56Bogart

Rebecca Riley

Tue, 28 May 2013 19:36:57 -0400

Cody Rae Knue sits down with artist Rebecca Riley in her studio.

56B: Tell me a bit about yourself and how you became an artist.

RR: That’s a long story because it’s been a long time. [Laughs] I always wanted to do art but I wasn’t one of those people that got into art because I was super talented or precocious. I just decided when I was little that I wanted to make art and I worked my butt off. I went to Carleton College in Minnesota, then worked for a while teaching and later received my MFA in Painting at Pratt. Once in New York, it look me a while to get the ball going, but once I got into my groove, I stayed focused and began with the Big Bang series of paintings.

56B: When did you move to New York?

RR: In 1986. I used to have a studio in Tribeca but that got very expensive. It had rats because they had so much construction going on.

56B: Your works remind me of petri dishes. They’re very molecular, like cellular systems.

RR: After grad school, I began making very linear paintings, with scribbles everywhere. The idea came out of abstract expressionism where you paint, then respond, then paint, then respond and so on. At the time, the teachers at Pratt were second generation Abstract Expressionist, who where very influential to us, but I was fed up with having to a make a decision all the time. It was too conscious. I wanted to get into my subconscious and see what would happen if I didn’t have to make too many decisions. What’s the simplest line I could make? It was a line going across the paper and that’s what began my Stack paintings. Still though, I wanted to get even further into my subconscious and not think at all. When you’re on the phone and doodling, you’re not thinking about what you’re drawing. It’s completely subconscious.

56B: That’s interesting because when I look at your work, they’re so intricate, it seems like everything is extremely planned out.

RR: In a way they are. Instead of making decisions as I worked, I made all the decisions up front. For all these paintings, I’m going to make circles. The circles will be yellow and I will paint them in with blue. I want to see what happens with different boundaries. After those initial guidelines, I wouldn’t think about the painting. Eventually my decisions became more complex and I began using a Spirograph. It’s a children’s toy that spins around and makes a linear pattern. I would then fill in those lines with my own pattern. It was like a hypothesis, in that way it was scientific.

56B: Why the children’s toy?

RR: It just made the right kind of lines. I like to think of these things as something that grows and continues outside the canvas’ edge. I thought about growth and movement, which is where the cellular pattern or cellular mitosis splitting affect comes from. I was inspired by lichens as well, which is a moss that grows on rocks and they’re one of the only kind of plants that’s almost immortal.

56B: There is a huge amount of natural and scientific themes to your work. How did you get there?

RR: I began exploring what systems are, how they can repeat, how certain patterns reiterate each other, and fractals. I never really got that deep into it except to realize what I was making. The Mathematics Department at Berkeley put my work on a pamphlet and told me they were visualizations of their pattern but I was approaching it in a different way. These patterns I was creating reminded me of the ones I saw in physics books, but I was much more interested in the aesthetics of it rather than the science.

56B: How did your Maps series evolve out of this?

RR: I felt I needed some sort of outside content and wondered what would happen if I applied these systems to maps.

56B: At first you can’t tell they are maps, we only know because you’ve told us. As you look at it more, though, the viewer begins to recognize those geographical points.

RR: Again, it’s a lot about growth. I see the maps are growing objects. If I took a map, instead of the lines from the Spirograph, I use the streets and rivers as the lines to structure my paintings around. Within those boundaries, I implement the same “cell dividing” from previous paintings. I had a show about called 75 Mile Radius, which focused on density in New York, Boston, Washington D.C., and Baltimore. I used density to base the patterns off of.

56B: So there is a method to your madness.

RR: It’s all madness. That’s practically what it is. I don’t paint the blue areas, the ocean or rivers, because unlike city lines, water flows over boundaries and needs to be free. With the patterns, the smaller patterns are more dense areas. Mostly the colors are inspired of the legend of the map or I intensify the colors already on the map. I’m curious about the existing pattern of the city and utilizing it.

56B: I look at these works like brains, everything connecting to itself. There’s a lot of movement to your work.

RR: Yes. It’s all very organic. After working with patterns for so long I think there really is a limited number of patterns in the world. The sort of veiny, sprawling lines, which I think are really beautiful, are in so many different things and I love that. Right now I’m working on more sculptural drawings. I had a space at the Flatiron Prow and I connected several maps together by hanging them. I can break free of the canvas.

56B: I love that you’re taking the pieces from the canvas to hanging sculptures.

RR: Well that’s encouraging! I’ve never worked in three-dimensional but it’s very different working with all dimensions on all sides, figuring out what will connect and what won’t. I like the idea of them being in constant transformation. I’m entranced by this idea of water creatures, water growths, almost like trees. I’m using the blue parts, the rivers to make these installations all over the place. I’m not sure what I’m going to do yet.

56B: It’s good to have new challenges.

RR: Yes, definitely. If I hadn’t done the sculptural piece for the Flatiron Prow, I would never have tried my new pieces.

For more information visit: www.rebeccarileyart.com

Polluted Eyeball Screen Printing

Fri, 17 May 2013 12:17:43 -0400

Cody Rae Knue sits down with Peter McGouran, founder of Polluted Eyeball Screen Printing

PM: This building is really interesting. I’ve been here for six years. I’m the longest tenured studio on this floor and have seen many people come and go. It can be great as you become friends with them but a lot leave eventually.

56B: It must be nice to always have a community around.

PM: Totally. Everyone has his or her own project. I’m the only screen printer, business wise on this floor.

56B: How did you get involved with screen printing?

PM: I originally worked in music management, for two managers in Manhattan. One of the bands they represented broke up and the singer formed a new band. They got a development deal from a label and I got in contact with the singer since I was looking for employment. I didn’t want to be a manager but he needed someone to book studio time, and I agreed to help out until he could find someone to take over. It was great because I had been a fan of the band and now I was able to be on the inside of it. It was really exciting.

56B: When did this happen?

PM: That was in 1999, so going back a ways. I was 25. I had graduated college but I still didn’t know what I wanted to do career wise. It took for me up until 30 before I knew what I wanted to set my mind to. I didn’t know what my strengths were. Working with the band I was around a creative group and everyone had a role, so I started doing their merchandise. A friend of ours had screens designed, which we then printed onto t-shirts. Each piece was a one of a kind.

56B: Did Polluted Eyeball start around then?

PM: No, not until in 2004. I moved to 56 Bogart in 2006. Prior to that I was in Williamsburg.

56B: What made you move over here?

PM: My building had been purchased and my landlord owned this floor, which was the blue print for the rest of the building.

56B: You saw this area really transform then.

PM: Yeah. There have been great changes and some less so. As anyone knows, when this happens, rent goes up, but I enjoy having simple needs at my footstep. I feel like the neighborhood has passed me by in certain respects. I’m 38 now and I’m working all the time. I’m not experiencing it the same way I was when I first moved to Brooklyn. I lived in Williamsburg and spent days and nights with the bands. I was a part of something great. Although, when I look at Polluted Eyeball, I am a part of something better because this goes further for me. This is my project while the band was someone else’s.

56B: Do you make your own work here or is a client base focus?

PM: It’s a higher percentage for clients, because it’s how I make a living. I don’t have as much time anymore for my own work, but I have never had a problem with that because I get to work with some really cool artwork.

56B: That’s very exciting. Do you work with local artists or larger companies?

PM: Mostly with artists but I also work with designers. Since most everything is digital now, people will come to me because they want a screen print feel for a project.

56B: What do you enjoy the most about screen printing?

PM: When I look at the artwork on the wall, I know how and when all of them were made. I teach workshops here and I can use them as examples. For me teaching is great because I am able to pass that knowledge onto someone else. What they do with it, that’s up to them, but I’m giving them information that I didn’t have when I began. I’m a self-taught screen printer. Everything up here is from commitment. I’m happy I don’t have to sit down at a desk, but I’m on my feet 12-14 hours a day. It involves a lot movement and a lot of problem solving. You have to be preparing for X, Y, Z, before they happen.

56B: I have to ask, where did the name Polluted Eyeball come from?

PM: It’s part of the lyrics from a Guided by Voices’ song, Come on polluted eyeballs, stop scabbing out the fields. It had a special meaning to me at the time.

Polluted Eyeball Screen Printing hosts workshops through out the month. For more information and a schedule check out www.pollutedeyeball.com

Mellow Pages Library

Mon, 06 May 2013 21:17:09 -0400

Cody Rae Knue sits down with Jacob Perkins and Matt Nelson, founders of Mellow Pages Library.

