Art Space Talk: Ross Barber

Ross Barber is an installation artist from Australia. He is also the Executive Director of Access Arts Inc. A curator statement nicely describes the work of Ross Barber: "Bodies looking at art, become bodies negotiating architectural space. Rather than expect particular bodies, he, Ross Barber politicizes such an expectation. Rather than ordering bodies, he creates disorder for them to negotiate. Rather than provide solid ground, he leads us to question who makes the ground on which we situate ourselves on, why and for whom."

Quartet four love songs, vinyl wall text, spoken word sound installation with accompanying Braille books. Image from Angela Robarts-Bird Gallery installation, 2006.

Brian Sherwin: Ross, you studied at the University of Western Sydney and Queensland University of Technology. Can you tell us about your academic experiences? How did they influence your later work? Also, who were your instructors during those years?

Ross Barber: I had a great deal of freedom to experiment while at UWS Nepean and while I only jumped ship from the painting strand of the course in my 3rd year and moved to sculpture it felt very natural. I had been a house builder and supervisor on large industrial sites prior to my accident in 1987 so I had a lot of fine and technical skills that had just built up over the years. I found I understood the built environment very well as a location of social/ architectural histories and their politics.

Also the university-- even for undergraduates --fostered independent research and thinking. As long as you were working and processing you got quality time with lecturers which was not pedagogic in nature, but collegiate and of course you find a ready group of collaborators in the student body who are ready to push each other and test ideas and outcomes. Probably the best person I worked with at UWS was Nick Dorrer not a lecturer, but the head technician. Lecturers I had a great deal of time for were Michael Goldberg, Anne Graham, Dr Sue Best and Dr Phillip Kent.

At Queensland University of Technology I was extremely lucky to have the Head of Visual Arts JM John Armstrong as my primary Master of Fine Arts supervisor and Dr Brad Hasman as my theory supervisor. Again they allowed me to follow what was natural my eclectic practice and encouraged my tendency for theoretical bricolage to flourish. John Armstrong was instrumental in my receiving my first major grant to travel and take up a residency in Cooperations Luxemburg. My time at Cooperations turned the world upside down for me. It was there that I learned the true meaning of collaboration and the proper role of an artist in a major social project.

I returned to finish my Master of Fine Arts and while doing that taught drawing to post graduate architectural students and acted as a non-assessing lecturer in the first year undergraduate program where my brief was to incite students to try things they would never tell there formal lecturers about. It was a great joy to see those students hit the ground running in second year.

Matrixs Nature Morte, 1999 - 2006, size variable, multiple configurations. Modules under construction, collected sticks copper wire, cell phones, birdcall ring tones, sparrow screen saver images.

BS: Ross, you are the Executive Director of Access Arts Inc. For those who don't know... can you tell us about Access Arts Inc.?

RB: Access Arts is the Arts/Disability peak body in Queensland. We operate on three levels of activity:

1. Entry level arts workshops and programs

2. Identifying and nurturing emerging artists experiencing disability and disadvantage

3. Employing Professional artists, administrators, and cultural workers experiencing disabilities and disadvantage

I have to say I am an artist who purports to be a manager. I took on the job as Executive Director in mid 2004 and the circumstances around that time were not pretty. While the organisation had had an illustrious history it had lost its vision and I found myself on the first day staring at a previously hidden $40000 deficit. The organisation only had sixty five members left and was threatened by the real possibility of the loss of all financial backing. I told the board of directors that I needed a free-hand otherwise they would be winding up the organisation within a year.

My appointment by the board was not taken too well by the then staff and I felt like I was in the Australian equivalent of Fort Apache. So after a frustrating time fruitlessly trying to get the staff behind revitalizing the organasation, not to put to fine a point on it, I finished their contracts and started recruiting artists and cultural workers experiencing disabilities who had never got the jobs when they had applied to the organisation before. Three years on we now have ten staff who are all artists and about fifteen extra artists working on a range of social and professional Creative Industries projects and we have a membership of 18,050 people.

We have survived a Commonwealth and state government arts sector wide program of budget cuts where fourteen arts organisations lost their funding and a further fourteen were put onto reduced annual funding only. We actually improved our position and will have a recurrent base funding income from government and philanthropic sources of just over one million dollars in 2008. In 2007 we generated about $400,000 into the community economy in wages and in kind through strategic partnerships.

Access Arts proactively recruits and employs skilled administrators, arts workers and volunteers experiencing a range of disabilities. Developing local, regional, national and international reciprocal partnerships and the provision of appropriate training and skill development opportunities are essential elements of our philosophy for staff, volunteers and members. Membership Services staff provide creative support, encouragement and programs for members of the organisation experiencing a disability or disadvantage, which is enhanced by first-hand knowledge of living with a disability. Here is the Access Arts Web address www.accessarts.org.au

Still from- She is always walking away....... 1948 - 2006

BS: Ross, one of your most well-known projects is titled 'She is Always Walking Away". Can you discuss this project? What are the thoughts behind it?

RB: I'm not sure how to explain she is always walking away as it is in reality a work in progress and shall always remain so. It is probably best for anyone interested to read about it on my site www.rossbarber.com/she_is_always_walking_away.html

There are layers that keep being exposed-- sometimes with a sense of delight and other times like raw nerves that hurt like hell. And of course this is about identity and memory where I have some concerns of being locked in a representational impasse and shall never escape it. I began to explore the work after a conversation with Michael Goldberg in 1993. He was encouraging me to begin writing. I had disclosed the experiences of being in a coma for 11 weeks after my accident which even to this day are so much more 'real' than everyday life in terms of clarity.

One experience in particular is where I returned to the Chinosorie garden of my childhood to find the ceramic doll I had found at about four years old and named Rosa. This doll that I had abandoned at about five years old had grown old in the garden and was clearly not happy that I had abandoned her. Rosa had been my secret companion and of course representative of my unformed femininity. I now understand that her name is derivative of my first signature attempts that I wrote in special books in my grand parents library at the time, RosA Barber.

There are a number of other parts of work that I have derived from that period in the coma state, as examples-- I'd kill for a cup of tea lagoons and Quartet four love songs which I believe is the shortest version of the Odyssey written.

Concept image- Lagoons Installation

BS: In your opinion, what are some of challenges that disabled artists face in the art world?

RB: I can only speak about the situation in Australia which is very concerning. There is a systematic devaluing of people experiencing disabilities across the socio/economic system in Australia. You can see it in the ongoing losses of basic services and support. This has led to great difficulties for artists experiencing disabilities to get into the vocational training that they need in the equivalent of your art colleges or in universities. Only .03% of people experiencing disabilities are succeeding in vocational training because the lack of either the will or awareness by colleges and universities to meet the access needs that people experiencing disabilities require.

Unlike Access Arts, the commonwealth and state disability arts sector organisations who are supposed to advocate for and develop emerging professional artists, do not employ artists, cultural workers or administrators experiencing disabilities except in very tokenistic ways. As I said in my Something is rotten in the arts and cultural state of OZ. There is a dearth of ‘disability’ arts and cultural policies at a national and state level, which underpins the lack of opportunity.

BS: Ross, tell us more about your art. Is there a personal philosophy behind your work?

RB: I value all that has come before and the work of contemporaries, but I reserve the right to challenge them-- some times respectfully, sometime playfully, and sometimes with a touch of irreverence. Similarly, I like to challenge the very ground that we situate ourselves on culturally and politically. There are things that have to be said about our contemporary world and I hope I will always be honest enough to say them at the least through my art.

Two bored workers wishing aprons, each made with 7 sheets of A4 paper covered with text, one in 16th century korean characters roughly translated means, “I would rather be eating soybean curd than planting soybeans in the field“ and one in english saying : “Some other body someplace else", 2003.

BS: What is the message you strive to convey to viewers of your work?

RB: I guess in the milieu of reception theory there can be an enormous difference in what I am trying to convey and what the viewer reads in it. All I can try to do in terms of the installation work is to try and create an immersive environment that will engage and challenge the viewer. Somehow I feel that I would like the the viewer to become a co-producer.

Recently, at a Pecha Kutcha Presentation, a young performance artist responded to a work of mine titled In the winter of 68 -- a text based work that was being displayed on the screen. She just got up and performed it moving through the audience reading off the screen with a empathy and cadence that I could never have anticipated. People were stunned and not sure what to do when she finished... all I could do was applaud, it was very moving. I am hoping she will interpret some of my other prose works.

