PDX Art: Interview with Gabe Flores

Can you tell me a bit about your art practice and what drives you to create Art?

Art helps in my process of letting my guard down. I enjoy how art enables me to be vulnerable. I think my vulnerability helps the audience to be ok with vulnerable themselves.


What labels are you comfortable with if any and if not why?

I guess I’m working on becoming comfortable with labels. I am a person of more color and people freely put me into categories. I wear t-shirts that say hyphenated-american because it allows for a pause before a category can be used.

I often wonder if being gay, an atheist, a person of more color is more important of a label than being a gardener, artist, or dog lover. I know the narrative of oppression tells me that of course the history of being brown, gay, and poor means that it recognizes the struggles, but I’m not always thinking about the struggle. Maybe I’m just selfish.

With ideas of diversity you can see all people as people one in the same or you can say that they all have differences that need to be acknowledged. The minute you decide either of them you are oppressing because both honor and both oppress.

You cannot free yourself from that label.

I came across an interesting quote from your blog stating
“therapy is expensive blogs are free”
Do you think that most of us repackage our inner chaos and present it as fresh fodder and do you consider Art as form of therapy?

I definitely think of art as a form of therapy because it allows me to process and concentrate on ideas that puzzle me. The majority of my work deals with being an oppressor and how there is no escaping that, so instead with my work I focus on how I can accept that I oppress and I can honor myself in not hiding that from myself.

How would you describe your experience of “Manor of Art” in retrospect?

I had a great time at the Manor. I had taken a bit of a break from participating in shows and putting myself out there. I am really thankful for being given the freedom to really do whatever I wanted. I met a ton of people and had fantastic conversations. I hadn’t felt that high in I don’t know when.

What is the role of the art critic in your opinion?

Their role is to keep the conversation going. Hopefully they act as navigators and give language to ideas the audience may only feel.

Do you feel your installation was worth the effort and what happened with your piece?

I would totally do it again. I loved my room. Because it was an installation piece a couple of folks were curious about how much something like my work would cost to have it in a home to purchase. I told them a round about number and then told them they could only have it for 10 days and then I would have to take it down. I love the idea of it being temporary because it reminds me how wonderful an experience can be even if it’s just momentary. I wanted to create the most comfortable room I could and I think was.


Did you leave part of it there or is going to have an afterlife?

I do need to go and pry a couple of pin nails out, that’s all that is left in the room. I might use the materials again, I mean I sanded and stained 350 mahogany tiles so I hope I’ll use them again.

Do you believe in a concept of after life?

Nope. I think that a concept in any life besides the one you’re participating is really not so important.
Several years ago I had a psychotic break and began hearing, seeing, and tactilely feeling things other people couldn’t and my psychiatrist thinks it was because of stress and judgments growing up closeted as a Jehovah’s Witness.
The voices were all about how others were judging me. The scenario was that all of this is virtual reality and that my “real” body is someplace in the future hooked up to machines and I would eventually go back to my older body after 7 years had passed.
Well, it’s been 6 years and I have finally become ok that maybe the scenario isn’t real, or rather isn’t so important. Maybe me concerning myself with this life hooked up to a virtual reality sort of gizmo is making me distant to whatever life this is that I’m currently in.
That is how I think about the belief in an after life, maybe we all have had minor psychotic breaks because we’re terrified of being fully present in the life that we have here and now, so we make up a life in a different world that wouldn’t be as bad is this one.
There is a lot hope though in the belief and you can never take away someone’s hope.

That brings me to ’’Greener than who, Greener Than You?”
What does it refer to is like meant as a survival strategy?

The ideology of Green is an idea where we find comfort even though we have unease at the same time.
Ideology is always based on the fantasy of the ideal, of course making it impossible.
To be fully Green is death.
We can only see parts of this ideology and hope to find satisfaction in the part we know. Or we choose to ignore parts because it’s just too much to be sometimes. It becomes a comfortable yet contentious part of us.
We think of being Green as our own and forget the systemic nature of how it has become something to be. Our ideologies are usually places where we find comfort, enjoy being, and can congratulate ourselves for getting it even if we sometimes don’t. I guess that’s why we maintain them.

I guess the survival strategy is to try your best, but don’t be too hard on yourself when you can’t.
We oppress each other with our ideologies and we oppress ourselves in the process because we are distancing ourselves from each other and end up playing a very silly “At least I’m not” game.