JP: The soundtrack today in the Library is Nirvana, MTV: Unplugged from 1992.

56B: How long have you guys been open?

JP: Since February 21^st of this year, so two months.

56B: With so much of the book world going digital, doesn’t it seem a bit risky to have a library and reading room?

JP: That’s not a risk for us. It was my studio, so I’m already paying for it. It was more of an experiment.

56B: Would you classify this as an art piece then?

JP: More of a social project.

56B: Are you both artists?

MN: We’re both writers, Jacob is a painter.

JP: I paint too, that’s what I went to school for. I started writing a ton in my studio and not painting at all. At a certain point I felt like the room was wasted on me.

56B: Where did the library idea come from?

JP: Matt was going to move back to Seattle after school and do something similar to Mellow Pages.

MP: No, what I planned on doing was an archive of small press books with a book-signing component. I was trying to get it set up with a friend of mine and we were going to do it legitimately as a non-profit with boards of directors.

56B: How does the Library run? Do you curate what is shown?

JP: Yeah, you don’t just come in here, check out books and take it home. We have memberships, but as far as money is concerned, it’s free. You can bring us ten books, leave them here, people check them out and at the end you can get them back. That’s where the curating comes in. We’ll only accept certain things. Our mission is to support small press publications. We want to feature fiction and poetry.

56B: Besides having the space already, was there a reason to set up shop here?

JP: Well that was the reason why. It just felt like the perfect spot. It’s a studio and a commercial space, so we can do whatever we want with it. We wouldn’t have done it anywhere else.

56B: How many publications do you have?

JP: Of what we have catalogued and on Good Reads, almost 1,200, but there are at least a hundred to two hundred more, especially when you start looking at the zines and the journals. We aren’t really cataloguing those, so I would say we are getting close to 1,400.

MP: It doesn’t look like it’s that much stuff, but when you start actually counting stacks and how many books it takes to go up to the top, it adds up.

56B: I love the way you display the books on nails, it’s almost like they’re pieces of art.

MP: We were trying to think of cool ways of displaying them. We thought of shelves but these walls are just straight dry wall. It just seemed the smartest way, functionally. Plus it just looks cool.

JP: Yeah, it was the cheapest and the fastest. Once we decided to do this, it was like: go!

MP: Yeah there wasn’t a lot of time between once said this is our place and actually making it our place.

56B: Are a lot of these books from your personal collection?

JP: Yeah but there is more than double since we got started. I think we had 700 books at first. Matt probably had 250, my brother had almost 300 that I rescued from North Carolina. He went to school there and when he moved back home to Portland, he left all his books in North Carolina. At one point I went down there to rescue a guitar, an amp and all the books with a rental car. Two days after I got the books, we decided to start Mellow Pages. That was sort of the reason why we thought to do this because I had a ton of books here.

MP: His brother’s books are interesting because they’re all very dense: philosophy, political and abstract. Someone came in here today looking for a specific book, which we had, and Luke, Jacob’s brother, had written notes in all his books.

JP: I think that guy just wanted to read it for the notes. He was doing his PHD and writing his dissertation on political theory, so he took notes with that frame of mind. My brother would draw a whole box around a paragraph and write four or five words to sum it up so he could go back later for that one specific paragraph.

56B: Do you have any recommendations for Summer reading?

MP: Tons of stuff. The book I’m reading now, “Crapalachia,” it’s Scott McClanahan latest book, it’s [pauses] amazing.

56B: What was your favorite book that made you want to read?

JP: My favorite book of all time is Hatchet.

MP: [Laughs] Really? That’s the good book.

JP: That was the first book that had chapters that I really liked. It was fourth grade and what I was into then. That book took over my life. I started reading anything because of Hatchet.

MP: I’d say my favorite was The Phantom Tollbooth.

56B: Do you have any plans to continue the library?

MP: Forever!

JP: We have year long memberships. We just got another one today, so for at least another 365 days.

MP: That’d be a cool way of doing this. As long as we have members, another commitment to that year. Yeah! This one is for you Chris!

For more information:www.facebook.com/MellowPagesLibrary

Robert Henry Contemporary

Fri, 12 Apr 2013 13:10:00 -0400

Cody Rae Knue sits down with Robert Walden and Henry Chung, owners and directors of Robert Henry Contemporary.

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56B: How did you get started with the gallery? You also run a vintage store, Robert Henry Vintage.

RW: That’s actually how it started; we opened a vintage house ware store, mostly from the 60’s and 70’s, in 2008. Since we had wall space we started showing artwork, our own work and that of our friends’. It was a great way to get people into the store. Now five years later we’re doing this. It just became something else.

HC: Robert and I are both artists as well. Using the wall space in our store to show work was just a logical decision. But at some point it really took over and we had to move the house wares online. Our retail space became purely an art gallery.

56B: You use to be in South Slope, when you did you migrate to Bushwick?

RW: We opened here on June 1^st of last year.

56B: What brought you to 56 Bogart?

RW: Oh well, the aura that is Bushwick. We were fairly isolated in South Slope and we needed to be in a place that had more foot traffic for art. Bushwick proved to be that place for us.

56B: What made it the perfect fit?

RW: A community of like-minded people and affordability.

HC: The lack of community over where we were before was really very difficult for us because we were so isolated. We were far. [Laughs] It made it difficult to see what else was going on. Here we have this huge community of peers that we can talk to, throw ideas around with and even have meetings with other gallerists in the neighborhood. Everything feeds off everything else. When we have openings the crowd is more than double [than the South Slope location], especially when our openings sync up. That would never happen at our old space. They would have their opening and we had ours; there was no cross over.

RW: There were four galleries, including us. Sometimes we would we have openings on the same night but galleries were fairly spread out, it lacked critical mass. It’s an analogous to an artist working in his or her studio and never showing beyond the studio. Some people are satisfied with that and that’s fine, but to me it fundamentally misses a huge part of what art is: the engagement with other people.

HC: We have a responsibility with the artists that we work with. Having a space where nothing happens is pointless; it’s kind of a disservice to us as a gallery and to the artists. In a community like this, when we have openings, people are actually seeing [the artwork]. We get people who are blogging and people who are writing in various publications.

56B: What would you like to see happen to this area? It’s getting really built up but still a small, intimate community.

HC: I hope to see it continue to organically grow. I think what often happens with neighborhoods like Williamsburg or Red Hook, and even Long Island City, is it gets to a point where we are now, then people try to make it more and pump in money but all too quickly. That has a potential to really stop a wonderful thing right in its track. Not to say that I don’t want to see it grow, we all want to see it grow.

RW: Change is inevitable. Once a neighborhood is “discovered”, real estate people move in and prices go up. That squelches the ability for things to happen organically and for people to experiment

HC: Exactly, but we don’t want to see it change so quickly or so drastically that it ruins the character. People begin to show safe stuff because they need to pay the bills.

56B: Most of the work you show are drawings and collages, why that focus?

HC: We started showing art that we liked at our original space and it just happen to be that kind of work: some what abstract, some what minimal, and very conceptual. It’s a personal preference and our programming reflects that.

RW: It’s extremely personal. We don’t show what we wouldn’t own.

56Bogart: That’s a good motto to go by.

RW: We know galleries that show works because they think they can sell them. I don’t want to show work that I’m not aesthetically and conceptually engaged with. Why should I promote something that is not of any interest to me? It’s a particular way to run a gallery and I don’t think it’s unusual. It’s just having a point of view. Clients go to galleries or specific gallerist for their point of view. The gallery is the liaison with the artist and to be someone the client can develop a relationship with. To me that becomes difficult if the works shown at a gallery have no relationship to each other whatsoever.

56B: Totally. I think it allows you to reach out to a specific audience, because you are just as involved as they are.

HC: Yeah and people comment sometimes that we talk so well about the artist that we show and about the artwork. The reason is we are very much engaged; we really, really love the work we show.

RW: Yeah, it’s another aspect of building community. We have a community with our artists, we’re friendly with all of them, and we don’t show anyone we don’t know. We very much like knowing whom we work with, because it builds trust. It’s just more enjoyable for us. It creates a micro community, as well as making our interactions with the broader community more interesting and more meaningful.

56B: How long have you been working together?

RW: Six years?

HC: Yeah. Wait, no, four years and we’ve been together for six years, or is it seven? Yeah, seven.

56B: It’s great to see a couple working together. What’s your favorite part about owning a gallery?

