Interview with Carl Heyward

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

I am a mixed-media artist with an interest in juxtaposition of imagery and themes through various media; there is something appealing to me in the combination of fractured or fragmented images that coalesce into something new and different especially in that the "rough-edges" of the units have meaning

and can't be broken down any further as "morpheme" in language; these visual units are then put together with other, often dissimilar, morphemes producing something between the lines, so to speak; an alchemy beyond intention; the parts not distilled, but united with other units of visual meaning, information producing a higher plane of communication.

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

Ethnicity, topical items, separation, exclusion, cultural absurdities, language-based gestures, art history what's in the news at the moment or on my mind; there is a great pleasure in improvisation which recalls my musical youth  playing in all sorts of situations, the most satisfying being jazz, space and ambient genres. Depending on the moment, the instrument, in the case of art, the paper, to guide; to be involved in the gesture and not an over-dependence on the brain; to trust self and the pure intention of involvement in the process to distill everything I know into nothing, newness, NOW toward a product that may be both beautiful and telling all at once.

q)Your favorite place on earth?

At the moment: the best of San Francisco (and that preference, unfortunately, dwindles moment to silicon moment); equally: Prague and Lecce, Italy (definitely)

q)What influences your work?

Time, feelings, joy, space, opportunity...Rauschenburg, Romare Bearden and Basquiat ...necessity.

q)What music are you into right now?

Always Miles; Henry Threadgill a composite tape FUNNY COLORED MONEY, Jack Bruce/Carla Bley: ESCALATOR OVER THE HILL, Eno.

q)Describe your thought & design process...

I like the vertical right side beginning...do not know why. When I began to commit to mixed media, I had (had) a reliance on geometry and division of space which guided the visual direction of a piece. These days, that process is probably ingrained and I am less conscience about the math (upon later inspection of a work-in-progress, however, that tendency seems to remain intact). I quiet the inner critic as best I can and bounce between a series of techniques to get the work done. Self doubt and the sheer ridiculousness of making art comes up a lot before, after, and during the process and I have learned to gently tell myself "do it", without judge and jury deliberating too much. It is exciting to shift the weight of self-criticism and carry on especially if from time to time the end result is satisfying.

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

Katrien de Blauwer a great collagist from Belgium. She has the knack for synthesizing disparate photo elements, usually portraiture, into something far greater than the parts and tells an emotional truth powerful, surprising and disturbing about existence, desire and expectation. She is great.

Jeffrey Thompson, Lorna Crane, Akiko Suzuki, Kathleen Migliore, Joan Stennick Margaret Glew, Vered Gersztenkorn; all brilliant artists who lay claim to a unique vision and a committed practice.

q)Favorite place on the internet?

most visited is Face Book for reasons of "business", as well as Art News Daily, Black Art in America.

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

Finishing up KNEE(jerk) Fragmentation (mail art) Project, which began in 2011 as a face book online process; attracted 500 artists from all over the world and has resulted in 3000 pieces of art mailed as one-for-one art exchange beginning with large original works, cut-up, fragmented and mailed to participants, repeated, with some echoing the process, others designing a single card (A5 or 5" x 7") and receiving one from submitted works or one of my fragments in return. This opened up many of the artists to work in a manner or medium unfamiliar to them, to play with an aspect of mail art, to collect work from diverse international artists and to create ongoing offshoot collaborations with artists that they would not have encountered otherwise. We have participant commomerative works for all, working on traveling exhibitions, participant catalog and limited edition book to document a fun and exhausting project.

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

Art makes it all worth while.