What would your ideal world look like and how can artists help to shape it?

People being really present and not afraid to show their supposed ugly parts.

I would like it if people shared their stories of struggle and perseverance because the real is somewhere in there.
I think artists need to be willing to get a little dirty and start point the finger at themselves first and be more willing to get dirty and be vulnerable.

Do you agree with the statement “imperfection is the new perfect”

Perfect is that ideal type that is part of the unattainable desire-based fantasy.
Ownership is the new perfect.
It’s hard because I would hate to see the new perfect become a confessional.

And what is satisfaction in your mind set?

Being ok with the idea that I’m going to be here for a while. That means planting bulbs in the fall and getting annuals in the spring so I can enjoy them all summer.

Because I thought I was going to be going back to the future I stopped planning ahead, even for bulbs and annuals. For me satisfaction is realizing that this is my life and I need to start enjoying it and stop being so hard on others and myself. I’m working on acceptance.

What can you tell me about your upcoming show?

There are no gimmicks in this show. I created the work with extremely limited resources. In 2008 I spent 9 weeks in a Native American based rehab for alcohol abuse and this work is my process of trying to navigate my identity and my efforts to find a connected form of treatment.
I’m a gay atheist who was raised as a Jehovah’s Witness, so I am immediately distrusting of groupthink and lack of questioning that sometimes happens in rehab. Going to the 17 acres near St. Helens was my white flag. It hasn’t been the easiest path since leaving residential treatment, but I think I’ve found a rhythm that works well for me.

I am very satisfied with the work. There are eight pieces that are reflections that I was trying to process, although I think of them as one piece because they all necessitate each other.

The show opens on October 3rd
at Q Center at 4114 Mississippi Ave

and the opening party is from 3 to 6.

more info about Gabe
at
http://gabeflores.blogspot.com.

PDX Art: Matthew Clark at Virtuoso Studios, Portland

contact
www.Thevirtuosostudios.com

PDX Art: Interview with Molly Dilworth

Variation (City)
From the perspective of the satellite, the urban rooftop landscape looks like a quarantine site: apparently unchanging, contained and secure. As with any system existing in an environment of flux, there are (literally) cracks in the surface, the boundary between the inhabited and off-limit space is constantly breached by water, plant, animal and human life.



ARTIST STATEMENT

The primary concern in my work is the relevance of painting in contemporary society. For me, this includes the interaction of paint and the digital world, specifically satellite technology using the Google Earth interface. My goal is to work with experts from various disciplines (solar-reflective paint engineers, green building engineers), and use real problems in the world today – like the waste stream from industry – as a starting point for projects.



Molly Dilworth is a painter who lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. Since earning her MFA from NYU in 2003 Dilworth has exhibited and performed nationally and internationally.
In 2008 Dilworth exhibited and performed painting as part of SUDDENLY: WHERE WE LIVE NOW, an ongoing set of visual art exhibitions, a reader, and a series of public programs (Portland 2008, Pomona College Museum of Art 2009, Seattle 2009). She has collaborated with Marina Zurkow to create the installation Psychaedelis Domesticus (Istanbul, Turkey, 2007). With MK Guth Dilworth performed Red Shoe Delivery Service (Australia, England, USA, 2003-2006). In June 2008, her work was featured in an article by Stephanie Snyder in Art Lies Magazine. In the fall of 2008 she was a visiting artist and professor at the Pacific Northwest College of art in Portland, Oregon. The 2009 exhibition Molly Dilworth: Dispersion in the Feldman Gallery at PNCA featured paintings made during her residency there. In September 2009 she will create a rooftop painting for Google Earth Brooklyn Suite (Poured Paintings V2/Rooftop) for the D.U.M.B.O Art Under the Bridge Festival.


Hi Molly here it goes



What’s your background in Art?

I was really restless from age 16 to 23, I moved all over the place to study painting, glassblowing and weaving in Albuquerque, Detroit and Seattle. I’ve always restlessly made things my whole life but it’s taken a long time to focus my hands and mind in the same direction.

What is your connection to Portland and how did you end up in NY?

I moved to NYC from Seattle in 2001 to attend grad school at NYU. There were two Portland artists in the program -MK Guth and Cris Moss – the three of us worked on Red Shoe Delivery Service together after finishing school, I got a great introduction to the Portland art world through those two. I’ve always loved Portland and feel honored to be an itinerant citizen in the city.