HC: Well part of it is being surrounded by art all the time. I hadn’t really thought about it until someone mentioned it to me and I though “Oh wow, yeah!” It’s very nice but also being social, especially in this neighborhood. There’s a lot people we know, even from before we moved here, that are a part of this community. On any given weekend they come in and just chat, even strangers. It’s very social, I enjoy that quite a bit.

56B: I’ve been wondering, how did you decide whose name goes first in your name?

RW: Well, that was a long process.

HC: Originally we were going to call it Waldung.

RW: It didn’t catch on as well. [We all laugh] It actually started with the vintage store and we wanted it to be the name of person. We wanted it to sound like a person’s store rather than a company store.

HC: Henry or Robert could be a last name but we decided that Robert Henry had a better flow.

RW: Consequently, I’m often called Mr. Henry.

Robert Henry Contemporary is currently exhibition Louise Dudis, Eye Level with the Smallest Leaf. They will be participating in Bushwick Basil and Bushwick Open Studios, as well as having a rare group exhibition.

www.roberthenrycontemporary.com

Naomi Edmondson interviews Casey Opstad.

Tue, 09 Apr 2013 12:23:00 -0400

Naomi Edmondson speaks to Casey Opstad.

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56B: Tell me about yourself, Casey.

CO: Excellent first question, Naomi. I grew up in in Grand Forks, North Dakota. I went back to school for a Masters in Painting. I went in 2009 and graduated in 2011. I always think people that grew up in North Dakota end up having a better imagination. You grew up in Brooklyn, you’re used to the stimulus. There’s stimulus in North Dakota, but only so much variance. You end up with a better imagination, because you’re able to keep yourself entertained.

56B: I can imagine that.

CO: My favorite gift was a drawing pad or a blank sheet. That is how I feel about North Dakota. I see it as a blank sheet of paper: you can put whatever you want there. You can make it whatever you want.

56B: This leads to my next question: who are your influences?

CO: That’s a good question too. I guess I should be honest about this?

56B: It’s always nice when you’re honest about these things.

CO: Honestly, I’d have to say my parents. They were always supportive. I have two great parents who never really questioned what I was doing. When you tell your parents you’re going to try to make it as an artist…well, our generation is a little different. But it can be difficult for that generation to understand. I also had some good art teachers growing up. Again, really supportive people. One teacher in particular was named Ryan Alson. He’s a pretty well known artist, but keeps it low key. He influenced me with his directness and his focus on drawing. I do think drawing is an important thing. I think a lot of people now, what with technology, don’t want to take the time to learn that skill.

56B: It’s becoming a dying art.

CO: Pun intended! I see it as sort of a metaphor. He taught me how to draw. Once given that ability, you’re able to see how the world is formed for yourself and others. The idea of the gaze…of what I want to look at is an important one.

56B: I agree. Drawing fosters the ability to discover your own gaze and your own point of view.

CO: Yeah. When you don’t learn to look, you end up stereotyping a lot of things. You end up assuming you know what you’re seeing. Seeing sort of becomes a metaphor for making decisions and living your life, and taking the time to really look.

56B: With that in mind, how did you get into art?

CO: It was one of the first things I was really good at and for which I was complimented. Growing up in North Dakota, I was really good at drawing log cabins. I was complimented on it. That became the way I received attention. But I also had a lot of different interests, including improv. comedy and theater. Then as I get older it became, “Do I want to be an actor? What do I want to pursue?”. Art was the area where I felt I had the most talent. It’s the one thing I do where time seems to stop. I mean, it happens on stage for musicians and it happens for me when I paint or draw. It’s sort of an indicator that you’re having a good time; when time completely vanishes.

56B: I wanted to get into the series of work I saw on your website.

CO: Yeah, there are a bunch of different things going on. The chalk drawings are erratic. I got this job doing chalk drawings and it’s been hectic.

56B: I really wanted to talk to you about the chalk drawings because I think they’re fascinating.

CO: I got this job with General Assembly on 20^th and Broadway. It’s sort of an incubator for high tech companies. It’s a really great business that is expanding. I knew the other co founder of General Assembly. When Steve Jobs passed, he called me to come draw a tribute of him on the company’s chalkboard. I get over there, put together a file. People are used to working on a white space with black material. So it fascinated them that I was doing the opposite. It takes a moment to adjust to that. I think they liked that bit of magic. Once I finished, they liked the portrait so much that they commissioned me to do a total of 24 pieces over the course of a year. They’re huge, probably six by ten feet.

56B: How long would you say it takes you to finish a chalk drawing?

CO: I’ve gotten pretty good at it now and there’s not much lettering. People assume if you can draw you can letter and that’s not the case. [He laughs]. It takes about three to five hours, depending on the level of detail.

56B: I want to ask about the selection process. The portraits chosen are very varied.

CO: The General Assembly wanted to choose people that have created things. They wanted to foster entrepreneurs, and people that are creating something out of nothing. Usually I give them three or four options and they’ll talk to me about them. For example, when MCA (Adam Yaunch, founding member of The Beastie Boys) passed away, right away they were like “Let’s do this.” That would be an example, because musicians create music out of nothing.

56B: Thus far, do you have a favorite portrait?

CO: Oh, good question. It would have to be the Phillip Glass portrait. There was something about it. It was his face and after it was finished, I started listening to his music more. I worked from a good photo and he has an interesting face. He has a really strong face, plus the iconic glasses. That was a turning point: when it became more about the drawing process. It was less about being precise.

56B: How did you get into chalk as a medium?

CO: They asked me to use it at General Assembly and it was the first time I ever used it. It’s kind of like pastels. But if you look at the drawings from the beginning to where I am now, they’re not very good. I mean, you can tell that it’s Steve Jobs. However, I didn’t trust my hand to do line variations. As I went along, I realized it’s a lot like pastels and pencils. But yes, it came through General Assembly. What’s so weird is that when I got that job, a lot of other people started doing chalkboard drawings for their offices. So now, seven or eight different jobs will call me up.

56B: Was that intimidating at first, since chalk is a new medium for you?

CO: Not really. My philosophy is: the advantage of the artist is having nothing to lose. I can tell you what I think, because what are you going to take from me? I’ll give it a shot and if I fail, I fail. I’d rather ride that edge. Even if the artist doesn’t like it, they can always burn it or paint it over. There’s always a new beginning.

56B: My last question: Do you have any words of advice for your fellow artists?

CO: Yes, I do have a bit of advice. Firstly, don’t ever take advice from me [He laughs].

Second, slow and steady always wins the race. The way I view it, it’s all about consistency. I’m not in this for the next five years; I’m in it for the long haul. That’s the only way to live, and do it right. Take it one step at a time. I’m sure that sounds hokey.

56B: It’s never hokey if it’s true.

For more information: www.caseyopstad.com

Magdalen Wong

Fri, 29 Mar 2013 15:42:20 -0400

Cody Rae Knue speaks with Magdalen Wong in her studio at 56 Bogart.

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56B: Tell me about yourself and how you got started with art?

MW: I actually got started at a young age, with my identical twin sister. We would always draw and paint; basically that’s all we did. We were always together and did everything together. We even went to the same art school, Maryland Institute College of Art. It was great, we could compare work with each other and I think that helps a lot because it pushed our work in different directions. After college we kind of split, she went to Pennsylvania and I went to Chicago. That was when I really started to realize that, oh yeah, we’re actually quite different. We have different interests and we do different things. I started to move towards more performative, sculptural work and she moved towards painting and illustration.

When I was getting my MFA at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, I really got interested in the little details of every day life. I would make musical scores from the nutrition facts on cereal boxes, or attach microphones to kites so you could listen to the sky while you fly it. I continued that investigation of the every day in a lot of my work, but in smaller and more intimate pieces.

After Chicago, I went back to Hong Kong to teach art for a few years. I got so tired and exhausted, a little bit depressed that I didn’t have time or energy to work on my art. I quit teaching two years ago and started doing residencies. That was really, really refreshing. I started making work again, little sculptures, projects and larger installations. It was a combination of everything.

56B: Your work has a lot humor to it, which is refreshing since art shouldn’t always be taken so seriously. Art is really funny sometimes.

MW: [Laughs] Yeah! Even though it’s humorous, I still think it’s still crucial and critical. I want to use a funny voice to talk about that.

56B: Is there a reason behind why you use every day objects? Such as the piece Chain or American Holiday Package.