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

http://faprile.wordpress.com/2013/04/12/carl-heyward-corrispondenze-urbane/

http://ahiceglie.blogspot.it/2013/04/garage-21-carl-heyward.html

http://iltaccodibacco.it/puglia/eventi/78034.html http://faprile.wordpress.com/2013/04/12/carl-heyward-corrispondenze-urbane/ http://www.salentoinlinea.it/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=5360&Itemid=41 http://spontaneouscombustionlanguageimagelab.wordpress.com/2011/12/25/eleven-notes-on-joan-stennick-carl-heyward-and-the-death-of-cy-twombly/ http://oggiarte.blogspot.com/2013/04/mostra-carl-heyward.html http://pictify.com/240528/homage-to-carl-heyward https://blogs.wellesley.edu/rare/2012/01/26/celebrating-black-history-month/heyward2/ http://highbrowmagazine.com/1618-art-carl-heyward http://books.google.com/books?id=X8ZPAQAAIAAJ&hl=it http://arteculturaok.blogspot.com/2013/04/carl-heywardbus-portrait.html http://www.artwork100.com/1/post/2013/02/i-am-very-pleased-to-announce-that-artwork100com-has-officially-launched-today.html http://www.apionline.org/citizenartist.html http://justanothermasterpiece.tumblr.com/post/37811672134/carl-heyward http://justanothermasterpiece.tumblr.com/post/31376429219/carl-heyward http://flcourier.com/2012/05/10/art-and-the-process-of-liberation/ http://altroaltrove.it/2013/04/07/carl-heyward-mixed-media/ http://altroaltrove.it/2013/04/07/carl-heyward-mixed-media/ http://www.rawwater.net/LaRawBlog/carl-heyward/ http://pinterest.com/pin/167829523586276507/ http://www.arteeluoghi.it/na/1146-mixed-media http://www.arteeluoghi.it/na http://ricerca.gelocal.it/repubblica/archivio/repubblica/2013/04/19/mostre.ba_031mostre.html http://oggiarte.blogspot.com/2013/04/mostra-carl-heyward.html http://new.wellesley.edu/sites/default/files/assets/departments/libraryandtechnology/files/wellesleyartistsbooks.pdf http://arte-bari.blogautore.repubblica.it/2013/04/26/3325/

Interview with Thierry Cauwet

q) Introduce yourself, name, age, location.

a)My name is Thierry Cauwet. I was born in 1958 in France. I have lived in Sèvres (Parisian suburb), 
Rome, Martinique, the island of Reunion and then in Paris...

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

a)I settled in Sèvres at the age of 17, in the squat of the "rue des Caves", where we founded a house of artists (which seems to be the first squat of artists in France) with painters, sculptors, photographs, writers, poets. Political claims and esthetical experiences went together. There I discovered the direct 
administration (auto-administration) and the relation of the individual to the group, with its richness, its
complexity and its limits. There I started my research around the body and its representation.

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

a)What motivated me at that time was the impossibility to leave aside the real body for whatever representation. "We want the world and we want it now" (Jim Morrisson). The real body thus imposed itself quite soon in my work. Video actions followed one after the other, filmed almost always in an empty room of the squat which served as a space of experimentation. Little by little, the actions gave place to immobility, the film to the photography and I created a series of living pictures.
After a period, long enough, of a work mixing presentation of the real body and pictorial representation, I created paintings without real bodies lying on them and I abandoned photography at that time as a medium. Since then, apart for some exceptions, I almost always paint bodies.

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

a)Yes music is very important to me when I work. Jazz mainly. I think my actual painting is a form of jazz.

q) How would you describe your work to someone?

a)Let us come back to the chronology, if you don mind. My passage from living pictures to the painting was accompanied by the discovery of a new world when I settled in Martinique in 1988. It was an important experience in my existence, it marked my life and my work. I discovered myself as a "crÈole" and I remained so, I think, in my own way. Gradually, during the following years until now, I developed one by one "pictorial functions". (I have just written a book with this title, published by Ulisse editions). Each "pictorial act" (or function) intervenes in a given moment of the painting making process. My painting is not idealistic, I don' t do sketches, nor projects. My painting is in this way very materialistic. On the other hand, my work wants to give account of a particular connection between plan and space, which for a long time I called "space guillotine", that is to say the cutting out into parallel plans. This is linked to a vision experience I had when I was 17 in the Parisian metro when, in a train, I had the very precise impression that everybody was flat, painted on a glass plan. I had for the first time maybe that day the impression to SEE

q) Influences ?

a)They are of course multiple !.

In bulk : the illuminations of the middle age (in particular the mozarabs), Matisse, the body-art and the Viennese actionists, Yves Klein, support-surface, François Rouan.
I also maintained a privileged dialogue with my Martinic friend Ernest Breleur. I think that we influence each other mutually, which is very stimulating and a great source of joy.

q) Describe your process for creating new work.

a)It would be too long. I refer you to my book "Les fonctions picturales", Ulisseditions.

