Interview with J Swofford

q)Please introduce yourself and tell us something about yourself and
your background.

a) My name is J Swofford. The letter J is my full first name and that is the way it appears on my birth certificate. My father's name is James Oscar Swofford III. He wanted me to be the IVth but my mother protested. They named me J as a sort of compromise. I grew up in rural Virginia in the Eastern United States as a bit of an isolated child. My family was good and caring but there were not other people nearby and I had few friends. The nearest grocery store was a half hour's drive away. My father is an artist and I grew up surrounded by art but I didn't embrace it right away. I think a part of me wanted to find my own way without feeling like I was mindlessly copying my father. I'm a contrarian at heart. I'll sometimes make a decision just to go against popular sentiment. I've lived all over the United States but I've settled for the past fifteen years in dark and rainy Portland, Oregon. Currently, in addition to shooting photos, I work at the Portland Art Museum. I also enjoy making my own fruit wine. As I write this I'm enjoying a bvit of wine I made from nectarines.

q)Talk about your art.

a) I am most in love with analog photography. I enjoy working with film and developing prints in the darkroom. Working with light and chemistry is a kind of magic. 

q) What’s the central theme of your work?

a) In everything I do I am exploring the symbolic connotations of images. In 2005 I read Carl Jung's "Man and His Symbols" and it changed my life. Since then I have been using photography to explore the unconscious mind and the Archetypes. I am fascinated with the idea that there is another intelligence hidden within my mind that is akin to all the gods, devils, angels, and demons that have ever been or ever will be.  

q) your most beautiful dream

a) Last night I dreamt that I moved to Chicago and got a job working in a ramshackle orphanage.

q) your worst nightmare

a) The first nightmare I ever had I dreamt when I was quite young, maybe four or five years old. I remember shrinking smaller and smaller. My point of view was under a faucet as a drop of water was gathering on the edge of the opening, threatening to fall as it grew larger, and a deafening sound of static grew louder and louder. I woke up yelling "no, no". So far it has been the only nightmare I've had.  

q) Best way to spend a day off?

a) When I get a day off from the museum I will often spend the day working on collage. Sometimes I like to have beer for breakfast.

q) who, what inspires you ....

a) I am greatly inspired by mythology and magic, both ancient and modern. I read a bunch of occult blogs written by contemporary witches, alchemists, and sorcerers. All the ancient Archetypes are still alive today and they probably will be forever. I am inspired by dreams and hypnogogic visions. I am inspired by the idea that, just like Joseph Campbell said, all the demons, all the angels, all the heavens and all the hells are inside me. By being quiet and learning how to listen to them they can all speak to me.

q) books that you love….

a) Carl Jung's 'Man and His Symbols' and 'Psychology and Alchemy', Joseph Heller's 'Catch-22', Tolkien's 'Lord of the Rings' and 'Silmarillion' and 'The Hobbit' (This is the first book I remember being read to me as a child), Grimm's Fairytales, Aesop's Fables, Bullfinch's 'Mythology', 'The Picatrix', Crowley's 'Vision and the Voice' and the 'Book of Thoth', Ursela LeGuin's 'Wizard of Earthsea', Julia Kristeva's 'Powers of Horror', Edward Weston's 'Daybooks', Minor White's 'Zone System Manual', Israel Regardie's 'Golden Dawn', 'The Lemmegaton', Agrippa's 'Three Books of Occult Philosophy', ...

q)music…artists….that you love

a) In music I tend to avoid Pop in all its forms, especially country but almost everything else I listen to all the time- classical, rock, industrial, metal, ambient noise, jazz, country, bluegrass. I love Mozart's 'Magic Flute', David Bowie, The Smith's, Joy Division, The Cure, Avalanches, RJD2, Del Tha Funky Homosapien, Femi Kuti, Frank Sinatra, Iggy Pop, Leonard Cohen, The Minutemen, and so many more. In music I am guided by my mood. One day it will be Snoop Dogg and then next it will be Bach and then it will be Autechre.
In art all of it has something to teach me but I am especially drawn to all things ancient and Neo-Classism of the 19th Century. I also really enjoy some of the art coming out of China right now.