MW: Yeah, I think that, even though I’m a studio-based artist, it’s very difficult for me to stay in a studio too long. It’s hard to just think up an idea, but what helps is to go shopping. [We both laugh] Not because I’m a girl! It’s mostly window-shopping, just to look. My favorite thing is grocery shopping. A lot of my ideas come from the grocery store, looking at what’s around me or going to flea markets and finding the best deal, like a housewife couponing.

56B: Similar to the TV show “Extreme Couponing”?

MW: Yeah! It’s like, oh my god! Watermelons are on sale! So I bought two, but I couldn’t finish them! I started to carve them and do different things to them, that’s how I made the piece Peeled. The Chain piece came from me going to flea markets. I kept coming upon these really cheap golden chains. They look nice but you know it’s obvious someone else has worn it. It doesn’t matter if it’s cheaply made, because there’s a history to it. I bought a bunch of chains and started to think about how to view them. Around that time a lot things started to happen with ordinary objects, such as cleaning detergent, milk and cereal boxes.

56B: So basically you use your art practice as an excuse to shop?

MW: [Laughs] I don’t always buy. I just like to look at things. I collect.

56B: What do you want the viewer to take away from your work the most?

MW: For different works, it is different things, but I always want them to be a bit curious. My objects are pretty ambiguous at times, like the milk splashes (Splashes, 2012 and Splash, 2010): the shapes are so weird. I still want the viewer to be very familiar with the objects, I still want them to be recognizable but for the viewers to stop and think to themselves: “Wait a minute, something is different. Why is it like that?”

56B: The milk splashes are so recognizable, because we see those shapes in ads, on TV and on milk cartons but when we look at yours, there is a realization that something is not quite right.

MW: I like that awkwardness. People will say I’m critiquing the culture they belong to, and one perspective could be that, but on the other hand it’s more about being aware of what’s around you. Maybe you can take the funniest thing out of it, instead of a critique of consumerism…

56B: Besides shopping, what influences you the most?

MW: The minimalists, even though my art uses very recognizable objects and not geometric shapes and solids, I always try to strip it down to the bare minimum. If the piece is about milk, it’s just about the milk. I always really love that minimalist quality in artwork. But at the same time, I’m very contradictory. I also like work that is very busy and obscure, romantic qualities in things. I like the feeling of work distancing the viewer in a very sensitive piece.

56B: Like Sunrise, Sunset, it’s a very romantic piece. It allows the viewer to escape to another world for a while.

MW: Yeah. Sometimes I put Sunrise, Sunset together with Unidentified Fountain. It’s another piece that I really like. It’s just a public water fountain, but when I shot the video, I turned the camera sideways so the water no longer shot straight up. For me that is really great. A water fountain can be a tourist spot or a place for people to go relax, it’s not something that is often looked at as being strange. Usually a fountain is romantic, but when it’s turned that way people don’t know what it is. They think it’s a meteorite and often it’s seen as a very sexual piece. That’s what I like about it, it has multiple meanings and physically weird.

56B: You have exhibited around the world. Where do you enjoy exhibiting the most and where do you think your work is best received?

MW: I don’t know. Each place is so different. Everywhere I go, I am able to make work that is really me. When exhibiting somewhere, I’m asked how my work relates to that culture and society but sometimes I find it very difficult to answer. I don’t want to always make work just because I’m in one specific place. I want to make work because I’m interested in something and maybe it fits in with the location. The funny thing is that no matter where I go, I am always able to find inspiration, which is really great. I won’t say that my work is cultural or country specific but I always use what I find there. In Greece I played with the ATM machines, which were fascinating. In Korea I started to draw the landscapes I found in the food packaging. For some reason it’s the craziest in Korea, they can be really cartoonish. The American ones used to have landscapes but now they just go for big ugly logos or bands of color. I always keep the same size [of the package] and take out all of the words and logo. Since I travel a lot, I collect them wherever I go. I get to try a lot of new things, but sometimes I open a bag and the food is really disgusting but I don’t want to waste it! [Laughs] I just want the packaging!

56B: What is your favorite thing about your studio?

MW: It’s the perfect box. I like the quiet and the privacy. I thought of sharing, but I know me, even if there is a curtain, I would be too conscious about it and wouldn’t be able to focus. I don’t need a big space, just a little cube. Plus it actually has a lot of sunlight. When I’m in my studio, it’s my workspace. Even if I’m not working, I’ll just sit here and stare at my work. There’s no Internet and not much phone reception, so I can be disconnected from the world for a few hours.

Check out Magdalen’s work at www.magdalenwong.com

Peter Calvin

Sat, 20 Oct 2012 17:35:31 -0400

Nikki Refghi speaks with Peter Calvin

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I meet Peter Calvin on the corner of Bogart and Harrison, from where we walk up to his studio in 56 Bogart. The initial dark and gray stairwell gives way to a large floor filled with artist studios. He opens the door, and window light brightens the space. Several paintings hang on the wall, with remnants of Peter’s studio practice below them.

The outwardly soft spoken and poised artist explains that he grew up in Santa Barbara and that his interest in art was initially found within his family. He smiles as he reveals that his sister would hold drawing competitions for which the prize was ice cream.

Calvin seriously found art during his senior year of high school, although he did not yet believe he could make a career as an artist. Only once in college, during which he was initially interested in architecture, he began to realize that art could in fact become a profession. Although he wasn’t originally interested in film, the medium gained significance for Calvin after he participated in a paid project; he noticed that his films were like paintings, of course with the addition of time. As a result, he returned to painting.

A multi-genre artist, Calvin often starts with photographs and pulls paintings from his images. He claims to find the work in the canvas, during the act of creating. I’m reminded of Michelangelo, who believed that the sculpture already existed in the block of stone and needed to be found by the artist. When I ask him about his strangely beautiful mold studies photographs, Calvin laughs and explains that the idea grew out of his fridge. He feels that he always finds himself looking for juxtapositions. Like mold, the landscape in California consists of growth, such as buildings and mountains extending above the land.

Calvin’s advice to emerging young artists is to experiment as much as possible, rather than quickly choosing a path. He emphasizes committing time to art over all, and gaining support from other artists for guidance and feedback.

For more information about Peter Calvin and his works, visit his website:
peter calvin artist/filmmaker or Peter Calvin Artist

Kyu Seok Oh

Sun, 07 Oct 2012 18:23:07 -0400

Naomi Edmondson talks to Kyu Seok Oh.

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56B: Tell me about yourself and how you started with art.

KSO: I was born in Korea, but grew up in Japan from the age of 4, when my family emigrated illegally. I used a new Japanese name because in that time Japanese people looked down on Koreans. We had to be very careful all the time because to be sent back to Korea would be very dangerous. When I was young I wanted to be a mime or an anthropologist, traveling to observe different cultures. Basically I was very interested in human beings and their experiences.

At the age of 16 I was allowed to go on a bicycle trip around Japan, which was the first time I was able to explore and have my own adventure. During my travels I had a lot of my first positive experiences connecting with Japanese people. I found beautiful nature and people working there; farming and fishing. It was really impressive to see people living in and with nature. Their lives were shaped by the landscape they lived in. The trip made a huge impression on me as a 16-year-old boy. When I returned home from my traveling it was the first time I felt I wanted to create something.

56B: Why do you choose to work with paper?

KSO: In Japan I worked with terra cotta, plaster, and bronze as my materials, which are all strong and traditional materials for sculptors. When I moved to New York I wanted to try new materials. I first experimented using thin manufactured wood sticks and craft paper for my work. Using these materials gave me the idea to make my own paper.

56B: Why are sheep the focus of your work? How did the Times Square installation come about?

KSO: In the Spring of 2009 I did an installation called Renka Project with the West Harlem Art Fund in Monte Fiore Park in Harlem. That winter Savona Bailey-McClain, the director of the West Harlem Art Fund asked me if I would be interested in doing an installation in Times Square and to submit a proposal. That spot is very colorful, crowded, and the center of the city, I wanted to bring the opposite taste: quiet, monotone, and the country side. With these ideas I decided to make the sheep. I wanted to make people wonder, “why sheep in times square?” with some kind of surprise. Glenn Weiss, the director of the Times Square Alliance at the time made all the arrangements for the installation and scheduled it to be part of the 2011 Armory, which I really appreciated.

56B: Were there any surprising reactions to the installation in Times Square?

