Student Interview
Questions (in bold) focused on my Cherry Biter paintings.
What inspired you to make the series 'biting’?
The color red was my jumping off point. Initially, as arbitrary as it may sound, I simply wanted to make red paintings.
I started brain-storming, trying to think of subjects that are intrinsically red. Answers abounded but mouths first, and then cherries, really resonated for me in light of my ongoing fascination with physical experience, especially in a historical era characterized by the decline of touch due to our increasingly digital culture.
Why this sense?, why close ups + warm colour palette?
Regarding color, see above. As for this sense, these paintings are about multiple senses: the taste of the cherry, the immensely gratifying feeling of crunching a firm, ripe cherry in your teeth, the satisfaction of hunger-all of it. At the end of the day these works depict hedonism: uncomplicated sensual pleasure and nothing else. The tight crop in this and all of my work enables me to be very specific.
Benefits behind the series biting?
It was a huge departure from the work I’d done before it so creatively it was a massive breakthrough. I really honed my tolerance for painting fine detail articulating the lips and tongue, something I had trouble cultivating the patience for prior to this series.
And, this work has been included in two museum exhibitions and has sold well.
What materials used and why?
I work with oil on canvas almost exclusvely. It’s luscious color and consistency are ideal for expressing these visceral, sensual subjects.
Oil painting wet-on-wet is a tight-rope act for sure, but the gorgeous “accidents” that show up in the juxtaposition of painterly marks and colors sliding apart and meeting provide brilliant flashes of pure joy that more than make up for the arduous task of wrangling this unruly substance into recognizable imagery.
What artist inspired you to create this series?
The Cherry Biter idea just popped into my head. As ridiculous as it may seem, I was not situating this work within the context of art history, contemporary or otherwise.
That said, I have forever been influenced by a professor whose enthusiasm for the Abstract Expressionists bordered on obsession. The way he talked about paint and gesture, the visceral nature of creating in this wild and life-affirming manner, embracing chance... that has underpinned my approach to painting since day one. But in general, I am motivated more by ideas and, in this work especially, sensations. Additionally, although I had not yet seen and therefore cannot claim to have been inspired by it, the work of Marilyn Minter shares a lot visually and conceptually with these paintings. Other than Minter, Warhol comes to mind, maybe James Rosenquist too. I have been very inspired by photography, advertising and cinema too: The eery, vivid imagery in David Lynch movies, Diane Arbus and William Eggelston photographs, gigantic Calvin Klein underwear ads on the sides of buildings…these things speak to me - loudly.
How did you become an Artist? What is your story?
I've always loved making art. When I was a little kid it was determined before I can even remember that I had some kind of talent for it.
I coasted on that through elementary school and high school, but when I went to college I was rudely awakened by a "bad" grade from a drawing teacher. He gave me a “C” (THE definition of mediocrity over here in America). I was aghast! Haha! Suddenly I was expected to really work at this thing that had come so easily to me. But ultimately that grade was a gift. And a sort of compliment too. Even though the work I did in that class looked pretty good, the teacher knew that I was capable of more and they let me know this by poking me where it hurts: in the ego!
I got an “A” (the highest mark) in the second semester which felt good, but the lesson to push the boundaries of my abilities and to take risks was the more valuable prize.