this installation raises a question on the role of the viewers’ perception, forcing us to go beyond the common way we perceive not only the outside world, but our inner dimension... I’m personally convinced that some information is hidden, or even “encrypted” in the environment we live in, so we need to decipher it. Maybe one of the roles of an artist could be to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially of our inner Nature... what’s your take on this?

I would agree that one of my roles as an artist is to relate outer Nature to inner nature. In the case of Frozen Moment, from my earliest days of painting I’ve always been fascinated by things floating in the air or flying through the air. I was a pole vaulter in high school and I’ve done free-fall skydiving many times, and I’ve always liked the idea of being able to freeze something as it’s falling. I was making Frozen Moment in winter, so the piece became about death and decay and the renewal of life. The leaves have so many coats of white polymer on them that they are rubbery and look like they are made of clay. The viewer is invited to look at the leaves as they like when they are falling. They jiggle and spin but never fall, so one

22

Donald Bracken

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

Donald Bracken

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

Memorial Windows clay and acrylic on canvas on 22 panel 80''x 18'' , 27 x 23 ft

Memorial Windows clay and acrylic on canvas on 22 panel 80''x 18'' , 27 x 23 ft

22

Donald Bracken

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

can exam the leaves’ shape, form , texture, contours, without touching it, from all angles, just as we could if we could freeze time and closely examine the world around us. The falling leaves and light perhaps represent death, but they show it as a transient state, embodying the paradox of life within death, because nothing is truly dead or gone as long as it is in our memory. It’s in my tradition of magic realism.

Your relationship with the use of materials to create imagery is intrinsically connected to the chance of creating an area of intellectual interplay with the viewers, that are urged to evolve from the condition of a merely passive audience, as in It Takes a Village. In particular, your process of semantic restructuration of a view has reminded me of the ideas behind Thomas Demand’s works, when he stated that “nowadays art can no longer rely much on symbolic strategies and has to probe psychological narrative elements within the medium instead.” While conceiving Art could be considered a purely abstract activity, there is always a way of giving it a permanence that goes beyond the intrinsic ephemeral nature of the concepts you explore. So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion personal experience is an absolutely indispensable part of a creative process… Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?

Personal experience can absolutely imperative.

The piece Night Music was originally a frozen moment of chaos inspired by Hurricane Sandy.

But it became about tripping on a summer night, and by that I don’t mean drugs but rather a total body and mind experience, about being drawn into the safety of the womb of mother, nature at night. It tries to describe the direct experience of lying in the middle of a tree-lined road still warm from the hot sun of the day and watching the fireflies merge with the stars to a jazz symphony of all the night creatures jamming in intricate patterns of rhythm and sound. And for Heaven and Earth, I had the experience of working in the World Trade Center, staring out the windows, eyeing the clouds and the view that no longer

22

Land

E

scape

Donald Bracken

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

exists from that particular perspective. I walked down ninety-one flights of stairs to the lobby once when there was a storm and the elevators weren’t running, so when I watched firemen on television valiantly going into the building and finding those stairs, I knew exactly where they were. And when the towers fell I really wanted to do a piece that conveyed my direct experience of having my full sense of safety shattered, so I veiled the image of New York City in a shroud of ash and dust.

However, we don’t necessarily gain information firsthand, as with certain societal issues or the horror in the Middle East; instead, we gather the information from a variety of sources and then we synthesize and evaluate it according to our individual belief system. Certain pieces of mine have definitely been influenced by this type of reprocessing or, to use your term, semantic restructuration, to become visualizations of that synthesis.

I’m not homeless, poor, or disenfranchised, but not having direct experience doesn’t mean I don’t understand how it affects society or is part of a chain of events. When I see something that stimulates me, I am seeing something visually that somehow has a connection to thoughts about the world or society, and while I work on the piece it takes on a meaning, and quite often the form or the kinetic connection will have a symbiosis with the thought I’m trying to express. In the case of Vestiges of Occupation, I was drawing a large root sitting on top of a destroyed beaver hut, first because of its intrinsic value as an image, but as I drew I began to mentally investigate the connection to the meaning outside of just what I was looking at.

By the way, I think it's important to remark that It Takes a Village has been conceived and produced in collaboration with artist and educator Denise Minnerly: I do believe that interdisciplinary collaboration such as the one that you have established together is today an ever growing force in Art and that that most exciting things happen when creative minds from different fields of practice meet and collaborate on a project…could you tell us something about this effective synergy? The artist Peter Tabor once said that “collaboration is working together with another to create something as a synthesis of two practices, that alone one could not?

22

Donald Bracken

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

Frozen Moment leaves , bark , acrylic wire , fishing line, 9x 12x 3 ft

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Donald Bracken

Donald Bracken

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

What's your point about this? Can you explain how your work demonstrates communication between two artists?

When my longtime friend and former art dealer, Denise Minnerly, came to my show and we were discussing the pieces Vestiges of Occupation, she started telling me about her concept for It Takes a Village, a community-based project where she went into homeless shelters, mental institutions, and youth groups and had participants shape from clay their concept of what a home is, with these individual clay houses coming together to form a community in the art installation. I was especially drawn to the concept of having homeless people expressing their idea of a home, which they don’t actually have, and I generally found the houses that they created were the most compelling. I thought that if Denise and I combined where we were going with our art, I would add how nature is interconnected with the human community.

My idea was to make out of vines a very interconnected structure that had no real beginning or end, a paradoxical structure representing the polarity of nature in that it could be perceived as either possibly malevolent or as a nurturing life force.

So the synthesis in this case really encompasses not only the collaboration and communication between two artists, but that of the community participants as well. The piece was first created in 2012, then was presented in a much different manner in 2014, and again very differently in 2015. It is planned to be an ongoing project, going into new communities and having people make houses, and every time it’s installed it will be restructured according to the space and community involvement. Our next goal for this community-participation installation is to take it to a housing project gallery space in New York City.

In the photo of It Takes a Village, on the left is Earth Variations, and on the right is Au Privave.

Denise knows my work well and we chose those pieces because we wanted to have It Takes a Village flanked by work that used the same materials but in a different form. Earth Variations is also an excellent example of semantic restructuration: It was the first large-scale piece I did, on 12 panels, using polymerized clay, a material that has its own predictably unpredictable personality and that, when I use it, I feel like it speaks and collaborates with me on how the work should progress. Earth Variations, created outside in on warm spring nights to the music of Habib KoitĂŠ, inspired by the budding trees and the swirling river by

22

Land

E

scape

Donald Bracken

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

my studio, was conceived as 3 panels high by 4 panels long. In the installation at NCC, the piece became 1 panel high and 12 panels long.

Multidisciplinarity is a crucial aspect of your art practice, and besides kinetic installations you also produce stimulating mixed media works, as the interesting Post 9/11. You seem to be in incessant search of an organic, almost intimate symbiosis between several disciplines, taking advantage of the creative and expressive potential of colors as well as of motion: While crossing the borders of different artistic fields have you ever happened to realize that a symbiosis between different disciplines is the only way to achieve some results, to express some concepts?

You know, from an early age I’ve always loved drawing. I’ve always loved painting. There was a point in my artistic career when I just felt the world didn’t need another acrylic landscape painting by me, and so in frustration I picked up a clod of dirt and smeared it on my painting. Then I discovered that I liked the dimension the soil added to the work and so I started using dirt to do landscapes, documenting the disappearing farmlands of Connecticut. I loved the colors of the earth, and I suddenly realized that this made the work not just about the earth but of the earth. It soon became apparent to me that each geographical zone had its own different colors and types of earth that had considerably different characteristics as an artistic medium, and I realized that some earth with high clay content cracked a lot when I made it very thick. I found that there was an interplay between the vision I had for the painting and the nature of the medium, and it felt like I was doing a duet with a jazz musician, because of the medium’s inherent qualities. When I had the desire to do a 9/11 memorial piece, the intrinsic qualities of the clay inspired me to do an aerial portrait of Manhattan because I knew that the clay would give a shattered effect to the image.

Another interesting work of yours that has particularly impacted on me and on which I would like to spend some words is entitled Vestiges of Occupation. In this work you explore the blurry boundary between

22

Looking East, polymerized clay on canvas on panels, 6.6x 1

collective memory and identity, investigating the psychological nature of the cinematic image: in particular, when I first happened to get to know with this work I tried to relate all the visual information and the presence of a primary element as water to a single meaning. I later realized I had to fit into the visual rhythm suggested by the work, forgetting my need for a univocal understanding of its symbolic content: in your work, rather that a conceptual interiority, I can recognize the desire to enable us to establish direct

Donald Bracken

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

3.5ft

relations... Would you say that it's more of an intuitive or a systematic process?

This quite often is not a conscious process, but it occurs through the process of making art, as in the piece Vestiges of Occupation. I had been collecting beaver sticks for several years because I’ve always been fascinated by beavers—they are amazing engineers and often create beautiful estuaries. The sticks sometimes look like Giacometti sculptures with the little heads and truncated arms. One rainy day I was sitting in my car drawing a large root that was

sitting on top a destroyed or deconstructed beaver hut. The root interested me, so I dug it out and took it to my studio and suspended it from a high beam. After living with this flying root for a while, I decided I should make a monument to the beaver, which was killed because, although it had created an estuary for birds and fish, it had also plugged up a drainage culvert and chewed on somebody’s tree, which was inconvenient for its human neighbors. So I decided to suspend the sticks from the defunct former hut, using almost invisible fishing line

22

Land

E

scape

Maya Gelfman

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

that makes the sticks become alive with kinetic energy.

works are political in this way, or do you seek to maintain a neutral approach?

I definitively love the way you recontextualize the idea of the environment we live in, as in your World Trade Center series and especially in the interesting mixed media painting Heaven and Earth.

Many contemporary landscape artists, such as the photographers Edward Burtynsky or Michael Light, have some form of environmental or political message in their photographs. Do you consider that your

Some of my work is just about beauty and love of life and love of nature, but left-wing politics is definitely part of me and some of my work clearly has a political side to it. For instance, I was involved with the NYC group shows for Art Against Apartheid. At other times I’ve made certain thought connections as a result of attempting to reconcile occurrences I think are out of place—such as while setting up my studio at the World Trade Center, I brought in several

22

Reagan Lake

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

very vulnerable and that there was a real complacency by American institutions considering how many people this country has pissed off. I somewhat share Noam Chomsky’s point of view of the United States’ role in 9/11 as a ramification of its international policies.

It appeared to me that there would come a day when an icon of American imperialism would be attacked and a normal means of conveyance would cause the disruption of the World Trade Center. I did two pieces on this theme while I had my studio at the World Trade Center—one was World on Fire, and the other was called Premonition of Disaster. Needless to say, I could not have conceived of the tragedy of 9/11, nor, as a pseudo New Yorker, could I have predicted my sense of loss or that my world would be turned upside down as a result of the events of 9/11, and the chain of events that are taking place as a result of America’s reaction to 9/11.

Thanks a lot for this interesting conversation, Donald. Finally, I would like you to tell our readers something about your future projects.

Anything coming up for you professionally that you would like readers to be aware of?

carloads of art supplies in boxes and cans. I am white, blue-eyed, and, at that time, was also blond. The mostly Middle Eastern security staff never checked my materials. I did have a photo ID, but it seemed odd that they were so casual in light of the World Trade Center terrorist bombing in 1992. It occurred to me while looking out over the city from this icon of American international financial interests that I could be in the IRA or a blond fundamentalist Muslim, but because of my race I was never checked. It seemed to me that the building was

I’m currently working on a project called Damascus Falling, which is another piece where I’m reframing the Heaven and Earth idea, except instead of having the vision of a city shattered by the traumas of two iconic buildings falling, now it’s become a vision of the total decimation of some of the many cities and regions currently being ravaged by the traumas of war—in some cases much like people lined up to be shot, in an allusion to Goya’s work about the instruments used by the Holy Inquisition, and El Greco’s painting 3rd of May 1808, of Spanish peasants being shot by the French.

In the summer I’ll be doing an outdoor installation at Lionheart Gallery in Pound Ridge, New York, and I also have a planned installation of a yet-to-bedefined vine and root piece and exhibition of other work at Five Points Gallery in Torrington, Connecticut, this fall. Denise and I are currently seeking out new venues for It Takes a Village, and I’m looking for an appropriately large venue for Memorial Windows.

Thank you for asking me to be in your magazine and for asking such thoughtful insightful questions

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

Gabe Babcock Lives and works in Oregon

An artist's statement

E

xploring the natural world around me and focusing on my role within it, i strive to illuminate the tension between nature and humans through art. Using found materials I challenge the integrity of the materials within spatial boundaries. Whatever the material, I find myself testing it, searching for its limits with a structural balance, much like an explorer gingerly traversing a glacier in high summer.

In using various materials and testing their limits, i toe boundaries; each project becomes an engineered experiment. Similarly, a stonefly's cocoon of sand and pebbles is fit for three years of tumultuous waters; the cocoon

22

can fail and its components once again become part of the river, shedding light on connectedness and impermanence. The tension and balance I strive for is like that of an eagle's nest.

Weaving found materials together with its beak, for the bird to balance a metric-ton basket on the highest point of the tallest tree to embrace the elements is like Russian roulette.

Nobody would ever do this, but an eagle does and succeeds.

Using craft as my wading staff, my goal is to create structure within the thalweg, conveying tension to the viewer standing safely ashore.

Gabe Babcock

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

The Redwoods at the Autumn Lights Festival in Oakland, California. Photo by Kelly Knowles 22

Land

E

scape

Gabe Babcock

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

LandEscape meets

Gabe Babcock An interview by Katherine Williams, curator and Josh Ryder, curator landescape@europe.com

Gabe Babcock accomplishes the difficult task of highlighting the tension between nature and human, creating an area in which emotional dimension and perceptual reality coexist in a coherent unity. He does not let the viewers in the foggy area of doubt: the evokative power of the combination of materials he uses to investigate about the relation between reality and the way we perceive it, generate an area of intellectual interplay between perception and memory, contingency and immanence, that invites the viewers to explore the crossroad between human emotion and nature's power: I'm very pleased to introduce our readers to his refined artistic production.

Hello Gabe and welcome to LandEscape: to start this interview, would you like to tell us something about your background? Are there any experience that have influenced your evolution as an artists and that still impact on the way you currently conceive and produce your works?

With only 27 years of observing i have little to specifically point a finger at and confidently say it had significant impact on my work. I have spent a great deal of time in the woods, and on rivers. Outside. Trailess. Always walking, always observing, always in wonder. I seem to fall into the habit of going on these adventures and inevitably looking for places with no human “print� and, usually, there is a log cross-cut by a chainsaw, or an old rusted pipe, or power lines.

For instance, last winter i was climbing to get to

22

Gabe Babcock

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

Gabe Babcock

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

The Redwoods at dusk. Emulating the bay area as night sets in

22

Gabe Babcock

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

the spring of a creek in the coast range. I scaled up the creek, high walled basalt canyon covered in moss with rhododendrons reaching for light over the edges. The old noble firs swaying madly in the horrendous wind and, as I climbed closer to the creek’s source, it only seemed to grow from the amount of rain falling.