BS: Can you tell us about your process of creation?

RB: A fair description of my practice would be eclectic installation and multi-arts in form, to say the least. I liken the maintenance of my practice to the use of the analogy of the plumber’s bathroom, all the taps leak. Even in this very demanding job of executive director at Access Arts, and because of the job in which I am surrounded by very creative people, I manage to continue my work and write lots of crap prose to describe my arts practice/work relationship .

There is a story about French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan who was out fishing with fishermen from the village he was born in and he spotted a shining object floating on the sea ( it turned out to be a jettisoned sardine can). One of the fisherman noticed him staring at it and said to him, "Ah you see the shining object the object sees you, I see only what it is". Sometimes a work comes into mind and is just there, 'a thing in itself'. Others will take many years to come to a reasonable state of being and then each one starts working back to me... a process of reviewing, refining, and shifting layers of meaning that cause new works or forms of the work to emerge.

Consuming Cambells Soup after Warhol, 2006

BS: Do you have any exhibits planned for 2008?

RB: I just keep making work-- the shows come and go. They are of little consequence. This year seem to be shaping up for me. I'm engaged to do a number of presentations of my practice, mainly at universities and for state arts bodies. I have applied to undertake a PHD and if accepted I will start mid-year.

BS: Do you have any advice for emerging artists?

RB: Keep investigating that myriad of shining and not so shiny objects. A close friend of mine, who is now very well known, complained to me that she no longer had the time to really look at what she was doing. She was torn between supplying the market with what she had got a name for, instead of what she loved playfully experimenting with. She felt she was always running, but stuck in one place. "Of course it is up to you", I said. "but you have to make up your mind on what it is you can live with and be happy."

BS: Finally, is there anything else you would like to say about your art?

RB: I am very grateful to have had a life where I have been able to have the basic means to make art and to meet others on a similar journey. It is a gift.

You can learn more about Ross Barber by visiting his website-- www.rossbarber.com. You can read more of my interviews by visiting the following page-- www.myartspace.com/interviews.

Take care, Stay true,

Brian Sherwin

Art Space Talk: Jack Chipman

Jack Chipman is a graduate of the Chouinard Art Institute (now Cal-Arts) in Los Angeles and has exhibited his abstract paintings, collages and witty assemblages throughout California and abroad. His rippings series began in San Francisco in the 1970s soon after graduation from art school. At that time artist friend Lynn Hershman, writing for Artweek, dubbed him "Jack the Ripper." Knute Stiles, in an Art in America review, wrote: "The rhythms and accidents, like the grain of wood (or the surge of the sea), are perhaps the magic factors—the intuitive aspects that give these pieces their commanding presence." At one point Jack seemed to have vanished from the scene, but one can only stay away from his or her work for so long...


ADHARMA 2, 118" by 108", Acrylic & Dye on Canvas/Wood, 1969

Brian Sherwin: Jack, you studied at the California Institute of the Arts and the San Francisco Art Institute. Can you recall your academic years? Who were your instructors? What kind of student were you?

Jack Chipman: My time spent at the California Institute of the Arts was during the bumpy period of transition from the original Chouinard Art Institute. I recall that many of the students were quite reluctant to see the old school in Los Angeles be closed in favor of Walt Disney’s new model of interdisciplinary studies which he built in remote and undeveloped (at least then) Valencia.

I studied with many of the old-timers who had taught at Chouinard for years but my favorite was Emerson Woelffer. He was an inspiration to me because he was a real painter with an established reputation as an Abstract Expressionist at the time. He was one of the major West Coast practitioners but I think his reputation suffered at the time because he lived and worked in LA instead of NY.

BS: Can you tell us about some of your other early influences?

JC: I liked many of the prominent AE painters in NY like Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning, but I was also aware of Californians like Richard Diebenkorn and Sam Francis. However, I was totally unaware of developments at the Ferus Gallery in LA then—something that I now regret.

ADHARMA 29, 104" by 120", Acrylic & Dye on Canvas/Wood, 1972

BS: You've mentioned that it was hard for you to shake the influence that Emerson Woelffer had on you in order to develop your personal direction. At what point did you find that direction? Was it a sudden burst of inspiration?

JC: I found my direction after relocating to San Francisco . I enrolled in Transcendental Meditation (because of the Beatles) and during an early session the concept of the "rippings" just came to me. I’m a believer in what is sometimes referred to as the "muse"—the universal creative force or energy that can be called upon to support ones endeavors (if you’re willing to accept it.) So, I guess you could call it a sudden burst of inspiration.

BS: Jack, at that time you were experiencing growing success-- collectors were starting to notice your work. However, by the 1980s you had-- for the most part --stopped exhibiting. Did you create any art during those years? Do you mind talking about those years?

JC: It all began innocently enough with my first visit to a flea market. I noticed some brightly colored pottery dishes that some of the dealers were selling and decided to buy a few. This unfortunately led to a pottery collecting obsession that consumed my energies for about 6 or 7 years. I also began to research the California companies that had produced the ware, which led to the writing of a succession of reference books on the subject. Meanwhile, I had moved back to LA where I met a fellow collector and artist who hounded me no end to get back to work. I finally caved in and rented a studio in an artists’ retreat located in San Pedro and set about to paint again. But it was difficult getting back in gear after an extended absence from my work. It was a real struggle!

RIPPING AFTERLIFE, 1, 32" by 42", Acrylic on Canvas on Metallic Bubble Pack, 2007

BS: How did you re-discover your artistic direction? Was it difficult leaving the research room for the studio, so to speak? Also, can you tell us about your series called "Loss Angeles". It was the first series you did after returning to your artistic practice, correct?

JC: At the San Pedro facility I produced one significant series called "Loss Angeles" which was about the many landmarks and attractions of the region that have disappeared over the years. As an LA native I had witnessed some of this demise—an unfortunate attribute of a "progressive" city. The series was especially important to me because it married my two competing passions—painting and pottery. I used an example of California Pottery as a signifier for each of the landmarks that I memorialized, including the famous Brown Derby restaurant and my old alma mater Chouinard.

BS: Did you ever feel like giving up during that time? What kept you focused on your creativity?

JC: No, I haven’t ever felt like giving up, even though it’s been tough trying to re-establish myself in the larger and more competitive LA art world. When you’re an artist, you just do your work even if the hoped-for rewards never come your way.

BS: At what point did you start to revisit the 'rippings' of your 1970s work? Why did you decide to return to aspects of that method?

JC: I moved from San Pedro to Long Beach and spent a productive year there in a large live-work space along with other artists. I just decided to revisit the concept that had distinguished my early work in San Francisco when Process Art emerged as a post-minimal development. But I did things differently by ripping (deconstructing) and reassembling completed paintings. Before, the process itself had been the key element of the work.

PORTAL, 23" by 28 1/4", Acrylic & Cardboard on Wood, 2007

BS: Jack, your newest work merges hard-edge elements with fluid abstract color-field paint handling. Can you tell us more about your recent practice? Do you still 'rip'?

JC: I’ve been trying to retire Jack the ripper but he keeps rearing his awful head. So far, my latest series of paintings are pure—no ripping has occurred.

BS: Philosophically speaking, how are the works that you create today different than the works you created in your youth-- do they reflect a change in time? In thought?

JC: Time changes everything. You can’t stay in the past with your work. It must progress and keep pace with what’s happening today in order to be taken seriously. I hope my current work, although not revolutionary, will be seen as a continuation of a painting tradition with roots in the NY and LA schools of the not-so-distant past.

BS: With these works do you return to your roots as far as your artistic influences are concerned? Or do you strive to focus on your own direction and set the influences aside?

JC: You follow the muse wherever it leads you and try not to look back.

FAMILY SCRAPBOOK REDUX #1, 36" by 36", Acrylic & Collage on Panel, 2007

BS: What do you hope viewers obtain from observing your work? Is there a message behind your work?

JC: I’m a believer in art for its own sake; not for the sake of critiquing society or changing the world. If there’s an underlying theme to my recent work it’s that we all have a better life to look forward to someday…but not in this world of turmoil and puzzlement.

BS: Jack, do you have any advice to emerging artists?

JC: Don’t get sidetracked. Keep at it no matter what. The reward is in the work itself.

BS: Finally, is there anything else you would like to say about your art?