q) What are you really excited about right now?

a) I've been following the court case of Prince vs Cariou with great interest. Working in collage as I have been I think that case has far reaching implications for appropriated art material. I've also been studying the Tarot quite intently.

q)your current projects….

a) For the past three years, and probably into the foreseeable future, I've been working on 'The Riddle of the Echo' which is a photographic project exploring the image making capacities of the unconscious mind. I've also started to design my own tarot deck in the style of 'The Riddle of the Echo'. I am also working on a digital project with the same themes to be sold on Eachone.com in July 2013.

q)your future projects….

a) For a while I've been kicking around the idea of illustrating the Mansions of the Moon and the Astrological Decans using live models. I'm still researching this idea so I've not gotten started on it yet.

 

q) Where can people see more of your work on the internet?

a) You can see more of my work on my own website, abnormalimage.com, although I am often slow to update it. My work is also featured on nativepublications.com as well as artgypsytales.com (I am also interviewed on this one). I have a Flickr.com page, www.flickr.com/abnormalimage/, my handle is unconsciouseye. I also have a Tumblr.com page of my work at http://unconsciouseye.tumblr.com/.

q) Final words?

a) Final words... what can I say. I want to thank everyone who looks at my work, especially those to whom it speaks. I am always open to feedback and would love to hear from all of you.
***

Interview with Hadas Hinkis

q)For the people who don't know your work - how would you describe it ?

a) I make head-pieces, masks, and decor. I make pictures and videos of people in surrealistic physical situations.

q)What are the key themes running through your practice?

a) The human body. Colors and patterns. Limitations. extensions. Flat versus three-dimensional.

q)Your favorite place on earth?

a) Haven’t been there yet! Probably in the middle of a rain-forest, somewhere without humans.

q)What influences your work?

Drag queens. Pop culture. Materials that I come across. The flow and feeling of emotions in the body. Everyday experiences of connectedness to my surroundings.

q)What music are you into right now?

a) Ken’s radio show on WFMU, an American free-form radio station. He plays all kinds of weird stuff, surprising and engaging. They also have lots of other shows for any kind of mood, fun to listen to while working in the studio. wfmu.org

q)Describe your thought & design process...

Its pretty simple: I get a “download”, an idea just pops into my head all perfect and amazing. Then I need to somehow bring it into the material realm, which is a challenge...

q)Which emerging artists are you looking forward to seeing more of?

a) Madame Peripetie in Fashion photography, Sharon Eyal in Choreography, Lena Dunham in writing for film and television. And a lot more that I’ve seen and admired, and will kick myself later for forgetting to mention.

q)Favorite place on the internet?

a) Network Awesome. They curate daily programs with films, music, documentaries, old television moments- the great and the terrible!

q)Do you have any upcoming projects/exhibitions we should know about?

a)No.

q)Tell us something we don't know - but should...

Wall paper glue + water + those annoying supermarket advertisements you get in the mail= papermache. Cheap and useful material for all kinds of 3d creations.

q) Where can people see more of your work on the internet?

a) On my facebook account, I upload more sketches and unfinished ideas. There I go by Hellza Papadopoulos.

Interview with Carsten Kruse

q)For the people who don't know your work - how would you describe it ?

  

a)I mainly paint all kind of objects in public places all over Germany very colourful, for example houses, trams or cars. Sometimes I have a permission to do this by the city, sometimes not. But I´m not what you would call a Graffiti-artist. All my work is handmade with brushes and roles. Nothing is improvised. The base of the perfect result is a draft, which I apply free-hand 1:1 on the wall. I never use templates. Sometimes, I make lots of big blobs on wood in my studio and copy them on the wall. Sometimes I´m childish and develop crazy fishes or frogs with very special characters. Fishes from mars? Sometimes my mood is more funny, sometimes my attitude is more provocative.

The trash of my public work, like brushes or empty cans is the basic material for my work on canvas, thus the artistic cycle is perfectly closed.

For more than twenty years, I´ve been drip-painting my so called monsters in all sizes on wood. They´re very mysterious to me and develop with me.

  

q)What are the key themes running through your practice?