What moves you as an artist?

Anything I can really feel.

What labels are you comfortable with like are you satisfied being a painter?

For a long time I fought everything about being a painter, I believed that everyone is trained in drawing and painting then eventually graduates to become Laurie Anderson, or John Cage. A few years ago I gave up my materials and my studio, and started curating and performing. It was time to use my brain –not just my hands - and move out into the world instead of working alone in the studio. I found out while walking through the Met while interviewing an artist for a show that all the paintings were as interesting as today’s headlines to me. I had to concede that I was a painter, like it or not.
I just spent 8 days, 10-12 hours a day working on a black roof – really physical, dirty work - it made me think about how artists in the 70’s called themselves workers rather than dancers, painters or defining themselves by a discipline.
It’s from another era, but I can really understand that through the work I’m making now.
I do find the conversation (or lack of) around painting really frustrating. Good friends of mine who are in the trenches of contemporary art have often told me they don’t know how to talk about painting. After having this conversation about a thousand times I was motivated to make work that could be talked about by someone who didn’t want to talk about painting. I prefer to talk to everyone, and have real conversations, and do an end-run around non-starters like ‘watercolor or oil? Landscape or figure?’

How do you develop your themes?

When I discovered that I really was a painter I was embarrassed to find that after painting for more than a decade I still didn’t know what I was doing. At all. So I set up a series of experiments or systems to address all the problems and questions I had about painting.
For example, if a painting wasn’t working I always had a series of color combinations which would ‘fix’ the work. The painting wasn’t any good, it was just sort of limping along with lots of bandages. So I made a rule about my palette: I couldn’t choose it.
I was working for a handmade wallpaper company in Queens at the time, and we threw out literally tons of Golden acrylics. I started using only that paint for my palette. It was difficult since most of the paint was mid-tones: beige, grey. Suddenly I had an interesting problem to work on, instead of pulling the same old tricks out of my sleeve.
It was a lot more fun, and I learned a lot of new tricks!
It turns out I’ve always loved things that have been used before they’re in my hands. I always feel a bit blank when I’m looking at a new canvas bought from the art store. I know the material has had life before me but that life is masked by packaging, and that makes me uncomfortable. I find it easier to use materials that have an obvious previous history, so using materials from the waste stream – another one of my rules – is something that has always worked for me.

What is the civic psyche and how can Art influence it?

Humans just need art, I can’t think of any other reason that we still make it. Attendance at museums went up sharply in New York after September 11th. As a culture we’re not trained to think about art so we think it’s elitist, which is unfortunate since we’re apparently programmed to need it. I’m not a neurobiologist, so I can’t explain why, but I know art (and music, literature and sport for that matter) is good for the civic psyche.


How has the relevance of Art changed over the last 50 years or so?

I take the long view. American art has a large voice that was much smaller a half-century ago, and it’s an industry now – not just galleries and museums but educational institutions, shippers and publishers. – but in the end people have always made art and fought about what it means.


They say “Nothing” doesn’t exist do you agree?

To me, nothing is a zero point from which everything grows. I think resetting to nothing is generative, the opposite of having an attachment to a particular outcome for a project. Nothing is like the perfect pop song in its artlessness and satisfaction.



“Mapping” has become a new code word, what does it mean to you and how do you incorporate it into your art pieces?

Oh, well – we need maps like we need art – just for different purposes. I made a map (except I think of it as a plan) of the rooftop painting before I started it. Of course, I didn’t follow it exactly – sometimes you get more lost when you follow the map religiously.

Do you collaborate with other artists from different disciplines?


Yes, and non-artists too.


What does “Waste” mean to you?


America! We’re professional wasters.






Can you tell me about the project you are working on right now and how can people follow your progress?

I’m currently making paintings on rooftops for Google Earth, I just finished the first one in Brooklyn this September, and plan on making a lot more. I spend a lot of time thinking about how the digital-virtual world affects us psychically and physically, this painting is the first large-scale public manifestation of that physical-virtual marriage. I post all my work regularly to my flickr page. (http://www.flickr.com/photos/mollydilworth/) I’m also embarrassingly active on facebook, but I try to keep it mostly professional, no breakfast-menu updates!