Springs fascinate me, maybe because i don’t understand them. But a vein of water coming up from the earth’s core, through bedrock...Something full and satisfying about it. Wholesome. Something as soft as water shaping something so hard as stone. Fitting and the way it should be. A little watching and observing, a slow amble with a little selfless time, and the mind is humbled by the simplicity of things in contrast with their layers of complexity.

So my mind gets lost in little thought circles as i clamber on through the stream up to its source. This day i found it and . . . “continued up under and through the alders and thorns until they grew so thick i was forced to crawl like a child on my hand and knees. I reached a rock out crop in a clearing and scrambled up it. As i looked up i realized the clearing was a swath cut through the woods for power lines, which were no more than 5 ft above my head. In a heinous rain storm the wind howled up this canyon of old growth trees, barely clothed and bare footed covered in blood and my only fear was how far can power arch?”

This type of outcome happens often enough.

It certainly curves my perception of the world and i inevitably question my role in it. And, this curiosity carries into my work.

Your approach is marked out with a deep multidisciplinary synergy between several practices, that are combined to provide your works of a dynamic and autonomous life. I would suggest our readers to visit http://www.gabebabcock.com in order to get a wider idea of your multifaceted artistic production. While crossing the

22

Land

E

scape

Gabe Babcock

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

borders of different artistic fields have you ever happened to realize that a symbiosis between different viewpoints is the only way to achieve some results, to express specific concepts?

A resounding yes. To paint a simple picture. I am from a family of ten. With farmers, teachers, biologist, foresters, teachers, artist, nurses, and more teachers, and now parents.

There are clearly different perspectives politically, environmentally, religiously etc. I have no aspirations to tell people how to live or think. Everyone does the best with what they are given, i only aim to offer another perspective. I don’t think many of my family members understand art, or what i do. But they support me and are fascinated about how I go about accomplishing certain projects.

And this perspective extends out to my audiences too. Some get it, some don’t.

Those that get it and like it, great! Those that don’t but are fascinated by the complexity and story of the process, also great! And for those who don’t get it and/or care for it… what am i supposed to do? Just smile I guess.

I would start to focus on your artistic production beginning from The Redwoods, an interesting work that our readers have already got to know in the introductory pages of this article. What most impressed me in this project is the way you have create a point of convergence between a functional analyses of the context you examine and autonomous aesthetics. Do you conceive this in an instinctive way or do you rather structure your process in order to reach the right balance?

For me, i think it is necessary to have this balance between aesthetics and concept in order to reach a broader audience. Making something aesthetically pleasing will attract a wider range of people in my opinion. Even if one doesn’t get art or care for it, or understand the concept of a piece, they can still see it and appreciate it. If the work is not inviting and approachable i think it is hard to

22

Gabe Babcock

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Gabe Babcock

Gabe Babcock

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

draw people in to want to understand the concept. But it is always the concept and the materials that help shape the piece.

The context is equally important, but i don’t try to force people to understand it. Each piece means something to me, but i don’t want what i see to impose on what they see. I think it is more effective for the viewer to ruminate on what they see, rather than to have my ideas interrupt their thought process. I want the viewers to take their experience home with them and reflect on it. For me I think this balance is instinctive. I am a very processoriented person and in order for me to be happy with my work I feel it needs a sense of cleanliness, supplemented by the wabi-sabi aesthetic.

A relevant feature of The Redwoods that has particularly impacted on me is the way you highlight the inner bond between Man and Nature: you invite the viewer to appreciate the intrinsic but sometimes disregarded beauty of geometrical patterns, bringing a new level of significance to the idea of landscape itself. In particular, the evolving nature of the installation offers a multilayered experience... Like Mariko Mori and Mike Kelley's installations, this work aims to raising a question on the role of the viewers' perception, forcing us to go beyond the common way we perceive not only the outside world, but our inner dimension... I'm personally convinced that some information is hidden, or even "encrypted" in the environment we live in, so we need to decipher them. Maybe that is a role of an artist, to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially of our inner Nature... what are your thoughts about this?

I agree to an extent. There are certainly millions of years of evolution encrypted in our minds and in nature. However, i don’t necessarily agree that we need to decipher it. Nature is phenomenal.

Certainly there are layers of complexity within it.

From our eyes’ perspective it is simple, elegant

22

Land

E

scape

Gabe Babcock

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

and beautiful. As we begin to decipher it, it gets more and more complex, interesting, and we learn we know less and less. For me i approach the totality of understanding as accepting that everything has its role in the process of things and, even if I don’t understand it, it has importance and serves a purpose. So i see my role, as an artist and human, as insignificant. I focus on where i fit in and how i influence the natural process.

Your suggestive recontextualization of materials from industry to generate a evocative, almost euphonic imagery that is intrinsically connected to the chance of creating an area of intellectual interplay with the viewers, that are urged to evolve from the condition of a merely passive audience, as in Tethered. In particular, your process of semantic restructuration of a view has reminded me of the ideas behind Thomas Demand's works, when he stated that "nowadays art can no longer rely much on symbolic strategies and has to probe psychological narrative elements within the medium instead". While conceiving Art could be considered a purely abstract activity, there is always a way of giving it a permanence that goes beyond the intrinsic ephemeral nature of the concepts you explore. So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion personal experience is an absolutely indispensable part of a creative process... Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?

Sure. I think the things i see and my experiences certainly impact on my creative process. However, I think taking it a step further is important.

For example, i understand the concept of Tethered. But when i go back to it, i feel something more. I remember the full experience of coming up with the idea and the trek i did on that blizzarding day in the Wyoming planes but it doesn’t mean i fully understand how that experience shaped the Tethered piece. I can honestly say i look at

22

this piece with a bit of wonder myself, and don’t really feel responsible for it.

Another interesting piece of yours that has particularly stuck out to me me and on which I would like to spend some time on is entitled Holding On. In this work you explore the psychological nature of the concepts of mass and gravity: in particular, when I first got to know with this work I tried to relate all the visual information and the presence of a primary element of water to a single meaning. I later realized I had to fit into the visual unity suggested by the work, forgetting my need for a univocal understanding of its symbolic content: in your work, rather that a conceptual interiority, I can recognize the desire to enable us to establish direct relations...

Would you say that it's more of an intuitive or a systematic process?

If i understand this question correctly, you are asking “is it intentional that my pieces don’t necessarily have a singular meaning? And if this approach is instinctive or planned?” I would say yes, it is intentional, as i want people to draw from the pieces what they see and not tell them how to think, just show them what i see. I am almost flattered that you mentioned water as a primary element.

In a lot of my pieces i have wanted to incorporate water but through the simplifying process it gets nosed out for one reason or another. So, for you to mention “water” as a primary element in my work is interesting to me.

I definitively love the way you recontextualize the idea of the environment in a wide sense, as in your Remove Yourself from the Negative Environment: by the way, many contemporary artists as Edward Burtynsky or Michael Light have some form of political message in their works.

Do you consider that your works are political in this way or do you seek to maintain a neutral approach?

I do like to remain neutral when it comes to

Holding On. A 400-pound rock suspended over bedrock by a wooden post embedded in concrete. Photo by: David Paul Bayles.

Gabe Babcock

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

politics and my work. I certainly have my own viewpoints as I am, by nature, a pantheist.

But, i think it can turn people off to see that directly in work. I have more appreciation for something suggestive, subtle and elegant.

particular, do you consider the issue of audience reception as being a crucial component of your decision-making process in terms of what type of language for a particular context?

A great example of this is Robert Adams. I know little about his work. But, what I do know I like and admire. His photos and philosophy are simple and poetic to me.

No. I want the audience to enjoy their experience. With A Piece of the Whole, i actually wanted people to take a stone to experience and understand impermanence.

Nobody would take the stones from the installation/show so i sewed 520 canvas bags, made a card and sent them to people.

People were moved, deeply in some cases, and at the same time sad to see the piece was dismantled. I can do nothing but smile.

Of course i would like people to like my work.

I want people to be interested. But, i really do not build these projects for them… it is a piece of me I share with them for the things i think are most important.

As most of your works, Slate Tokonoma is open to various interpretations: in particular, the effective reference to wild nature communicates to me a process of deconstruction, recontextualization and assemblage both on a semantic and on a formal aspect.

What is it specifically about deconstruction which fascinates you and make you want to center your artistic style around it?

I am not sure my work so much focuses on deconstruction but more using what is available.

A slab of granite left over from a neighbor’s countertop, redwood blocks from a burn pile and a 5 foot tall piece of slate I packed out of a canyon, split with an axe to make butterfly stones and found a way to make them balance. It is much more about making use of what i have. The granite was the exact width for the space, i had wanted it to go through the existing post to create a way to break through the barrier of the two rooms. I think that says something about letting things be rather than forcing them.

During these years your works have been extensively exhibited in several important occasions, and the physical involvement of your audience is a crucial aspect of your approach: for A Piece of the Whole, you encouraged visitors to take a piece of the show home: so before taking leave from this interesting conversation I would like to pose a question about the nature of the relationship with your audience: in

Thanks a lot for this interesting conversation, Gabe. Finally, I would you like to tell us readers something about your future projects. Anything coming up for you professionally that you would like readers to be aware of?

Sure thing, thank you for taking interest and the time to look through my work. I have recently installed a piece up on the Olypmic Pennisula that is titled Flowers in the Sky. Another hanging rock piece questioning permanence, fragility and control. Also, September 4th will be the opening for a large installation in Hood River, Oregon along the Columbia River that is focused on the dams of the Columbia Watershed. Less discrete and a little more poignant, this one is meant to bring awareness to dams and the impact our conveniences have on the natural processes. Finally, I am just putting the final touches on an Aerie inspired by “Wind” by Tanka, Ryohei 1976, looking over the Klamath Wildlife Refuge in Southern Oregon.

An escape from the wind, but a platform for the raptors… a stage for symbiosis, i hope.

22

Gosia Mielech Lives and works in Warsaw, Poland

My name is Malgorzata Mielech. I am a freelance artist based in Poland. I am a dancer, teacher, creator and a researcher involved with DanceLab. Coming from a Ballet background, I graduated from Olga Slawska-Lipczynska Ballet School (2007). In the years 2007?2012 I was a soloist in the Polish Dance Theatre and had the pleasure to collaborate with many supreme choreographers and directors, what gave me a various amount of artistic tools and creative incentives.

I was dancing in the whole repertoire of Polish Dance Theatre and working with many choreographers including in particular: Ohad Naharin, Yossi Berg, Jacek Przybyłowicz , Gunhild Bjoernsgaard, Susanne Jaresand, Ewa Wycichowska and many others. Now I am co?founder of DanceLab, an independent dance company and co?creator of choreography and other artistic projects for the group. The Premiere of “ Sababa” (chor. M. Mielech, Z. Jakubiec) and “ We bleed the same color” (chor. Shi Pratt) happened in June 2013 at the Polish Theatre in Poznań. I also co?created a multidimensional artistic project called DanceLabirynth as well as „Nilreb”? a piece to sum up DanceLab’s residency in Berlin. I have toured with performances from DanceLab’s repertory in (Berlin, Jena, Jerusalem, Wroclaw, Krakow, Poznan), taking artistic residencies (Berlin – Uferstudios) and developing my dance skills by participating in various dance projects, festivals and numerous dance workshops .

While being a freelance choreographer and dancer I created and performed a solo piece “Sacre”, directed by Krzysztof Raczkowski, on the 10th Poznań Ballet Spring in the Grand Theatre in Poznan. My latest solo piece called Anonymous had a premier in Poznan, Poland in June 2014. It’s a performance that connects dance, street art, original electronic live music and mapping.

Gosia Mielech

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

LandEscape meets

Gosia Mielech An interview by Katherine Williams, curator and Jurgen Stern, curator landescape@europe.com

Hello Gosia, and a warm welcome to LandEscape.

I would start this interview with my usual introductory question: what does in your opinion define a work of Art? By the way, what could be in your opinion the features that mark an artworks as a piece of Contemporary Art? Do you think that there's a dichotomy between tradition and contemporariness?

In contemporary art there are no rules, no boundaries, no taboo subjects, no limit's and no tool more powerful than imagination. The key is to learn how to really listen to yourself, then observe, to be bothered about questions which may appear and let them begin an inner discourse. For me personally any creation ought to have a meaning, a micro or a mini mission to fulfil, in order to be called an art piece. Contemporary Art surrounds us from all around, it invigorates our senses, broadens our horizons and creates, for us, a perception of reality. It is a challenging responsibility to carry, for any Artist to satisfy the viewer’s deep hunger. For me personally a work of art needs to have an individual impact on a viewer, it has to DO something. It is not about seeking dramatic solutions or finding simple answers. It’s about being honest, searching and available. I wouldn’t say that there’s a dichotomy between tradition and contemporariness, I am more inclined to say that they interpenetrate. By acknowledging the past with all its burdens, superstitions and an overwhelming tradition, Artist's can only gain creative incentives. Tradition is immortal, stable

22

Gosia Mielech

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Gosia Mielech

Gosia Mielech

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

and entwined with dailiness. It would be a shame to deny the tradition, an immensity of inspirations that Artist's can confront their ultra contemporary approach with.

Would you like to tell us something about your background? You have formal training and in 2007 you graduated from Olga SlawskaLipczynska Ballet School: moreover, I think it's important to remark that this wasn't your first experience with dance and that before graduating you already started a career in Ballet... How have these different experiences impacted on your development as an artist and on the way you currently create your dance?

Obviously, ballet technique has strongly influenced the beginning of my professional career. Simultaneously I was training in contemporary dance, as well as other dance techniques, that from the earliest years gave me a wide spectrum of dance education. The fascination and dedication to ballet turned out to leave strong technical fundamentals in the body and habits that I was able to confront in the later years, by focusing on improvisation and seeking for different values and qualities of movement in dance. Improvisation opened up a totally new chapter in my life. Dance wasn’t about perfect figures, symmetrical excellence and partly numb body anymore. I started focusing on imagination and more importantly, I started to really listen to my body instead of telling it what to do. From that moment on, I was more careful and conscious about the reality that surrounds me. During my years of dancing in the Polish Dance Theatre, I was able to turn theory into practice by combining my movement research and collaborating with many sublime choreographers. Another milestone on my dance self-education route was discovering GaGa language. After several visits to Israel, where GaGa originates from, I became entirely inspired by this movement philosophy, which is created by Ohad Naharin. “There are many things in it: the importance of yielding and the collapse of delicacy, connecting effort to pleasure, working without mirrors, being aware of our explosive power and sometimes using it.

Being calm and alert at once.” – Ohad Naharin.

22

Land

E

scape

Gosia Mielech

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

Discovering GaGa triggered me to look for more joy, freedom, courage, self- acceptance and to focus on my personal body language.

Before starting to elaborate about your production, would you like to tell to our readers something about your process and set up for making your artworks? In particular, what technical aspects do you mainly focus on your work? And how much preparation and time do you put in before and during the process of creating a piece?

