We've only had one snow this year but that's enough to make me start planning my hibernation mode.
So far: I will knit, I will make soup, and I will try to convince Michael to let me paint flowers on the wall.
Any Nova Scotian, upon hearing this promise of paint, will automatically evoke images of sweet little Maud Lewis' home; our best known outsider folk artist. Her paintings make me SO HAPPY and a guaranteed cure to anyones woe's is a trip to the AGNS to see her exhibit.
Born in 1907 she married Everett Lewis when she was 34, Everett was a fisherman who delivered his catch to the villagers of Marshalltown in Yarmouth County. Maud accompanied Everett on his rounds and during the holidays she'd bring along Christmas cards that she'd drawn ( a hobby she and her mother previously shared) and sold them for 25 cents. Her neighbours looked forward to buying her cards and encouraged her to make more art. Everett also encouraged her talent by bringing home the old boat paint with which she began her career as a prolific folk artist. In their little tiny house Maud spent her days painting everything in their little tiny house. She also made work to sell to the locals and passersby who came to the door to enquire about the 'Paintings for Sale' as advertised outside. Maud suffered severely from rheumatoid arthritis, no movement was easy to make, but her slow colorful process of painting gave her a creative outlet that cured the harsh realities of life.
A is for Art featuring Laura Dawe
Laura Dawe is a local legend, who, last year studied full time at Dal (where she was the arts editor for the Gazette) as well as wrote and directed her first feature film. The film was made at the lowest cost possible with the help of an amazing crew who worked for free, funding raised by the sale of her paintings, and by insane parties she and friends like Chris Foster threw.
Laura Dawe stuck a needle in my arm, repeatedly, over three years ago leaving me with an inked heart on my wrist that represents a lot to me including the beginning of our beautiful friendship.
It's the hardest and the easiest thing to be friends with Laura. No mater how socially anxious I am, she, the host of the biggest party, will stick by my side making me laugh till it hurts to breath and then... we DANCE! She is a doer and does everything she sets out to do whether it ends well or not, it was all meant to be. And as a friend you stand there in awe as she weaves her magic, both inspiring and intimidating. Inspiration pours out of her skin and walls of her house and you get surrounded in the haze of ideas and productivity. Her drive is intimidating for anyone lacking, she accomplishes more in a month then most do in a year or two or three. There is no separation between artist and work, her fantasies become a fictional reality she reenacts through words that either stick to the page or are played out on screen. Her friends become paintings, her stick-and-poke subjects become friends. The more you know Laura the more you see her work as an ongoing visual diary and even if the subjects in some paintings are from found photos you know she would say 'Hey' to everyone of those people if they were to pass her on the street.
Laura is currently hard at work completing post production on her film Light is the Day which is premiering at The Atlantic Film Festival September 24th, 9:25pm at Park Lane. I am SO PROUD of all her accomplishments (this one may be the topper) and I am so happy to feature her on this blog.
Dear Laura,
The spectrum of your creations is wonderfully broad, it seems you have no limitations. What elements visible or invisible connect your body of work?
No painting, poem, video or photograph makes sense to me until the colours figure out. After that, in one way or another, it's all just composition: placement, amount, repetition.
I hope that the invisible connecting element is apparent, but who knows....? It's appreciation. We (you and me and everyone we know) are the luckiest people in history. We won the craps shoot through no real merit of our own. The worst thing we can do is take it for granted that we work so little for so much while everyone else has worked so much for so little. I try to paint the beauty, or to capture it on video. We should cup it in our eyes and hands. It's fleeting. It can't last. Rainbows (or, orgasm arches as I call them) over disillusioned crowds, portraits of my friends with their eyes covered by gorgeous messes of masks, these are, pathetically, my attempts.
xoxo thanks Laura!
Ais for Artan Interview with Kate O'Connor
Kate O’Connor is a Master of Fine Art…so says Yale and so says I. Previous success in the field of illustration has not narrowed the art practices of this talented lady. Her newly updated web site is a quick lesson what she can create with, or without, paper...
Dear Kate,
I miss you and I wish you lived in my spare bedroom, but I am excited to know you are moving to NYC after spending 2 years at Yale for your MFA. Congratulations! Please sum up those 2 years in five words:
I was so happy to see your web site with so much new work displayed. I am assuming(though I may be wrong) that some or all of these new works were projects within your degree. What parameters/esthetics/practices/themes are a common thread in your work, if any?