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

I have no advice to give except never to yield on the essential of their work for opportunism.

q) What are you really excited about right now ?

a)The Peinturie and here is the founder text.
"I/we, at the beginning of this year 2013, decide :
Your world is over, your countries are worn out, your frontiers are down-at-heel.
I/we declare found this day the Republic of the Peinturie, independent and autonomous nation.
The Peinturie does not recognize the right of ground, even less the right of blood.
The Peinturie has supple and moving frontiers. 
The frontiers of the Peinturie may be the carnal envelop or any other envelop susceptible to include one or several people. The Peinturie is in the world and out of the world.
The Peinturie is less to do with geography than with time.
The plan of Peinturie is supple and moving.
In each place you find yourself you can declare yourself painting, inhabitant full right of the Peinturie.
Every territory painting may be linked to the others by ties invisible or not, it is for each citizen to decide.
The Peinturie is the memory of the future and, curiously, it is also the future of this memory.
A better world has always been possible, which does not mean that it will come. The Peinturie is the refuge of this expectation.
The Peinturie is an ark, bad times are to come.
The Peinturie is protection, it is expectation, no hope in its territory.
The paintings may paint or not, it is their free will and the paintings painters have no more rights than the paintings who do not practise painting. If our country bear this name, it is because of the vessel the "Peinture" which helped us to discover it.
The Peinturie is not a state, as it has a soul, that is to say a movement.
The Peinturie is one or more animated bodies, conscious of their movement and of that of the other. The Peinturie is a dance.
The painting may have double nationality. We can be painting and French, Belgian, Iranian or from Central Africa. If the painting citizen draws a certain strength to live in Peinturie, he does not forget the fights for the emancipation and the liberation of the individuals in all the other countries of the world. From the oppression was born the Peinturie, which will not forget the oppress.
The Peinturie is not a lick of the real, it is its laboratory.
The Peinturie knows the power of money without believing in it.
The economy of the Peinturie is not based on money but on the libido, that is to say on the desire.
The Peinturie is a provisional nation. The whole painting federations have for vocation to gather in an international confederation of painting territories, the ICPT (or CIPT). We know that this is only possible after climatic disorders have provoked the ecological catastrophes foreseeable
because of actual irresponsibility of the nations.
The Peinturie, in view of this perspective and by strategic necessity requests its recognition by the United Nations Organisation".
T.C.

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

a)See previous question.

q) Best way to spend a day off ?

a)Alas ! I have less and less time to rest.

q) Upcoming shows/ projects ?

a)In June a show at the MaÎlle gallery in Paris and next year at the Alain Oudin gallery in Paris. The salon of the book in Paris and a festival of contemporary art in Brussels. Also the development of the activities of the group "humainternational" (Ernest Breleur, Jonathan Hecht, Thierry Cauwet). I would also like to have an expo with Jean-Louis Magnet and Yann Purcell.

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

a)www.thierrycauwet.com 
www.enseigne-des-oudin.com
and on Face book..

Interview with Andrew Lundwall

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

a)I don’t think that it would be fair to describe my work, because I’d hope that it resonates with different people in more ways than one.

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

a)I work in a very improvisational & intuitive way, so I don’t really create with a specific subject in mind. 

q)Your favorite place on earth?

a)Right now.

q)What influences your work?

a)This is something that’s very hard to put my finger on. A lot of things can happen in the course of a day that trigger me to want to create, it could be anything from the most mundane incident to a film I’ve watched or something that I’ve read.

q)What music are you into right now?

a)I’ve been on a bit of a jazz bender for the past month, especially recordings that feature Bud Powell, Eric Dolphy, Charlie Haden, or Max Roach in some capacity.

q)Describe your thought & design process...

a)Normally, I’ll start out with a few images that seem to correspond with each other in some strange way, then I tear or cut the selected images into fragments & rearrange until a piece feels like it makes some sort of sense to me.

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

a)The emerging artists I’m looking forward to seeing more of are those that are featured Schematoscope, an FB-based blog of mine:
https://www.facebook.com/Schematoscope

q)Favorite place on the internet?

a)I don’t really have any favourite places on the internet.

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

a)Not at the present time.

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

a)My Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/andrew.lundwall
or my Flickr:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/alundwall/

Interview with Jay Zerbe

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

a) My work is abstract but not cerebral. I tend toward painterly, even calligraphic mark-making, but I keep the surface fairly flat. My work is basically about two things: space, and color. There is generally a landscape but sometimes an interior feel to the pieces, although nothing is recognizable. Nor can any static view be arrived at. Everything is in flux. There is a constant visual flow through the pieces, so your eye is entertained by a journey that never ends. The color is generally intense enough to grab your attention, while still being non-abrasive (usually). The color is the emotional soul of each piece.

