Interview with ROMAN PYATKOVKA

q)Walk us through an intimate day in your life.

a)It was quite a long time ago.  My friend and teacher, famous photographer Boris Mikhailov (winner of Hasselblad prize) used to constantly criticize my works, even tear them down. Once I made a very intimate project “Adultery”. It was dedicated to the theme of evolution of the psychology of a man living two lives – one with his wife and another with his mistress. Boris looked at it very precisely, then he hugged me and congratulated with a great job.

q)Where did you grow up/where do you live now and how does that contribute to your art?

a)I was born and still live in Kharkiv. I identify with the Kharkiv School of Photography’s middle generation. This was the generation that debuted in the 1980s. It had no official recognition or state support. Consequently, our esthetics has been largely driven by the desire to be an artist in hostile circumstances. The lack of photo studios meant we had to turn to our private space, where our tiny apartments, our personal and even intimate life became the proving grounds for our art. The unavailability of high-quality equipment and materials led to the emergence of “poor quality” as an esthetic category. The absence of any formal education, funnily enough, made photographic art more intellectual, produced as it was by humanists and assorted freethinkers. Our existence outside the socialist context critically distanced us from the Soviet art system and the political structure in general.

q)What is your earliest memory that propelled you to create?

a)I was nurtured in a very intelligent family. Since childhood I was deeply interested in music, dances, I was spending a lot of my time on reading, movies and theatre. While I was in my adolescent ages film directing and acting classes were absorbing all my time. Thus I can say that since my childhood I was into the creativity.

q)Tell us a little bit about your creative process.

a)My art is a three-way junction of ideologized Sots Art, deeply private conceptualism, and frighteningly simple realism.

As an artist, I study personal relationships in various social environments. Sometimes a snapshot is just raw material, and I come up with a complex system of image processing to turn a realistic photograph into an epic installation. I use individual shots like puzzle pieces to create a single picture, a single exhibit-worthy organism.

q)How do you wish for your art to be perceived?

a)I would like my works to be interpreted by recipients. With new project I create my own secret language. The code to it lies in sensitivity. It is crucial for the recipient to feel firstly, and through that feeling to comprehend my art.

q)What do your internal dialogues sound like?

a)I am in the constant search for the striking and actual ideas that will touch everybody. I suggest letting go of the purported credibility of a captured fact and rewriting, reimagining events through the prism of personal experiences, which are always true, being given us here and now. Contemporary photography is a reflection of social relations and a study of life’s various facets. A contemporary artist is a blend of the social and the personal in exact proportions.

q)Do you feel that there are limitations to what you want to create?

a)I understand that I irritate a lot of people because of the provocative character of my pictures. They are brutal, scandalous and erotic. And people tend to so called mental inertia, thus are used to clichés in art. 

If a person spends all his life on fashion magazines, Hollywood movies and visits of the photo amateurs forums it is normal that one’s taste is in a very poor level. As result – people do not understand contemporary art. It is common today that people, without any qualification and education, let themselves judge contemporary art.

My art is not a pop-culture, it is not for big auditory. I understand that there won’t be big lines for my exhibitions.

Do I have any taboo? Yes. In 1988 I made one of the biggest mistakes in my professional life. I created erotic pictures with using religious symbols. It was not made on purpose, I just thought that it will work. It affected my personal life in a very negative way. So I have promised myself not to sin in art.

q)Do you feel art is vital to survival and if so, why?

a)I believe that contemporary art, as it is today, has to be in high demand. It gives visual picture of all the contradictions between political and social institutes. Today an artist is the one who has to ring the bells of liberty and democracy.

q)Describe a world without art.

a)As a famous French novelist Honore de Balzac once said, “All humanity is passion; without passion, religion, history, novels, art would be ineffectual”. I couldn’t describe it better.

q)Tell us a secret, and obsession.

a)Look at my pictures and I'm sure you will find the answer.