JC: I’m not opposed to selling. We do live in a commercial world.

You can learn more about Jack Chipman by visiting his website-- www.jackchipman.com. You can read more of my interviews by visiting the following page-- www.myartspace.com/interviews.

Take care, Stay true,

Brian Sherwin

Art Space Talk: Javier Albar

Javier Albar is an artist from Madrid, Spain. Javier produces abstract pieces with a restrained and subtle palette. Circles, jagged lines and solid masses of black create compelling designs of powerful presence. Javier combines printing (woodcut, xylography, lithography and plastic) and painting on canvas with mix spray and acrylic colors. He explores the essence of his being by meshing organic and geometric shapes together.

Munsterland, 2007, woodcut and lithography, 70 x 50 cm.

Brian Sherwin: Javier, can you tell us about your early years? Can you recall any experiences from your youth that impacted your decision to pursue art as an adult?

Javier Albar: I've been drawing for as long as I can remember, and always wanted to work on something creative. I was not very content during the time that I worked as an interior architect even though it was creative work... I always felt a desire to express creativity more freely. I was 28 when I made the big decision to change my direction. Since then my life has changed completely.

BS: Javier, tell us about your academic background. Where did you study? Who were your instructors? How did your work mature during those years under that guidance?

JA: I started studying interior design at age 20. For 8 years I worked as an interior architect while struggling with the need for having more freedom with my creativity. While working on interior design, I was recommended to go to Brita Prinz Gallery workshop. It was there that I discovered the joy of xylography and met Eloisa Gil Pena. She showed me a new world. Three years later, I studied fine art at the University of Aranjuez, Madrid under very influential instructors.

While attending the university, I worked independently, parallel with the school work, to develop my unique style and to reach my artistic maturity. The University of Fine Arts has given me more practical resources and theoretical training, but the real essence of my art is self taught.

Huella Efimera, 2006, lithography and woodcut, 76 x 50 cm.

BS: You are from Madrid , Spain ... does your cultural background play a part in your work?

JA: My work has a universal cultural background, and I do not identify with typical Spanish culture. I am inspired by-- and identify with --the essence of works from other artists, my own life experiences, the culture of cities and countries where I have traveled, and the marks left by the people with whom I have related... the magic of life.

BS: Javier, you are interested in organic and geometric abstraction. In these works you deal with themes of architectural deconstruction and you utilize circular shapes as a form of transition between the organic and the geometric. Can you go into further detail about these these works-- the thoughts behind them?

JA: My abstractions stemmed from a book of drawings of dinosaurs bones. From it I invented my own drawing of bones and created compositions with them. I then drew lines on the transparent papers as if they were architectural plans, and transferred them onto wooden planks. My work combines the influence of interior architecture and the shapes of vegetation and organic materials.

A professor of art history once said to me that the organic and geometric were not compatible-- I thought a lot about this and came up with a solution that using circles would be the best transition between the two. I started experimenting by deconstructing forms and creating the connections in poetics forms, emotional and intuitive.

With it appeared in my work, what seem to be maps of invented cities, aerial views of cities lit at night, man made mechanisms, and textures controlled and uncontrolled. I call these textures skins of memories of thoughts.

Organicirculo del Deseo, 2006, woodcut, 78 x 54 cm.

BS: In your use of geometry you do not wish to follow a mathematical calculation. Instead, you adhere to an intuitive and emotional use of geometric forms. Can you go into further detail about this? In your opinion, why do these forms 'speak'?

JA: I drew circles intuitively to create compositions. I discovered that the circle I drew intuitively were connecting randomly at one point. I call this the 'hidden connections'. The precision in their connections were incredible. Then I realized that my art was a reflection of my life. A circle represented me and the other circles represented people in my life whom I have interacted with and the way the circles connected was the connection I had with others. I felt pure magic.

BS: As you have mentioned, you discovered xylography at the Brita Prinz Gallery workshops... and that the knowledge of this technique influenced you greatly. For those who don't know, can you tell us about xylography? Also, why did learning about xylography change your artistic direction?

JA: Since I had discovered xylography while I was working in interior architecture, drawing many compositions of architectural plans, my xylography work is heavily influenced by architecture. This makes my work very different from the work of others. I felt very fortunate being able to incorporate what I was already doing into a new form of art and to become more expressive... free.

Organicirculo Marino, 2006, woodcut, 70 x 70 cm.

BS: Javier, can you tell us more about the process of xylography-- how you use it?

JA: I've discovered my own method in working with wood based in the need of satisfying my desire to express myself. I first do line drawings on 4mm Okumen wood. I then cut the pieces with a cutter. This requires experienced precision. Using the pieces, I superimpose the shapes using a stamping method. Transparent inks are used to create different values and sometimes colors.

BS: Javier, you are open to experimentation in your work. You now incorporate new techniques combined with xylography, such as lithography and more recently the matrix of a type of plastic called Arraglás, playing with new resources such as sanded circles, and the atmospheric scratched backgrounds. Why is experimentation important to you as an artist?

JA: For awhile, I have been incorporating a less perfect and uncontrolled style with the more controlled work done previously in an attempt to link the idea of understanding what can and cannot be controlled in our lives. I am also experimenting with stamping on fabrics with hair like fibers, such as corduroy, velvet, ...etc. This method of stamping black ink on black fabric or tone on tone, played with the way the light is reflected. The direction the hair is laid invites the viewer to reconstruct the images with his movements and imagination. The work appears minimal, but it seduces the viewer to discover what's hidden within. Some are very atmospherically trapping. This series was inspired by my dreams at night... the traces and tales of people who stay within my thoughts and dreams without physical presence in my life.

Organicirculo Omunculo, 2006, woodcut, 106 x 75 cm.

BS: Javier, aside from the use of the circle... is there any other form of symbolism in your work? Do certain colors mean different things to you? If so, tell us about the symbolism of your work.

JA: The organic forms are very personal. A section of an earlier design is often used to create an evolutionary continuity. This is done with the concept of earlier design being the seed to sprout a new design that grows and branches out to different directions. This forces some of the elements and shapes of my art to reappear-- though I try not to repeat images. I am very critical of my works and always wish to be surprised by them.

BS: What else has influenced your work? Do you find inspiration in the work of other artists?

JA: At first I looked for inspiration in other artists by reviewing their work in great depth. Some of those artists are-- Chillida, Saura, Tapies, Goya, Kupka, Pollock, Rothko, Egon Schiele and many others. I also looked for inspirations in form by architects like Zaha Hadid, Calatraba, Frank Gehry. All these artists have left a essence in me, which I incorporate into my work. But now I am also finding my inspirations in nature, fractals and everything else that I find surprising in life.

BS: Javier, I understand that you are an educator as well. Where have you taught? Can you tell us about that experience and how it influences your personal work?

JA: I have some teaching experience. I have been one of the instructors of master art prints at the CIEC Foundation (www.fundacionciec.com) in the city of La Coruna in Spain, where I've taught my technique in wood engraving. I have also taught classes at the University of Fine Arts in Madrid. I am currently doing research with a grant from the Ministry of Education and Science of Spain to make a doctoral thesis. However, teaching is not my primary intention. I wish to work in a field that leaves me time to create. Life puts the thought in our sight.

BS: What advice do you have for art students?

JA: The first and foremost important thing I want to say to them is to work hard towards achieving a goal. One should broaden his knowledge and mature in art by traveling and seeing and experiencing with his own skin, while staying open minded to different ways and cultures. An art student needs to come to the realization of all things within himself-- in his own time and own place.

Organicirculo Conexion Oculta, 2006, woodcut, 100 x 70 cm.

BS: Do you have any exhibits planned for 2008?

JA: This January I am exhibiting in the city of Móstotes near Madrid after having exhibited in Münster, Germany and London in recent months. In May and June I will exhibit with other Spanish graphic artists in the gallery Arthaus66 (www.arthaus66.com) in Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA, and again in Münster Germany

BS: Finally, is there anything else you would like to say about your work?

JA: My goal is to live an exciting and incredible life full of surprises. I feel fortunate to do art. Through art, my life has become very exciting and I've met many wonderful people. Art has made my life magical and brought me many surprises.

Javier Albar is a member of the www.myartspace.com community, login ID-- aranjuez. You can read more of my interviews by visiting the following page-- www.myartspace.com/interviews.