You have started to include the On-line world as a platform to present your concepts.
How has that influenced or expanded the way you see what is an appropriate back drop for Art and who is the targeted audience?

A few years ago I worked in Chelsea and had a hard time seeing the shows, since the galleries all keep the same schedule. I saw most shows – even the ones on my block – online. It’s not the same as seeing the work in person but it’s an incredible second choice. I mentioned that I want to have an interesting conversation with everyone, the internet is good for that.


Can you tell me a little about “The Naked City”?

Today we’re so comfortable with the International Style that we forget it ever faced opposition. After WWII, all of Europe had to be rebuilt and The Situations viewed the International plan as top-down, inhumane and dictatorial - a continuation of the ideology that caused all the devastation.

The Naked City can be seen as a predecessor to the traffic calming or slow/local food movement – essentially a preference for the accident and chance present in daily life if aimless wandering is allowed. A modern equivalent is the farmer’s market – I can have real conversations, learn things and get recipes – whereas at Safeway I just get the stuff, and maybe an empty feeling.
Just the other day I went out for groceries and ran into a Richard Serra sculpture in the middle of my street.
Of course, I immediately posted it to facebook. But if I hadn’t gone out in the world, I wouldn’t have anything to share on facebook. Nor could I find Serra’s warehouse any other way, I looked it up online when I got home and I only found one blog posting of someone else who had accidentally witnessed the last time the pieces were moved.
The Situationists were advocates of the happy accident provoked by the dérive, or drift. Guy Debord named his famous psychogeographical map “The Naked City” (1957), it was a visualization of these Situationist ideas.

I think of the Naked City circa 2009 as the physical world without a digital overlay – anything we experience with our bodies. A moonlight bike ride, the smell of fall, a car crash, a first kiss – nothing virtual about any of that! Not that I’m in any way anti-technology, I’m making paintings for satellites, after all.




What is the potential for Virtual space and how will it affect the future of the human race?

We’re all going to have carpal tunnel! Start working on ‘prayer pose’ now. I recently heard about a community who are building exercise machines to power their electronic devices. They want to fight the dangerous leisure that our machines have given us. I do think it’s fundamentally changing our language and behavior, as all new technology does. But we’re still animals, after all.

What is on the Art horizon for you and can we expect to see one of your projects being realized here in Portland?

I have another 12 rooftops to finish in Brooklyn before the winter sets in, that’s keeping me pretty busy right now.
I’d love to make some rooftop paintings in Portland, I have a few places in mind but if anyone wants me to make one, please contact me. The night I finished the first painting in Brooklyn everyone said ‘oh it would be so great to have a cluster of these on rooftops all around!’ Marking a territory in this way is very interesting to me. I want to work with others, roofing contractors and choreographers for example, to expand what I can do visually and conceptually.

thanks Molly

All the documentation of my first rooftop painting for Google Earth (finished last Sunday!) can be seen here.

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


contact Molly Dilworth at

www.mollydilworth.com

Molly Dilworth
madilworth@yahoo.com
158 Norman #1, Brooklyn, NY 11222 646.515.5161

PDX Art: Interview with Leah Stuhltrager, Dam/Stuhltrager Gallery about "The East/West Project"

Photo credit Jackie Friscia


PDX Art: Interview with Leah Stuhltrager about the East West Project

Hi Leah thanks for doing this


Tell me a bit about your gallery
Since when does it exist, who runs it and what kind of Art is exhibited there?

Dam, Stuhltrager has existed for over a decade, but it transformed from a project space to a professional gallery about four years ago. The gallery is recognized for the new media and installation artists. The gallery represents Mark Andreas, Brose Partington, Ryan Wolfe, Mark Esper, Ruth Marshall, Anna Frants and Cris Dam.

As a general rule, I am attracted to artists/artworks that pack more than a knock knock joke's punchline. I'm interested in learning more about what a piece is conveying when it exudes independence in thought and voice. I respect artwork that speaks eloquently for itself and isn't reliant on a trend or accompanying catalog. Generally, I am drawn to artists who redefine the medium they work with so that the medium may work specifically with them.

What is the mission of Art and what can we learn from Art History?

I had a conversation with one of my artists today about what it means to be an artist. It climaxed in him telling me, "Making art doesn't always make me happy. Its just what I was born to do."