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

a)www.pyatkovka.com

http://cargocollective.com/romanpyatkovka

Interview with JIM LUCIO

q)Walk us through an intimate day in your life

a)A great day will be me getting up at about 6:30am.  The house is always quiet at that time, so I can get some writing done or work on some stuff for the homoarts.com website.

I love to cook, so a good day would include planning and preparing a nice meal that I am hopefully sharing with a few friends--and opening a few bottles of wine.  I also usually try to spend some time in my studio working on my collages.

q) Where did you grow up/where do you live now and how does that contribute to your art?

a)I grew up in Salinas, California which is very close to Monterey and 100 miles south of San Francisco. I’ve spent just about the same amount of years in San Francisco, New York City and now Baltimore; I guess I am inspired by my own movement. The idea of staying in one place too long bores me and I start getting a bit agitated.  Baltimore has contributed more to my overall creativity because there are fewer distractions than larger cities and less of a rat race experience which leaves more time to think about being creative.

q) What is your earliest memory that propelled you to create?

a)I don’t know that this inspired me to create, but I remember as a very young child, looking at a photo of Picasso’s Les Demoiselles d’Avignon and being totally confused and mesmerized by it. I didn’t understand it, but I think I liked it…I couldn’t stop looking at it.  I guess the easy answer is that I always preferred art class to anything else and spent a lot of time drawing, which I never do now.

q) Tell us a little bit about your creative process.

a)As it relates to the collage work I’ve been doing for the last couple of years, it’s been a really rewarding experience to step away from digital design and go completely analog and handmade.

Over the years, I have amassed a pretty large collection of old paper, magazines and various bits of ephemera, so what I typically do is sit at my work table and almost randomly pull something from one of the piles of paper around me and just wait to get inspired by something.  From there it becomes more about finding the right components to add to what I’ve started.  Sometimes things come together quickly and other times it will take hours to find the right little scrap of paper to finish a piece off.

I also start pieces and set them aside until I see a use for incorporating them into something later.  I have a whole bunch of piles and small boxes of half ideas that I can pull from and use when the need arises.  It really is like a puzzle sometimes to make everything fit the way you want it to.

q) How do you wish for your art to be perceived?

a)I look at what I do as my own visual language—like each collage is its own marketing piece. I like to say that I consume and regurgitate everything I take in visually. I translate what I already find in print and turn it into a product or design that is much more appealing to me in its new form.

So, I hope people can see and appreciate the language I am putting forth and enjoy this aesthetic as uniquely my own.

q) What do your internal dialogues sound like?

a)I wish my dog would make me some coffee. I am sick of winter.  What new projects can I start?  What can I make for dinner? I need to update my website and make art.  It’s a continuous cycle of what…where…how…who.

q) Do you feel that there are limitations to what you want to create?

a)Not at all. Currently I am working a lot on my collage work, but my creative output includes photography and events.  I co-ran a gallery in Baltimore for a while and worked as a visual arts director doing major outdoor installations with other artists.  I want to take www.homoarts.com more into the realm of publishing and events and I love collaborating with other artists, so that pretty much leaves all possibilities on the table.

q) Do you feel art is vital to survival and if so, why?

a)It’s vital to MY survival..that’s for sure. It’s just something I need to do. I love helping other artists…promoting their work, talking about it and whatnot, but I also need to produce my own because it’s the pure thing I can offer that is just from me without anyone else fussing over it. It allows me to really ‘check out’… when I am making art it’s the closest I can get to feeling in a zen place. I suck at meditating and this is as close as I can get to it.

q) Describe a world without art.

a)It is joyless. It is not being allowed to creatively thrive when you have something worthwhile to offer. It is soul-crushing to those who need to create and are somehow deprived of it. And for those who say they don’t appreciate it, their worlds would suck if they couldn’t reap the rewards provided by artists.

q) Tell us a secret, and obsession.

a)A secret…for as sociable as I can be, I often prefer to be alone.