KSO: Once the piece was installed in Times Square, the white paper and steel platform shined with the neon colors of the surrounding signs. I tried to imagine the lights on the white paper while I worked on the sheep in my studio, but it took on a new life once it got there, I never expected the steel platform to reflect the light like it did. Seeing the sheep in Times Square for the first time reminded me of my family first moving to Japan. We were from a small village in Korea and moved to Tokyo. The way the sheep looked small and a little scared in the center of the city reminded me of that experience.

A lot of people kissed and hugged the sheep and sat on the platform, because they wanted to touch the sculpture. In the beginning, I was really scared and screamed in mind when I saw the first person do that. But, as the week of the installation progressed I began to really enjoy how people interacted with the sculpture. I realized this is Times Square not a museum or gallery where you stand at least 5 ft. away. The installation coincided with the 2011 Armory and Times Square Alliance curated the event. This brought a lot of media focus, which surprised me.

56B: Describe your sculpting process.

KSO: The original way to make paper uses tree skin, but this resource is expensive and takes a significant amount of time. So instead I developed a technique to make paper from paper. I shred the paper and blend it with water and glue, so it becomes pulp. I lay the pulp out in thin layers on wire mesh formed with curved shapes. After the paper is dry I remove it from the wire mesh and assemble pieces together to create my sculptures. When making my sculptures, I always try to achieve a natural curve created from the weight of the pulp itself on the wire mesh.

56B: Any words of advice for fellow artists?

KSO: From my experience with public art specifically, I have learned that the only dependable factor is that the plan will change. Whether it’s the date, duration, size, or budget of a project, as an artist you have to be ready to adapt. Most importantly don’t panic.

Slag Gallery

Mon, 20 Aug 2012 09:48:00 -0400

Sean Alday talks to Irina Protopopescu of Slag Gallery.

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IP: I finished school and had a degree in art, but later I went back to school. This time it was dental school, so I have a doctorate degree and I worked as a dentist for some time. I lived in Paris, Italy, New York. Wherever I was I was attending shows.

That was how I met the artists I show now, that and people I knew from graduate school in my country.

56B: And where are you originally from?

IP: Romania.

After all of that time in school and as a dentist, I decided to open a gallery. Prior to moving to New York I spent one final year in Italy and then toured Europe going to all these shows and biennials and wonderful things. So after that year was over I moved and opened the gallery.

Which was an ordeal in itself, I went to the Lower East Side and I went to Chelsea and opened one on 27th street. It was around the time of the crisis but I kept on going and ended up moving here.

56B: When did you relocate to this building?

IP: I moved here in February from Chelsea. I was on the ground floor of a building full of galleries.

I was just looking for another space. I looked first in Chelsea and the Lower East Side. I looked here, knowing so many artists in the area. One of my artists was in a Momenta show which is how I met everyone here. Finally we exchanged emails, I came out and checked out the space. I liked the energy and I really felt that it was a good fit.

56B: How have your shows gone thus far?

IP: From a general perspective: Things are going well.

Each day there are different challenges. I tend to welcome them [laughs]. I enjoy this new type of struggle. I am able to do the shows that I want to do.

56B: Briefly, what are the guiding principles for your gallery?

IP: Basically the guiding principle is pleasure.

I want to keep myself open to finding something new that will instantly grab my attention and imagination. When I choose the works from an artist’s studio, I want to tell a story based on the concept of the show. I install all of the work by myself. I can turn things around in the last minute. I do this so that I have freedom. I need freedom.

56B: How much freedom do you have here compared to your other gallery ventures?

IP: Basically the same amount but I pay less for this… I am able to send the artists to different shows here for example. It’s good both for them and for me, let’s not pretend that this exchange is completely altruistic.

But that is the same as with Bushwick Open Studios. It’s wonderful for the artists and if it’s wonderful for the artist then it’s wonderful for me.

56B: What is your main goal?

IP: Main goal? Hmm… well, I can’t say… it’s not really a business because it’s all pleasure. This is part of a bigger goal, a life goal. I take it day by day trying to make every single moment worth it.

Waking up in the morning and it’s not to an alarm, it’s a reaction to the desire and curiosity to keep going. I don’t even have to be excited to do so, even when I’m sad the curiosity is there.

Annelie McGavin of Studio 10

Mon, 13 Aug 2012 17:06:46 -0400

Sean Alday speaks to Annelie McGavin.

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This interview was conducted as a 6 month follow up in June of 2012.

56B: The last time Larry and I spoke was shortly after he opened this gallery. At the time, he said that he was looking for an intern, but you’re a fulltime employee. Is that correct?

AM: I’m in the gallery three days a week and there are at least two or three additional days a week when Larry and I go on studio visits together. We’re open from Thursday to Sunday. Otherwise I’m collaborating on press releases with the artists for upcoming shows and working on things that don’t have to be done in the office.

But yes, originally Larry was looking for an intern. It became clear that someone else was needed in an authority role to help with the implementation of ideas.

56B: When did you start working here?

AM: Oh, I started here… I suppose right after you spoke with Larry in December. I got the internship through Austin Thomas, whom I met through Ben Godward. We just had good chemistry which is how I started working here officially.

56B: Do you curate any shows?

AM: Yes, Larry and I work collaboratively to curate exhibitions. The group exhibitions require more attention to keep the work together on a thematic level. We’ve only had two of those thus far.

The solo show is relatively easier. It usually involves a studio visit, a conversation and a collaborative vision on what works will be shown.

But everyone is involved in a curatorial capacity. We encourage our interns to get involved so that they have the opportunity to learn to speak about art. Which is an important skill to have.

56B: What kind of art do you like personally?

AM: I tend to like work that’s more on the conceptual side. There is work in this show [Text] that I really enjoy, John’s [Avelluto] work is something I like. I don’t think that humour in art is really necessary but there’s a lightheartedness about his practice that is enduring.

56B: What did you expect to find when you came here?

AM: I didn’t have any preconceived notions of Bushwick. I did expect to find more emerging artists. But other than that, I didn’t know what to expect. I’d never been to Bushwick. I’ve lived in Williamsburg for over a year, and my social group was there and in Manhattan.

Ben [Godward] introduced me to a lot of people out here. I didn’t look at this as a professional arena and I wasn’t necessarily a part of the scene. I can sense it changing for me, which I’m grateful for. I think that this is a great community and I’m glad to be a part of it.

Bushwick street art

Sun, 05 Aug 2012 16:30:23 -0400

Bushwick street art

K.I.D.S. Corner Library

Sun, 05 Aug 2012 16:30:00 -0400

There’s a new library in town!

The K.I.D.S. Corner Library has just moved in next door! Located on the corner of Harrison and Bogart, right across the street from the Morgan L train stop, this little local library was created by artist Colin McMullin. The Library is available for anyone and everyone to use, just stop by NURTUREart Gallery (right next door) to get a library card. Your library card will provide you with the secret code to access the library and check out/return books. Donations are encouraged, especially those that reflect the interests of the neighborhood (BRING US ZINES!) There’s even a special box in the Library dedicated to recipes to add and share.

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Check out the K.I.D.S. Corner Library Tumblr for a list of titles
http://kidscornerlibrary.tumblr.com/

& email thekidsforever(at)gmail(dot)com to get in touch with a librarian for more information!

Eileen Weitzman

Thu, 19 Jul 2012 16:55:00 -0400

Adriana Rabinovitch interviews Eileen Weitzman

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56B: Tell me a little bit about yourself and your practice.

EW: I’m educated, but not art-wise. I didn’t go to school for art and I’m self-taught. In my 20’s I started trying things I thought I might be interested in like music, playing piano, which I enjoyed. I wanted to broaden my horizons more, so I took a course at a park district that was offering oil-painting, drawing, and acrylics. It was a short thing, and I was very surprised that I made a few creative drawings. When I was young, I had hoped to be an artist but I felt I was very rigid so I had stopped. I was about the only person who finished the course, and after that I payed the teacher for some private lessons in oil painting, since we’d hardly gotten into that. Since then I have just developed myself.

56B: I read online that you started as a painter and things started to grow out of the canvas. The oil paint got ‘thicker and thicker’ I think is what you said, and you started to add things to the canvas. Tell me about this transition?

EW: Well, I love texture.

[she shows me one canvas in a pile of about 30 huge paintings in the corner of her studio]

This canvas, for example, I painted over some rope to add the texture under the oil paint. And this one I used some paper-mache. It just finally dawned on me. I like making things. Making three-dimensional things felt more like making things than painting things did.