Take care, Stay true,

Brian Sherwin

Art Space Talk: Guy Sherwin

Guy Sherwin studied painting at Chelsea School of Art, London in the 1960s. His subsequent film works, often including serial forms and live, are characterized by an enduring concern with time and light as the fundamentals of cinema. Recent works include multi-screen projection and gallery installations. Guy has taught at Middlesex University, London, the University of Wolverhampton and at the San Francisco Art Institute.

Guy taught printing and processing at the London Filmmaker's Co-op (now LUX) during the mid-70s. His films have been exhibited internationally and have been included in several important exhibits concerning film-- 'Film as Film' Hayward Gallery 1979, 'Live in Your Head' Whitechapel Gallery 2000, 'Shoot Shoot Shoot' Tate Modern 2002, 'A Century of Artists' Film & Video' Tate Britain 2003/4.

Stills from The Train Films

Brian Sherwin: Guy, you studied painting at Chelsea School of Art in the 1960s. Care to reflect on your past? Who were your mentors at the time?

Guy Sherwin: Film was only beginning to happen at Chelsea when I was there, and this was largely through the enthusiasm of tutor Anne Rees-Mogg who was starting to make her own films. However some tutors didn't accept that film could be a fine art as it used 'time' (i.e. to them 'Fine Art' was about objects, and film wasn't an object). Other influences on my work were the formalist and material-based paintings that I was surrounded by, also the book 'Art & Visual Perception' by Rudolf Arnheim which demonstrates that you cannot trust what you see.

BS: Your film works often include live elements and serial forms. They are characterized by an enduring concern with light and time as the fundamentals of cinema. How did you make the jump from painting to film?

GS: I made a series of abstract relief paintings in which the colours on the forward surfaces were the same as the colours in the shadows, which made an ambiguous space. The viewers' movement, plus the quality of light, affected what you saw. This was one step towards working with time, and hence film.

Stills from Animal Studies

BS: Guy, you are featured in A History of Experimental Film and Video by A.L. Rees. In the book your SHORT FILM SERIES, which you undertook between 1976 and 1980, is explained in detail. Rees mentions that you returned to the series after almost twenty years, with studies of animals and insects. He goes on to mention that there is a link between your work and the surrealists. Care to go into further detail about this? What other influences have you had?

GS: I very much respect A.L.Rees' opinion but I'm not sure about this comment linking my work to surrealism. Admittedly there is a quirky humour in the Animal Studies but that's not the same thing. My main influence has been the work of the London Film-Makers' Co-op with which I have been closely involved, particularly the physical, material approach to film practice by artists such as Malcolm LeGrice, Annabel Nicolson, William Raban, Steve Farrer.

BS: Are you still working on the series? How many films are included in the series at this time?

GS: There's about 15 which I'm very happy to show and another 15 which I'm less happy to show. The Short Film Series is in principle an ongoing project, but in practice I made most of them in the late 70s and another batch in the late 90s. Part of me would like to be the kind of artist that just sticks to one thing and keeps producing one-shot films like this on a regular basis, but another part of me got in the way and wanted to try other things.

Man with Mirror. 1976/2006. Performance for super 8 film and hand-held screen.

BS: Your work seems to bend time in that you enhance work from the past with present day technology. You combine the old with the new. In that sense, you control time... you manipulate it... shape it into what you want it to be. With that said, why has the idea of 'time' had such a lasting impact on your progression as an artist? An example of this focus can be found in your piece Man With Mirror in which you interact with your former self.

GS: As I mentioned earlier 'time' was the first thing that intrigued me about film. Images that move in time. It may not be so obvious with video, but when you're working with cine-film there's something magical about winding a little strip of images backwards and forwards through a viewer, making some insignificant action, captured from the world of movement, move forwards or backwards or stand still.Aren't we all obsessed by time?

In Man with Mirror I interact with a film of myself that I made 30 years ago. In the film I'm holding a mirror painted white on the reverse side, and my movements with the mirror are echoed by my movements with an actual mirror in front of the audience. To get the feeling of it I had it recorded on video. I can see that it's full of strange illusions and time shocks. There's a version of it on Youtube. (www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXD7UMlAixg)

BS: Your Recent work often involves multi-screen projection and gallery installations. Are you working on any projects at this time?

GS: I've been finishing a book accompanied by a DVD. Its called 'Optical Sound Films' and is published by LUX - the main artists' film agency in this country (www.lux.org.uk). The title comes from the way sound is normally carried in 16mm film, as a thin band of fluctuating light. There are about 20 titles in all. The films were made either in the 70s or more recently. Each film included in the DVD is also illustrated in the book, along with a simple description of how it was made.

Mobius Loops. 2007. Performance for 3x or 5x 16mm projectors. Optical sound.

BS: Guy, you have maintained your research practice for over 30 years. What do you hope observers gain from the span of your work?

GS: Difficult question. I can answer in general terms. The materialist project that was very strong in the 70s but became marginalised in the 80s and 90s has come back but with a different emphasis. In the 70s 'materialist' film meant opposition to the illusory codes of mainstream cinema, but nowadays a materialist approach to film (by which I mean working with the physical substance of cine-film, not disguising its material essence, as most films do) has a particular impact as distinct from the easy illusionism of video which is now commonplace in the gallery.

BS: Guy, you have instructed classes at Middlesex University, the University of Wolverhampton and periodically at the San Francisco Art Institute. Many instructors have mentioned to me that the classroom can drain an artist of his or her creative energy. How do you balance the role of being a teacher and the work that you do as an artist?

GS: Students can be inspiring too! I consider myself lucky to be working in a field that relates directly to my own film practice.

BS: I understand that you taught printing and processing at the London Filmmaker's Co-op (now LUX) during the mid-70s. Can you share some of your experiences of the Co-op? What was it like working with experimental film in the 70s?

GS: Video hadn't arrived in the early 70s when I started to make films, so film was the important medium and I think we were all aware of its power - to make powerful material images screened to a captive, but aware, audience. Television was dull, Hollywood was duplicitous, the galleries were compromised (has anything changed?). It seemed a time when anything might happen and when the future of art was film. That idealism was not borne out by events.

BS: Have you worked with other experimental film cooperatives? For example, The Film-Makers' Cooperative in New York City or Canyon Cinema in San Francisco?

GS: My films are distributed by both these organisations and I keep in touch, but I'm not directly involved.

Stills from Railings

BS: I find it interesting that for the longest time experimental film has been considered an 'underground' movement... yet the influence it has had on the commercial media is obvious. In other words, the influence is all around us yet many of the groundbreaking creators of experimental film are not as known compared to artists who work in other forms of art.One can observe how experimental film has shaped cinematography, visual effects and editing. Also, the genre of music video can be seen as a commercialization of many techniques of experimental film. Do you think the public is starting to acknowledge the founding creators of this form of art?

GS: Yes, I think that as video and film now have a strong showing in the galleries it's impossible for young curators and gallery owners to ignore the history of artists' films, which didn't start in the 90s as some still think (even the timeline in Tate Modern suggests that it started with Bill Viola and Gary Hill!) but has a long and illustrious history going back to the origin of film a century ago. I still find it extraordinary that that big white tome 'Art in Theory, 1900 to 1990' by Harrison and Wood barely mentions film. I can see that older art historians haven't time to catch up with films' huge history and it's easier not to mention it, but as I said the younger generation can no longer turn a blind eye.

BS: Finally, is there anything else you would like to say about your practice or experimental film in general.

GS: Another word about my practice. In the last few years my films have been shown mostly as performances, sometimes using several projectors at once. In some of these I work with my partner Lynn Loo and we adjust the projection and sound in a partly improvised way which brings film projection a little closer to improvised music. On occasions we've also worked with musicians. There's more information on these and my other works on www.luxonline.org.uk/artists.

You can learn more about Guy Sherwin by visiting the following site-- www.luxonline.org.uk. You can read more of my interviews by visiting the following page-- www.myartspace.com/interviews.

Take care, Stay true,

Brian Sherwin

Art Space Talk: Janet Biggs

Janet Biggs is among a substantial group of artists who turned to video and video installation in the early 1990s. Trained in painting and sculpture she has exhibited since 1987. Biggs is known for a body of work centering on the image of the horse. In her earlier video installations, Biggs has examined the way society constructs gender, often using the image of the horse as an emblem of female sexual sublimation and masculine power.