I am currently obsessed with reality cooking shows, homoarts.com and getting through all 692 episodes of Prisoner: Cell Block H…they’re all streaming online and I am currently on episode 133!

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

a)www.defekto.com

www.homoarts.com is where you can find my work, artist interviews, etc.

Flickr: www.flickr.com/defekto/

Interview with TYLER SPANGLER

q)Walk us through an intimate day in your life

a)I usually wake up early, around 6am. I will go to the end of my street and check the surf. If the waves are good I will grab a banana and go surf for a couple hours. After surfing I will make some black beans and spinach and start responding to emails. I then put on my headphones and start working for the rest of the day. If the waves are still good I will have another surf before dinner. I usually go to bed really early, like 930. 

q) Where did you grow up/where do you live now and how does that contribute to your art?

a)I grew up in Orange, California up until high school then moved to Huntington Beach where I finished high school. Surfing is my biggest influence moving closer was amazing. I just recently moved to Pacific Palisades and I love it even more. I can see the ocean from my workspace. I take the rich and vibrant colour palette of the ocean as my main inspiration. 

q) What is your earliest memory that propelled you to create?

a)I remember being fascinated by Ren & Stimpy, The Simpsons, and video games. I loved how something that someone created could have such a powerful influence. I initially started imitating and drawing cartoon characters. However, my drawings had a bit of a morbid twist to them, containing dismembered limbs and pools of blood. My teachers were not enthusiastic about it. I began getting into surfing and again being influenced by psychedelic art. Shortly after that, punk music and all of its appearance found its way into my work.  

q)Tell us a little bit about your creative process.

a)I like to give existing objects new meanings, a commentary on culture. My work has a colourful, nihilistic playfulness to it. I find textures that are intriguing to me and pair them with body parts to create a mood filled narrative. I dont like to do the same thing over and over so I find myself experimenting with patterns, typography, collage, and imagemaking to keep things fresh.

I love tearing things apart. When I work on a piece, I find that I create a majority of it only to break it into pieces and disconnect the forms suggesting an intended flow or movement. I am always listening to music while I design. I find that slow, repetitive, heavy music has the best effect on me.  

I cant sit still. If I am not working on a clients project, I am making something for myself. I am always reaching out to other artists and designers for collaborations because I think that sort of connections reveals a lot about myself and how I work as well as making an awesome friend. 

q) How do you wish for your art to be perceived?

a)I want people to be mesmerised. I want people to feel happy and introspective at the same time. I want my work to tell a story. I want people to view my work as a progressive journey. 

q)What do your internal dialogues sound like?

a)How can I fuck this up and make it beautifull. I love marrying harmony with chaos.


q)Do you feel that there are limitations to what you want to create?

a)Absolutely. I want to have my work on everything in the world. I am a bit overambitious. I want to see my patterns on airplanes, houses, bridges, sky scrapers, highway roads, everything. I dont think art and design should be limited to a gallery or a book. There are so many possibilities to spread beauty with art. 

q) Do you feel art is vital to survival and if so, why?

a)I think it is a great release for a lot of people. I couldnt imagine a world without art. People are always going to create something. Art to one person might be packaging milk cartons in an efficient way or how a chef prepares a dish. I think art is each persons way of doing something. So yes, I think art is vital to survival. 

q) Describe a world without art.

a)Homogenised blandness.

q)Tell us a secret, and obsession.

a)I dont have any secrets. I am obsessed with surfing and music. 

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

a)My website is the best option: www.tylerspangler.com It pretty much contains everything I’ve ever made.