56B: Because you could create something that you could interact with, walk around?

EW: Yes, and there were fewer rules, actually. It gives a sense a freedom but also makes it more frightening. At least with painting you have this canvas or rectangle or surface or something that you have to fill. With sculpture, it’s completely blank until you figure out what to do with it.

56B: Who are what would you say your primary influences are?

EW: Yes, I’ve certainly been asked that question. I would say that when I did my first real oil painting after that class, which was on one of those oil board type things, didn’t want to start too big, it was certainly Matisse at that time. I loved Matisse and I loved the German Expressionists, particularly Kirchner. There’s certainly many painters I love but I’m not sure there was even any one person in my mind when I was making things. I eventually started really liking people like Eva Hesse and Yayoi Kusama. I also more recently have come to appreciate the work of Annete Messager, especially earlier things. She’s got a show on now, which…some things I like, but I mostly like her older work. She’s very experimental and tries all sorts of things. I like that. I also like the concepts of Sophie Calle. I guess as far as my favorites go, they’re mostly women now. Not that there aren’t many male artists whose work I appreciate.

56B: When I was looking through your photography on your website, I noticed many of the places you visit, like Turkey, India and Egypt, and colors and the textiles that are associated with these cultures. I see a similarity between many aspects of these cultures and you work. Do you feel that this is an influence on you?

EW: I’m sure that it is. I love Islamic design. Old tiles, like in Morocco. That’s why I started going to Middle Eastern Countries. I think I am influenced by them. The tiles, the colors…

56B: Yeah, I see the influence and dominance that pattern has in your work…

EW: One of the first less-frequented, as in not in Europe, places I visited was Senegal. The color and patterns in Senegal are out of this world. It’s unbelievable. India has bright colors and great color combinations but the clothes that they wear are not patterned. In certain African countries though, particularly Senegal and Mali and parts of West Africa, the people put these colors and patterns together that are out of this world. It’s overpowering - a feast for my eyes.

56B: Like your work.

EW: Right. I think when I got to this piece [The Scream (In Living Color) featured below] I felt like I could use any colors and patterns that I want to. I just thought, OK, anything can go together. I can make anything work.

56B: Let’s talk about the titles of your work. I think they’re almost always funny, and they seem to come from cliches and ironic statements. What would you say the relationship is between your work and it’s title? And how important is the title to understanding or appreciating the work?

EW: I generally don’t have a title for a piece when I start. I don’t usually have a lot of the idea either. At some point, I’m figuring out what I’m doing. If I think of a title then, that helps me focus on the work. I love colors and patterns and designs. I’m really interested in space and negative space and it all coming together, not feeling crowded even if there is a lot going on. I have also become interested in, especially within the last 15 years, making some kind of statement. I want my work to be visually appealing and emotional, but it also has a political context. Now, that’s not the most important thing. I really want people to get joy and pleasure out of it, but I also do want to say something. That’s usually where the title comes in. To focus in on what the piece is about. The title gives one a little guidance on how to view the piece.

56B: Your work is reminiscent of children’s toys, which seems to invite people to touch your work. Do you encourage tactile interaction with your work?

EW: I always tell people they can touch my work. …kids love my work. But adults want to touch it too, and I let them. I think one of the reasons I started making sculpture was because I wanted to be able to touch it too.

56B: How long have you been at 56 Bogart?

EW: I’ve been here over 6 and a half years.

56B: How have you seen things change since you moved in?

EW: When I first moved in it was all companies, factories. There was a hat factory next door. I was the third artist in the building.

check out Eileen’s website here: http://eileenweitzman.com/

Meg Hitchcock

Fri, 15 Jun 2012 11:11:00 -0400

Conner Calhoun interviews Meg Hitchcock

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56B: When did you stop doing painting and and start the work that you do now?

MH: I painted for over twenty years and I moved to New York and in 2008 I got tired of painting and I felt like what I was doing had already been said and I had a real passion for sacred writing and started to work with text from the sacred books, just started playing with shapes with all the books from my shelf, which quickly morphed into what I am doing now… I take a holy book and cut it up and turn it into another book. For example, I take a passage from the Quran and create it by using pieces from the Bible.

56B: Do you consider yourself a religious artist?

MH: The word religious makes my head spin to be honest.

I was a born again Christian until I was 30 and I had a lot of experience with fundamentalism, I feel passionately that fundamentalism destroys the spirit, so I consider myself a “spiritual” artist, it just so happens that my materials are sacred text.

I feel that my work reflects the human condition, we are all human and we are all trying to figure out our way in the world and make sense of it. Everyone has their own idea of what life is about and yet we are also these spiritual beings.

It’s complicated, it’s hard to figure out, and those who think they have the answers, really don’t.

56B: Do you think you are humanizing religion… bringing it back to earth?

MH: I guess so, I haven’t put it that way before, but yeah I am humanizing religion and spiritualizing the human experience. I am no longer a Christian but I am definitely not an Atheist, I’m just one of those people who says “I have no idea”, my work is an expression of my spiritual path, but it’s also a practice.

56B: What brought you to this building?

MH: Well some one was telling me about the place so I could tell other people, and then I thought the place was perfect for me. It was a mess but I cleaned it up. It feels like a monk cell sometimes.

56B: Like your own little temple?

MH: It can be hellish sometimes…

People walk by my window and they look in.

56B: Oh, that’s funny [chuckles].

MH: Oh it’s not funny when it’s happening. It’s like ‘what are you thinking’ [towards imaginary peeking toms]? I feel like a fish in a bowl. During the day they cant see me, but during the evening I have to close the curtain.

I will be sitting here and then suddenly I feel this presence and I will be like “ GO AWAY!”

56B: So your work is more of a private matter?

MH: Oh absolutely, I have to be alone; I could never share a studio. The passages that I’m using are from sacred books and they tend to be pretty heavy.

56B: You have a little Buddha over there.

MH: That’s Shiva. NOT Buddha. Sheba does not like to be called Buddha.

56B: I’m so sorry Shiva.

[we both begin to bow to him ]

MH: I don’t worship him; he is very similar to Jesus though.

I cant worship Jesus anymore, its been ruined by my past experiences. When I think of Jesus I think of stale coffee and old ladies eating donuts after church; it completely devoided the meaning, and I found that on my own as an adult, Sheba found me. And it’s just a symbol that has a view of potential.

56B: Do you want to say anything else about your work?

MH: They aren’t meant to be read, because it would be really hard to read them, the line goes upside down. It’s mostly just an energetic shape.

56B: Are your pieces like a visualization of the energy coming from these sacred text?

MH: I guess so, that’s a good way of putting it. How they come out is sometimes in my control and sometimes not.

Inside the Studio of Nathaniel Lieb

Wed, 06 Jun 2012 13:37:47 -0400

Sean Alday talks to Nathaniel Lieb in his studio.

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56B: Tell me about yourself.

NL: I’m an artist.

I started off studying biology in school and moved on to art. I’ve been a working artist since I moved to New York in ’84 or ’85.

I started off in the Bronx and moved a few times between the Lower East Side, Williamsburg and SoHo and then to Greenpoint where I am now.

My studio in Long Island City was there for a while. It didn’t have an address; it was right off the Newtown Creek. One day I saw people taking soil samples and next thing I knew, the building was sold. So that sent me searching for a new space again.

I looked at this building in 2004 or ’05. At that time the landlord was offering half of the floor for lease. But I couln’t get anyone to go in with me, so it wasn’t something that I could swing then. When I had to move from LIC, I came back here and this studio is what I got. Things had changed, prices had changed; Bushwick became interesting for artists to come to because it was the easiest place to get to with affordable rents.

When I did move in, around ’07 I rented two spaces and sublet one out, after the crash I had to let it go. I think that the landlord had rented the third floor to the guys who run Brooklyn Fireproof, and saw that it worked so he decided to do the same thing himself. This was of course between when I first looked and when I finally moved in. He saw the writing on the wall and went from hat makers to art studios.

56B: What were your initial thoughts when galleries started popping up?

NL: Well, I was one of the first people who put on a gallery show in this building. It’s not well known, but the story behind it was a grad-thesis show.

I went to grad school later in my life, so for my thesis show I turned one of the spaces downstairs into a pop up gallery. It showed the landlord that the possibility was there to have an art gallery in the building.

Subsequently, other people rented it for the same purpose. Never for more than a month at a time but it was a nice space.

NURTUREart was looking at the building at the same time that I was looking, they went elsewhere obviously, but ended up downstairs eventually.