If open, inquisitive and patient, one can learn all he/she needs to know from Art History... But it is Art History's philosophical conundrums that keeps someone creating. There's still answers to be conceived through Art and that's a sufficient enough reason for a true artist to donate their life to trying to communicating them.

What is your connection to Berlin and how did you come up with the idea to open an annex in Berlin?

Over the past few years, my gallery has developed very sincere and rewarding long term ties to the international art communities in St Petersburg/Russia, Istanbul/Turkey, Madrid/Spain and Basel/Switzerland. We’ve been lucky to be a part of an unifying international circuit of galleries who are in business not for the money but primarily for the love of art. Gaining the experience, exposure and absorbing the culture throughout the greater "Art World" gives my artists the tools and knowledge to communicate more universally through their work.

Stepping out of your own front yard is important to any career but learning from the experiences/people met along the way is more important. It is the knowledge gained that informs the art/curation, not the notches in the resume. The contemporary art communities in Berlin and Shanghai were places my artists and I felt great admiration for and energy pulsating from. This September, we opened up EAST/WEST (a six month project) in Berlin and created three installations for an exhibit at Oriental Pearl Tower in Shanghai.

What do you think of Berlin as an Art capital comparison to NY?
They are very different in every way and are defined by the characteristics that make them so unalike. Thank goodness for that.


How did you get in touch with Gallery Homeland and Portland Artists and how does it feel working with a Guest curator?

I've known Paul Middendorf from Gallery Homeland for several years. The gallery curation is fairly straightforward, East Coast artists are selected by me, West Coast artists are selected by Paul. Interestingly enough, the Brooklyn artists I selected for EAST/WEST tend to create works that emanate nature as a theme in one way or another while Paul selected Portland artists who are generally inspired by urban landscapes and issues.

Each exhibit at EAST/WEST includes at least one Berlin artist (and often their gallery). In the past, I have found working with other galleries (guest curating artists) has led to relationships that I am honored to hold close long after the exhibition closes. It is my goal and hope that this is true of the professional and personal relationships begun in Berlin over the next few months.

What is the premise of "the East West Project", how is it financed and what are the expectations for it?

EAST/WEST Berlin is the pilot for a 6 month project that everyone involved foresees/is working towards building into a continuing program. It currently is being financed equally by me and by Gallery Homeland. The next incarnation of EAST/WEST is positioned to have space donated and more private sponsorship.

What kind of issues are addressed by your artists?

My artists address issues that are current, timeless and clearly articulated within their art. I support causes and artists I feel contribute meaningful discourse to the advancement of art. My attention is dedicated to those who are saying things no one else has completely said, who's places in art history are not accessory, who have a contribution that is only theirs to offer.


For how long will the project run and how has it been received in the Berlin art scene and what are the art trends there?

EAST/WEST Berlin runs from Sept 19, '09 thru April 1, '10. We have had our doors open for six days so it is impossible to discuss how we've been received just yet. Likewise, as a newbie just immersed here in Berlin as of last week, I'm among the last among the crowd to have a viable or insightful opinion on trends this early in my tenure here.


Can we expect a project in Portland by Dam Stuhltrager?

All is possible if it is wanted enough.

How has the new economy influenced the international Art world?

Artists should be and are inspired by other things than the market.

What is in next for your gallery?
Beyond our homebase in Brooklyn and EAST/WEST in Berlin, my gallery currently has artists exhibiting or installing at The Oriental Pearl Tower in Shanghai, The Moscow Biennial, The Mills Building in San Francisco and The Hunterdon Museum in New Jersey.

Anything else you’d like to share?The EAST/WEST Project is online
at http://www.damstuhltrager.com/east_west.html

As well, we have a facebook page heavy with photos so its easy to virtually visit our exhibits in Germany from America

at http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/profile.php?id=100000238313482&ref=profile



Dam, Stuhltrager Gallery
38 Marcy Avenue
Brooklyn, NY 11211

www.damstuhltrager.com
info@damstuhltrager.com

PDX Art: Interview with Nance Paternoster

Hi Nance thanks for doing this





Where are you originally from and what brought you from NY to Portland?

I was born in Queens, NY but grew up in Cold Spring Harbor, Long Island. A whaling town on Long Island Sound – which is why I have moments of fleeing to the coast here every once in a while :o)

I lived in San Francisco for many years and then moved to Portland to work as Flame Artist (Compositing and Special FX) on the FOX series the PJs at Will Vinton Studios.