  

a)The key theme of my work is colour. I try to transform sterile and conservative public places into something funny, happy and positive. I fight for the freedom of facades. I´m against white and grey walls and I´m looking for the facade-design of tomorrow.

q)Your favorite place on earth?

   

a)My bed

q)What influences your work?

   

a)When I started painting  my monsters twenty years ago, I was mainly influenced by Jackson Pollock. Nowadays I´m open for all kind of mural art and street art, but not influenced directly. My work is very influenced by music, I think. I listen to crazy stuff all the time.

q)What music are you into right now?

   

a)I´m totally into Free Jazz and Noise….especially musicians like Peter Brötzmann,

    Jooklo duo, John Wiese as well as Merzbow. Currently my favorite instrument is the sax. I love chaos in music. I`m not a big fan of structures and melodies.

q)Describe your thought & design process...

  

a)When I see a certain object, I can see immediately the painted result in front of me.

q)Which emerging artists are you looking forward to seeing more of?

   

a)The stuff of Toys Art Gallery in Los Angeles is great

q)Favorite place on the internet?

 

a) Discogs.com …you can find rare and hard to find records there

q)Do you have any upcoming projects/exhibitions we should know about?

  

a)Of course I have, but they`re secret until it`s published.

q)Tell us something we don't know - but should...

a)I am ectotherm like a lizard, I only start moving when the sun is shining on me J

q) Where can people see more of your work on the internet?

  

a)www.carstenkruse.com

Interview with Mason Saltarrelli

q)Introduce yourself, name,age, location.

a)Hello, my name is Mason Saltarrelli, I'm 33. I grew up in New Orleans, Louisiana and in 1997 I moved to New York. I now live and work in Brooklyn, New York. 

q) Can you describe your path to being an artist? When did you really get into it?

a)Growing up in New Orleans I started photographing jazz musicians at the Palm Court Jazz Cafe and at local festivals. I was 12 years old. I met Doc Cheatham, and started traveling to New York to photograph him at Sweet Basil in Greenwich Village and we became good friends. As a teenager I would leave the Palm Court at 11pm and meet up with friends in the French Quarter where there was no shortage of characters to document through out the rest of the weekend nights. As my visits to New York increased, so did my understanding of Henri Cartier-Bresson's "Decisive Moment" theory. Photojournalism became my obsession. I was the photo editor of Fordham University's new paper for two years and had a mentorship with the photo director of the NY Times for a year. My senior project was an exhibition of my travels in New Orleans, New York, Prague, and Zurich. At this time everything was switching over to digital photography. It seemed to me that the photojournalists were spending more time on their computers and less time shooting. That broke my desire to be a photojournalist. I knew I wouldn't keep up shooting film and I was just finishing college, so I stayed in NY and kept my part time job as a binocular renter at Madison Square Garden. I didn't stop shooting, but I also realized I didn't know what I was going to do. A roommate offered me two weeks of work as an artist's assistant for a world-renowed artist. I had no idea what that meant, and as long as it didn't require computer skills, I figured I could do it. Slowly but surely I began to realize that painting offered a gift of expression that photography did not. When I came to realize that, that's when I really got into it. 

q) Describe your ideals and how they manifest in your work.

a)My approach to art is through philosophy. That idea leads people to ask, "ok then, what is your philosophy?"

To that question I have no concrete answer because just as often as life changes, so can one's ideas about it. I do however believe that our spirits are our strength if we allow them to be. Much of my work is about dying. That's sounds morbid, but it's not meant to be. I believe that the departure from the human form is the greatest gift one will ever receive if they lead a good life. I make paintings and drawings that symbolize paths of the spirits of people and animals and nature that I admire. The Hopi Indian's Kachina doll is a very important aspect of my work. Initially I painted the same doll over and over. I did that so I could teach myself how to paint in the conventional sense. I then began to break the doll apart in my work, I let it explode basically. This to me is a symbol of how powerful the spirit of a person can be. I believe being in the human form is an opportunity to expand your spirit or compromise your spirit. I make work that I need to make to remind myself of that message, because in this world that's an easy one to forget. And hopefully in reminding myself of that message, when my art leaves my studio, I can share that message with others. My work is very personal. I use it as a way to pay respect to people who have passed before me. Most of my work is simply my way of saying thank you, both to people I have known such as my father and to people I have never met such as prisoners of war.

q) Is music a part of your studio time? What do you listen to?

a)Sometimes I use music as white noise if I'm painting in my studio in Brooklyn and need to drown outside noises out.  Sometimes I actively listen to the music that my mood dictates. That allows for a broad spectrum: Al Green, Coco Rosie, Otis Redding, Waylon Jennings, TV on the Radio, Wild Tchoupitoulas, Frank Sinatra.