I like the feel of the galleries around here… but now that there are so many in this building I find it irritating.

56B: What’s irritating about it?

NL: I feel like I’m posing in my own studio. I’m in an art building now. It feels less like a working building and more like a display.

Granted, they’re on the ground floor and I’m on the fourth floor. I do like NURTUREart, Momenta Art, and Interstate. I think those are good galleries and I like the work that they show.

I think that Interstate is doing the most exciting stuff.

56B: What about the neighborhood art scene outside the building?

NL: What’s most interesting about the Bushwick Renaissance is that multiple generations run the galleries. Younger people are opening spaces and older people are opening spaces. We get a mix of people looking at the work.

For example, the Lower East Side always felt like a young hip scene. I don’t know that I want to be a part of a young hip scene. But out here, the lines are crossing. The energy is good.

56B: Tell me about your work.

NL: A breakthrough piece is hanging on the wall over my editing station. I was doing a hand-eye coordination piece, where I tried to make a perfect cube in six cuts. And at one point I was working with a handsaw, the piece on the wall is made up of a lot of scraps that I just left on the floor for a while. I tripped over them until I moved them.

As I moved them I looked at it and realized that I could put them back together like a jigsaw. I pulled all the pieces that I could find, and put it back together with glue and a clamp.

Afterwards, I found myself running down the hall to tell my neighbors. I kind of realized that I don’t really do that with my work. I realized that that was important, that excitement. It wasn’t about refining it to a beautiful little piece; it was more about completing a feat. For me the feat became important, because that’s what I was making when I conceived it, not a refined and polished piece.

The work has become more about what it’s like being a human with my particular traits. We all have pride, we keep track of things, we share experiences, and we perceive time differently. In the midst of all this I’m doodling, playing games like children would.

I like to make things.

Hold on for a moment, [he picks up a large glassy stone]. This is obsidian. It’s part of my new work in progress. I want to develop different skill sets and document the process. I’m going to start by making stone tools because that’s when man became man. And I’m a little intimidated to make the first strike [laughs].

I’ll probably tape it.

56B: Will you use the tools that you make, to create more work?

NL: It’s not so much that I want to employ the tools. Obsidian is really too soft anyway, also I’m not a survivalist but the further you go, the more you learn.

56B: If there’s anything that you could teach or impart to the art world, what would that be?

NL: Stop thinking and just make… I teach art school so I’m part of the problem [laughs].

Listen to yourself running down the hallway excited to share something you made that may be kind of stupid or naive. It’s not that you’re proud of it because it’s artwork, you’re proud of yourself and want to share it. That’s a good place to be.

Highlights from BOS at 56 Bogart

Sun, 03 Jun 2012 18:29:00 -0400

Artist Cynthia Sparrenberger at her studio

www.sparrenbergerstudio.com

Studio 10’s show Text featuring artists John Avelluto, Audra Wolowiec, Meg Hitchcock & Mary Carlson

www.studio10bogart.com

Artist Lisa Levy sharing some motherly love through her project Rockin’ Mommy Love

www.lisalevyindustries.com

Dumitru Gorzo’s show REALITY’S NOSTALGIA at SLAG Gallery

www.slaggallery.com

Andrew Zarou’s work at Robert Henry Contemporary

www.roberthenrycontemporary.com

Seung Mo Park’s wire and mesh portraits and sculptures

www.hadacontemporary.com/park-seungmo

Justin Berry’s show Fissure and Facture at INTERSTATE PROJECTS

www.interstateprojects.com

Juan Miguel Palacios with his work

www.juanmiguelpalacios.com

Artists William H. Tedford III & Adrienne Michalski in front of their work at Sam Simon’s open studio

www.whtiii.com

www.adriennemichalski.com

Artist Kan Spray Painting Flowers on Grattan Street.

Fri, 25 May 2012 12:44:06 -0400

Artist Kan Spray Painting Flowers on Grattan Street.

Mira Schor: Painting and Politics

Thu, 17 May 2012 16:31:00 -0400

Emily Reese talks to artist Mira Schor.

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Mira Schor fuses ideas of gender, politics, and representation of the body in her paintings that advocate the medium itself. Mira has shown in 56 Bogart at Momenta Art and Agape Enterprise, and she brings the perspective of someone who has had intermittent, extensive experience with the building in its many roles.

56B: Firstly, what kinds of work have you featured at Agape Enterprise? How has the space been conducive to your work’s perpetuation of its intended discourse?

MS: I’ve shown some drawings at Agape Enterprise. I was delighted that Eric and Kiko invited me to be one of the artists they wanted to feature when they began Agape. I love the space they occupy, I mean that room with its wacky fake or cheap dark wood wainscoting, the drawings looked great on those dark walls. I can’t say that experiences at 56 Bogart street have led to new ideas but I think the building is a great gift to all concerned, it’s synergistically good for all the arts organizations to be there and great for the art community, in New York City, not just Bushwick. I’m really happy to be associated with it, through my earlier connection with Momenta Art, and some contact with NURTUREart as well, and I’m excited about the possibilities of doing something at Agape that would not exactly be performance but might fit in with their developing direction.

56B: You mentioned in an interview with Bradley Rubenstein that you formerly painted the body of a female growing into her sexuality, but that now your figuration is a “barely gendered, barely embodied person walking around, sleeping, watching, reading”. You also mentioned that you have sought the loss of control within your painting technique itself. How does this near-total lack of gender, body, and control supplement ideas about female power?

MS: In terms of your question “How does this near-total lack of gender, body, and control supplement ideas about female power?” I think first of all that any cultural utterance by a woman who is critically aware of gendered power relations in our culture contributes to female power. This is consistent with the theme of my recent work that was shown at Marvelli Gallery, “Voice and Speech.” I am interested in giving “speech” to “voice”—the knowledge of the body, the knowledge of craft, of experience, of visuality—“speech,” speech here meaning the power of articulation in public and theoretical language. In terms of lack of control, what I’m trying to get at in the work is a quality of expression that an come to you when you trust your perceptions and your craft enough to let go of some overdetermination. It’s a bit of a game, because it’s hard to really lose control when you know how to do something but in the little moments where that seems to happen you can get to something interesting.

56B: You grapple with the gendered narrative of art history. How do you fit yourself into the female art historical canon, and how has your perception of your own role changed since you initially started making work?

MS: How do I fit into the feminist art historical canon? That is a huge subject and at times a bit of a sore point. I’d refer or have to defer to my essay, “Generation 2.5.” My generation hasn’t fared very well in getting into the feminist art historical canon, even though we are the first full generation who contributed to the development of most of its tropes at the same time or very close to that of the pioneer generation before us. I’ve worked with autobiographical representation and narrative in ways related to Frida Kahlo and Florine Stettheimer, starting before either of those artists were widely known (and before I ever heard of them). That was when I was a student, in the early ’70s. I very early on became interested in language as image. Starting in the mid-70s, I moved from interpreting “the personal is the political” as necessitating my being in the picture via recognizable self-portraiture, to allowing my handwriting, legible and not, to stand in for myself and to put forward the idea of women being filled with language. My works from that period were in line with the appearance and sometimes also the meaning of works by Hanne Darboven and Mary Kelly, among others, but my work from that time was not widely seen and has not yet received the critical attention I hope it will eventually get.

56B: Is there such a thing as the history of art production as an ungendered whole, or do we inadvertently separate female artists from their male peers through our discussions? Is this fruitful or detrimental?

MS: The idea that the history of art production is ungendered is an illusion and a fantasy that, even now, after forty years of feminist art and the dramatic transformation of art historical practices stemming from the feminist art revolution, still persists and that people cling to. Women artist still want to be seen as artists, not women artists. You can understand why: woman retains associations with second-class citizenship and the term woman as a theoretical category in particular is very devalued, which then has an effect on political activism. Yet work by a woman who is looking critically or with conscious awareness and criticality at her own life and society will somehow invest her work, even if it’s abstract or about other things entirely, with something that enlivens form and iconography. Women who don’t may have more commercial success but they also may end up subsumed to a (male) universal. We separate female artists from their male peers by omitting them from discussion and comparison. If they are seen as the same, the world still tends to gravitate towards male artists while subscribing piously to the myth of the universal. Just recently a young woman artist told me she wanted to be seen not as a feminist or a woman artist but as a human being…of course she does, and she is a human being, the whole point is that whether she likes it or not she will be considered as a woman. It’s a tough issue, constantly in contention, as it should be. If it disappears from contention, we’re back at the (male) universal.