The process of creating a new piece starts long before I enter a dance studio. The beginnings are very blurry, I usually have some scattered images in my head and a general idea of the piece. Then I start my research, I look for inspiration's, mostly focusing on various visual stimulus, which has the strongest impact on me. I see an image, a piece of street art hidden inside a scruffy gate in the middle of a busy, soulless, hectic street and I get absolutely captivated.

Even when I come to a rehearsal with a fixed plan, I never know what will come out of it, because I deal with a very sensitive matter, which is my mind. I often connect to my feelings and memories and I am mixing it with my abstractive fantasy world. After a few weeks of more theoretical research I am able to lock myself in the studio. Creating choreographic material is based on different improvisation tasks, it’s an ongoing experiment. It is a unique, beautiful and very challenging time. In a way I am starting a new chapter of my life. I am also facing my demons –I get frustrated, insecure, I fight not to be too judgmental or overly ambitious. It may easily destroy spontaneity, joy and roughness that I appreciate so much. Music is equivalent to dance in my opinion, so I spend a lot of time either discussing thoughts with dj’s, producers and musicians or completing a soundtrack myself. The entire process of creating a dance piece; mastering the technical aspects of it and working on both the dramaturgic and energetic cohesion of the piece as well as bringing together all the other artistic elements (costumes, scenography, lighting) takes few months.

22

Gosia Mielech

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Gosia Mielech

Gosia Mielech

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

Now let's focus on your art production: I would start from your extremely interesting work entitled We Bleed The Same Color that our readers have already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article: I would suggest our readers to visit your website directly at http://www.dancelab.eu in order to get a wider idea of it as well as of your current artistic production. In the meanwhile, would you tell us something about the genesis of this piece? What was your initial inspiration?

Shi Pratt’s (choreographer of the piece) initial inspiration was a social interaction, closeness and intimacy between individuals. The creative process was truly interesting. We were given very detailed, surprising tasks, that we individually or jointly were dealing with. For instance, Shi gave us a map of a sewage system in New York – we were supposed to choose one of the routes for ourselves and then transform these paths into movements, making a duet with another dancer who picked a different route. So we were faced with a goal; we had to find a connection between a very real thing: a New York’s sewage system map and our interpretation of it in conjunction with a partner. Shi was watching us for hours in total silence, she saw us struggling, being stuck in one spot, failing but all the time progressing and learning about one another. An other example in the performance: there is a scene called ‘hunt’. It is a very intimate and yet quite strong in meaning, part of the piece. It is about changing stories and shifting between extreme emotions. One time you’re yielding, then you’re attacking. It's a sweet and bitter game. Basically Shi was leading us through movement and a mental rollercoaster and pushing us to experiment with our limitations. We Bleed The Same Color creates a hermetic, isolated reality in which we play different parts; we hunt, seduce, protect, dominate and dream. In the piece we play with arousing, disrupting connection and intimacy to highlight the ways in which we form social connections.

As you have remarked, We Bleed The Same Color explores the differences and similarities of how we understand and experience situations in relation to each other and what has mostly impacted on me of this wonderful piece if the

22

Land

E

scape

Gosia Mielech

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

perfect symbiosis that you have been capable of establishing between the harmony of the movement and a skillful usage of light, which creates such a parallel dimension to our perception process... This has reminded me the well known Picasso's quote "Everything you can imagine is real" I would like to ask you if in your opinion personal experience from real world is an absolutely indespensable part of a creative process... Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?

I would rather say that personal experience from the real world is an inescapable and natural part of a creative process. Experiences are shaping our personality and understanding of the world. I think that the creative process could be disconnected from a direct experience, however Artist needs to have something to relate to, not necessarily something tangible. It can be an abstract image, story or adventure, but substantial enough to visualize. As long as we can imagine something. Then it exists in our mind. We are able to connect to it, reflect on it and make it real for ourselves. The power of imagination is crucial in every creative process.

So the more connected, to the fantasy elements within us, we are, the more creative we become.

Every experience enriches us as a human being.

We learn and mature through discovering life.

Multidisciplinarity and experimentation are a recurrent and very important features of your dance practice: for example, Anonymous which recently had a premier in Poznan it's a stimulating performance that connects dance, street art, original electronic live music and mapping... while crossing the borders of different artistic fields have you ever happened to realize that a synergy between different disciplines is the only way to achieve some results, to express some concepts?

I would be more inclined to say, that synergy definitely helps to achieve some results, but it’s not the only way to do so. By integrating different fields of art, we can enlarge the impact on the viewer and deliver a fuller picture. It is also a chance to present the spectator with a form of art that was unfamiliar to him until now.

22

Gosia Mielech

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Gosia Mielech

Gosia Mielech

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

It gives us unlimited potential and thanks to this, we can create a multilayered piece of art, that has no artistic, nor cultural boundaries. However, it is possible to make an evenly powerful statement by using less elements. There is a very strong message in simplicity and monism. Sometimes the piece is mainly focused on physicality, roughness, naturalistic dance, which cannot be distracted by fancy lighting, costume or even sound. Everything depends on what the artist is trying to say, how he can express that and keep the cohesion within the performance.

A feature of the stimulating Sababa that I have highly appreciated is the way you force the viewers to a deep intellectual interaction and involvement, communicating a wide variety of states of mind: forcing the viewer to explorate and in a certain sense to challenge the usual way we perceive the space... I would go as far as to state that this work, rather than simply describing something, pose us questions: and in a certain sense forces us to meditate to the way we perceive not only the outside world, but our inner one...

We live in a society that cultivates speed, greed, a culture of material achievement, power and superficiality. There is seldom a place left in life for deeper contemplation, pursuit of peace and balance. It is a pure luxury being able to appreciate the reality and listen intently to yourself. Sababa is all about sharing and rediscovering inner perception. Sababa is a dance piece, that illustrates Zofia and my (co- creator of the piece) overwhelming fascination with dance, freedom and commendation of Israeli culture. It presents a sine wave of people’s emotions. The viewer can either relate to it, or just observe. As you correctly noticed we are not trying to describe anything, or ask questions. We simply reveal a piece of our inner, abstract world. We are inviting the audience to enter a non verbal dialogue, from which the spectator takes whatever he or she wishes and builds a fantasy story. The piece does evoke emotions, usually brings positive thoughts and leaves the audience uplifted. People often compare Sababa to their favourite video clip or a mood busting, refreshing song that they can listen

22

Land

E

scape

Gosia Mielech

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

to over and over again. Every time we perform that piece I leave the stage feeling overwhelmed by the enthusiastic feedback and honest satisfaction. There is nothing more awarding than touching other people’s emotions by taking them on a journey.

I think it's important to mention that you are the co-founder of co-founder of DanceLab, an independent dance company and co-creator of choreography and other artistic projects for the group: dance is intrinsically a collaborative practice and I do believe that interdisciplinary collaboration today is an ever growing force in Art and that that most exciting things happen when creative minds from different fields of practice meet and collaborate on a project... could you tell us something about these effective synergies? By the way, the artist Peter Tabor once said that "collaboration is working together with another to create something as a synthesis of two practices, that alone one could not": what's your point about this? Can you explain how your work demonstrates communication between several artists?

As long as you keep your integrity and you are open to other influences you can only benefit from any creative collaboration. I take great inspiration from that. Sometimes, leaving your comfort zone, your studio, where without any distractions you can develop your project in an intimate atmosphere, can be very beneficial. I discovered that, while working on the Anonymous performance, I was switching rehearsal spaces. The creative process was literally happening all the time, in various venues. One of them was an art gallery, which exhibits beautiful photographs by a renowned polish photographer, Szymon Brodziak, who specializes in black and white pictures, capturing women’s beauty. The gallery looks like a fish tank, it is a rectangular, mostly glazed space, which is situated on a busy street in Poznan. The main inspiration for Anonymous is street art. It was a perfect opportunity to create, despite the fact that I was surrounded by people and street life, but most of all being constantly exposed to everyone. It was a unique experience. Usually beginning a creative process is a very personal

22

Gosia Mielech

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Gosia Mielech

Gosia Mielech

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

time. In dance it is never overly interesting for an accidental viewer, it is all about endless repetitions, brain work, not much about dancing. It was extremely challenging to stick to my slow, careful research instead of letting my ambition win and dance my heart out while people were stopping to stare at me. In this case, it wasn't about any direct collaboration with an other artist, it was a more blanket experience.

So far your works have been exhibited in several important occasions and it goes without saying that feedbacks and especially awards are capable of supporting an artist: I was just wondering if an award -or better, the expectation of an award- could even influence the process of an artist... By the way, how much important is for you the feedback of your audience? Do you ever think to whom will enjoy your Art when you conceive your pieces?

I sometimes wonder if it could ever exist a genuine relationship between business and Art...

When I was wondering if there is a possibility of a genuine relation between art and business, my first answer was: no, there isn't. But then I thought, often, when art and business meet, great things can happen. It usually introduces art to a wider range of people and allows artists to create without a constant financial struggle.

It also brings colour to business.

I guess, if you’re creating a piece for a special request, then you are obliged to deliver ‘the product’ and agree on some compromises along the way. Does it mean that this artistic creation can’t be perceived as a piece of art anymore?

The answer is: of course it can. It is still art. The unquestionable fact is that the Artist, in order to be able to exist and to produce new creative material, has to have a financial input. That’s where business comes in. Art and business don’t have to exclude each other as long as artists keep creative freedom and the Artist doesn't end up being forced to sign a contract with the devil, whereby they become limited and censored. To answer your first question: I

22

Land

E

scape

Gosia Mielech

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

respect my audience a lot, so when I build a performance I think about how certain aspects of it will influence them, but I don’t wonder whether they will like it or not. It’s not about mutual sympathy, I want to take them on a journey and evoke reflections. It doesn’t matter if they are an educated contemporary dance enthusiasts or just a random person. The spectator is my companion, someone I care about. I take him on a journey, talk to him, share feelings, build trust, however I’m always going to be a separate individual, no matter how much we’ve been through together. Art for me is about sharing the magic, creating a “parallel universe” in which the viewer can dream and live the experience. Its roots were still firmly set in the root of the social world.

Thanks a lot for your time and your thoughts, Małgorzata. My last question deals with your future plans: what's next for you? Anything coming up for you professionally that you would like readers to be aware of?

Thank you for asking me all these intriguing questions. They were quite personal and challenging – I enjoyed this interview a lot.

I have a very exciting time ahead of me. I will be involved in a variety of interesting collaborations and performing my own dance pieces nationally and internationally. I will be creating a couple of projects in Poznań, Cultural Center Zamek (an interdisciplinary institution presenting the most interesting phenomena of contemporary culture, such areas as visual arts, theatre, film, music and literature). I will be involved in Arbor Cosmica; Andrzej Panufnik's jubilee and ‘My Music’ project. I will also participate in a research project with Isabelle Schad (Berlin based choreographer) in Old Brewery, New Dance. I will be performing ‘Anonymous’ project in London (The Place) from 4th until 8thof November. I would love to invite all our readers to join me there.

22

Gosia Mielech

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

Malgorzata Zurada Lives and works in Warsaw, Poland

An artist's statement

M

y area of interest revolves around the notion of meaning and sense-making.

I am interested in how the world seen as a set of signs is one of infinite possible interpretations, impressionable and open to reshaping.

My works refer to broadly understood metaphysics, myths and occult sciences as well as beliefs and rituals of past and present, from cultures of the world and from Western esoteric tradition. I am especially interested in visual languages connected with various belief systems and means of coding esoteric knowledge.

natural phenomena to the mundane potentially holds encrypted messages there to be deciphered. It is within this frame my research takes place, resulting in works that are documentation of personal experiments and seeking knowledge rather than building narratives or producing objects. Over the years the core of my work is gradually shifting from graphic arts and drawing towards more conceptual and ephemeral, making use of the performative potential of my body and embracing time and space as other factors of potential meaning.

I am drawn to objects and situations whose meaning transcends the physical reality - remnants, ruins, rubbish, experiences on the verge of existence and oblivion. My practice often takes form of contemporary archaeology in which everything from historical objects or texts through

Currently I work across disciplines and my practice includes photography, video, installation, performance and sound.

22

Malgorzata Zurada

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

Malgorzata Zurada

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

LandEscape meets

Malgorzata Zurada An interview by Katherine Williams, curator and Josh Ryder, curator landescape@europe.com

Małgorzata Żurada accomplishes a deep investigation about the liminal area in which perceptual reality and a dream-like dimension blends together into an unexpected point of convergence: through a marked transdisciplinary approach she carries out the difficult task of creating a lively symbiosis between instinctive perception and a refined cultural analysis that invites us to decipher the reality we inhabit. One of the most convincing aspects of Żurada's approach is the way she unveils that that Art is a vehicle not only to express feelings, but to dissect them, grapple with them, and integrate them into a coherent unity. I'm particularly pleased to introduce our readers to her refined artistic production.

Hello Małgorzata and welcome to LandEscape. I would start this interview, with some questions about your background: you have a solid formal training and you hold a MFA in Graphic Arts at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw, then you attended management postgraduate studies at the University of Warsaw. How have these experiences influenced your evolution as an artists and how do they impact on the way you currently conceive and produce your works?

Hello and thank you for invitation to this interview.

I started my formal training even earlier when I attended an art high school, which lasted 5 years, then 5 years at the Academy of Fine Arts. The most valuable thing there was that I got acquainted with a wide variety of mediums including painting, drawing, sculpture,

22

Malgorzata Zurada

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Malgorzata Zurada

Malgorzata Zurada

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

photography, various printmaking techniques as well as calligraphy, typography, graphic design and spatial design. After that I tried myself for a while as an actress for TV and a theatre mime that's when I learned about the body and it's performance potential. All these experiences add up and influence the way I work today.

Management studies were meant solely for getting myself "closer to the ground" and learn practical means of working in culture, art business, supporting myself and other artists etc.

Transdisciplinarity is a key feature of your practice: your work ranges from photography, video and sound to installation and performance. You seem to be in an incessant search of an organic, almost intimate synthesis: have you ever happened to realize that a symbiosis between different disciplines is the only way to achieve some results, to express some concepts?

Probably mixing or switching mediums can be beneficial for expressing some concepts. What drives me is the desire to experience diversity, so working across disciplines is a natural choice, or even a necessity. I know that narrowing down to one or two disciplines is a smart move and it works for many artists, making it easier to master your chosen field of expertise and gain recognition. However, it doesn't work for me.

When I consciously concentrate on one field for a longer period of time I begin to feel stuck and constricted. Changing mediums or looking for synthesis also supports creative flow. After all we're multifaceted and multidimensional beings, so there's no need to impose limitations on ourselves when it's not absolutely necessary.

Now let's focus on your artistic production: I would start from (((O))) an extremely interesting works that our readers have already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article: and I would suggest to visit directly at http://www.mzurada.com in order to get a wider idea of your multifaceted artistic production. In the meanwhile, would you tell us something about the genesis of these stimulating project? What was your initial inspiration?

