GS: How did you come to this technique? Was there an inspiration, or is this wholly your own madness at work?
ME: “Wholly you own madness” I like that! It reminds me of the Dali quote, There is only one difference between a madman and me. The madman thinks he is sane. I know I am mad.
GS: As I understand it, you make a digital photograph, then work with printing and oils to create the work. The paint on top of the photograph allows you to work on an artistic expression that photographs frequently lack, and infuse the work it with a realism that is frequently missing in oil-on-canvas. At least that would be my own take. How off base am I?
ME: You have the high concept correct; I’m fusing experience, digital photography, digital painting, digital printing and traditional oil painting to create the finished pieces. This allows me to use a wide range of the skills developed over a lifetime and apply them to the creation of a new form of artwork. For some people this sounds like ‘cheating’, that I’m ‘just painting on a photograph’ and therefore ‘not making real art’. It’s an interesting perspective and always strikes me as the same attitude of looking at a Jackson Pollock and saying, “my five year old can do that!” or feeling cheated that George Lucas didn’t actually film Star Wars on other planets. Is music 'more valid' if played live rather than being studio produced? Many looked at Andy Warhol’s soup cans the same way; they sold poorly at early exhibitions, even at $250 apiece only one or two were sold at the first show. But Marcel Duchamp made an interesting observation, “if you take a Campbell’s Soup can and repeat it fifty times, you are not interested in the retinal image. What interests you is the concept that wants to put fifty Campbell’s soup cans on canvas.” It’s something similar with the SkiPaintings; they have strict formal boundaries – a digital production process fused with traditional oil painting – and a conceptual basis – the interface of human high technology and nature on the cusp of global warming.
I produce in volume (the suites are produced as a group with as many as 25 paintings in development at a time) because of my history in film, animation and special effects which is all about getting big jobs done quickly and in computer graphic software development which is about codifying the conceptual. In computer graphics – and software development in general - it’s all about giving structure to conceptual thought to produce tools that can be used by others. So as I work I give a lot of thought to what I want to do, what I want people to get out of it, how I want it to look, what it will take to produce and how it can all be accomplished. Going back to the film side of things the questions are also ‘what is the viewers experience’ and ‘how do you make that great?’ how do you involve people in the work to give them an interesting experience? It’s a moving target of course and endlessly interesting.
A couple of key points about the photography are that 1) these are my photographs, 2) I place myself in the experience and the photos and compositions reflect the physical nature of the experience and 3) the camera is only one visual tool among many and I treat like a sketching tool, a light & texture sampler, and not an end in itself. In other words the camera is a means to an end and straight photographs are not my final product (not currently anyhow).
In Suite Five, “Self Portrait On Top Of The World” (taken at Alta, Utah) a series of photographs were taken that went from horizon to horizon which produces a strange perspective of the world unfolded an introduces a sense of vertigo. These works are usually composed of several or more photographs that are digitally composited (put together) and painted to achieve a certain feeling in the composition which is amplified with the color of the pigment on the canvas surface. The digital work is where I can apply my filmmaking background and skills.
In the 21st century making Art will be about choices the artist makes, not that it isn’t now, but as the material sciences proceed to give us access to working on a “nano” scale (molecular level) through “human scale” up to the scale of “earth works” and out into space what choices do you make for your Art. Definition and redefinition are a constant part of the dialog of making Art. The 20th century saw an incredible array of exploration; fauvism, cubism, surrealism, photorealism, conceptualism, pop and on and on. Creating Art is a process of making – or at least attempting to make - sense of the world we inhabit. That is where the SkiPaintings become a meditation on the world we inhabit.
September 20, 2006 |