Yes most of it was work I did at Yale. My thesis was called I Feel Funny which basically summed up the work methodology I developed and learned to articulate here at school. The ideas, themes and motivations that I developed were just extensions of what I've always been interested in, albeit it sometimes, in new ways. Design is rooted in the idea of setting up rules that govern the way a project is seen though. One of the things I began to explore was setting up rules that didn't necessarily correspond, or make sense, or make things easy or clear. This meant that the results of a given project would often be unexpected and usually funny or irreverent in some way. Kind of an eff-you to the traditional notions of graphic design, which I like to look at I guess, but bores me to death to have to do. Working this way helps reassure myself that I'm an artist or something, and makes it really fun. I also learned to work the way that feels good and natural to me, because the results will be better in the end. The old "be yourself" mantra is the obvious I mentioned in the 5 words above. It's so stupid, and true. I can't believe I went to Yale to um, figure that out.
You are funny. It seems like humor is an important aspect of your life and your work.Your portrayals on the absurdities of life are hilarious and endearing. What is your “sense” of humor?
Humour mashed with tragedy. I think it's the result of being Canadian and Irish–both countries suffer from inferiority complexes spurred out of having super-power neighbours. I think both places have very particular brands of humour...it's darker and more absurd than American yuk-yuk.
I can’t describe the J-O-Y I felt watching your videos. What do you like most about making video art? If you could make a music video for the Who is this Goo? by Pastoraliawhat would it look like?
Thank-you Natalie! Video art is liberating because all of a sudden you've got time, and sound to add the usual visual stuff. It's really challenging to do after working in the 2-d for so long.
Ooooh. The idea of making a Pastoralia video makes me REALLY excited! Ray are you reading this!? I need to make you a video! It would be absurd and beautiful, have a really controlled but janky aesthetic. I'm seeing an above ground lavender pool with purple water (obviously), a semi-detached McMansion and yellow autumnal leaves, blue, blue sky, shot in Winnipeg because Ray Fenwick of Pastoralia is from there and I've never been there. Or if we had the budget to go to a pineapple plantation, we'd go there. Pineapples growing in the wild are C.R.A.Z.Y looking!
Your previous embroidery work with uncanny Craigslist postings has now evolved into a “Personals” video staring balloons. Why balloons/why personals? (*side note: I am having an obsession with YouTube comments :)
I have this really juvenile impulse to anthropormorphize things. I really love blobs and balloons are a really lazy way to make attractive colourful form. Personals are so contrived and weird, but also reveal a vulnerability about a person. You tube comments are weird too–people say the worst things to get attention. It reminds me of a time when I went to confession and made up all sorts of stuff to get a rise out of the priest. Bored people do things like that. Plus it's easy to shoot your mouth off when you're anonymous–just like pervs yelling from car windows.
What are your ambitions now that you are finished grad school? What is your fantasy career?
Right now I'm going to NYC because it's close to New Haven and I've always wanted to live there. I'd really like to create a TV show. Something really weird, with awesome costumes and hilarious characters. I like directing because you get a hand in everything, which keeps things interesting.
*.* WoW *.*
Thank you Kate for a great interview!
Make sure you visit Kate's website to see more of her work , including freaking amazing interactive web sites she put up after our interview...check your mood and the weather
* all images and videos belong to Kate O'Connor
A is for Art
I am not ashamed of my affinity for unicorns. And when I first came upon the work of Coral Silverman, I was very happy to see my ol' one-horned friends in gouache complete with tapestry-esque floral motifs. But it is within the Unicorn Travesties and Silverman's other collections we see the crude juxtaposition of city and country, indoor and outdoor, and the consumption runoff of our everydays. Kudos I say, kudos!
Wow you are one hard working fellow. Some would call you an illustrator, some an artist, some a writer and others a rock star. What would you call yourself?
I tend to go with artist, because all of the activities you mention are related to my art practice in some way. They either enrich it, expand it, or support it. Art is what they all have in common.
That being said, I do feel a bit hesitant calling myself an artist, despite the fact that I've had shows and definitely have an art practice. In my head there's a group of artists I think of as real artists, and I find it difficult to place myself in their ranks. Part of me feels like I haven't earned the title yet, even though I'm not sure what would happen to change that.
On my imaginary mental business card the word artist has a lowercase a, but perhaps one day Lawrence Weiner will show up and, after a long tearful ceremony, he'll give me the capital a, saying something along the lines of "it was there the whole time". Of course Lawrence Weiner would never participate in something like that. It would be Jeff Koons, which would cheapen the whole thing for me and so I'd just end up back at square one.
Do you like how your very first question threw me into an existential crisis? Why are you being so cruel to me?
You exemplify one who works for oneself. If someone goes to Java Blend for a coffee super early and tells a friend about it they refer to early as 'Ray-time'. Wait, what? Haha!
In a city where many artists are working for minimum wage and cursing the man, you are making a living making. How did that come to be?