22

Land

E

scape

Malgorzata Zurada

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

In December 2014 I was an artist in residence at Arteles Creative Center in Finland, where I worked on several projects, including (((O))) and Banishing by means of pyramid-like structures. The first work was centered in one moment in time, one day, while the latter was spanning throughout the whole month. I new I wanted to do something pertaining to winter solstice, mark down this day in a way, as the more north you go, the Sun gains in importance and has almost godlike status for people. At that time I was researching solar cults and solar symbolism as well. I decided to prepare a timespecific performance for 21.December, the darkest day of the year - in anticipation for the influx of solar energy. Performance was loosely based on a Lesser ritual of the hexagram. One of this ritual’s uses is to invoke planetary and zodiacal forces (solar force in this case). The method was to take the ritual out of the magical circle and into the studio space to study how the energy, voice and body movement change when given another context. I ended up skipping some parts and adding new ones, thus creating something between silent invocation and a coded, visual storyline told by gestures. It was performed and recorded 21/12/2014, Sun-day, precisely at noon, facing south. The day, time and orientation in space were chosen accordingly to tables of correspondences used in alchemy. It can be seen in many ways, e.g. as a story of death and rebirth, an adoration of the Sun, an invocation of the solar force to reinvigorate oneself or as a ritual to ensure that the Sun will come up the next day as usual - accordingly to one’s belief system and state of mind.

Your investigation about signs that pervades the reality we inhabit in questions our relationship with the outside world and you seem to deconstruct and assembly memories in order to suggest a process of investigation about the liminal area in which the Self and the Outside share an ephemeral coexistence: maybe that one of the roles of an artist could be to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially of our inner Nature... what's your point about this? ... I'm sort of

22

Malgorzata Zurada

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Malgorzata Zurada

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

convinced that some informations & ideas are hidden, or even "encrypted" as microscopic grains of sand in the environment we live in, so we need -in a way- to decipher them. Maybe that one of the roles of an artist could be to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially of our inner Nature... what's your point about this?

I subscribe to a view on reality as a creation of the mind, an illusion in a way. To quote Terence McKenna: "What we call reality is in fact nothing more than a culturally sanctioned and linguistically reinforced hallucination". So I'm all about inner nature, as it's the only nature that we can actually experience. In such worldview division between the self and the outside you refer to is illusionary, there is no liminal areas and everything is a liminal area, everything is and is not, is a center and a threshold, has every conceivable meaning and has none. It's a radical relativism where the information is there to be deciphered, and at the same time the only information is one created by the perceiving mind. Certainly, one of the roles of the artist is to reveal something about the world that general population doesn't see or pay attention to. It's a role similar to a shaman in traditional communities, being a link between the world of men and other dimensions, or a conduit through which information flows both ways.

Another interesting work of yours that has particularly impacted on me and on which I would like to spend some words is entitled banishing by means of pyramidlike structures: in particular, when I first happened to get to know with this piece I tried to relate all the visual information and the presence of a primary environmental elements to a single meaning. But I soon realized that I had to fit into the visual unity suggested by the work, forgetting my need for a univocal understanding of its symbolic content: in your work, rather that a conceptual interiority, I can recognize the desire to

enabling us to establish direct relations...

Would you say that it's more of an intuitive or a systematic process?

Ghost repellent, central part of Banishing by means of pyramid-like structures was created as a temporary functional object. For one month I lived in an old, wooden, XIXcentury school building, in the middle of Finnish countryside, pretty much secluded from the outside world. During first couple of nights I experienced unusually intense nightmares, and while awake I couldn't help but hear a variety of subtle non-human made noises, clicking, tappings or wind howling, so my imagination started to create eerie stories.

I decided to build a protective device, charge it with intention and observe how it will affect the atmosphere in the room and my overall perception. The object was supposed to continually banish all unwanted non-physical beings and nightmares, and was burned the last day when it's work was done. An artwork in this case is multilayered: an object itself, the effect the object had on me during that month, the act of burning it, the ashes I collected (remains that became the object.2) and the video documentation of the whole thing. It can be characterized both by conceptual interiority, meaning imbed by me during the process, and by its potential for direct interaction. I had very interesting feedback on how people who had a chance to see the artwork before burning related to it and what kind of stories it triggered in them.

Answering your question about intuitive vs. systematic approach - I don't plan and don't have a desire to control the reception of this or other work. And during the creative process both approaches have to be equally present the work has to be well thought and well researched and has to feel right at the same time.

Your practice is intrinsically connected to the chance of creating an area of deep, almost physical interplay with the viewers, and while exploring the liminal area between perceptual reality and a dreamlike dimension, in blind horse, lame rider

22

Land

E

scape

Malgorzata Zurada

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

urges us to evolve from the condition of a merely passive audience and I definitely love the way your works take an intense participatory line: In particular, the intrinsically contingent nature your investigation has reminded me of the idea behind Ernesto Neto's works: while conceiving Art could be considered a purely abstract activity, there is always a way of giving it a permanence that goes beyond the intrinsic ephemeral nature of the concepts you capture.

So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion personal experience is an absolutely indispensable part of a creative process... Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?

I think that under certain conditions everything is possible, so creative process disconnected from direct experience could be possible as well.

However, when we attempt to create anything in physical world or even only on mental level we have to use a tool that is our body and mind. The answer here depends on what we define as a "person". I like the concept of artist being a conduit, an antenna to a transcendental frequency, so that the best works are rather made through us, not by us. Creation cannot be then credited to one particular person, but rather to an unseen source we all can tap into.

I started blind horse, lame rider project after experiencing very detailed dream about certain places and objects blending smoothly into one another. I decided to pull them into waking reality, and thus began a long term project devoted to materializing every object of art that will appear in my dream, in the exact form as it came to me. It's a way to explore both dream state and waking life state and the relation they share. The leading line of the project is taken from the Tibetan buddhist practice of dream yoga, where the practitioner strives toward regaining consciousness in sleep, manifesting dreams of clarity and realizing true nature of mind. Blind horse is an energy - prana, lame rider is the mind. When joined together they run blindly, creating dreams that appear to be contingent, but are in fact driven and shaped by karmic traces developed from waking life

22

Malgorzata Zurada

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Malgorzata Zurada

Malgorzata Zurada

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

experiences. From this point of view all is interconnected and never random.

Your approach seems to be marked out with an organic symbiosis between several viewpoint out of temporal synchronization: moreover, the reference to the universal imagery from nature, environmental elements that recurs in your works seems to remove any historic gaze from the reality you refer to, offering to the viewers the chance to perceive in a more atemporal form. In this sense, I daresay that the semantic juxtaposition between sign and matter that marks out your art, allows you to go beyond any track of contingency... in particular, how much do you explicitly think of a narrative for your works?

My works are indeed atemporal, you're right.

To a certain point I would call them nonnarrative as well, as I usually don't concentrate on building narratives, but treat them as byproducts instead. I'm always interested in sign, form, sound, the constituents - and what's beyond that, what kind of meaning attached and where it comes from, its fluidity and potential for manipulation. This "what's beyond" usually makes for an actual story. If I work directly with narratives I rather deconstruct them into pieces, like I did in my work Prediction, where I took fragments of my grandmother's letter written in 1963 and assembled them anew. She wrote about spiritualist seancé during which spirits said I will be born sometime in the future. What I was interested in most were words as conglomerates of letters, their forms and sounds and how via association or disassociation they acquire meaning.

But beyond that, obviously, the most important thing there was a nebulous idea of an ancestor I've never met, who is present though in me now in the very flesh and blood, communicating with unseen dimensions in the past to predict me coming in the future.

So the work itself is visually very abstract, and only if you know the context you can see all those layers of meaning attached.

Over these years your works have been exhibited in several occasions, including a participation at the 41st Painting Biennale “Bielska Jesień". So, before taking leave from this interesting conversation I would like to pose a a question about the nature of the relation with your audience: in particular, do you consider the issue of audience reception as being a crucial component of your decision-making process in terms of what type of language for a particular context?

I don't think about audience at all while I'm working, only when I'm done and about to show the work, be it at an exhibition or online I start to think what to say or write to explain my motives and make the reception easier.

I'm aware that some of my works are pretty hermetic and hints on how to understand them are in place. Although I'm always very clear about ideas I convey I still want to leave lots of place for free interpretation for people, so that they can take in my works anyhow they like.

Thanks a lot for your time and for sharing your thoughts, Małgorzata. Finally, would you like to tell us readers something about your future projects? How do you see your work evolving?

In recent years my work has been gradually evolving from drawing and painting towards more time based and presence based practices like video and performance.

I definitely plan to continue on this path. I want to work more with sound as well, especially in collaboration with other artists.

I recently started working on an art book, it's gonna be based on one esoteric concept taken from Japanese theory of aesthetics - I want it to be a collaborative project as well, and hopefully it will be realized and released sometime next year.

Wish me luck!

An interview by Katherine Williams, curator and Josh Ryder, curator landescape@europe.com

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

E lena Kholkina Lives and works in Dallas, USA

An artist's statement

D

oorways (2013-2014) is an artist book of personal photographic images I've taken over a couple of years and is based on an interaction of landscapes, cityscapes and interiors. The viewer travels through the places, guided by lines and visual rhymes in the book spreads. Tactile paper brings another dimension to the looking process.

The book is built in a complex way, the system of hand-bound pages brings volume and turns it almost into a sculpture. There is no narrative, no main characters, no events, only a smooth flow of images that are doorways into each other, a mental trip that aims to clear viewer's mind of everyday thoughts. There are several enigmas hidden inside the book

22

and keys to unravel them, which will probably take time to guess and will invite viewers to come back to the book again and again. I call it a zen book - a tool for visual meditation, for being simply here and now. Doorways was shortlisted and exhibited at Unseen Dummy Award 2014. The book is fully handmade and self-published in a limited number of copies (100). The box is embroidered.

Elena Kholkina

Elena Kholkina is a photographer based in Moscow, Russia, graduate of the Institute of Contemporary Arts in Moscow and Phootodepartament St.Petersburg, winner of Rock your dummy! 2013 photobook contest and recipient of the Urban Urge Seed Grant 2014. Her photographs, art projects and books have been exhibited in Russia (Moscow, St.Petersburg, Kazan) and in Europe (Minsk, Riga, Bologna, Aarhus, Amsterdam, Paris)

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

LandEscape meets

Elena Kholkina An interview by Katherine Williams, curator and Rob C. Anderson, curator landescape@europe.com

Explorating the semantic potential conveyed by Photography, Moskow based artist Elena Kholkina accomplishes the difficult taks of explorating the ephemeral nature of reality, in relation to the contingent reality we inhabit. While seducing the viewer with an ambiguous and pulsating aesthetics, she succedes in creating an area of deep interplay, that urges us to forget our need for a univocal understanding of symbolic contents, gently inviting us to rethink about the atemporal mark of Reality. One of the most convincing aspect of Kholkina's work is the way she effectively harmonizes an analytical approach to composition with a lively gaze towards contemporariness. I'm very pleased to introduce our readers to her refined artistic production.

Hello Elena and a warm welcome to LandEscape: to start this interview, would you like to tell us something about your background? You have a solid formal training and after attenting a post-graduate course at St.Petersburg Fotodeparttment under the guidance of Nadya Sheremetova, you attended the prestigious Institute of Contemporary Arts Moscow: would you like to tell our readers how did these experiences influence your evolution as an artist and

22

how they impact on the way you currently conceive and produce your intersting works?

Thank you for your interest in what I do.

Before attending these art schools I had been photographing for some time - I worked as a photographer assistant and shot personal documentary, often using the medium to socialize and express emotions. I had a series I wanted to turn into a book, and that's where it all started - in feeling the need to explain my ideas and get across a clear message, through images and words. Fotodepartament not only provided the opportunity to work on my critical stand but also planted me into a certain socially active and creative environment of people where I felt inspired.

The next step was ICA Moscow where curators and professors aim to broaden artistic horizons of all the students and foster a culture of critical debate. The most important thing for me was and still is learning to formulate, it is a constant search for accuracy - in words, ideas, images etc.

Now I would start to focus on your artistic production and in particular on Doorways, an extremely interesting work that has been shortlisted for Unseen Dummy Award 2014 and that our readers have already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article: and I would suggest our readers to visit directly at http://www.offonroad.com in order to get a wider idea of your

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Elena Kholkina

Elena Kholkina

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Elena Kholkina

Elena Kholkina

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

multifaceted artistic production. In the meanwhile, would you tell us something about the genesis of this interesting project? What was your initial inspiration?

One of the project 's inspirations was the song Doorways by Radical Face. It ran this idea of entering a place to find yourself somewhere else, and I was having a similar feel looking through my archive of personal images from all sorts of places.

Sometimes it felt just like passing through doors from one place to another and that's what I decided to work on - build a virtual journey from real ones. The first dummy was completely different - more classical in terms of form and sequence - it was also shortlisted for Unseen in 2013 - and then I reworked it completely into the present form which was then shortlisted the next year.

There is no narrative in Doorways, and I have appreciated the way you have been capable of bringing a new level of significance to the sign of absence, that invites the readers to a careful investigation: this seems to be a recurrent feature of your approach that urges the viewers' perception in order to challenge the common way to perceive not only the outside world, but our inner dimension...

By the way, I'm sort of convinced that some informations & ideas are hidden, or even "encrypted" in the environment we live in, so we need -in a way- to decipher them. Maybe that one of the roles of an artist could be to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially of our inner Nature... what's your point about this?

With Doorways I was looking for a way to guide the viewer through the book without telling a story, so the book's imagery is build in between the photographs - there is something that arises from neighboring photographs, which we can't see but rather we start to feel as we thumb through the book. I agree with you regarding the need to

22

Land

E

scape

Elena Kholkina

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

reconsider things - definitely we do, for one reason because we are living in the world of secondary images and cultural codes, and often what looks as a certain thing is in fact an image of something else. Reality is nowadays a database, and all of us constantly have to handle this, decipher things, as you mention.

Another interesting work of yours that has particularly impacted on me and on which I would like to spend some words is entitled In the shadow: the core of this project is an exploration of the theme of replication in the contemporary world and in particular, when I first happened to get to know with this piece I tried to relate all the visual information to a single meaning. But I later realized that I had to fit into the visual rhythm suggested by the work, forgetting my need for a univocal understanding of its symbolic content: in your work, rather that a conceptual interiority, I can recognize the desire to enabling us to establish direct relations... Would you say that it's more of an intuitive or a systematic process?

The visual rhythm you mention is important for the project as it is talking about replication, appropriation and copyright issues. I was looking for a form that would strengthen the idea of "In the shadow" (selfportraits shot against the background of paintings made by famous Russian artists Dubossarsky and Vinogradov), and I remembered tourist postcards - the ones that are sold together in a long leporello and it worked well together with the photographs. Referring to what you say about establishing direct relations - I believe the work becomes interesting when it leaves the viewer with possibilities for interpretation. I think I systematically look for a certain balance between my message, its form and possible interpretations.