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

a) The unknowable, sense memory, pleasure, puzzles.

q)Your favorite place on earth?

a) My studio of course! I have a great studio now in the country, with lots of light, and view of neglected weed-filled fields. A nearly-constant breeze keeps everything moving. An ocean of vegetation.

q)What influences your work?

a) My collage work, which is quite a bit different from my painting practice, and the world I see around me. I have lived in dense cities most of my life, and have recently moved to the country. I see a lot of influence for both of those environments in my work. Obviously, more natural/organic forms are appearing in the newer work. Even though I don't do actual landscape painting/drawing, the landscape (or cityscape) around me enters my vision, gets processed somehow, and comes out in the paintings.

q)What music are you into right now?

a) My taste runs predominantly to 20th/21st century classical that tends toward the progressive and post-tonal. Favorite composers are Thomes Adès, John Adams, Giacinto Scelsi, György Ligeti, Kaija Saariaho, Luciano Berio, Morton Feldman, and Steven Mackey just to name a few. But I also like jazz with a mid-century feel, and '80's punk. They all get shuffled together on my iPod. The unpredictable shifts between genres keep me awake.

q)Describe your thought & design process...

a) I occasionally start a canvas from a collage. In that case, I start a "portrait" of the collage piece, focusing particularly on the overall structure, and the relationship of tonal areas. Mostly, I put a background color down, to get rid of the white, and just start "imagining" into the space. I'm a very intuitive painter, although I spend a lot of time stepping back to see what is working and what is not working. "Working" for me means that the basic composition is strong (based on the values of larger areas), and that I am not fracturing/fragmenting the composition too much. I also control the color quite carefully. I'm more conscious of color control toward the ending of the piece, when I really want to see a world of color where nothing is too distracting, and all-over the piece is not a dull monotone. I do have favorite colors (green, purple-brown), but I work at getting a wide variety of color palettes into my work. Much more challenging that way. And I do enjoy a challenge!

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

a) That depends on how you define "emerging". If an artist has "emerged" enough for me to see their work published in an art magazine, even just a review, are they still just "emerging"? If I have only seen someone's work on Facebook, and they have only shown sporadically without getting reviewed, are they "emerging"? In either case, here is a small list: Elliott Green, Suzanne Ulrich, Cecil Touchon, Amy Sillman, Olav Christopher Jenssen, Rebecca Michaelis, Albert Oehlen, Gary Stephen, Joanne Greenbaum, Charline Von Heyl, Iva Gueorguieva, Laura Sharp Wilson, Eve Aschheim, and Sammy Peters. Non of them (except Touchon) are Facebook friends. I really don't want to discourage any FB friends by not mentioning them. And, since I am always judgmental, I would.

q)Favorite place on the internet?

a) The place i go to most often is Facebook. I enjoy seeing the work of other artist friends, as well as the work they post of non-facebook artists whose work they enjoy. It is amazing to me how many quality artists are working today. Perhaps this was always true, but now we have to means to know them and track their progress.

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

a) I've had a busy year this year. 2013 may get busy, but all that I know about at this time is a solo show at Purdue University (NC) that opens in January. I have also just published a book of my collages with a forward by Phillip Larrimore, which was just was released on Lulu.com, but should be available on Amazon.com in a few weeks. I'm quite excited about that!

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

a) I think about death a lot. That is not (I think) apparent in my work. Most people perceive my work as joyful and hopeful (which it is!). But the whole process of making art for me is a process of experiencing the ecstatic before my light is snuffed out.

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

a) You can see my work on my own website, www.jayzerbe.com, and also on the websites of the galleries that carry my work: www.marjigallerysantafe.com, www.katehendrickson.com, and www.modernartsmidtown.com. And of course, Facebook.

Interview with Vaka Valo

q) Introduce yourself, name,age, location.

a)My name is Vaka Valo.  I don't celebrate my birthday.  I mostly live between East Asia, California, and Northern Europe.  Like a Comanche, not a Cowboy.  The world is my home.

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

a)I suppose it occurred sometime early in my childhood.  My parents could not afford a piano or lessons, so naturally I turned to creating visually with the standard tools of expression and household items.

q) Describe your ideals and how they manifest in your work./Is music a part of your studio time?/What do you listen to?/How would you describe your work to someone?/Influences?/Describe your process for creating new work.

a)I have many vast and varied influences.  Too many to list in this interview.  If one is specifically talking about particular art movements or periods of history, it constantly shuffles and is dependent upon the project I am working on.  I certainly hold the Dadaists and Surrealists in high regard, but also everything that happened before these movements and everything after.  The music and processes of John Cage and Brian Eno are a constant inspiration to my approach in creating.  My projects begin with curiosity, then a series of ongoing intensive experiments follow.  If I like the results, a system is introduced and a project organically arises from that.  I just stay very curious.  Ideas are too limiting.  All of my projects involve chance elements for raw material that I have no control over, then I create something original from that.