If I'm working in Montauk, NY outside. I might play some of the same music, but there I prefer to channel the energy and hear nature, so often in Montauk, music is too distracting.

q) How would you describe your work to someone?

a)It's a type of harmony by way of chaos. Each one is it's own spirit map. That's why you see some re-occurring images in the work yet each one is unique.

q) Influences?

a)Visually: Walker Evans and Philip Guston.

Far more important, mentally: My Dad, my Aunt, and my Dog, Bird. All free to roam. 

q) Describe your process for creating new work.

a)All my paper work begins by tinting the paper and giving it a patina of undetermined age. The more broken down, the better. Most of my canvases are left outdoors to be exposed to the elements in places I consider special in Montauk. I like to let the earth and it's inhabitants help play a role in my decisions of where marks will go and what colors they will be made with.  My work is often a response to what nature has created on the paper or canvas. It's a conversation between the two of us. This is fun for me because it gives the work a life of it's own, it becomes less mine, which I appreciate. It makes me more just part of the process rather than the ruler. Once the proper marination of nature is set in the material, that's when I get down. I don't like to get too set up to paint, I let my intuition do most of the work. When all cylinders are firing, I use my last name. It's an Italian word for a type of jumping dance. I love to dance on my paintings. I'll even kick them, they kick back.

q) What advice do you have for artists looking to show their work?

a)It's hard. The art world is full of people in clicks patting each other on the back. Staying in their boring comfort zones. First and foremost, remember, if it's your art you love, be true to it. The "art world" is a business honest art making is not, it's a form of mental science given life by human skills and limitations. If it's your art you love make it, believe it, know it, and love it. Be patient, try to find the right people for it, dealer and audience. Rushing it will just waste your time. My work is not currently exposed on the level I would like, but that's something I've learned to accept through trial and error. If there will be a time for some commercial success, it will come when that time is right. If not, I will keep working and pushing myself to explore what and who I am. Haste makes waste.

q) What are you really excited about right now?

a)I'm currently in New Orleans, so I am excited that I am in a beautiful city that moves at a far slower pace from NY and has Po-Boys. They say NY has everything, not true. I've never had a good Po-Boy there.

q) What do you love most about where you live?

a)I love Prospect Park. Nature is the greatest artist. No human will ever come close to creating what nature has given us. The park helps me remember that. 

q) Best way to spend a day off?

a)My friend has a great Italian restaurant, Scalino in Park Slope, Brooklyn. I could sit there all day. 

q) Upcoming shows/ projects?

a)I'm currently in a group show at Tripoli Gallery in South Hampton with a great group of artists: 

http://www.tripoligallery.com/

And something's in the works in Washington DC with:

http://www.randallscottprojects.com/

q) Where can people see more of your work on the internet?

a)Holler at me: http://www.masonsaltarrelli.com/

Update coming soon. 

Interview with Danny van Ryswyk

q)Introduce yourself, name,age, location.

a)My name is Danny van Ryswyk, 40 years of age. I am a Dutch surreal artist living and working in the historic heart of Amsterdam.

q) Can you describe your path to being an artist? When did you really get into it?