In about 2005 I started making a comic calledHall of Best Knowledge, which is this heavily typographic comic about a character's desperate desire to be a genius. After that was going up online for a while, I started getting illustration work from people who liked it, and things grew from there. As I did more work, I got more work.
I've read your latest Pile/Newsletter in which you state your intentions for the year 2010. You'll be doing large scale paintings, morepatterndesign (!!!), a residency at the infamous Struts Gallery in Sackville, and vignette book called Mascots (temporary cover above right) which will be published by Fantagraphics late this year. The book consists of words and drawings on found book covers, where do you locate these covers and what is it about the found material that keeps you coming back?
I find them at Value Village or Salvation army. Most thrift stores have a rapidly replenished stock of old hardcover books, and more often than not they're ones I'm comfortable cannibalizing. I'm a book lover, so I would keep and read any guts that seemed interesting, but that hasn't happened yet. Mostly they're the biographies of people I've never heard of.
As for why I use them, there are lots of reasons. I was initially drawn to them by their colours, which are often quite unusual and intensely hued. They also made sense because they were the right size for the drawings I was doing, and were cheap. However, after I'd used them a few times I realized there was much more to it, that they weren't just a solution to a problem.
First, I love the process involved in finding them and preparing them for use. Instead of heading down to the art store I get to go and root through shelves in a thrift store, which takes a lot longer but is a much more pleasant way to spend an afternoon.
Second, there's something nice about using a drawing surface that has a past. By the time I'm ready to start drawing on one of them I have a history with it, and that's in addition to it's already long history as a book. It serves as a strange base for what I end up doing, in that it kind of contrasts conceptually. The things I do are often fragmented, like short flashes of narrative, so I think it's funny to have that take place on something that has a long previous life.
Lastly, the fact that they're originally book covers makes a lot of sense. I often think of my work like titles for books that never manifest, and in this case the book has actually been removed entirely so you have no choice but to fill in the book yourself.
One thing I should acknowledge here is that much of this was thought of after the fact, but that's kind of how I work. I'm not trying to bullshit here. I try to trust instinct and improvisation when possible because the results are usually more surprising than when I try and plan something out in detail. In this case the book covers made a very simple kind of sense at first, so I went with it, but it became richer upon reflection. Same goes for most of what I do.
Kudos to having your year planned in advance! Do you agree with the following quote? :"Fail to Plan, Plan to Fail?" - Henry Weld Fuller
I agree with that, but I think for me it is just a way to achieve some kind of focus. If I don't plan out when I am working on what, I would probably just spin my wheels, working on a bunch of things at the same time and making little progress.
Now lets talk about the band Pastoralia. Which consists of demigod Mitchell Wiebe , ace of bass Rebecca Young, and you.
Is this your first band?
No, my first was a pop-punk band in high school, in WInnipeg. We started off doing Green Day covers! It's really embarrassing but look, Green Day used to be way less... whatever they are now.
Ach, I'm defending Green Day?
Where did the music making magic come from?
I've played guitar at a basic level since I was a teen, so there's that, but I also was a Drum and Bass DJ in the rave scene for about 5 years. Prairie rave scene, late nineties. Are you snickering?
While I was DJing I was also making electronic music, which I kept doing long after I stopped playing records.
How long were you sitting alone concocting beats before spilling the beans to Mitchell?
I'd been working on music for fun ever since those DJ days, but I never really did much with it. I got bored of making instrumental music. After I heard Mitch in the band City Field I started thinking how fun it would be to combine my music with his vocal and lyric approach. I think he's a genius. His voice is a great and strange instrument, one I instantly loved, and his lyrics really resonate with me on both a personal and artistic level. He approaches his lyrics like art, something different from poetry that hints at the more abstract and magical aspects of words. It's something I think about a lot, so it seemed natural to want to work with him.
It took us a while to find the sound we wanted, but once we found a process that worked it all started to click. Or, it clicked for us. Soon after that we asked Rebecca to join, which has been amazing. They're both so talented, and SO funny.
You've really established yourself on the internet, people that I don't know from places I've never been are some of your biggest fans. What are some tips you would give other artists for projecting their work online?
I just did something I was interested in at the time, put it up for viewing, and some people liked it. That's how it worked for me. Luck helps too, though.
The question is: is it good to have an internet presence? I know it's easy to be critical after it's worked okay for me, but it's easy to feel conflicted. There are some images and things I really would like stricken from public record, but the web holds on to them. I can't do anything but wait until they somehow digitally degrade. Also, when I'm looking up people I admire, I often find they have no presence on the web, which is interesting. It's like they're to busy being amazing to put things on the internet.