More recently Biggs has focused on themes ranging from the representation of desire and pleasure to issues of spectatorship and aging. She has broadened this inquiry into questions of power and control by drawing connections between social and pharmacological prescriptions on behavior. Her multiple-channel installations, condensed yet epic, have garnered her a strong critical reputation and numerous museum exhibitions, as well as a position that places her work in the lineage of post-feminist discourse. Janet Biggs is represented by Claire Oliver Gallery in New York City and Solomon Projects, Atlanta, Georgia.

Brian Sherwin: Janet, you studied at Rhode Island School of Design and Moore College of art. I'm always curious to know who instructed people I interview. Who were your instructors at RISD and Moore College? Have you stayed connected with those schools?

Janet Biggs: I've stayed connected with RISD and Moore through exhibitions at both schools and by participating as a visiting artist. Both schools helped shape my thought process and practice through access to inspiring professors and by fighting against professors who were limited and limiting. Some of my inspirations at Moore were Harry Anderson, Frieda Fehrenbacher, Jack Thompson, and Jerry Crimmins. At RISD, Bruce Chao inspired by giving practical information about how to survive as a professional artist while never allowing for creative complacency. I was lucky that both schools have active and aggressive visiting artist/critic programs and exhibition schedules. I was exposed to and influenced by a lot of artists/critics who were aggressively pushing their work and their careers such as Valie Export, Jody Pinto, Richard Artschwager, and Lucy Lippard.

BS: Janet, you were one of the artists who turned to video and video installation in the early 1990s. However, you originally focused on painting and sculpture. Can you tell us why you decided to focus on video and video installation? Perhaps you have a story or two about those early years?

JB: I've always been interested in the immersive experience. Even when I was producing paintings and sculpture, I would combine objects and/or images to make installations. At the time, my studio was small so I would make "commuter installation art"...lots of small elements making up a large-scale installation. Video seemed like a great economy of means. I could create something phenomenological out of projected light. The immersive nature of video installation has been satisfying enough to keep me working in the medium for the last ten years, but I didn't count on the amount of equipment (and it's rapid obsolescence) needed to present the work. My studio is now full of projectors, laser disk players, video tapes, DVD players, projections screens, and sound systems...and I'm thinking of going hi-def soon.

BS: How did your experience as a painter and sculptor enhance your video work?

JB: I wanted my work to engage the viewer through time and multiple perspectives, allowing the viewer an active role in the completion of the piece. The static, linear read of one meaning, one intent felt too limiting. I wanted to challenge ideas about authenticity and authorship, allowing the viewer an increased role.

Recently, I have been directing performances that combine multiple elements, environments, and disciplines such as video projections with live synchronized swimmers, musicians, and equestrians. Video installation and performance seem more akin to how we experience life.

My experience as a painter and sculptor did not prepare me for the intense experiences that can be had through the moving image and sound. The sensory envelopment of sound is now a key part of my work. When I first started making videos I concentrated on the visuals using only the inherent sound from the images. As my worked developed I discovered the incredible possibilities and power of sound. I still feel like I’m only scratching the surface of the possibilities of sound, but am excited by the exploration. I've created and recorded sounds, sampled sounds and music from others, collaborated with composers like Blake Fleming who played with the Mars Volta band and Steve White of the Blue Man Group.

In my performances, I've been able to mix live sounds on site. I've combined sounds of live actions such as a horse's hooves pounding the ground in front of the audience with the pounding percussive piano of Jose Luis Hernandez Estrada.

BS: Janet, you are known for a body of work centering on the image of the horse. You use the the horse as a symbol of female sublimation and masculine power. Can you go into further detail about the symbology behind this use? Perhaps you could share your motivation behind that choice?

JB: Originally, using the image of the horse was a way to access my own experiences with power, pleasure, and control. As a child most decisions were made for me by others, but I could get on the back of a 1200-lbs. animal and have it go wherever I wanted. Using the image of the horse was also a way for me to explore male and female roles and societies rigid choreography of those roles. As the work progressed I became more interested in subverting stereotypical images of the horse, and by extension stereotypical ideas about gender. I've been able to take multiple roles in both the production and reception of images due to my interest in theorist Judith Butler's ides about gender's relationship to masquerade. Video has so readily been linked to the objectification of women that it's interesting to subvert it into a new kind of seduction.

BS: More recently you have focused on themes ranging from the representation of desire and pleasure to issues of spectatorship and aging. Tell us why you have decided to explore these themes.

JB: As my experiences broadened I became interested in looking at identity within a larger realm, both through levels of societal participation and ideas of free will. I was the guardian for a relative of mine who was severely autistic and obsessive compulsive. She could not live independently, was non-verbal, and self-injurious without medication. In my past work I had been active in the deconstruction of stereotypes. With the responsibilities of guardianship I was confronted with questions of functionality. I was forced to look at structures of societal participation. My work became more about construction than deconstruction. I needed to imagine the experiences of others and tried to recreate some of these mental states in my installations. These installations were named after the drugs that are used to treat different psychoses. I combined seemingly unrelated actions, environments, and events to create a solipsistic visual landscape often using images of athletes as examples of isolation, obsession and compulsion.

BS: Can you tell us more about the philosophy behind your work? What is the message your strive to convey to viewers of your work?

JB: I seek to continually challenge myself and my audience.

BS: Are you influenced by world events? Have any specific events struck a cord in you, so to speak?

JB: There are certain films where I can completely loose myself…totally buy into the Hollywood dream machine. Blade Runner is one of those films. I have always been a fan of cyperpunk and science fiction. Philip K. Dick and Ridley Scott hit on themes that interest me…what makes us human such as empathy, relationships to animals, constructed memories, as well as hybridization, globalization, our role in climate change and genetic engineered, drug enhanced identity.





BS: Janet, can you tell us about some of your recent work? For example, Enemy of the Good and Airs Above the Ground... can you tell us about the process that goes into them? Do you 'map' the videos out in your head? Do you sketch out preliminary ideas?

JB: While some pieces are mapped in detail (especially the synchronized, multiple-channel installations) others come together more as a collage. Last year I traveled to the Citadel in South Carolina and filmed the cadets for a week, concentrating on the Summerall Guard's rifle drill team. This footage became part of a single-channel video titled "Performance of Desire'. The cadets relinquished their individuality to become part of the choreography of war, performing a silent drill that demanded precision and exact synchronization. I paired the Citadel footage with images of inverted, synchronized swimmers suspended in slow motion to explore the strenuous effort and dedication behind the appearance of youthful ease. The hyper-stylized gestures and affected costumes of the athletes belied the power, agility, and strength required to make every action graceful.

Unlike my video installations where I can control all elements, in my performances I lay down a loose framework to work within. If I’ve done my job well and brought the right people together in the right environment then the piece takes on a life of its own. One of the exciting things about performance is that my original thoughts will be interpreted by the performers setting up new moments of discovery for all of us.

My most recent performance took its title, "Enemy of the Good," from the Voltaire quote, "the perfect is the enemy of the good". It examined the driving desire to transcend constraints and the impossible search for perfection. With nods to Busby Berkeley’s lavish musicals, the photographs of Muybridge, and referencing Santaigo Calatrava’s soaring architecture and symbolic Olympic flame, the piece explored the isolation and obsession required to make something difficult appear effortless and transcendent.

The piece opened with William Martina’s live haunting cello solo against a background of large-scale, synchronized video projections of a spinning horse, tethered hawks, and harnessed sled dogs. The video images changed to ethereal, weightless swimmers as Venezuelan national rider, Andres Rodriguez walked into the foreground and picked up a trot on his grand prix champion horse. Concert pianist, Jose Luis Hernandez-Estrada bowed to the audience and took his place at the grand piano. The horse galloped around the piano and headed for a jump behind the cellist. The pianist dove into an intense piece that made playing the piano look like an extreme sport while the horse and rider jumped the fences blocking their path. The piece built to a crescendo as the soloist flew up and down the keys and the horse and rider soared over one of the video projection screens.

BS: What are you working on at this time?

JB: I recently came back from filming the motorcycle land speed trials on Utah's salt flats. I worked with Valerie Thompson who set two land speed records. I am now cutting the footage to become part of a performance that will combine the salt flats video footage with live speed skaters and bagpipers performing on ice.

BS: Janet, your work has been reviewed by ARTnews, Art in America, and several other publications... how do you handle exposure like that? Does it inspire you to go deeper with your work? Some of the artists I've interviewed have mentioned that they try to 'block out' this kind of success so that they can focus on their work instead of what is being said about them... what is your opinion?