a)You don't 'become' an artist, it's not a profession like a computer programmer or construction worker. You are born with a talent just as you are born with a sexual orientation. It is something you are. But it needs an incredible amount of dedication to develop this talent. Been born with a talent does not mean that you can lay back and relax, it is not an easy life. It also means that I am very one-dimensional in my talents and interests. This is what I understand and do best. And I try to survive from within these boundaries. In the early 90ties I started working as a full time illustrator, specialized in Photorealism. I did an incredible amount of packaging illustrations of fruit, cookies, candies, you name it. The deadlines in the commercial field are always tight and never far away form been totally unrealistic. I worked so hard for so many years that I started to develop serious health problems like chronic stress and RSI. How bad they might seem, it was important that it happened to me as I needed to wake-up and understand that I was going the wrong way and was completely destroying myself and my artistic integrity. It was then I began to investigate how I could do the things I always wanted them to do, tell my own story instead of telling the story of a cooky manufacturer. 

q) Describe your ideals and how they manifest in your work.

a)My ideals do not manifest in my work. I try to have as little ideals and goals as possible. It is important to

stay away from such illusions. We humans have a habit of always looking at tomorrow and have these future dreams. It is important we live in reality and not in illusions. The fact is, we never know what might happen just a second away from now.

q) Is music a part of your studio time? What do you listen to?

a)Sure, I listen to a wide variety of music styles. I highly prefer minimalistic dup techno like Basic Channel, and electronic ambient music like the works of Thom Brennan, it's hypnotic.

q) How would you describe your work to someone?

a)Obscure surrealism. My work is best described as a fuse of absurdity, melancholy and Victorian portraiture.

q) Influences?

a)My UFO encounter I had when I was a kid. This has a very important influence in my life and work. This was the point I became interested in anything which is said to exist 'above and beyond' nature.

I have a large collection of books about paranormal and extraterrestrial subjects. I love 19th century photography, especially hoaxed ghost 'spirit' photography from that period. I just love weird things and odd antiques. Dreams.

q) Describe your process for creating new work.

a)I have a mental image of an idea and I work from there. I never make a sketch, it takes away intuition. I start in ZBrush, which is three dimensional software. It is a complex program that allows the artist to 'sculpt' it's subjects in virtual reality. It works almost like real clay and gives an incredible freedom of expression. This is where my idea gets form and shape. After finishing my 3D-sculpture I import it in another three dimensional software program where I set-up light, camera and texturing. At this point everything comes together. Then I render the scene in high resolution and this is brought over in two dimensional software: Photoshop. In Photoshop I start to paint and manipulate my render for as long as needed to complete the right mood and obscure atmosphere I am aiming at. The whole process from start to finish takes many weeks to complete.

q) What advice do you have for artists looking to show their work?

a)Dedication, do something different. Stick to yourself and work from there.

q) What are you really excited about right now?

a)A holiday. I need a beach, a blue hawaii cocktail and some sunshine. I spend too much time in my studio.

q) What do you love most about where you live?

a)I live in the historic heart of Amsterdam. It is a very crowded place and lots of weird things happen here!

Amsterdam is beautiful. It is a big 17th century museum with a strange mix of tourists, yuppies, locals, laid-back people an lunatics. Amsterdam is never boring, you can go to a nightclub or wander in the small streets. Drink a beer on a bench and look over the channels, visit a museum and see the works of Rembrandt. 

I have traveled all over the world, but a place like Amsterdam is unique.

q) Best way to spend a day off?

a)Spend the day with my girlfriend, exploring the city, have some coffee, go to the movies and having a diner.

q) Upcoming shows/ projects?

a)I am working hard on new works all the time.

q) Where can people see more of your work on the internet?

a)I don't keep track of where my work is published. All new work is published on my site.

There is an upcoming book of Dutch artists where my work will be published in, I recently got

published in an San Francisco based art magazine called Sex + Design, art blogs like you contact me, lots of good things are happening!