22

Elena Kholkina

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

Elena Kholkina

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

Your practice is intrinsically connected to the chance of creating an area of deep, almost physical interplay with the viewers, that are urged to evolve from the condition of a merely passive audience: I definetely love the way Don't trust your eyes takes such an intense participatory line not only on the way we enjoy Art, but also and especially on its conception. In particular, your investigation about the intimate consequences of constructed realities has reminded me of Thomas Demand's works: while conceiving Art could be considered a purely abstract activity,

22

there is always a way of giving it a permanence that goes beyond the intrinsic ephemeral nature of the concepts you capture. So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion personal experience is an absolutely indespensable part of a creative process... Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?

I feel that the answer to this question will be changing for me with time. For now it seems right to show a certain level of

Elena Kholkina

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

Multidisciplinarity is a crucial aspect of your artistic practice and you seem to be in an incessant search of an organic, almost intimate symbiosis between several disciplines, taking advantage of the creative and expressive potential of Drawing, Photography and Video: while crossing the borders of different artistic fields have you ever happened to realize that a symbiosis between different disciplines is the only way to achieve some results, to express some concepts?

As in the course of life you devote yourself to different activities, the symbiosis seems more versatile. It seems logical to pull together things you enjoy.

"honesty" - although I realize that the term itself is complicated by the pervasive influence of information on us and much of what we call internal is in fact based on external, as if we do not translate but rather retranslate, and it is difficult or impossible to move away from it.

And yet even in these conditions a statement that brings across an internal interest of the author seems more acute, touches me more, as at least for a moment it has a taste, a hint of "real". So I come from personal experience most of the time.

For me it is important to keep doing these activities (like dance and photography, for example), and I would not want to give them up, so they are woven into the creative process - it's all a matter of lack of time in a way.

And yes, it gives you a wider palette, the more you say the more people will understand you. Like in "Don't trust your eyes" - maybe you're not so keen on images in the background, but you might get caught by the dance, and that's when you begin to read something, or "believe" the artist.

The recurrent reference to a universal imagery suggested by natural elements as in Dark matters seems to remove any historic gaze from the reality you refer to, offering to the viewers the chance to perceive in a more atemporal form. In this sense, I daresay that the semantic juxtaposition between sign and matter that marks out your art, allows you to go beyond any dichotomy between Tradition and Contemporariness, establishing a stimulating osmosis between materials marked out with such an absolute feature and a modern, lively approach to Art: By

22

Land

E

scape

Elena Kholkina

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

the way, do you recognize any contrast between Tradition and Contemporariness?

Between tradition and contemporariness I feel more continuity, less contrast/opposition.

What comes to mind from school knowledge earlier artists were looking for "new" and in the modern post-medium art we are looking for "other" - certain hybrid versions replacing the concept of "new".

I love the way you re-contextualize the idea of the environment we live in and I would go as far as to state that your capability to evoke the presence of a view invites to rethink to the way we relate ourselves to the environment we inhabit in... by the way, many contemporary artists as the photographer Edward Burtynsky or Michael Light have some form of environmental or political message in their photographs. Do you consider that your works are political in this way or do you seek to maintain a neutral approach?

I don't deliberately do political works, but an artist is in any case a mixture of engagement and detachment - so there is no way we can escape information and probably no way we can separate information from our works. So if there is an acute political problem, it may come up in the work even if the author never intended it. This is what happened with a recent project of mine - Vobortens2015, which I created as a response to the educational process, self-actualized in connection with the military conflict between Russia and the Ukraine and it is now part of the exhibition called War Museum in Moscow Museum of Modern Art. During these years your works have been extensively exhibited around the world, including a recent participation at MANIFESTA10 in St.Petersburg. So, before taking leave from this interesting conversation I would like to pose a a question about the nature of the relation with your audience: in particular, do you

22

consider the issue of audience reception as being a crucial component of your decision-making process in terms of what type of language for a particular context?

When I'm doing something new I trust the audience will understand simply because we are all human. I don't think I can or should try to predict who the viewer will be, cause then it's more of a commercial thing,

Elena Kholkina

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

if you know what I mean, then I would be trying to suit somebody's interests, and it should not be the case with an artwork. It is probably more important to learn to talk to different kinds of audience if you present your work personally, I mean if you get a chance to speak about your work in public.

Thanks a lot for your time and for sharing your thoughts, Elena. Finally, would you like to tell us readers

something about your future projects?

How do you see your work evolving?

I have several ideas in mind for now - an urban photographic project, a new zine and a new book. I'd like to know myself where it is all going, but seems like it is and is going to be an open field for experiments An interview by Katherine Williams, curator and Rob C. Anderson, curator landescape@europe.com

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

D jojo & Versteeg Lives and works in Dallas, USA

An artist's statement

W

hen I was four years old, I had a near death experience while having an open heart surgery.

My heart stopped beating, my body temperature went low, a heart-lung machine kept me alive. Coming back from that threshold, I knew that opposites are bound together and that I encompass both. It left me fascinated with edges and yearning for meaning.

My works are born from that same simultaneous sense of vertigo and stability.

They deal with a dichotomous - the realization that one reality can reflect many and there is no one definition. The truth is endlessly evolving and expanding. I try and reconcile conflicts and contradictions such as beauty that encompasses crudeness, weakness as a source of strength and disillusionment that feeds innocence. The early works (“Red Heart”, 2007-09) are naïve drawings of bodies and situations, subtle yet disturbing. Minimalist figures floating in white space. With time, layers appear (“Illusions & Reality”, 2010-13).

Through intricate drawings and

22

installations I struggle to weave together the past, present and future. Recently I’m fascinated with transformation (“Release”, 2014-15). The Sisyphean process evolved to a new set of rules, which dictates different materials, gestures and speed. The new paintings are large and expressive, made in one continuous session, like an intense ritual.

I see my studio as a cross between a womb and a lab. My practice is a tool for understanding myself as well as the world of phenomena around me. My goal is to generate a change that shapes perspectives and actions, thus enabling for something new to occur - symbolically, conceptually and tangibly. I have a distinct feeling that there is something beyond me, a life force, which I can’t put into words but I can channel into art.

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

LandEscape meets

Djojo & Versteeg An interview by Katherine Williams, curator

Rotterdam based artists Djojo & Versteeg accomplish the difficult task to capture the essence of human experience and immediately conveying it into a fantasy realm, marked out with both imagination and a though-provoking reference to real world. Their staged photographies unveil a careful process that can be considered an investigation about the liminal area in which Imagination and perceptual reality find an unexpected point of convergence, coexisting in a coherent unity. One of the most convincing aspects of Djojo & Versteeg's practice is the way they creates an area of intellectual interplay that urges the viewers to explore the unstable relationship between perception and memory in the contemporary age.

We are very pleased to introduce our readers to their refined artistic production.

In particular, you formed a duo during time in art school: while Rik has an academic training in Fine-Art Photography, Danny has an autodidact background as a stylist and make-up artist.

I personally find extremely fascinating the convergence of formal training with a self-taught approach and I do believe that interdisciplinary collaborations -as the one that you have established together- is today an ever growing force in Art and that most exciting things happen when creative minds from different fields of practice meet and collaborate on a project...

Have you ever happened to realize that such synergy is the only way to achieve some results, to express specific concepts? By the way, the artist Peter Tabor once said that "collaboration is working together with another to create something as a synthesis of two practices, that alone one could not": what's your point about this? Can you explain how your work demonstrates communication between two artists?

Hello Rik and Danny, and welcome to LandEscape. To start this interview, would you like to tell us something about your background?

Well, the collaboration kind of started without us realizing we were such a good team together. At the academy

and Josh Ryder, curator landescape@europe.com

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

Daughter of Deception from The22Masquerade Ball series

Djojo & Versteeg

Djojo & Versteeg

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

we started working together on random projects that happened from time to time. These projects were fashion stories most of the time. At this time Danny was just starting doing make-up!

After a while we noticed that a lot of the make-up done by other artist was still very beauty related, but we wanted something more expressive and theatrical. So instead of trying to find the right artists for this, we just started doing it ourselves and that is basically how it all started. Three years later and we're still working together!

We totally agree on the statement by Peter Tabor. We both share the same vision, which is always helpful when you're working together. But the most important part of our collaboration is that we can really share our abilities and learn from each other. Danny can deliver the best make-up because he knows how the lighting works, same as for Rik because he'll know how to capture the best angles to bring out the makeup and styling even more!

I would start to focus on your artistic production beginning from The Appearance of the Subconscious Mind, an interesting body of work featured in the introductory pages of this article: the way you explore a dream-like dimension reminds me of the idea behind Thomas Demand's works, when he states that "Nowadays art can no longer rely so much on symbolic strategies and has to probe psychological, narrative elements within the medium instead". I like the way you give to

the ephemeral nature of human feeling a sense of permanence, capturing the essence of human experience. So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion, personal experience is absolutely indispensable as part of the creative process? Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?

We do believe personal experience is really important as a part of the creative process. Daily experiences make you who you are and affect the way you think. We also believe that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience in theory, but we wouldn't know how, because that is definitely not the way we work.

Disconnecting a personal experience would be a work of it's own, but then our question would be: How do you capture that moment?

Because once you start working on it, it will ultimately be influenced by you and thus your personal experience. It's a very good question and we would love to answer it, but for now it raised more questions than answers, haha.

The Appearance of the Subconscious Mind can be considered as a refined investigation that unveils that nature itself holds the key to much inner knowledge of our own nature, providing the viewers of an Ariadne's Thread, inviting them to challenge the common way we relate ourselves with the outside world... By the way, I'm sort of convinced that some informations & ideas are hidden, or

22

Land

E

scape

Djojo & Versteeg

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

even "encrypted" in the environment we live in, so we need -in a way- to decipher them. Maybe that one of the roles of an artist could be to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially of our inner Nature... what's your point about this?

In our own work one of the most important issues we can relate to is searching for a way to show the viewer an undiscovered and subconscious world.

Most of our inspiration is coming from theories, myths, technology and the way the human being is able to relate to it. We don’t think it is important for every single artist to reveil the inner nature, but in a way every artist is influenced by something that inspires them from their daily live. Most of the time we react to issues we see in our own lives and project this in an image whether it’s a statement or by showing our research on a subject.

It goes without saying that your photographs are the result of a lot of planning and thought, but at the same time they convey a sense of ironic spontaneity that is a hallmark of your style. One of the things that I have mostly appreciated of your approach is that you seem to be wanting to move beyond standard representation: I like the direction you are taking. Creating what at first appears to be a photographic image but subverting its compositional elements, making the viewer realize that your work has a different message. What has influenced your style?

When we started working as a duo our first series and images were very fashion

22

Djojo & Versteeg

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

From Sculpture to Body, video

Djojo & Versteeg

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

related. In the early stage of our work as u duo we used clothing from renewed or upcoming designers and most of the time the designs were our starting point for creating an image.

After a while we realized that our concepts and ideas did not always show through with the designs we used to capture the idea with. At this point, our main focus was to really get our statement right by using only objects and fabric to get the concept perfectly aligned with what is in the image. Every detail is staged, like in fashion, and we love it.

Your approach seems to stimulates the viewer’s psyche and consequently works on both a subconscious and a conscious level.

How did you decide to focus on this form of photography? And in particular, do you conceive this in an instinctive way or do you rather structure your process in order to reach the right balance?

With Rik having a fashion photography background and Danny fine arts, the decision was made the moment we started working together. We were really missing the conceptual aspects of photography, because fashion is a really fast industry. Back then, the images shot were really evolving on set or even in the editing phase, but after a while it wasn't really satisfying anymore. Before we start shooting the actual image now, preparations can take up to a week or more. So it is really a structured process, but anything can happen on set!

Another interesting project of yours that has had particular impact on me and about which I would like to dedicate some words is entitled "The Masquerade Ball". What most impressed me in this project is the way your analysis of mundane situations shows a point of convergence between a rigorous investigation about the liminal area in which fiction and reality blends together and autonomous aesthetics on a formal aspect. As most of your works, this piece is open to various interpretations: in particular, it communicates me a process of deconstruction, recontextualization and assemblage. What is it specifically about deconstruction which fascinates you and make you want to center your artistic style around it?

What fascinates us about deconstruction is the fact that you have the ability to rip a twodimensional concept apart and layer it, creating a new twisted way to look at it. Like all of our images, at first, it seems as you are looking at a regular, slightly weird, image. But if you pay closer attention the smallest detail can influence your whole idea of the concept, which is already open to interpretation.

Besides the stimulating series that we have been discussing so far, you also produced an interesting short entitled From Sculpture to Body that our readers can view at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o

22

Land

E

scape

Djojo & Versteeg

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

8GQkdQ1DvY#t=77. By definition video is rhythm and movement, gesture and continuity. You have create a time-based work that induce the viewer to abandon himself to his associations, looking at time in spatial terms and I daresay, rethinking the concept of space in such a static way: this seems to remove any historic gaze from the reality you refer to, offering to the viewers the chance to perceive in a more atemporal form.

How did you conceived the rhythm for From Sculpture to Body ?

From sculpture to body, was actually a short fashion film, produced for a runway show of Ilona Putkaradze. She gave us a free hand to do anything we wanted as long as we used a specific track. This beat by Moderat is what inspired us most for this short film. We wanted to create a film that related to Ilona's collection. Most of the shots are inspired by the materials and the statue she used which was her inspiration for the collection. We wanted to show the viewer a glimpse of her concept and the process she went through before creating her designs.

Your artistic production is based on the chance to create a thoughtprovoking involvement with the viewers: so, before leaving this conversation I would like to pose a question about the nature of the relationship of your art with your audience. Do you consider the issue of audience reception as being a

22

crucial component of your decisionmaking process, in terms of what type of language is used in a particular context?

Sometimes audience reception is important in a decision-making process, but it's not something we focus on. We want our images to have a serene aesthetic about them, which will draw the viewer's interest. Only to have them realize that that's not the only visible layer. We want our images to be weird, but also beautiful at the same time to really create that thought-provoking involvement with the viewers and raise questions about why we made certain decisions.

In terms of language, it's really the twist of beauty that lies within an image.

Thanks a lot for your time and for sharing your thoughts, Rik and Danny. Finally, would you like to tell our readers something about your future projects? How do you see your work evolving?

We just started a new project that is based on gender. We don't want to give too much information about it already because we want to surprise the viewers with a grand series. In September we're going to start with another project which involves Transhumanism in which we are going to combine photography with video. So make sure to keep an eye on us, haha!

And thank you for the interview, it was a lot of fun!

Djojo & Versteeg

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

David JP Hooker Lives and works in Dallas, USA

An artist's statement

I

n my case the idea of making work from direct experience came from reading Bourriaud’s Relational Aesthetics and Merton’s New Seeds of Contemplation. At about the same time I had an artist residency in Indonesia.

While I was there I was incredibly conscious of how radically out of place I was in that culture, that environment, and I wanted to find a way to make work that expressed that. The breakthrough for me was a

22

performance piece I made where I simply videotaped my feet as I walked through a rice field: something the locals can do without thinking about it but for someone unaccustomed to it like myself it was like trying to walk across a 200 yard-long greased balance beam.