JB: I don't avoid or "block out" responses to my work. The work isn't complete until it is out in the world. That kind of communication with an audience (including critics) allows for their active participation in the reception of the work and often presents challenges. Some interpretations I dismiss as not constructive to my studio practice, but others encourage an inventory of choices.

BS: You are represented by Clair Oliver Gallery in New York City and Solomon Projects in Atlanta. What exhibits will you be involved with in 2008?

JB: I will have a solo show at Solomon Projects, Atlanta in the spring and am working on a performance that will premiere next winter. A great video show that includes one of my installations and was curated by Andrea Inselmann at the Johnson Museum, Cornell University will travel to the Haggerty Museum at Marquette University in the fall.

BS: Janet, the Internet has allowed video artists to gain a lot of exposure with just a few clicks of the mouse. This is due in large to art networking sites like Perpetual Art Machine and Myartspace and social networking sites like Myspace that allow video artists to upload their videos with ease. One could say that this is a great time to be a video artist, what say you?

JB: Sites like Myartspace, PAM, and Lumen Eclipse are amazing resources for artists, curators, critics, and traditional gallerists. If not actual gate keepers, these sites maintain a level of criticality in the work they show and in their programming that keeps them vital. Few museums, even those with deep pockets and a commitment to collecting video, can rival the breath of some of these sites. That being said, I'm not a fan of more is better. Unlike most web 2.0 sites like YouTube and MySpace, where quantity doesn't always equal quality, the above mentioned sites maintain a focus. I don't believe that the medium is always the message and that just because it's a video and uploaded somewhere it's worth watching.

BS: Speaking of critics, exhibits, and the opportunity that the internet has created for artists... do you have any concerns? In many ways the advent of the Internet has shifted the foundation of the traditional art world... is this a good thing?

JB: While I am really excited by the broadening of possibilities that have opened up for artists (as well as for musicians) through the internet, we are all still thinking within the box...this one just happens to be a flatscreen with broader access. The relationship of the arts and the internet is still in its infancy.

One concern of mine as I find more and more of my work uploaded by others is scale. Many of my pieces are intended to be presented at a certain scale. If an installation is meant to dwarf the viewer as they physically find a path through the images it will not be effective in small scale or as sequential images on a computer screen. Artist's intent needs to be respected.

Another is financial survival if all work becomes public domain.

BS: Janet, do you have any advice for emerging artists who are exploring video and video installation?

JB: Try painting so you won't be a threat to me in the future.

BS: Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions Janet.

JB: Thanks Brian.

You can learn more about Janet Biggs by visiting her website-- www.jbiggs.com. You can read more of my interviews by visiting the following page-- www.myartspace.com/interviews.

Take care, Stay true,

Brian Sherwin

Art Space Talk: Diana Baumbach

Diana grew up outside of Chicago with her muralist mother, businessman father, and sister Sarah. For many years, she studied ballet. She performed with Ballet Chicago and with the Bolshoi Ballet at the Vail International Dance Festival. Later, Diana decided to go to college and study fine art. She received her BFA in Printmaking and Drawing from Washington University in St. Louis. After taking some time off, she decided to pursue her MFA at Southern Illinois University. She recently finished her MFA in Printmaking and Drawing. Diana currently teaches studio foundations and digital media at the University of Wyoming. She also teaches printmaking at Laramie County Community College.

Brian Sherwin: Diana, your mother was a muralist-- do you credit her with your early interest in art? What else can you tell us about your early years as far as art is concerned?

Diana Baumbach: My mother and I actually have very different approaches and goals when it comes to artistic production. She never pushed me towards art as a child and for many years, fine art was just a hobby for me. Living with an artist as a child did, however, introduce me to the idea that the creative impulse could emerge in domestic spaces. That idea has been central to my recent work.

BS: Diana, you studied printmaking and drawing at Washington University and you continued your studies at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. Can you tell us about your experience at these schools? Who were your mentors during those academic years?

DB: The printmaking program at Washington University was very conceptual and I used that time for creative experimentation. Most of what I made then bears little resemblance to what I do today. The graduate program at Southern Illinois University offered a unique experience to teach undergraduate students while also taking classes myself. There was a strong graduate community and I really enjoyed working with instructors Leslie Mutchler, Jason Urban and Chris Wildrick while there. While at Southern Illinois University, I made friendships and contacts that I value greatly.

BS: Diana, you also have experience as an educator. You have instructed art at Laramie County Community College and the University of Wyoming. What do you teach? Also, how do you balance your role as a teacher with your need to create your personal art? Is there ever a conflict?

DB: Primarily, I teach foundations level courses. At the University of Wyoming, I teach 2D design, color theory, and digital media. I'm very interested in working with younger students and guiding them through their own exploration of the elements and principles of design. Much of my work deals with formal elements, so I actually see an overlap between foundations studies and my own work. I am fortunate enough to be provided with a wonderful studio and a relatively light course load, which allows me the time and space necessary to make my own work.

BS: Allow me to ask some questions about your art. Your art deals with the intersection between fine art, design, and everyday life. Can you go into further detail about your art and your artistic process?

DB: Sure! I am inspired by the everyday objects around me just as much as I am by fine artists. I really value the thought that goes into the design of a cup or a chair. Much of my work references functional objects…blankets, paper towels, toilet paper, a doll house…but I make everything by hand using slow, repetitive techniques. The time that I invest belies our attitude towards our surroundings and the idea that we live in a disposable culture.

BS: Tell us more about how you mesh household patterns with printmaking techniques...

DB: To be honest, I do not use printmaking all that much in my work at this point. I am more interested in the concept of the multiple. In the past, it has been useful to use serigraphy to rapidly recreate patterns and allow for variations in color.

BS: Is there a philosophical reason for your use of patterns from household items such as printed fabrics, paper towels, napkins, and furniture? Is there a message that you desire to convey with this choice? For example, are you making a statement about consumerism?

DB: I am interested in using these objects as a point of entry and investigating them for their formal qualities. Most of my work can be appreciated simply on a formal level. I'm not trying to make any sweeping statements about our culture, but rather, to make people look a bit more closely at their surroundings…and hopefully help the viewer recognize that they are making aesthetic decisions about the world around them on a daily basis.

BS: Diana, can you tell us more about your artistic influences? Have you been inspired by a specific artist or art movement?

DB: Sure, I am inspired by the artists Andrea Zittel, Anu Tuominen, Thomas Demand and the architects Rocio Romero and Frank Lloyd Wright. I think there are some very interesting collaborations happening between designers and large companies like TARGET and Alessi. I also really love Scandinavian design, especially Marimekko fabrics.

BS: What are you working on at this time?

DB: I just finished up a few pieces for the faculty show here. They are a bit different…colorful! I'm also working on a grant for a new project called Shared Space. It's an alternative gallery that aims to bring challenging contemporary art and design to rural Wyoming.

BS: Diana, I understand that you established an alternative gallery space called Gallery Thirteen13. Can you tell us more about that project? What are your goals for Gallery Thirteen13?

DB: Gallery Thirteen13 was a project that took place in my home in Southern Illinois. It was essentially a reaction to living in a rural area where there were no art galleries. I decided to create my own exhibition space using an extra bedroom in my apartment. The project ended when I moved, but will hopefully be reincarnated as a new project, Shared Space. I have some very exciting exhibitions in the works which will involve new media, site specific installations, and a permanent collection, but funding is still pending.

BS: Tell us more about your opinion on alternative galleries. Several artists in St. Louis are starting to exhibit from their own homes instead of relying on a traditional gallery setting-- I remember reading about that several months ago --it seems to be a trend. What do you like about this direction that some artists are making in regards to taking exhibiting into their own hands?

DB: I am very excited about the possibilities of alternative art display. The more I read, the more I realize that there are tons of similar projects popping up throughout the US. I feel there is a lot of energy in D.I.Y. projects that makes the traditional gallery system less and less of a necessity. Perhaps this impulse comes from the possibilities on the Internet. There are so many ways to get your work out there nowadays.

BS: Do you have any advice for artists who are interested in learning more about printmaking?

DB: I would encourage young printmakers to attend the print conferences (Southern Graphics Council and Mid-America Print Conference). It is an excellent was to get excited about printmaking and to meet like-minded people. Printmaking is so community oriented that it's important to connect with the larger print community. Also, I would encourage printmakers to participate in and/or organize print exchanges. It's a great way to connect with other printmakers and start a collection.

