So Majestic

So Majestic has a feeling of other worldliness, or fantasy. Is this a real space or an ideal representation of home to you?

The term ‘real’ is so subjective.  I’ve been thinking about this specifically in relation to the home because in moving from place to place, the space I think of as my home bleeds from one structure to the next.  So where is my real home? Is it where I am now or where I am from?  Isn’t it a construction of both?  Complicating the discussion is the fact that the greenhouse in So Domestic only exists in the context of this painting.  It was never a direct observation or photograph of a place you could walk into. It is a construction, but is no less real for being so.

The notion of fantasy is something I’ve been struggling with in my work. It definitely plays a role when the studio becomes a site for experimentation and play, allowing for flights of fancy. I think the sky in this painting is an example of taking a natural phenomenon and letting it run its course as an invention – a memory or an idea of a real sky. Like a child, I still stare at the landscape around me with incredible wonder. At the same time, I’m a little self-conscious about overplaying that hand, and I think the title for the piece tries to reflect that complexity. It kind of makes fun of itself at the same time it attempts seriousness. And at the end of the day, fuck yeah. It’s fantastical.

As you said in your last interview that Cramped Apartment is more closely related to paintings you have been making in the past 3 to 4 years, does that mean that So Majestic is going in a new direction? Do you think you have now changed your art direction from here on?

At the beginning of 2010, I finished a large drawing (Greenhouse) that was the basis for So Majestic, and as soon as it was finished, I knew it would eventually become a painting. That’s really rare for me. Usually when I finish a drawing that isn’t a study, I’m done with the image and the piece exists only on paper. Building the painting altered the composition and objects in the painting to the degree that the two pieces are quite separate, but both the drawing and the painting had the goal of getting the viewer to look up at the great expanse of the world.

This body of work is a natural extension of my 2009 series So Romantic, but in many ways embraces the extremes of that previous work. These pieces are bigger and more ambitious. The saturated palette is more unadulterated, and the shifts in contrast are more abrupt. These paintings are also more taxing to make, but the results are encouraging. I think there is more to explore along these formal avenues, and that will continue in the coming year.

There is no real furniture represented in this piece, only the home’s structure with in the flora’s space. I feel like this painting has more of a relationship to nature than the others, almost as if this home is more a guest in the plants habitat rather than the plants being a fixture in the home. Does this painting have specific ties to the earth and our relationship as human’s living on it?

I think those are all really good observations, and I would agree that there is a kind of environmentalism in this painting. I hope it’s not too preachy though.

Interview by Nelleke Mack

#1 Cramped Apartment

Can you tell me what historical painting you started with in order to create the composition for this piece?

For the bulk of my work, there isn’t a direct reference to a specific painting.  In the show at Half/Dozen only one painting has its compositional basis in an art historical reference.  That said, I’m highly invested in citing the history of painting as a way to place what I do in the studio in a context bigger than I might otherwise feel.  Cramped Apartment is more closely related to paintings I’ve been making for the past three or four years in its structure.  I wanted it to feel closed in and cluttered like my studio.  (I paint in a converted one car garage)

I know that the title of the show “So Domestic” typifies these ideas of home that are being discussed, can you tell me how Cramped Apartment’s title illustrates the meaning of this piece?

I think this is the kind of space I find myself in most of the time.  My home is full of art, books, tables —  stuff.  It’s lived in.  And the homes of my friends and peers trend that way as well.  Cramped Apartment is a pretty obvious labeling of the space.  One window, a kitchen that looks into another room, a mirror to open up the space.

This painting more than the others have representations of objects that are not recognizable, geometric shapes represented in perspective, why is that? do they represent actual objects in your space that you abstracted?

Even when objects are recognizable in my work, they function for me more as abstract shapes.  That’s not to say that a TV as an image has no meaning, but it’s more likely placed in a work to perform a formal task.  I needed something glowing and green, so it becomes a TV.  So when there’s a flat rectangle leaning against a wall, or a patterned geometric form curling into the next room, I stop short at naming them.  They do a job that would be similar if they were more ‘finished’ or visually defined.

Your color palate is so bright and not reminiscent of classical works you may be drawing from, is that an effort to divorce your self from their influence? or referencing more modern influences?

Well, first of all, painters from Giotto forward have used some pretty insane colors.  Look at the reflection in Vermeer’s Young Woman with Water Pitcher and tell me that blue isn’t intense.  Or Titian’s Bacchanal.  But a lot of my color sensibilities come from modern abstraction – I’m floored by the optics of color laid out by Albers in Interaction of Color.  I usually lay out my palette in a fairly straightforward progression from cools to warms to cools again, so that I can jump between temperatures within individual hues. 
Aside from academic art history, I’m a lifelong comic book fan, so saturated color may be built into the way I visualize.  Plus paint is colored goop, after all.  Seems logical that paintings should show that off.

Interview by Nell Mack

Can you talk about your juxtaposition between iconic imagery (the mountains, “Hankie rag”, and the chair) and the minimalist objects?

Objects from domestic life and consumer culture give the work a human touch. Art objects are examples of workmanship just like a building or a chair, and I want to make sure the importance of the worker is not forgotten or neglected in the object.

You have spoken about the working class mentality of your work, past and present, and in Purple Mountain Majesty most of the works are in ascension. Can you talk about these correlations?

The work for the show was being made just after I had been unemployed for months, and I finally got a new day job. So there was a mixture of genuine optimism surrounding my work life. But the visual references to ascension also relate to the overwhelming visuals of monoliths, and how that kind of oppressive force can be related to the helplessness one might feel while working for just a paycheck.

This body of work is clearly rooted in socio-political ideas, which is something that has not always been a part of your past work. Do you see art at large moving away from “meta” theoretical ideas, just as your work has? /or why not?

All the Postmodernist meta-narratives were about trying to find our place in history. Now we are more concerned that our histories are vanishing and all culture is becoming one homogenized global culture. We are filtering through and reinterpreting popular culture to provide our own viewpoint and interpretation. It’s not really any kind of public service announcement, socio-political basis. It’s much more selfish. It’s about trying to be an individual in a consumer culture that is becoming more and more standardized.

Can you explain the relationship between the bright “warning” colors and the contrasting black, white/ black and orange? can you also explain how the black specifically influence the works?

All the colors I used are derived from the government ordained colors for caution tapes, and black is a part of that system. Although, each color has its own feeling and aura. All the bright colors provide that feeling of optimism I talked about before, and black and white contradict the optimism with a certain sparseness and somberness.

Can you talk about your “Jackhammer” piece?

Jackhammer is the bridge to a previous series of work I did, where I was playing with the way visual tension could allude to the tension one experiences being a worker. That thinking influenced my reliance upon the caution tape colors in Purple Mountain Majesty, and their purpose as a symbol of hazardous and unsafe places. So Jackhammer served as a foundation for the rest of the pieces to be built upon, which I suppose is a bit ironic, since a jackhammer is exactly what you would use to tear a foundation apart.

Your titles for the show have have a satirical bite to them, how do you choose your titles?

My titles are tend to be somewhat literal. Mostly because I try to avoid poetic flourishes, and cement the objects in “real” life. The satire, cynicism, and humor come from my displeasure in being just another worker bee like everyone else.

How much of the work was made specifically for this gallery space? How much time did you have to prepare for the exhibition?

All the work was new and created for the space. I believe I had 6-8 months to prepare for the show.

What is next for your artistic endeavors?

As far as my studio practice goes, I’m excited about working with more 2-D pieces, since I’ve been making only 3-D objects pretty consistently the last few years. Otherwise, I might start setting some of my sights outside of Portland.

Interview by Jason Brown