Interview with Ryan Greenly

q) Walk us through an intimate day in your life

a) I’m much more of a night owl.  My evenings and nights are usually spent collecting.  I find myself collecting vintage books, scraps of paper, wood scraps, plants, flowers, etc. to create art.

q) Where did you grow up/where do you live now and how does that contribute to your art?

a)I grew up in a small agrarian town of 4,000 people in the hills of Pennsylvania.  I grew up with my hands in the dirt and reading William Blake and Ginsberg.  For one year I hitchhiked solo across the USA squatting, Dharma bumbing, committing Anarchy.  At the age of 21 I moved to Hawaii for 10 years, where I was surrounded by amazing natural beauty, not to mention the best surf.  Currently, I’ve been living in Taipei, Taiwan for 2 years.   I have a deep respect for Taiwanese culture and history. 

My hometown really influenced me in my regards to the imagery I use in my work.  Images of homeless friends, authors, hermits, and farmers.   Hawaii’s influence is where I became impressed with bright, bold color usage in my art.  Taiwan has only pushed me further because of the huge support and opportunity for artists here. 

q) What is your earliest memory that propelled you to create?

a)I think it began with my grandmother, my uncle, and my father.  My father built old air cooled Volkswagens and Porsches and would create these amazing paintings that were a cross between Pollock and 70/80’s Sci-fi fantasy paintings.   Artists like Peter Elson, Dan McPharlin, and Chris Foss.  My grandmother taught me to keep my heart low to the ground and keep my hands dirty, close to the soil and vegetables.  She truly showed me self-reliance and sustainability.  My uncle was a well-known local landscape artist.

q) Tell us a little bit about your creative process.

a)I’m a heavy researcher.  Authors, philosophers, and subversives fascinate me and it crosses over into my art making process.   It usually takes me a good hour to get into the “zone” for actual painting.   I rely heavily on a more instinctive or intuitive approach to design and layout.   I have a bit of an OCD with placement and literary connections.  Most of my collage material is actual photocopies from the reading that influences me the most in my general way of thinking.

When working on installations this could involve building actual structures and occupying them for long periods of time and creating a scene from found and made objects.  

With video and sound work I find I’m fascinated with the use of the loop and the act of reappropriating images and stories based around wildlife created in Hollywood.   It relies heavily on the contradictions and hypocrisies found in mainstream film.

The manifesto work is more done under the influence of literature; which delves in the areas of autonomy and the function of art, with a sort of tongue and cheek approach.

q) How do you wish for your art to be perceived?

a)I suppose; first, as aesthetically approachable and secondly, function as informational.

q) What do your internal dialogues sound like?

a)I’m at war with the disconnection of ego in painting and the overall function of art in society and it’s role or duty to the rest of society.  I’m fascinated by this sort of isolated, yet shamanistic ritual that every artist embarks upon; in his or her attempt to find something spiritual and unexplainable and then sharing or influencing society with the results.  There are two possible ways this exploration can be interpreted:  First, the need to withdraw from society to become comfortable with oneself.  Second, the return from isolation to share this knowledge with others.  Artists make the complete journey, both the withdrawal and the return.  The artist begs the question, “What is the most difficult of all things?” and simply answers, “To truly know yourself.”

q) Do you feel that there are limitations to what you want to create?

a)I’m at odds with art functioning as a commodity, limitations of size or material always seems to influence island art.  I tend to fall in the category of smaller artworks just because I have lived on islands for most of my adult life.  Things like shipping costs and storage become a factor.  But at the same time I loathe being held down by objects or “things” so this as well could result in smaller objects.  I also find a stronger intimacy with smaller paintings.

q) Do you feel art is vital to survival and if so, why?

a)Yes absolutely art is essential to survival.  Art must act as a tool for social change and enlightenment.   Art speaks of self-reliance and assurity.  Art has a greater purpose than merely to reflect reality and depict existing things.  The greatest theories that reflect on utopian societies were in themselves created in isolation, art to holds the same function.  It provides a deeper picture of what is possible.

To quote Thoreau in regards to Walden, “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.”

q) Describe a world without art.

a)It would have to be a world without creation or imagination.  A world without true hope.

q) Tell us a secret, and obsession.

a)I loathe American domestic and foreign policy.

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

a)At my website ryangreenlyart.com

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

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