BS: Finally, is there anything else you would like to say about your art?

DB: Thank you for the opportunity to display my work on www.myartspace.com and for taking the time to interview me!

You can find Diana Baumbach on www.myartspace.com-- login ID, dbaumbac. You can read more of my interviews by visiting the following page-- www.myartspace.com/interviews.

Take care, Stay true,

Brian Sherwin

Art Space Talk: Evguenia Men

Evguenia Men is interested in the reaction of the human soul as it experiences both grief and joy. Evguenia views the human soul as an enormous secret world that becomes visible through perceiving and painting the essence of visible objects. She interprets human emotions by juxtaposing colors of her subjects. When in desperation she may see red as black, yellow as grey, or blue as brown. Objects are distorted, sugar is bitter, and peaches are tasteless. For example, Evguenia paints grief turning to joy by showing an open red and black mouth screaming out white pearls.

Brian Sherwin: Evguenia, you were born in St. Petersburg, Russia. Can you tell us about your youth and your early experiences with art?

Evguenia Men: I grew up in a very artistic city. Every weekend my parents used to take me to see a theater play, or a ballet, or an exhibition at Hermitage or other museums. At home I had a huge collection of art books and literature of various genres, so I literally lived in an imaginary world. I didn’t like being outside, partially because weather in Saint Petersburg is usually quite miserable, so I can say I preferred living "inside".

BS: Evguenia, where did you study art? Can you tell us about your academic experience? Who were your mentors?

EM: I graduated from Junior Art School in Saint Petersburg when I was sixteen (I studied there for four years). At that time there were many special schools for gifted children, they all were almost free of charge but one needed to pass entry exams to be accepted by a particular college. Our teachers were from the famous Saint- Petersburg Academy of Arts, and the education was very "classical", i.e. traditional and academic. Back then I didn’t like those strict rules and "boring" subjects we had to draw and paint. I hated those still-life sets with dusty bottles and pieces of grey clothes surrounding them. We were not allowed to express ourselves artistically freely. Let’s say, I could not paint my bright "fantasy world" I was living in. Now looking back though, I am really grateful to my teachers for the strictness, because all those "classical" rules now live in my blood and my consciousness, and technically it helps enormously. Also we spent a lot of time in museums studying art history, observing and discussing paintings which I liked very much.

Later after graduating from the University I spent three years studying cinematography as a student of the Department of Film Directing (St. Petersburg Institute of Cinema and Television). I’ve written several screenplays, shot a few short films as a director but finally decided that the film industry requires too much discipline and organization, and if one is not a natural ‘crew organizer’ it can just kill one’s creativity.

BS: You have a master degree in chemistry from St. Petersburg State University. How did the study of chemistry influence your work? Do you use any of your knowledge of chemistry while working with art materials?

EM: At first, when I switched completely to arts and painting I had thoughts that I wasted my time studying chemistry. Later, after realizing that different paints I use for my pieces are based on a wide variety of solvents, I discovered virtually limitless possibilities for experimenting with physical qualities of paint.

All my mixed-media works are based on chemical experiments. I use mixtures of acrylics, watercolors, enamel and oil to make rich backgrounds of my works. Sometimes I use thick mixture, sometimes go with more "creamy" texture. It always depends on the mood of painting I am working on.

It’s very important to know which solvent evaporates faster or slower, because this process has a great influence on a final product. Every time I find something new to apply on a canvas surface, it’s quite amazing and often unexpected, but clearly has a component of practical chemistry.

BS: You have lived in the US and Australia. I understand that you enjoy traveling. How have those experiences influenced you as an artist?

EM: I used to travel a lot. I’ve visited many countries in Europe, lived in the States for three years and also in Japan. Now living in subtropical Brisbane in Australia allows me to paint outdoors all year long because of perfect climate conditions, and I travel much less now. Actually, to me all this travel experience has opened one simple but deep mystery-- that the human soul is always the human soul, and one has to deal with the same "myself being" with the same inner problems and joys everywhere regardless of outside cultural diversity.

BS: Evguenia, your art deals with themes of love, jealousy, hatred, desperation, passion and joy-- you have mentioned that you paint the human soul --can you go into further detail about your work and the message that you strive to convey?

EM: What I meant by this expression is that I cry, laugh or feel a joy through my art. I can give you an example. I painted ‘Pearls Are Running Free’ (image above) when I was having a terrible depression and pain. My painting process was the only remedy to escape suffering. So I got into the world of images and squeezed my feelings into oil.

Pearls are beautiful things, but they also represent a mysterious act of painful creation by a living creature. When a grain of sand gets inserted into a shell, the mollusk suffers and tries to get rid of pain by surrounding it with layers of nacre. The result of suffering is beauty. The difference between the words "pain" and "paint" is just a single letter.

BS: When you say that you paint the 'human soul' are you referring to the spiritual side of life? Is there a degree of spirituality to your work?

EM: The spiritual world is an invisible but very real place to me. In other words, it’s something you know existence of, but can’t see, touch or even explain. How can one explain the process of creating? I think music is another good example. It’s a mysterious complex of thoughts, intuition, feelings of images and sounds. It is always something uncertain that nobody can explain by verbal means. What is really fascinating about art is uncertainty and mystery.

BS: Evguenia, you use a lot of symbolism within the context of your work. Can you tell us about this symbology? Perhaps you could explain the meaning behind certain colors that you use?

EM: I use symbolic meanings of colors that come from Orthodox Christian iconography: red represents suffering; blue – Heaven, sky; dark blue and purple – mystery; gold – Royalty, nobleness etc…I add some contemporary and personal interpretations as well, like for example red in my works represents blood and passions; black – the unknown, mystical; blue – happiness and so on.

BS: So would you say that the essence of your work is about conflict-- about how two opposing forces can mesh together to form a whole? Are you trying to create a sense of stability in the unstable, so to speak?

EM: I don’t try to create a sense of stability. What stability could there possibly be if there is a constant struggle between good and evil inside a human heart? It is always dynamic. On the contrary, I try to show how strong this battle inside our hearts is, and how constant this struggle is.

BS: You mention that art is a confession... are you trying to redeem yourself through your work? Can you go into further detail about this?

EM: It’s very simple. I paint what I feel, what I am thinking about at this very moment, and what I am fighting within myself.

BS: In your opinion, what does art need to have an authentic voice? What does a painting need to be truthful-- and if needed --honest in its brutality?

EM: In my opinion, an artist has to be honest with himself. Never try to imitate someone or to be popular, or to be someone else. I think one’s honesty to oneself is the way to be authentic. About brutality…? If someone paints an ocean of blood it might look too straightforward and even kitschy (in a bad sense). A strong message about death may not look brutal at all, at least at first sight. I mean, you don’t have to copy horrible images of everyday reality to deliver a strong message.


A good example is Picasso’s "Guernica ". I’ve never seen any other painting which describes horrors of war so deeply and strongly. But in order to paint something like this you have to be as talented and profound as him. So finally everything comes to the possession of talent, which nobody can define or describe. You can only feel its presence. And again it is what links oneself to the invisible.

BS: Tell us more about the philosophy behind your work...

EM: The fact that I often paint plain everyday objects is kind of my life philosophy. I find that every humdrum object may have a mysterious meaning. It’s like ancient Greeks described the ‘human-animal-plant-stone-earth’ ladder as a set of interconnected steps. It’s similar to subjects chosen by H. C. Andersen for his fairy tales. If you can find meaningfulness in simple and ordinary things which you can see and touch every day, you can be a truly happy person, because then you live in a fairy tale each day of your life.

BS: Finally, is there anything else you would like to say about your art?

EM: First and foremost, painting makes me happy and gives a clear definition of what is really important in my life and what is not.

You can learn more about Evguenia Men by visiting her website-- www.evmmen.com. You can read more of my interviews by visiting the following page-- www.myartspace.com/interviews.

Take care, Stay true,

Brian Sherwin

Art Space Talk: Derek Ogbourne

Critics have noted that there is no room for comfort in the work that Derek Ogbourne has created. Derek captures the sadness of mortality and the fragility of our existence within the context of his work. He explores our collective fears and weaknesses by creating scenarios that are at times alarming-- scenarios that are charged with a darkly surreal energy that captures our morbid fascinations. Derek is represented by Carter Presents and Galerie Brigitte Schenk.