David JP Hooker

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

David JP Hooker

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

LandEscape meets

David JP Hooker An interview by Katherine Williams, curator and Josh Ryder, curator landescape@europe.com

David Hooker harmonizes the expressive potential that comes from Nature with a rigorous formal approach: taking advance from a marked performative approach, he accomplishes the difficult task of establishing a symbiosis between a contemplative gaze on the reality we inhabit, with a lively performative practice. One of the most convincing aspect of Hooker's practice is the way he finds a point of convergence between several disicplines that invites the viewers to explore the crossroad between Human and Nature: I'm very pleased to introduce our readers to his refined artistic production.

Hello David and welcome to LandEscape: to start this interview, would you like to tell us something about your background? You have a solid training and after your studies at the Winthrop University you moved to the Kent State University, where you earned a MFA of Ceramics: how did formal training impacted on your evolution as an artist. In particular, how did it inform the way you currently conceive and produce your works?

I have to admit that the move from functional pottery, which was my primary production when I entered Kent State, to performance art seems rather random. When I was an undergraduate I was actually an English major studying art on the side. At the time I wanted to make large-scale artwork that people had to interact with, rather than just “look at.� Sometime after college I realized that the interaction I wanted was part of the dialogue of pottery, I just had to adjust from trying to make big things to small things. That

22

David JP Hooker

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

David JP Hooker

David JP Hooker

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

was a huge revelation to me: that the “big ideas” could be pursued in small, humble objects. And that that pursuit had a long history that crossed generational and cultural boundaries. That basic philosophy is still part of my artistic practice.

In particular my thinking has been heavily influenced by my study of tea ceremony ware from Japan and Korea. In Japan there is a well-developed aesthetic defined by the Japanese words “wabi-sabi.” It is telling that there is no direct translation of these words in English, but the basic gist of the term is to find the beauty of things that are humble, unambitious, natural and ephemeral.

I still make functional pots from time to time, by the way. I think they continue to help me develop ways of thinking about other works by grounding me in a practice that values a fundamental connection to material, place and history through disciplined repetitive action.

The hallmark of your approach is a multidisciplinary symbiosys between Plasticity and environmental contemplation, wisely combined with a marked performative feature that gives a dynamic life to your pieces, and I would suggest our readers to visit directly at http://www.davidjphooker.com in order to get a wider idea of your multifaceted artistic production. While crossing the borders of different artistic fields have you ever happened to realize that a symbiosis between different disciplines is the only way to achieve some results, to express some concepts?

First, thanks for the plug! I never start any project deliberately trying to be multidisciplinary. I actually prefer the elegance of a simple solution. I think I am a bit of a magpie, however, as I tend to collect the “shiny bits” of any discipline and glom them together. Sometimes I feel like my practice has become too multidisciplinary, so that there is little symbiosis, So I’m really happy that you are able to see the connections.

That idea of a symbiosis between plasticity and environmental contemplation is really right at the heart of what I’m looking for. I am always looking for a kind of visceral knowledge; a kind of bodily understanding of places or objects. I was pretty athletic as a kid, and I think that kind of physicality has influenced the way I approach art.

22

Land

E

scape

David JP Hooker

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

Now let's focus on your artistic production: I would start from the Service Project, that our readers have already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article: since this work is performance based, it is critical to document the work in a way to best narrate your own story. Would you tell us something about the genesis of this interesting project?

What was your initial inspiration?

A teaching job caused my family and I to move from a rural farm town in South Carolina to the suburbs of Chicago. I began to research a little of the history of the area and found some interesting things that were largely overlooked as most people in the area are so culturally focused on Chicago. I thought there were stories here that needed to be told; stories that might cause us to think more seriously about the land we inhabit, the types of houses we build here, and the way we think about our community. The first of these is Winfield Mounds, which is the name of a Native American mound site right in the heart of the town I live in. Right away there is a lot of tension in the name, as the mounds—and the town— are named for General Winfield Scott, the general President Abraham Lincoln assigned to “take care of the Indian problem” in the area. The story doesn’t get much better from there. The mounds were discovered and desecrated by relic hunters in the late 19th century, further excavated by academics, and then “rebuilt,” sans artifacts, sometime in the mid 20th century.

I wanted to find a way to connect myself to that once sacred space, to honor it, and yet not ignore the tension inherent in me, a white male and a resident of the town, interacting with the space. I grew up playing tennis and I began to realize that might be a perfect metaphor. Tennis is primarily considered a rich-person’s sport, one that is typically associated with country clubs. Yet as a player I spent countless hours practicing all the various strokes. Practicing has become a ritual activity to me, it is as spiritual as it is visceral. I decided I would go to the mounds and ritualistically hit serves in different seasons, it seemed the right balance between honoring the space and recognizing the tension.

22

David JP Hooker

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

David JP Hooker

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

Your practice is intrinsically connected to the chance of creating an area of deep, almost physical interplay with the viewers, that are urged to evolve from the condition of a merely passive audience and I definetely love the way your works take an intense participatory line: In particular, the intrinsically contingent nature your investigation has reminded me of the idea behind Thomas Demand's works: while conceiving Art could be considered a purely abstract activity, there is always a way of giving it a permanence that goes beyond the intrinsic ephemeral nature of the concepts you capture. So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion personal experience is an absolutely indespensable part of a creative process... Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?

That’s a tough question. It brings to mind Sol LeWitt’s Sentences on Conceptual Art and also his great wall drawings. Would he have considered his process disconnected from direct experience? My guess would be yes and no.

In my case the idea of making work from direct experience came from reading Bourriaud’s Relational Aesthetics and Merton’s New Seeds of Contemplation. At about the same time I had an artist residency in Indonesia. While I was there I was incredibly conscious of how radically out of place I was in that culture, that environment, and I wanted to find a way to make work that expressed that. The breakthrough for me was a performance piece I made where I simply videotaped my feet as I walked through a rice field: something the locals can do without thinking about it but for someone unaccustomed to it like myself it was like trying to walk across a 200 yard-long greased balance beam. Rice Field Walk expressed my experience of Indonesia far more succinctly than anything I might have done symbolically or abstractly.

The ambience created by the Service Project has reminded me the concept of Heterotopia elaborated by French social theorist Michel Foucault and what has mostly impacted on me is the subtle but pervading sense of narrative: although each of your project has

an autonmous life, there's always seem to be such a channel of communication between your works, that springs from the way you juxtapose ideas and media: as I have been told once, "nowadays art can no longer rely much on symbolic strategies and has to probe psychological narrative elements within the medium instead". What's your point about this? And in particular, how much do you explicitly think of a narrative for your works?

I really like the connection you make to heterotopia in the Service Project. I hadn’t thought of that, but I think it is bang on. But I have always thought more in terms of Liminal space; a place where the sacred and the mundane overlap. That idea interests me a great deal. It think I am attracted to the sense of mystery, something in a place or an object that is decidedly present, at times palpable, but ultimately unknowable. Trying to make contact with that and also present it to the viewers.

There is something of a narrative in that.

For about 12 years after graduate school my work was explicitly narrative. A few years ago I realized my work was changing and I thought I was getting away from narrative. My colleagues challenged that notion and I began to realize they were correct. When I start I am not thinking about narrative, only trying to connect to the material and the space. In that way I think I am fulfilling the quote you were given.

Somewhere in the exploration, in the trying to connect, a narrative emerges. I have to admit the term “narrative” sounds so linear to me it feels restrictive. There is something poetic there, too, but like your friend I am weary of symbolism.

Another interesting work of yours that has particularly impacted on me and on which I would like to spend some words is The Sweep Project, that has been recently exhibited at the Illinois State Museum. I like the way it challenges us to consider our role in building a more equitable society today: Art has never operated in a vacuum and it is almost impossible to separate art from its subtle or explicit socio politic context. And as Edward Burtynsky's or Michael Light's work, much of your art, as I interpret it, seems to aim to be a political intervention that helps re-frame

22

Land

E

scape

David JP Hooker

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

our understanding of the nature of our relation with the environment we inhabit... do you think that you approach is politic in a such way? Moreover, what could be in your opinion the role of an artist in our society?

I do think my work is politic, but not necessarily political, if that makes sense. As you say one doesn’t make work in a vacuum. When I was in school in the 80s and 90s most of the work was overtly political and didactic. I dabbled with that but for the most part I found it dissatisfying: art used solely as a vehicle for ideology tends to “shout,” and I’m not really interested in shouting. I’m more interested in listening, more interested in paradox; there is too much complexity in the world, in our relationship to the world, to express it in simple binary ways.

That being said I certainly have issues that I feel passionate about and those issues become a part of the work: our relationship to the land, for example. I do think the Sweep Project is very politic in that way. As I travel on my pilgrimage through the county I pass through a wealthy suburb with a lot of “cookie-cutter” mansions that have no relationship to the environment, other than to simply try to dominate it. It seems like an attempt to achieve the “American dream” on steroids, at the expense of history, the land, and our sense of community. It strikes me as the exact opposite of Alain De Botton’s philosophy in Architecture of Happiness, or even the opposite of what the famous American architect Frank Lloyd Wright set out to do in this very area a century ago. In a subtle way I hope my project draws attention to that.

One of the things I really like about this project is that it invites the resident’s of the community into a one on one conversation. People occasionally stop me to ask what I’m doing.

That gives me a chance to talk to them about the history, the fact that the Underground Railroad was active in their own backyards.

Most people I meet have no idea. I also love that when I tell them the story, they always tell me a story back. It’s an amazing opportunity to connect with a stranger in a meaningful way that comes directly from artistic practice. I also give them a cyanotype print as a memento of our conversation–I am making prints of the places I travel as part of the project and I carry

22

them in my backpack. Those meetings increasingly fuel the project. I do think this is a role artists are embracing more and more: to make work that directly interacts with a small community: to tell stories in microcosm rather than trying to make universal statements, to make work for small audiences rather than always pursuing big international “success.” It’s an exciting time to practice.

Politics do sometimes affect the work as well.

You mentioned the Sweep Project at the Illinois State Museum. Turns out that didn’t happen due to budget cuts in an election year. The new governor slashed the state’s arts funding, which was already working on a shoestring budget.

The museum director was left trying to pick up the pieces and has had to postpone the exhibit, which included a community performance piece, indefinitely. That was a tough pill to swallow but I decided that wasn’t going to stop me from continuing. Hopefully it will still happen. I can tell it from your question it must still be listed on my CV. I need to fix that.

I definitively love the way you recontextualize the idea of the environment we live in and I would go as far as to state that your capability to evoke the presence of a view forces the viewers' perception in order to challenge the common way to perceive not only the outside world, but our inner dimension as well ... you seem to deconstruct and assembly memories in order to suggest a process of investigation: maybe that one of the roles of an artist could be to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially of our inner Nature... what's your point about this?

Yes, thank you for your insight. That’s exactly what I’m talking about when I mention the conversations I have with residents I meet during the performance of the Sweep Project.

The first goal, however, is to change my own perceptions, to challenge my own internal nature, through direct communion with places and objects. I think that is why the ritual nature of my practice has become increasingly important. That kind of knowledge takes time. I am really inspired by the works of Tehching Hsieh and Wolfgang Laib in that respect.

When I first happened to get to know Construction Sculpture, I tried to relate all

David JP Hooker

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

the visual information and the presence of primary elements to a single meaning. I later realized I had to fit into the visual unity suggested by the work, forgetting my need for a univocal understanding of its symbolic content: in your work, rather that a conceptual interiority, I can recognize the desire to enabling us to establish direct relations... Would you say that it's more of an intuitive or a systematic process?

Wow. Can I first just say what a pleasure it is to have this conversation? You are affirming everything I think about when I view the work myself! I, too, realized during the making of the pieces that I had to give up the symbolic content of the objects, that I wanted to find a way to touch the wabi inherent in the objects. In some strange way the construction process helps me to do that. But that is both a systematic process and an intuitive one. I am systematically building these constructions as a way of stripping away, or at least challenging the viewer to reexamine, the symbolic content of the objects, yet the way each construction is approached is largely intuitive. I do believe the intuitive approach reveals some kind of systematic thinking; there is some kind of system to the way I am putting the pieces together, but I am still trying to figure out what it is through the explorations.

Your pieces are in private and public collections and during these years your works have been extensively exhibited around the United States, including over 14 solos: so before taking leave from this interesting conversation I would like to pose a question about the nature of the relation with your audience: in particular, do you consider the issue of audience reception as being a crucial component of your decisionmaking process in terms of what type of language for a particular context?

That is always the million-dollar question, isn’t it? Take, for example, this interview.

Discussions that include Foucault’s “heterotopia” or the Japanese aesthetic “wabisabi” are clearly going to self-select an audience, right? How intentional are we being about audience reception with this publication?

I’ve decided—and maybe you have too as an editor—that while I want to be considerate of audience, I ultimately want to make the work that I’m interested in and passionate about, and to let it speak with it’s own voice. What else can I do, really, if I want to be authentic and make work that’s authentic? Not that that comes without a cost. Several times I have approached community groups about the Sweep Project, hoping to get more community buy-in, to get a chance to work directly with members of the community. The first and biggest hurdle is always the performative nature of the project.

Why, they want to know, don’t I just paint a mural? That is to say why can’t I use an artistic language they are already familiar with? While I appreciate the sincerity of their question I just know it is the wrong direction to take. That’s not what the art wants to be, and ultimately the power of the work to communicate in a meaningful way would be destroyed. So I continue to sweep; it reaches less people in the community overall but the impact it has on those people is greater.

Thanks a lot for your time and for sharing your thoughts, David. Finally, would you like to tell us readers something about your future projects? How do you see your work evolving?

Well I feel I always have too many projects going at once, so my main goal this year is just to get some things finished! I hope finish the Joilet to Crete Pilgrimage Sweep, the main part of the Sweep Project, this year, and to develop the construction series further. I can sense it may be leading me into a direction in which more minimalist compositions might emerge, which I find intriguing. I have started a project where I am attempting to make 10,000 ceramic bees, all numbered, from a single mold. This summer I am heading to a residency in the Black Hills of South Dakota where I hope to make some connections with the Native American Lakota tribe that might lead to some future performative/collaborative works about the nature of the land there, and how our two cultures perceive that land differently. So, yeah, a lot going on.

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

Christopher Reid Lives and works in Wilmington, NC

An artist's statement

I

am a realist painter drawing on the beauty I find all around me to create art. I am inspired by the way light falls on a form or filters through the atmosphere in a landscape. With the right light, even an ordinary everyday object can become a work of art. I want to share my vision with others. Too many people stumble through their days oblivious to their environment. I want to help others better appreciate their world by allowing them to see it through an artist's eyes.

While plein air painting one day, an old man came up to me and said, “I have been coming here to drink my morning coffee most of my life and I never realized how beautiful it was until I saw your painting.� That is the greatest compliment I could hope for.