It is from this the context change that the raw material transforms into something else entirely.  I like having that type of self-imposed limitation upon my work.  It makes for very interesting and unexpected results.  Both the elements of chance and contextual transformation are very exciting to me.  In any art form.  My goal is to tangibly realise chance occurrences into an ordered artistic arrangement so other people can enjoy the images in my mind, whatever form they may take.

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

a)It seems the creation of a personal website to display work would be primary.  The Internet has made this easier than any previous time period.  One's audience is no longer limited by current geographic coordinates or timelines.  That being said, nothing compares to experiencing a work of art in person.  It also seems there are no rules to this type of thing, which is both daunting and encouraging.

q) What are you really excited about right now?

a)This current season, Autumn.

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

a)Being just a few steps away from the ocean.

q) Best way to spend a day off?

a)Getting lost in nature with close friends.

q) Upcoming shows/ projects?

a)I have recently created and launched a website to display my ongoing projects.  My goal is to obtain funding/gallery representation so I can print/frame/exhibit/create editions/books of my projects.  I cannot afford to print/frame/etc. on my own, so I hope my website will help me to obtain funding somehow.  All of my projects are ongoing.  Things will appear and disappear as they are created.

Interview Enrique del Val

q)Introduce yourself, name,age, location.

a)My name is Enrique del Val, I was born in 1979 in Oviedo, Spain and grew up in the Basque Country. My live in Australia although at the moment I'm located in Berlin.

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

a)I've always been into drawing. Since very little I'd draw over and over the things I liked. I wanted to become a doctor though. It was only at university studying Fine Arts that I started -and fell in love with- painting. That was more than ten years ago. I've always painted and been involved in the art scene since, but I'd say I'm more fully committed to my painting practice since about 2009.

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

a)My ideal is that life is magic, that's what my work's always been about. Breaking through the convencionalities of the world and of painting and unlocking the magic possibilities of life. I see positive emotions and untamed discernment as the keys to make that leap.

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

a)I sometimes listen to music when I paint. If I do, I like the song-writers like L Cohen, the Cuban Silvio Rodriguez, Van Morrison, also classic music and depending on the mood punk-rock. I've lately been into Edith Piaff. Music helps me to open up and keep my emotions warm. The problem is that I can lose touch with what's really going on on the painting.

q) How would you describe your work to someone?

a)I find so difficult to tell people about my work that I made a website with my pictures and I encourage paople who ask me to have a look. Although my practice is very important for me I like talking lightly about it with the people I feel most comfortable with.

q) Influences?

a)Rembrandt has been in my mind for a long time. And so it has Francis Bacon. Today I look at painters like Peter Doig and Daniel Richter. I see a lot of art and I consider myself an sponge and I like it. Other influences may include the Rolling Stones, García Márquez, Silvio Rodriguez, movies such as Clockwork Orange and Trainspotting, Buddhism and partying hard with my friends.

q) Describe your process for creating new work.

a)The sources of my own work are my own experiences and stories. So until recently I've been using photographs that I usually take, to create my paintings. Lately I've been feeling a bit constricted by the photos, so I'm intending to work more and more from sketches and memory. Like many artists do, I work on a painting and tend to get obsessed with it. Then I need to put some distance between my mind and the painting and after some time has passed I decide whether it needs more work or it is fully functional and autonomous, in which case it is ready for the world.

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

a)Facebook with its many dangers is a good platform to display your work. I don't know, I am aware of the tension between wanting your work to reach as many people as possible and on the other hand not wanting to be pushy or indiscreet, I think that struggle it's a very common phenomenon nowadays.

q) What are you really excited about right now?

a)I'm excited about being in Berlin and spending more time in Europe after a decade in Australia. I'm trying not to get nuts about my next series of paintings and have some rest. Unsuccessfully so far.

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

a)Australia is a great place, the landscape is so beautiful and things are quite easy, quite light. Berlin provides me with a vibrant yet tranquil lifestyle. And all that stuff in the museums, quite amazing.

q) Best way to spend a day off?

a)Best way to spend a day off? Doing something without believing I shall be doing something else.

q) Upcoming shows/ projects?

I'm in this trip open for new projects, exhibitions, collaborations to come in Europe. I'll be back in Australia in November and try to arrange an exhibition for next year with my gallery. And my other most important project is my six-years-old daughter Maika.

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

a)Please visit my website www.enriquedelval.com or Facebook Enrique del Val. Thank you Claudio.