56B: On the other end of art history, where do you think the “art future” (either feminist or otherwise) is headed?

MS: The future of art? There will always be cultural utterance of some form or another and these days we’ve accelerated the art critical recognition of various forms of cultural utterance as art (gaming etc..). Some of the ways of making or thinking about art that made me an artist in the way that I am, a fine artist, a painter, a maker of individual hand made things, are fading right now under pressure from the digital and the spectacular. Advanced theory demolished aura, and presumed relevance of the non-photographic. The market pushes spectacle and brand. As a teacher it’s hard to instill the potential of painting to express or comment on culture or to be a space of resistance (another old idea!). But you have to feel sorry for all the artists who just can’t figure out how to make works they see in galleries, museums, and fairs, that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars just to produce. Meanwhile every year at least one art supply I rely on for my work is discontinued.

56B: Have any of the conversations or experiences you’ve had in 56 Bogart led you to explore new themes or ideas, either in your work or in your thought processes?

MS: What I like about 56 Bogart Street is that it’s a human scale situation with art organizations and galleries that have evolved from a community and that remain committed to a diverse range of work that artists can and do produce; it’s not exactly not part of the market of course, but it feels like a more organic and accessible space.

About that Cave... Bryan Wilson and the Atomic Priesthood

Mon, 07 May 2012 14:49:00 -0400

Joana Ricou talks to artist Bryan Wilson. Bryan investigates nuclear technology and its ramifications, with a focus on the legacy of the atom bomb and the management of nuclear fall out and waste.

“The cave is an attempt to create a television show to explicate a lot of this information. I’m building the set for that.”

BW: This began with an interest in trinitite, which is a glass formed from the first nuclear explosion and subsequent nuclear explosions but, specifically, that moment being a literal distillation of the turning point in human history when we started impacting the world on geological time scales. A lot of these nuclear materials are volatile in excess of 100’000 years into the future.

Burial becomes the most economic way to deal with this. So it becomes a very interesting design problem of how do you create monuments, language or symbols to communicate in excess of 50’000 years into the future. What does that look like?

56B: Yes: “don’t open this door.”

BW: I’m reading through designs, strategy propositions, academic papers, and I came across Thomas Sebeok, who was a semiotitian. He put forth this idea that, in addition to whatever monuments we made, there would be a group of people in every generation at these sites that would retain this information, a type of secret society, an atomic priesthood. And he set forth some loose guidelines for that it would have to be: somewhat terrifying, off-putting to the general public.

For this last year I’ve been trying to form what that priesthood might look like, creating drawings, sculpture, the tattoos I have on my arm, a film that is a part of the ritual that was done all under the guise of this…

56B: Are you part of the atomic priesthood?

BW: I’m making it up as I go along so nobody has imbued me with the authority…

56B: I think if you’re making it, you get to call yourself whatever you want.

BW: Indeed. And that’s where this kind of art process starts to step in and it becomes an interesting way of engaging not only history but what the future might look like.

All of this started with me doing a performance: I drove from my home in Montana to the Trinity, which is the test site of the first explosion.

The interesting thing there is there wasn’t much of a crater but there was a thousand foot by ten foot deep lake of green glass - trinitite. Essentially the tremendous force and temperature created by the bomb sucked up and in a flash *snaps fingers* melted the sand to the extent that it started to behave like water vapor and it came up into the mushroom cloud and, just like water vapor as it starts to clump together, it rained back down on the desert floor. The lake of glass is no longer there because it was bulldozed away but the site itself is now a historic monument.

[There’s no lake of trinite anymore but there is an obelisk, made by the United States government.]

BW: Shortly after the aftermath of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, he became very political and the result of that was him being publicly humiliated. I kind of look like him so I dressed as him as a way of paying homage to this site, as a way of conjuring his spirit. There was something very sacred about this site and the language about it, trinity, test site. There was a grave feeling about everything there.

We just got funding from the Art Council of England to make a book and do an exhibition of this project. What does that mean like, informing people, getting people present to this notion of we’re all in this nuclear age - we’re still in it. We’re at a point where really action is necessary. What does that look like? What might that world look like?

Momenta Art

Thu, 03 May 2012 17:22:02 -0400

Sean Alday talks with Eric Heist of Momenta Art.

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As I walked into Momenta Art’s gallery space I saw Eric Heist on the ground installing a piece of drywall for a new exhibition. I waited for him to get it into place before asking if he was ready for an interview.

56B: What brought Momenta Art to 56 Bogart?

EH: This is where the artists were going. My friends from Williamsburg were relocating their studios here too.

56B: How many spaces were open here when you moved in?

EH: Interstate Projects. I believe that was it.

56B: What is Momenta’s relationship to the other spaces?

EH: Peter [of the Bogart Salon] has been on the advisory board for many years.

The model that we worked with when we opened in Philadelphia in 1986 was, we rented more space than we needed and then we sublet studio space to artists. In Philadelphia we rented an entire 5 story building and sublet the four stories above us.

We rented extra space here to sublet also. Each space we sublet is roughly 650 square feet and our space is 1,200 square feet. So we sublet to Studio 10 and an artist’s studio. The benefit isn’t as drastic as our original location, though it does allow us to have a larger space than we had on Bedford Avenue.

Which in turn gives more freedom to the artists we show.

56B: When did you move from Philadelphia to New York?

EH: 1992. I went to Hunter College for graduate school and was working with Momenta at the same time. We started doing nomadic shows in SoHo when the galleries were moving out. We funded that by doing raffles somewhat similar to the benefits we host now.

We were later able to rent a space in SoHo. And after that it was off to Williamsburg in ’95.

56B: When did you move to this building from Williamsburg?

EH: We opened in September of 2011.

56B: What’s the biggest difference between here and Philly?

EH: People come out after the opening is over. It was pretty sparse after the opening, but those were and continue to be successful.

56B: Who do you feel is Momenta Art’s main audience is?

EH: Artists.

56B: You just hosted your spring benefit. Can you give me your feelings about that went?

EH: For me personally… It was a blur [laughs]. I try to blend in and make things run as smoothly as possibly.

We had a lot of artists and a lot of ticket holders. It was a lot to keep track of.

56B: What kind of feedback did you get, both from the artists and the ticket holders?

EH: Everything I heard from the artists was positive. Everyone understands that it’s charity. I definitely understand that there’s a lot of anticipation surrounding getting your ticket called. I think that people come because they know that it’s done to support the artists.

56B: What galleries have you visited in the neighborhood?

EH: Not enough. Let’s see… I’ve been to Regina Rex. I went to Luhring Augustine’s opening. I go to English Kills pretty often. Factory Fresh. Storefront.

56B: Could you pick a favorite show that you’ve seen in the neighborhood?

EH: I really liked Stephen Truax’s works [at Storefront]. I had never seen his work presented that way. I thought it was really nice.

56B: What do you think Momenta’s relationship is to the larger Bushwick community? The arts community in particular.

EH: Well… This building has definitely become a hub. We’re pleased with that, we get an audience that we didn’t have on Bedford Avenue.

I know it creates some friction with some spaces that were already here.

56B: What’s been your gut reaction to the attention that you receive? You were definitely thought of as a big fish after relocating, along with Nurture Art.

EH: We showed up before Luhring Augustine, but they are certainly the biggest fish now.

56B: Do you read what people write or do you measure it in inches?

EH: I do care about what they say. I would like to see real criticism about the work being shown.

I want to know what people are thinking, what their ideas are. What’s the point of making art?

What I saw happen in Williamsburg was an emphasis on the entrepreneurship. I didn’t like that dialogue.

56B: What would like to demystify about this whole thing?

EH: That there’s some specific aesthetic to Bushwick art. That line came out of Williamsburg too, that there was a funky aesthetic to it.

This is where artists are going and they bring their practices with them. They don’t suddenly arrive here and find trash on the street and start making collages out of found objects. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but that’s not how it is. It’s a container for all different types of work.

56B: What’s the future of Momenta?

EH: It’s gotten to the point where it needs to become a bigger organization. One component of that will be an artist-run area, which I will be working within.

I need to keep pushing Momenta to take risks.

56B: Do you think that the move allowed it to take more risks?

EH: I think that the danger is that we will stop taking risks. I have to mess it up a little bit in my role.

There’s an element of chaos that is important in any creative endeavor. Finding a balance in that chaos is the key to success.