I think one former interviewer of yours referred to Nova Scotians as bears, remember? Anyway I think that's funny, funny and stupid because little did they know the neatness that is Halifax. A city where a illustrator published in PRINT can walk around like a free man. What is it about Halifax that has kept you around this long?
I have great friends here, first of all. It's also a beautiful city, and one whose cultural activity far exceeds it's size. I suppose those are the pat answers everyone gives. What I love most about Halifax is that it's where I've lived for the majority of my relationship with my wife. We have so many memories attached to this place, which will make it hard to leave this summer when we move back to Winnipeg this summer. After ten years here it'll be strange to leave.
It will be strange indeed when you're gone! Thanks so much Ray!
*all photos belong to Ray Fenwick. To see more work visit his websiteand flickrpage or just put his name in google.
I am in total admiration of you and your work. Your drawings, embroideries, sculptures and animations are so beautiful, sincere, and whimsical they are very representational of you as a person. Gush Gush Gush.
Your latest animation Margaret of the Mountain is a wonderful culmination of your previous work with an extra special treat of narrated prose.
How did this piece come into fruition?
margaret's mountain was made as part of my thesis for my mfa . it was inspired by spending time with my grandmas while i was having the usual old life/love trouble. animation seemed like the best way to spend alot of time alone and think alot, and a way to bring my two favorite things together - writing and drawing.
Who is Margaret?
margaret started as a composite of my grandmas and great-grandmas - inspired from hearing their life/ love stories and drawn from old photographs of them. but in the end the actual stories dropped out of the work- and it became much more abstract and poetic, margaret became a way to think through questions i was having trouble finding answers to.
I love the stanzas that accompany the drawings or the drawings that accompany the stanzas.
Does one bring forth the other?
i read, write, draw and make things in no particular order -and i have no idea wether they all have any business mixing with each other. but sometimes i feel compelled to wear all my favorite clothes all at one time. and sometimes is works. i don't know - i hope so ?
The images you capture in your drawings, to me, represent the beauty of ordinary events that we try so hard to remember but are always the first thing we forget. Do you treat the compiled zines as journals of your life or are they more fictional?
hmm . i do think i have a bad memory and i do worry about forgetting. so writing things down and sketching people and places where some significant thought or thing happened makes me feel calm and engaged with my experiences. i think i need to constantly practice paying attention - it helps me to keep being enchanted with the world and with people. both are really complicated so taking time to write and draw things down helps me makes sense of them. there is something really comforting to know that writing and drawing are skills that you can practice for a lifetime and that there is no end to learning through them. and the zines are based on lives i know and my own and they are fictional too. i like writing something ordinary into being something supernatural and epic. i like thinking that everything matters that everything has potential and practicing my imagination.
Congratulations on your ability to synthesize your multidisciplinary art practices into really focused pieces. Are there any other mediums or techniques you would like to work with/incorporate?
i secretly want to make big classic marble sculptures. i just spent a lot of time at the louvre and i fell in love with the big twisted half naked sculptures of greek gods and martyrs and the busts of queens and philosophers. but does anyone know how to do that anymore? where do you get 10 foot high chunks of marble? anyway i think that would be really amazing.
What do you need as an artist to feel inspired and feel like you are growing?
i think i need to just keep looking and reading and trying out new ways to live. i also need to keep alot of love in my life- especially romantic love. sometimes going out for a coffee is enough, but sometimes i need to get on a place and get lost somewhere new. practice starting over and over again. and thank goodness i have seriously amazing friends that make my life totally magical.
I was lucky to meet you during your two week residency here in Halifax at the Anchor Archives,before embarking on your European adventure!
How did you like Halifax and do you think you’ll spend time here in the future?
Halifax made me really happy. the residency was so generous, and it was so great to have the facilities to silkscreen - it is really physical, messy and material somehow much more exciting that just sitting in a ball drawing. halifax seems to have a lot of good people who work hard at what they care about. the community around the anchor archive made me feel super welcome, and i really enjoyed the way food and community seemed to be really valued and shared. i would really like to live in halifax at some point, it seems kind of gritty, really creative, hopeful and really comfortable.
How is the European adventure going?
i just got back to canada a few days ago , so i am still processing the whole europe adventure. i was lucky enough to go to five countries and live in berlin for a month. i worked really hard at going to every museum and gallery and sight i could find. i am totally overloaded with inspiring things, and lots of history, art and key phrases in 4 languages that i get all mixed up. now i gotta find a job , and sleep and catch up with my family and friends and deal with 4 months of mail. ( i love mail ).
Thank you very much Elisabeth! All the best in life and in pastries!
-Natalie
To spend some more online time with Elisabeth you can visit the following websites