My creation process is intuitive and uses no shortcuts. The process itself is enjoyable and meditative, especially when I am painting outdoors en plein

22

air. I prefer to work in pastel, watercolor, acrylic, and charcoal. I usually listen to the subject to determine the media. I challenge myself constantly by using different techniques and varying subjects and media. I further hone my drawing skills through weekly life drawing sessions with a model and frequent sketches.

I have always been orbiting an art career. I wanted to be a comic book illustrator in high school. Then I wanted to design 3d animation in college. After college I ran an advertising firm and did a lot of graphic design. I finally realized that the only part of any job I had ever loved was the creation and drawing. So it isn't that I decided to become an artist, but that I finally stopped fighting it. Art is no longer something I do, it is who I am.

Christopher Reid

Marsh pastel 24�x18

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

LandEscape meets

Christopher Reid An interview by Katherine Williams, curator and Josh Ryder, curator

to love art and figured out why certain paintings worked better than others. This was the beginning of my art education.

landescape@europe.com

Christopher Reid's paintings reflect the tradition as a permanent interplay between inscrutability and beauty: contradicting Adorno's view that art acquires meaning in proportion to its lack of function, Reid's gaze on reality provides the viewer of a functional service. His careful investigation of the epiphanic feature of the details of the environment we inhabit invites us to rethink about the way we perceive reality, and in particular, his stimulating work entitled Landscape Reflection clearly shows the interconnection between perceptual process and emotional dimension. I'm particularly pleased to introduce our readers to his art.

Hello Christopher and welcome to LandEscape. I'll start this interview with some questions about your background. You have a solid formal education and studied fine art at The Savannah College of Art & Design, and at the UNCW. Would you like to tell our readers how these experiences influenced your development as an artist and how did they impact the way you currently conceive your works?

When I was a small child, my greatgrandmother died and I saved her library of art history books from the trash. I already had a deep respect for books and liked the pictures. I reread the entire collection throughout my youth. I examined the photos of paintings by Caravaggio, Rubens, Bosch, Turner, Sargent, Titian, and the museums of the world. I learned

22

We all owe a great debt to our teachers, whether they be the past masters who inspired us or professors who introduced us to a new concept. We grow so much faster when we are able to learn from not only our own experiences, but from others’. In college I learned how to talk about art and better describe my thought processes while I am creating. When I taught art, I began to understand it on a deeper level and appreciate my teachers even more. As an artist, one must put in countless hours practicing, but an art education helps aim you in the right direction.

I entered art school wanting to gather as much knowledge as possible because art fascinates me. I did not expect it to develop my style or improve me magically without practice. In this way I truly benefitted from the strengths of a solid art education. I may not agree with some of the concepts I was taught, but I can appreciate how their introduction causes me to question and examine my own work.

I suggest visiting http://www.reidsart.com in order to get a wider idea of the artistic production that we are going to discuss in these pages. I would start from your Landscape series, that our readers has already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article. When I first began this project I tried to relate all the visual information to a single meaning, but I soon realized that I had to fit into the visual unity suggested by the narrative that pervades your images, forgetting my need

Christopher Reid photo by Kimberly Brandt brandtphotos.com

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Christopher Reid

Christopher Reid

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

for a universal understanding of its symbolic content. In your work, rather than a conceptual interiority, I can recognize the desire to enable us to establish direct relations... Would you say that it's more of an intuitive or a systematic process?

I realize that my portfolio runs the gamut of subjects from portraiture to plein air landscapes and is hard to categorize. If art is a form of communication, why would each artist say only one thing? I understand that “brand recognition” is important for sales, but I love too many flavors to choose only one for the sake of commercialism. I paint because I love creating art, not to get rich. There are much easier ways to make a living, but none that I am so passionate about. Another reason for my range of subjects is that I want to grow as an artist every day and the best way to do that is to explore new subjects and challenge oneself.

In answer to your question, Art is both intuitive and analytical. I utilize my left brain when analyzing composition and planning, but allow spontaneity when actually painting and interpreting my subject. I feel that it is a mistake to use only a portion of your brain when creating. Both hemispheres of my brain are engaged during the creative process. I paint whatever subject speaks to me at that moment.

I paint en plein air often and at competitions I see other artists rushing around scouting what to paint days in advance. That just isn’t how I work. I have to see the light at the time of my painting in order to determine what interests me. I need to be excited about what I am painting. When something catches my eye I begin to analyze the composition and determine how to create a work of art from it.

While working, I listen to the painting. I may alter the division of space, omit objects, grab objects from outside the picture plane, or invent, if that is what is needed.

You draw inspiration from reality and you use archival materials. In your works the scene is real and it seems that one of your goals is to represent what’s really there and still use a painterly approach. Philippe Dagen wrote in his “Le Silence des Peintres”,

that the coming of a straight realism has caused a progressive retrenchment of painting from the role of representing reality. With exception of the Hyperrealism movement, Painting is nowadays more and more marked with a symbolism. Do you think that the dichotomy between Representation and Painting is by now irremediable?

Moreover, how much do you explicitly think of a narrative for your works?

I don’t think that painting and representation need to be in conflict at all. The real reason for the hiccup in art history during the 20th century where Realism became disconnected from art was due to the rise of photography. The role of the artist as a mere recorder of a visage or event was over. Once this artificial means became ubiquitous, many assumed that Realism was no longer valid. Many artists valued being different over having their art actually express their idea. I find this entire line of reasoning to be utterly ridiculous. It is like saying we should all stop speaking clearly because now we have a computerized voice on our cell phones or that we should begin muttering incomprehensibly. Saying that realism is no longer valid is like saying that the advent of microwaveable dinners meant the end of restaurants and chefs should all begin creating dishes that nobody could eat. I think it is noteworthy that none of the masters from before the 20th century were merely recorders, but they were all realists. Each artist added their own unique voice and perspective to the discussion.

The first goal of any form of communication is to be understood. A byproduct of the 20th century hiccup was that as many artists abandoned realist art as a universal language, they disconnected from the audience they were trying to speak to. Art became something that many people who like to buy art could not understand and then artists bemoaned their poverty. The word “artsy” became appended with the word “fartsy” during the hiccup.

Each of us has our own voice and we should clearly speak what is on our minds. What are

22

Land

E

scape

Christopher Reid

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

we trying to say as artists? If I am intrigued by the play of light and shadows across across a wall, I want to share that fascination with my viewers. I am capturing my interpretation of an experience and mood, not a mechanically reproduced recording. I am not interested in what is trending, only in how I can express my own artistic vision so others can experience it.

Realism is universally understood. I could stop my paintings halfway through and call them finished or splatter paint around randomly and call it art, but I would be lying to myself and the viewers.

As for a narrative. Sometimes I begin a painting with a narrative in mind, and sometimes I just paint and listen for the narrative. I think the viewer will create their own narrative if the painting is a successful work of art and the more involved a viewer is in the creation of the artwork, the better. I don't usually try to force my interpretation onto the viewer.

I like the way your careful approach offers a rigorous but at the same time lively visual translation of immaterial and physical sights that pervade our reality. In this sense, your approach is intrinsically connected to the chance of creating an area of intense interplay with the viewers, that are invited to evolve from the condition of a passive audience. In particular, your refined investigation about constructed realities has reminded me of the ideas behind Thomas Demand's works: while conceiving Art could be considered a purely abstract activity, there is always a way of giving it a permanence that goes beyond the ephemeral nature of the concepts you capture. So I would take this occasion to ask you if, in your opinion, personal experience is an absolutely indispensable part of a creative process... Do you think that the creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?

I think that personal experience pervades everything we do, not just art. Perspective is relative. If two artists were to do a painting from the same photo of the ocean, do you think the artist who lived at the beach or the one who lives in the mountains would create a more

22

Christopher Reid

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Christopher Reid

Christopher Reid

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

personal and true painting? Artists can certainly create art disconnected from direct experience, but there is no advantage to it. When painting a dragon, would an artist not benefit from first studying reptiles like alligators? Would you want a portrait of you painted by someone who had never even seen a photo of you?

I think that the need for familiarity with a subject is even more vital to the success of a landscape. I paint en plein air often and I have seen this practice greatly improve my handling of landscapes, even when working with photo references. I am more aware of how the environment felt and how the colors truly looked.

Photos do not capture the true colors or value range visible in real life. Having experienced a scene firsthand, I am aware of the breeze on my skin, the scents in the air, and the sounds, so that I can attempt to convey those sensations in my painting. If I am standing in the shade, I tend to paint with a cooler palette than if I am in direct sunlight. I believe that painting subjects of which I have direct experience contributes an authenticity to a painting that the viewer picks up on, even if it is subconscious.

I also believe that if you are to invent aspects of a scene, direct experience is vital. We each have icons in our minds that match words. If I ask 20 people to draw an eye, almost everyone would draw the Egyptian hieroglyphic eye. That is not how a real eye looks. Because I have drawn so many eyes from life, my drawing would look much more realistic. I have replaced the typical icon of an eye with a more anatomically correct one in my mind and have a greater understanding of how it functions. It is the same with types of trees. I am much more familiar with oak trees than with banyan trees because I have painted oak trees en plein air many times. Experience is what allows me to invent.

I definitively love the way you extract a peaceful vision of reality from the general idea of the environment we live in, as in Needlestack and Safe Harbor. Many contemporary landscape artists such as the photographer Edward Burtynsky or Michael Light have some form of environmental or even political message in their works. Do you consider that your works

22

Land

E

scape

Christopher Reid

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

are political in this way or do you seek to maintain a neutral approach?

I am glad that there are artists who deal with political messages in their artwork, so I don't have to! In modern society we are so inundated with social issues that I do not want to drag that into my art.

When I am enjoying a landscape, I don't want to think about the latest wars in the Middle East or which corrupt politician was caught on video today.

I get sick of that and I don't want to get sick of my art. I paint with a smile and I don't think I could do that if I were using my art to give speeches.

I do believe that an artist has a duty to help shape the mores of their society, but this can be done subtly. Most of my art is meant to cause people to appreciate the beauty of the world around them. If someone develops an appreciation for the beauty of a sand dune on an uninhabited beach, then hopefully they will be less likely to destroy it.

You mentioned Safe Harbor and Needlestack. Both show the presence of man in the environment. I do not make a judgement, but leave that up to the viewer.

The morning and evening light can make anything beautiful. Perhaps someone living in a large city has forgotten this.

They might not be able to do much to prevent pollution personally, but maybe my art can help them appreciate the beauty of life around them and make life a little better. Art allows a viewer to see the world through someone else's eyes – from an external perspective.

The nuance of light colors that I have admired in Scattered Light has suggested me a sense of dramatic -and I would daresay "oniric"luminosity that seems to flow out of the canvas that communicates such a tactile sensation.

Any comments on your choice of "palette" and how it has changed over time?

I would say that rather than being oniric, or dreamlike, people have become so accustomed to viewing the world through a lens that when confronted with realistic light it now appears shocking. On the morning I was painting Scattered Light in a sunlit park, billions of people were staring at digital screens. This has become the new

22

Christopher Reid

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Christopher Reid

Christopher Reid

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

“reality” and “photorealistic” has somehow come to mean “real” to most people. I am often told that my art “looks better than a photo.” That is because I try to make it look more like my real experience and if it looks just like a photo, what is the point in painting it?

My palette varies for different media. My palette for watercolor and acrylic is based on the doubleprimary system with 3 earth pigments and white added in. I like the earth pigments not so much for their color as for their different working properties.

I don't use black and mix my own darks. I mix all secondary hues myself. For pastel I use an open palette and grab whatever I need. I removed all achromatic grays from my pastel set because every time I think I see gray in nature I look closely and actually see a low-chroma color instead. I do use black to create shades in pastel, but try not to overuse it.

Scattered Light is one of my plein air paintings and shows how I react to the colors and light I see in real life. I don't preselect a palette for pastel and I go so far as to put all the colors back in the box after each painting to make sure that I am grabbing colors because they feel right and not because of a set palette. Even when I use an unlimited palette with 200 pastels in front of me, most paintings never end up needing more than 15 pastels. I find that color harmony is stronger when I use less colors.

My palette has definitely changed over the years. I will often try one new color just to see if I should add it to my regular palette. I don't want a lot of colors, so it would need to be superior to a color I already use. My watercolor palette has evolved to be highly transparent, but for acrylic I have had to alter my choices to include more opaque pigments.

In your investigation about the liminal space between representation and abstraction references a universal imagery suggested by natural elements that are quite recurrent and seem to remove any historic gaze from the reality you refer to, offering to the viewers the chance to perceive in a more atemporal form. In this sense, I daresay that the semantic juxtaposition between sign and matter that marks out your art, allows you to go beyond any dichotomy between Tradition and

22

Land

E

scape

Christopher Reid

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

Contemporariness, establishing a stimulating osmosis between materials from an absolute dimension and a personal, lively approach to Art...

I don't often try to recreate scenes that I did not experience. I know that some artists love painting false nostalgia, but I prefer to paint my experiences rather than what I imagine someone else experienced. I value authenticity.

Because I am a contemporary artist, my paintings tend to reflect contemporary scenes.

Many of my landscapes show the influence of man because it is hard to escape. I may remove power lines if they clutter my composition but I am not pretending the environment is still pristine. I often camp out on islands. On one recent camping trip, the noise from a highway miles away continued every hour of the day and night. There were no clouds in the sky, but plenty of jet contrails. Soda bottles and beer cans were washed up amidst the driftwood. This is the world we live in now.

Sometimes we need art that shows us how our environment should be and sometimes we need to be confronted with how it actually is. I think that even within the context of a polluted environment one can find beauty. A drainage ditch or retention pond can have interesting colors and reflections despite their utilitarian functions.

During your over twenty-five year career your works have been extensively exhibited on several occasions, including a recent solo show, "Reflection", at Jazzcars Gallery. So, before taking leave from this interesting conversation, I would like to pose a a question about the nature of the relation with your audience - in particular, do you consider the issue of audience reception as being a crucial component of your decisionmaking process in terms of what type of language to use for a particular context?

I don't view the audience as separate from the artwork. They are active participants and vital to a painting's success. We create art together. As a 2-dimensional visual artist, I can only suggest part of my experience in pigment. The viewer's

22

mind must fill in a lot of the blanks. If you are verbally describing a scene to someone, you want to speak so that they understand and in a context that they are familiar with. In the same way, the audience is always a consideration when creating art. My style and subject matter are entirely my own preference, but it is important to me that the audience is able to enjoy the art. Rather than paint only what I think the audience wants to see, I try to make sure that my paintings have a clear vision. If I don't understand where a painting is going, how can I expect my audience to?

I typically paint whatever interests me at that moment and in the style reflective of my mood. I approach the issue of finding a common language with the audience when selecting works for a show. This gives me full artistic freedom while also being practical.

Thanks a lot for your time and for sharing your thoughts, Christopher. Finally, would you like to tell us readers something about your future projects? How do you see your work evolving?

