Your contributions to the recent show at Sanctuary were similar to your solo show a couple years ago at the old Ubu studio space. What have you been exploring?
I’m interested in comparative mythology. Gods and demi-gods. Human-animal hybrids. I have three bodies of work happening. I’ll work on one aspect for a while and move on. I’ve begun installation work, a few pieces at the Artist Studio building. “Beasts and Meditations,” the show at Ubu, was the beginning of the other two aspects. I explored human and hybrid forms and had meditative pieces, repetitive cut-out body parts that were made into ropes and stacks. Since Sanctuary is a body-art venue, I figured it was the place to explore the figures.
The work I’m doing now is the more meditative aspect. I’m starting to explore the more spiritual aspects of my practice as religious exercise. I’ve been working with vintage print material and magazines for the whole five or six years since I finished college. Every single magazine I’ve had has all the hands cut out. When I’m trying to work out a solution to a project, I’ll just pull that out and cut.
Why hands?
I think there’s so much meaning in every gesture. There are entire languages based on communicating with your hands. It’s how I make things. One of the first times I intentionally sat in meditation, tried it out, I had this image come into my head of ears stacked like rocks on the beach. I went into the studio and made a few pieces like that.
So the inspiration, new avenues for these works, comes from a meditative state, not just that the repetition is a meditative aspect of the work?
I’m trying in my personal life, and in my practice, to capture these moments that pop into my head.
The more I learn about comparative mythology, the more I imagine the current role of the artist as being a cleric, a sanctioned role in our society.
Yes, a visionary. I’m very interested in the language of symbols. The idea of the collective unconscious, no matter who you are, there are similarities in people’s lives and experiences. Everyone can take these basic myths and apply them to their lives.
Why collage and not painting or sculpture?
My degree is actually in painting but cut-paper is what has grabbed me. There’s a certain soothing effect that happens when I do it. Even the installation work I’m doing is cut-paper. Instant gratification. I want this here, and I put it there. Very immediate. I’m very selective about the images that I choose, I spend a lot of time sorting through them but once I have all the elements there, I can execute the idea very quickly. I don’t have the patience to draw anymore but I have the patience to cut hands for twenty hours a week!Are you involved in "Sacred and Profane" this year?
I am a collaborator in the overall project of the festival this year. As opposed to artists having individual rooms, the overall approach everyone is taking this year is going to be quite different. It’s a secret. It’s very exciting and I’m really happy to be collaborating, in contrast to my solitary work.