Untitled Photograph, 24in x 12in, 2007

Brian Sherwin: Derek, you studied at the Slade School of Fine Art. Who were your instructors during those years? Would you like to share any of your experiences at the school with our readers? Also, where else did you study?

Derek Ogbourne: At the Slade we weren’t instructed as such, mostly we were left alone to do what we pleased. My assigned tutor was the performance artist Stuart Brisley, he did a then, well known performance where he sat in a bath full of offal. I had come from a small provincial art school and the Slade, to begin with, threw me off my pedestal.

By the second year I felt more comfortable in London and the Slade. I then enjoyed my time there so much I carried on and did my M.A as well. On second thoughts, I wish I had done my M.A somewhere else or waited a few years until I really needed the discipline to kick me up the arse.

BS: It is my understanding that from 1983 until 1989 your main focus was painting. Can you recall the themes you were exploring at that time? Have those themes remained consistent in the work that you create today in other mediums?

DO: I painted large human sized canvases with organic subject matter, the process was very physical, I had no plan and the paintings evolved into forms that I recognized as part of my subconscious, colour was very much present. I think the organic was an attempt to get in the inside, the very physical process of painting them was the external component, me. I have inherited similar concerns today with my Museum of Optography and with my video works that have been characteristically physical in nature.

Diving for Pearls, oil on canvas, 6ft x 5ft, 1998

BS: Derek, why did you change the direction of your work by making the leap from painting to installation and video art? Was it a sudden change in direction?Also, would you say that your experience as a painter has been a direct influence on your work in other mediums? If so, can you go into detail about that?

DO: To me, it wasn’t a great leap, I was following my line of enquiry in a logical and natural way. I became dissatisfied with creating illusion on a flat surface, I wanted to walk or fly into the space that my paintings portrayed, also I believed the process had its limitations.

My sculptures, on the other hand were interactive, tactile and concrete, no ambiguity. The element of time entered the work with my performance pieces, the process of interaction with the world became more important than icons of the still. Video was an extension of my use of technology in my performances.

Yes, the core language is the same. As a student, I kind of worked my way through the history of art picking things up here and there. My very earliest favorite were the heroic sea paintings by Winslow Homer, they were monumental and cinematic before cinema. Edvard Munch was also a favourite. My influences are very broad and too diverse to mention but you can see strong links from cinema and science.

Still from 'Death and the Monument' 2008

BS: What are you working on at this time?

DO: I’m working on 3 main things: Death and the Monument a near feature film I’ve been working on for around 4 years. To be mega brief: Its about a man that edits out and collects the film frames that follow disaster, See: www.derekogbourne.net/modules/articles/article.php?id=10. I am building The Museum of Optography in miniature for the Museum of Optometrists in London and a virtual Museum for Goggle earth. I am also producing a series of organic drawings that are a cross between rotting retinas and cartographic maps.

Rotten, pencil on paper 59in x 85in (detail), 2007

BS: Can you tell us about your process? How does your work come into being? Perhaps you could select one of your more recent works and describe the early stages of that piece. Place us inside your head, so to speak.

DO: This is a difficult question. All I can give you is some metaphorical answers in the hope that you will get an idea: In a way it’s often like returning to see an old friend where both of you have very gradually changed, or it is like voluntarily getting lost in the wilderness and then eventually realizing you have your compass in your pocket. One of my needs is to be more effective in putting across my ideas even if this means changing the medium. I don’t see a lot of difference between making a film and making an installation, it’s all the same root language.

The Museum of Optography, my show at Brigitte Schenk Gallery, was a return to the organic and of my earlier concerns but with the element of small fractions of time on a micro level, the border between life and death. The physicality of my video pieces relates to trauma connected with a time years ago when I was thumped in the eye in the street, quiet out of the blue, this made me fear (for a week or so) walking across the road. A singular event that has spawned a whole body of work, especially the video pieces.

Struggle, video still, 1997

BS: Derek, now that we know a little about how you think... where can we see your work? I know that you are currently represented by Galerie Brigitte Schenk and Carter Presents. What exhibits do you have planned with them in 2008? Will you be involved with any art fairs? Also, where can we see your art online?

DO: The galleries I’m with usually decide on the fairs they participate in, the last one was Miami Art fair in December 07.

This year, I am going to do a piece in The British Optical Association Museum and a solo at Area 53 Gallery, Vienna, Austria, they have has asked me for their representation. I am also looking to publish the second volume of The Shutter of Death, Museum of Optography entitled Encyclopedia of Optography. The publisher Re/Search is very interested and I am hoping they will publish it, if not, I will be on the hunt for a good publisher.

www.derekogbourne.net/modules/articles/article.php?id=16

www.college-optometrists.org/index.aspx/pcms/site.college.What_We_Do.museyeum.museyeum_home/

My website is www.derekogbourne.net

Museum of Optography, 2007
BS: Speaking of art fairs, what is your opinion about them? I've noticed that there is some debate over how they may change how brick and mortar galleries function. Critics have suggested that in the future galleries will grow to depend on art fairs in order to thrive. Others have mentioned that art fairs, due to the amount of work exhibited, may change how art is viewed by the public in both positive and negative ways. What is your opinion?

DO: To begin with I hate art fairs, why? Because the art fair is more and more about a short and intense media event in a time where art is increasingly about celebrity and surface, rather than art of depth and integrity, all the vulgarity to do with the art world is condensed into the corporate fair. Very often the art that is produced is specifically for the fair or more sellable examples of an artist’s work.

If your work is sexy, colourful, large, slick and maybe mildly controversial then this is perfect for the art fair. In a way you can’t blame the galleries, the corner shop art gallery cannot rely solely on passers by to bring the money in. I think galleries are already fair hopping in order to survive.

Still from 'Gravity and Others' 2002

BS: Derek, I'd like to close this interview with a few question pertaining to your involvement in the academic side of art. You have taught and lectured at several institutions-- including, Goldsmiths College, Cavendish College, Wimbledon School of Art... at what point did you know that you wanted to be an educator as well as a working artist?

DO: It was the natural thing to do, work as an art tutor. I’ve had loads of crap jobs like working in Pizza Hut and packing bibles, before teaching. I wouldn’t recommend it if you want to make a living, especially in London. I love giving talks on my work, in a way it’s like thinking out loud. Many students find it difficult to talk about their work, I did to begin with, but the more you do and the more you live with your work the more natural enthusiasm you have.

BS: How did you find balance between being an instructor and creating your personal art? Does one conflict with the other? Have you ever felt that your academic pursuits held you back-- or did those experiences enhance your personal work?

DO: This is very difficult. Energy is too dispersed. On the positive side with teaching it does enable me to re-evaluate my own position and practice as an artist, I do learn all the time.

BS: It often seems that art students allow the medium they choose to define their direction-- for example, a painter will remain a painter because that is what a painter does. Would you say that artists, especially students, need to instead focus on defining the medium within the context of a greater direction that goes beyond the confines of any single medium?

DO: Yes, I agree limiting yourself is never a good policy if you want to go forwards as an artist, however there is a place for the obsessive attachment to one form or idea. The trauma due to my wack to the eye is a good example. I used to (when I was a student) try and define art all the time, I had a new definition every week. Now I don’t discourage the practice because we should always be evaluating what we do.

Untitled Photograph, 24in x 12in, 2007

BS: What other advice do you have for art students?

DO: To begin with don’t be fussy about the shows you are asked to be in, although still aim for bigger and better shows. The more exhibitions you are in the more likely you will be offered venues that are more prestigious and you will get a better deal.

Don’t teach if you think you’ll make a good living. Put two fingers up to your tutor at the end of your studies and go your own way. Following your parents, a teacher can be one of the most influential people in your life, so trying to rid yourself of paternal influence will turn out to be futile because nurture and nature will creep in later with vengeance.

I find the hardest thing to achieve is objective distance from your work. This takes time and you can never fully achieve it.

BS: Finally, is there anything else you would like to say about art in general?

DO: My father always says to me "Get a proper job" even after 28 years. But I’m afraid I love it, perpetual play time!

You can learn more about Derek Ogbourne by visiting his website-- www.derekogbourne.net. You can read more of my interviews by visiting the following page-- www.myartspace.com/interviews.

Take care, Stay true,

Brian Sherwin