Interview with Jesse Corinella

q)Who are you? Where are you from and where do you live now?

a)I'm Jesse Corinella, born and raised on Long Island in Roslyn, New York.  I went to school at the University of Delaware and, after a bit of traveling, I ended up back here in New York.  Presently, I live in Carroll Gardens, in Brooklyn.

q)What is it that you do? What media do you use?

a)By day, I work as a retoucher at Wieden+Kennedy, but by night, I work as an illustrator.  Most of my work is done in pencils, inks and watercolors, though more and more, I'm working digitally.  I don't think I'll every completely work digitally, but it's a tremendous time-save to digitally colorize analog drawings.

q)What do you think sets your work apart?

a)Everybody brings something unique to the table, be it conceptually or through their craftsmanship; lately, I think it's the way that I render, more than my subject matter, that's gained attention.  I really enjoy rendering, so whenever I get involved in a project, I'll spend tons of time focused on the minutiae of a piece.  As long as I can maintain a sense of scale throughout the rendering process, I always feel that the pieces come out stronger in the end.  Patience goes a long way, but to me, drawing is meditative.  I could never spend so much time doing this if I didn't enjoy it so much.  

q)How long have you been showing your work for?  Did you have a “big break?” 

a)I've been showing work since I was a kid, but not in any serious sense.  I was always the kid in school doodling in class, so I was always getting involved in small projects here and there.  I still haven't had any great break, but to be fair, I think I need to be producing more work to get there.  I don't think it's a single moment as much as it is persistence.  There's a lot of competition, so it's really important to keep fresh and updated with your work.

q)What are some things that have inspired you?

a)Oh, man.  Nature is a huge inspiration; pine cones, crickets, lightening bugs, dogs.  Outer space is huge too - I'm a really big science buff.  Lighting is huge too: the golden hour is my absolute favorite time of the day - that moment when the sun blares orange and red on everything it touches.  That blood orange on a concrete wall against a brilliant blue sky is something I think about every time I color a piece.  It's pretty unbeatable.  I don't follow design journals all too much, nor illustrators or photographers, really.  I probably should, at least to know what's going on out there.  I used to be a pretty big video game fan, but I've distanced myself from that world a good deal.  It's so easy to get lost in absorbing other peoples' products, so much so that you don't produce anything yourself.

q)What have you been working on recently?

a)For the past year and a half, I've been working on an epic science fiction graphic novel, OHM.  The story takes place on a dying Earth in the near future, in a world run by corporatized nations.  One such nation, OHM, is the centerpiece of the story.  I've been having a blast conceptualizing space ships, futuristic fashion and all sorts of fantastic architectural settings.  It's been a real project of passion, so at the end of the day, I'm hoping to knock this out've the park.

Also, I've been doing a bit of collaborating with a Brooklyn-based band, Snowmine.  I grew up with some of these guys, so it's great to see that they've gained so much traction.  They're really talented, so I hope that they keep getting the press that they deserve..

q)Do you listen to music while you create your work?  If so, would you give some examples? 

I do; I listen to a lot of ambient music.  Explosions in the Sk and Loney Dear come to mind.  I listen to a lot of talk radio too; WNYC is my go-to NPR and PRI affiliate.  I'm a really big fan of Radiolab and This American Life, so whenever I get a chance, I try to catch up with those programs.  Recently, I've been kind've obsessed with Joe Frank; I accidentally came across his work while working really late one night.  He's a brilliant, tremendously talented storyteller.  He produces both fiction and non-fiction and he goes to tremendous lengths to produce these wild, fantastical, rambling, biting stories.  Sometimes, they're light and fun and eccentric - but often, they're profound and dark and heart breaking.  They're great fuel to work through a long night in.

q)Do you do work in any other media? Other projects not necessarily related to your main body of work?

a)I do a great deal of writing, though it usually shows up in my illustrative work.  I do a bit of photography, too; I was simultaneously trained as both an illustrator and a photographer, though the pencil dominates more of my time than the camera nowadays.

q)What advice do you have for artists looking to show their work?

a)Keep working.  Stay really busy producing work that you're happy with.  Find the time to make a large body of your work, but even more importantly, share it.  As long as you have a cohesive idea or style, you'll be able to find someone, somewhere to help host it.  Once you've produced, get your work out there as quickly as possible; just make sure that it doesn't disappear into a drawer somewhere before other people get to see it.

q)Do you have any upcoming exhibitions of your work that you can mention?

a)Nope; I've been spending most of my time working towards a publication.  Once that piece is up-and-running, it'd be great to display all've the original pieces that went into it: character designs, setting designs, models and all sorts of production artwork.

q)Where can people see more of your work on the internet?

a)www.jessecorinella.com