I am having fun working larger and am experimenting with different surfaces and media. I am currently fascinated with capturing water in new ways, but I never know what will interest me from day to day. I respond to my environment. The day to day weather certainly affects my art as it does my mood. I am going camping again this weekend and I will be open to whatever inspires me. All that I can be sure of in my future projects is that I will continue to question and explore my world through art.

Art is a passionate journey. I may set goals such as how many paintings I hope to finish in a year, but I don't constrain my artistic choices in the same way. There must be a balance in life between structure and chaos.

I wish I could predict the evolution of my work, but there is no finish line for an artist. I am always exploring and improving my skills. I never stop learning or challenging myself. I hope to be painting until my dying breath.

Angela McFall Lives and works in Basel, Switzerland

An artist's statement

orn in N.Ireland in 1969. Grew up in Ottawa Canada.

Graduated from Canterbury School of the Arts in Ottawa.

Exhibited in Ottawa Canada.

Graduated from the University of Ottawa with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Studio Art. Joined the artists’ collective ‘The Enriched Bread Artists’ in an old factory space in Ottawa.

Moved to Tokyo, participated in art exhibitions around Japan.

Was hired to teach art in Switzerland, Head of Art Department.

In recent years exhibiting in Switzerland and internationally.

Currently working on several projects ‘Monument’ and a series on ‘Place’ in my studio in Vevey, Switzerland.

Angela McFall Marsh pastel 24”x18

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

LandEscape meets

Angela McFall An interview by Katherine Williams, curator and Josh Ryder, curator landescape@europe.com

An intense synergy between a careful attention to emotional sphere and a refined artistic sensibility leads Angela McFall to accomplish an insightful exploration of the liminal space between representation and abstraction, in which memories and perceptual reality coexist in an atemporal dimension.

One of the most convincing aspect of McFall's work is the way her investigation about the relation between time and space creates an area of intellectual interplay between contingency and immanence, that invites the viewers to explore the crossroad between human emotion and Nature's geometry: I'm very pleased to introduce our readers to her refined artistic production.

this interview I have looked deep into my paintings, and explored some ideas that I have expressed visually, but never before put into words.

I’ll begin with background- Yes my experiences with my Bachelor of Fine Arts degree and my involvement with the Enriched Bread Artists’ Collective had an influence on my work but I think the experiences that shaped my work date from much earlier. My early days in Northern Ireland, my experiences as an immigrant, and later my experiences as a traveler heavily influenced my work in terms of how I perceive place, and I would have to say that my work is all about time and place. In the 1970’s Belfast was in political turmoil. The streets were burning. I remember being in bomb scares and seeing the destruction. I remember piles of rubble, buildings blown up and reduced to rubble. I think that gave me my first sense of how dynamic and fluid the physical world can become.

Hello Angela, and welcome to LandEscape: to start this interview, would you like to tell us something about your background? You have a solid formal training and you hold a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Studio Art that you received from the from the University of Ottawa, and then you joined the artist's collective The Enriched Bread Artists in Ottawa.

How did these experiences influence your evolution as an artists and how do they impact on the way you currently conceive and produce your works?

Later my experiences as an immigrant showed me how cultures grow out of the physical environment, as we move around there are things we carry with us, almost like physical pieces of a place. Much later as a traveler I learned so much about different cultures.

Travelling also teaches us about time. In some of the places I have been, there has been an element of time travel. Walk through an ancient market place in China you could be experiencing a place 1000 years ago. Or a port in Morocco where the fishermen fish in rhythms passed down through time, not much has changed. Find yourself on a moving sidewalk in Tokyo before a giant screen under a neon moon and you are moving through the future.

Hello and thank you for the opportunity to respond to your very insightful questions. For

You asked how my Bachelor of Fine Arts influenced my creative process. I am passionate

22

Christopher Reid photo by Kimberly Brandt brandtphotos.com

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Christopher Reid

Angela McFall

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

about drawing and painting but I was studying art at the height of conceptual art’s influence on art schools. Drawing and painting were already out of fashion, passé, but I just couldn’t give them up.

Everyone was making installations out of sugar and human hair and I was making massive charcoal drawings of ruined castles in Northern Ireland. To some extent my paintings have a conceptual element, in terms of the ideas they contain. One of my favorite works of art is ‘One Chair and Three’ by Joseph Kounellis. As much as I admire the cool, removed, somewhat scientific approach of conceptualism, it just wasn’t enough for me. I want to get swept up, carried away by the moment, and in that sense I am a romantic, an emotional extremist.

Early on people often compared my work to Turner so I purposely avoided Turner, as I wasn’t consciously referencing his work. Many journeys later I dreamed of a canyon with rushing water.

The next day I painted the canyon, shortly after that I came across a very similar painting by Turner. After that I came across another painting

by Turner looking out from Montreux (where I live) onto the small town of Villeneuve (where I had been living).

After that I looked into Turner and realized there was a deep sense of the sublime in my own work, and a light that had always been present, but not conscious.

I would suggest to visit http://angelamcfall.com in order to get a wider idea of your artistic production that we are going to discuss: I would begin from your Mixed Media works, that our readers has already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article. When I first happened to see #1 I tried to relate all the visual information to a single meaning.

But I soon realized that I had to fit into the visual unity suggested by the inner coherence of the canvas, forgetting my need for a univocal understanding of its symbolic content: in your work, rather that a conceptual interiority, I can recognize the desire to enabling us to establish direct relations... Would you say that it's more of an intuitive or a systematic process?

This is a complex question and I’ll begin by

responding to the idea of inner coherence in the canvas. There is a theme running through my work, which explores place. Yes inside my canvas there is an inner coherence, a place in itself, which relates to a place beyond the canvas.

There is a Japanese concept called ‘Shakkei’ , Borrowed Scenery. A Japanese garden has its own set of relations within its walls, its frame so to speak. However the garden should also connect with the space beyond its walls. It should borrow the forest beyond, and the nearby trees, and draw those elements into its own frame. I think this happens in my own work in that my paintings communicate with the space around them, and reference places beyond the edge of the their frames.

In terms of systematic or intuitive approach-I would have to say both. The foundation of each painting is a line I draw freehand and then another line. I create an axis, as if each piece has its own inner map; an equilibrium. Cartesian coordinates.

On top of this axis I start to build layers of structure, colour, light, and lines. At this point the work becomes very intuitive.

I like the way #4 and #5 show a symbiosys between the abstract idea of night that evokes such an indefinite impalpability and a tactile feature suggested by a careful saturation of intense tones, which is a recurrent feature of your works and that I can recognize also in #5: not only for the obvious references to urban elements, but especially for the sensation of movement suggested by the stimulating nuances of tones that pervade your canvas: any comments on your choice of "palette" and how it has changed over time I like this image you evoked-‘the abstract notion of night’. In a way much of the world disappears at night ; deconstructs. Things we know to be there are no longer visible. I think this touches on an idea in my work about disintegration.

Disintegration, change of state, sublimation; the moment when one thing changes state. Day becomes twilight ,becomes night. Perhaps my paintings evoke this sublimation of the physical world. Take any moment and it will disintegrate fall apart, even structures which seem solid are in various states of erosion; entropy.

In terms of palette it is interesting that in order to

22

Land

E

scape

Angela McFall

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

evoke light you need dark. It is this contrast that sets off a visual reaction. In my colour choice I want things to react off each other, to activate the colour.

While referring to an easily "fruible" set of symbols as starting points, you seem to address us not only on a mere contingent view but especially to invites us to rethink about the way we relate ourselves to Reality in an absolute sense. So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion personal experience is an absolutely indespensable part of a creative process...

In this question I will address the idea of our relationship to reality. My work questions reality, as there really are just so many questions about reality. Our world has become so visually oriented that a great deal of information comes to us in the form of pictures, and symbols. We are literally bombarded by images. It has reached a point where I think we are overloaded with visual information and this is having an effect on our perception of reality. We are taking everything at face value, a very superficial level, and few are looking beyond, or deeper. We are stuck on the level of sensationalism, and shock. In this state many things, which are untrue, are accepted as true, or real. Real, what is that anymore? I explore this in my mixed media series. The painting below is a real man, a passerby, looking at a painting, which I placed in the street.

Your works seem to be pervaded by a subtle narrative, although you seem toreject a direct explanatory strategy: rather, you seem to offer to the viewer an Ariadne's Thread that allows to find personal interpretations to the subject you question. How much do you explicitly think of a narrative This is a very interesting question. I love stories and I believe a narrative can be present while leaving the viewer to construct their own version of the story. It doesn’t need to be linear. In life I no longer believe that this leads to that, there are far greater forces at work than the control we attempt to exert over things.

I personally don’t like being directed, I don’t like things, which are closed, fenced in. In stories, and films I like being left the space to imagine, I think

22

Angela McFall

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Angela McFall

Angela McFall

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

that is what we do naturally. We construct our own interpretations, we all perceive differently. I would say that while painting I have very abstract stories in my head. Somehow these stories are expressed in the paint. Stories which are present, but loosely defined, in order to leave space for interpretation.

I once had an exhibition in Zurich and one painting evoked a beach in winter. I was in a discussion with 5 people from all over the world. Everyone claimed to know the beach, yet for each person it was a different beach, in a different country. This would be an example of what I refer to in my work as ‘archetypal places’. The beach in winter, the woods at twilight, rainy evening in the city in late autumn just before winter. These are places we many know, or have experienced.

These places stir something deep inside usbecause it is perhaps the ‘us’ that exists far beyond the boundary of our own skin in the present. This touches on some Jungian ideas on the collective unconscious.

Back to the original question of narrative perhaps my work gives a setting for some unspoken narrative to take place. I create the scene and the viewers bring their stories.

When I look at your pieces, I feel like I am getting drawn into a complex world, and a relevant feature of your approach that has particularly impacted on me is the way you highlight the our perceptual process in realtion to the environment we inhabit: in your Places series you seem invite the viewer to appreciate the intrinsic but sometimes disregarded beauty of ambiguous envirnomental patterns, offering a multilayered experience that, like Wolfgang Tillmans's works, raises a question on the role of the viewers' perception, forcing us to going beyond the common way we perceive not only the outside world, but our inner dimension... I'm personally convinced that some information are hidden, or even "encrypted" in the environment we live in, so we need to decipher them. Maybe that one of the roles of an artist could be to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially of our inner Nature... what's your point about this?

I love this question as it really gets to the core of

22

Land

E

scape

Angela McFall

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

my work, the perception of place versus the physical place. I have travelled so far and seen so much, and traces of all these places remain in my mind like a strange collage. I think this sense of ‘mind’ is a place in itself. It is an abstract place, we are constructing in our mind, it is like an emotional map. The memory of a place is no longer the physical place like a concrete fact but a place reconstructed and overlaid with our emotional state.

Like the grain of sand and pearl, the mind transforms the place, and I believe the painting is the perfect space to express this duality. In reading an article by Jordan Wolfson I was amazed to find the most articulate definition of the painted space that I have ever read. ‘…may help lead us to the unique contribution and gateway that painting provides. Painting offers two contradictory experiences. On the one hand, a painting is a flat two-dimensional object, with its surface texture and color shapes. On the other hand, a painting offers the possibility of a three-dimensional experience, the illusion of moving into space and discovering form. Stability and instability. Fact and imagination. Actual and fictive. It is this twin role, and its simultaneity, that gives painting such power.

Real and unreal. Real and more real. Painting, through the coexistence of two seemingly opposite experiences, interwoven into an actual unity, may provide the receptive adult the possibility of moving from an experience of fragmentation into an experience of wholeness and integration, not only within oneself but with the world at at large.

Boundaries between me and other, between inside and outside, prove to be not quite as firm as previously thought. This occurs not only because our minds are teased into non-discursive awareness by the shimmering interchange between the twodimensional and three-dimensional experience…’ http://paintingperceptions.com/art-politics/howpainting-can-help-save-the-world-actually When admiring Cubification that I have to admit is one of my favourite pieces of yours, I daresay that your approach take the our perception with bathed breath, lingering about the dichotomy between the real world and a dream-like dimansion: such symbiosys takes an intense participatory line with the viewer. But at the same time, you remove any historical

22

Angela McFall

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

22

Angela McFall

Land

E

scape

CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW

gaze from the subject, urging us to take us in such an atemporal dimension, that seems to invite us to question the consequences of contemporary age on a sociopolitic aspect... In particular, I would like you to elaborate for our readers the interesting concept of CUBIFICATION that you have in order to highlight the standardization of everything in our society.

Yes, Cubification is a pressure I have been feeling recently. It is a word I came up with a few months ago to describe the sense that we are being forced into smaller and more controllable spaces (or lack of spaces). We used to live in neighborhoods, now we live in zones. Public transportation feels more like some subtle criminal activity as time based tickets force us to be more and more stressed about time frames. It just seems that humanity is under attack, and we are being forced into a dystopian vision of the future. We are already living in the strange reality that Fritz Lang imagined in the film ‘Metropolis’, in 1927.

‘CUBIFICATION is a word I made up to describe the contemporary experience. Cubification is the standardization of everything. Fittng into smaller and smaller spaces, organic spaces are becoming cubified. The seats on the train are smaller therefore you must be smaller. Each year the lines in the parking lots are redrawn smaller, your car should be smaller, in fact you shouldn’t have a car you should have a bike.

Should and more should. Freedom is being filled with should and more should, and more people are telling you what you should do, wear, eat, and there is less and less space for freedom.

Less freedom and less time, time is being cubified dissected into smaller and smaller particles- Zeptoseconds- smaller and smaller divisions of time so you can get angrier and angrier at the person in front of you who has taken one zeptosecond too long to buy their ticket to get on the train which is now even smaller.’

During your over twenty years career your works have been extensively exhibited in several occasions around the world, including a recent show at the Galerie

Böhner. So, before taking leave from this interesting conversation I would like to pose a a question about the nature of the relation with your audience: in particular, do you consider the issue of audience reception as being a crucial component of your decision-making process in terms of what type of language for a particular context?

I think about where the works will be viewed, but I don’t think reaction to my work is something I can anticipate. I love watching people interact with my work, they either get it or don’t, and I think my work requires a certain level of engagement and the people who get it really get it. I think my work also open up some emotional channels that may be too much for some people.

Many years ago I had done a series of paintings about telephone poles. In Canada I found them very interesting, these giant wooden poles crisscrossing the city, carrying everyone’s conversations, full of words. During an exhibition a woman took the painting off the wall and was already heading out to the street with it. She said she could hear what it was saying.

I think when I paint there is so much happening on many different levels that a lot of emotions are woven into the painting, and then what people will take from them I can’t control, but I do feel they communicate a great deal with the viewer.

Thanks a lot for this interesting conversation, Angela. Finally, I would you like to tell us readers something about your future projects. Anything coming up for you professionally that you would like readers to be aware of?

It has been a pleasure to respond to your very interesting questions and yes I am very excited about an upcoming project in one of the oldest cities in the world.

I have been selected for a painting project in Mtskheta , Georgia in the spring. It is a UNESCO world heritage site and I will get to spend a week painting in the streets of a city with a 2600 year history. I will continue my series of work called ‘Monument’ which explores landmarks in the city through drawing and painting.

22