What is Computer Graphic Imaging and who developed it?

To me, this term would imply creating & manipulating imagery on a computer.

For me this medium has never stayed just at that point. What I mean is, I have always taken the image from the screen and integrated other mediums with the printed image, whether it be film, collage, 3-dimensional collages, light sculpture, fabric, veneer, metal, paint, pastel etc. Anything really – but with a focus on mixing things in a way where the result is archival and 1 of a kind.

Check out this link for the History of the field. When I started, there was very little happening, so I was lucky enough to watch it all evolve. We studied programming, and traditional artists such as Miro and Kandinsky as we wrote software to emulate color and shapes as well as composition.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_graphics#History

To me since my teacher Ed Zajec was from Europe, Slovenia – his influence was pretty international. He was a pioneer and developed his own approach to using Digital tools as fine art at such an early time (he started in the 1960s).

http://ams.syr.edu/index.php?content_file=zajec.txt&title=Computer%20Art

http://digitalartmuseum.org/zajec/index.htm



Since when is it accepted as a new Art medium or is it?

I would have to say that even though there was a group of us always believing that it was a fine art form of it’s own, this medium has always been questioned due to it’s inability to reproduce exactly onto paper what we see on screen until about the 90’s.
I have collaborated with other Digital Artists from around the world almost yearly since 1985 at Siggraph experimenting with other mediums.
http://www.siggraph.org/s2009/galleries_experiences/the_studio/

The other issue was that since the file was on the computer, how could a Digital piece be of value since you could make as many pieces as you wanted. With the invention of Archival Inks by Jon Cone things began to change.
http://shopping.netsuite.com/s.nl/c.362672/sc.5/category.248/.f
with the development of new inks by several people and the testing of achival inks by http://www.wilhelm-research.com/ we now know that these inks if used on archival surfaces can last upwards of 100 years.

At this point, photographers began to be interested and created limited edition series of Giclee (ink jet) prints.

I now use many traditional mediums confidently with Digital printing onto all kinds of properly prepped surfaces to create one of a kind fine art pieces and not only do I see more acceptance but more people in the gallery scene understanding the terminology and use of digital mediums.

What tools are necessary?

Well the fastest Mac made is always the most pleasurable machine to work on, Photoshop, Painter, a Wacom drawing tablet for free form drawing & great pressure sensitivity so that the harder you press the more ink comes out, several hard drives for image libraries and backup, 1 large format printer (my preference being Epson – though I am excited to jump in with Canon and HP now that they have large format Fine Art printers). I own the Epson 9800 which prints 4” wide by 150 feet long and a small Epson 220 which is 13” wide and can take long rolls as well, and lots of fine art paper and fabric and other materials to work on as well as paint, pastels, gesso, molding paste and anything Golden makes, good brushes, and a good UV Varnish to preserve the final piece.

Of course, these are my preferences…keep in mind I started programming in Fortran and printing onto punch cards with computers that did not recognize color at that point…so really as long as a machine can comfortably run Photoshop with a file the size you would like to print – then you are set.

How does it feel to be one of the pioneers for digital Art photography and animation?

Well, I guess I would consider myself to be a Digital Fine Artist as that has always been my roots. I have always felt lucky to have chosen a field that blossomed before my eyes and continues to grow and be incredibly exciting as well as amazing in the yearly developments. I have witnessed so much and continue to imagine what will be in our future. I feel I have a lot to offer in teaching having started with such basic digital tools and in programming as it gives me a solid understanding of how things work.

And how has it progressed since its early days?

Well to start, I can remember when I got back from studying a year in Italy in 1984 and attended New York Institute of Technology to make up some Computer Graphic credits. They had at the time a paint system that was developed by programmers and scientists. This was before with had GUIs or any kind of user interfaces that made sense to artists. The menus were non intuitive and hard to use. We used a scanner the was black and white yet the paint system could understand color so we had to add color to the black and white images which gave the images a unique color sense.

If you look at the piece in the gallery on this page of my site on the top row to the right you will see an example of this. This piece is called “American Brunch” and started with a group of images placed onto a flatbed scanner in 1984.

http://www.nancepaternoster.com/hmls/VintageWork_BW.html

From there, I took at job at a company called Genigraphics where we used a machine that used it’s own language – which is how I have come to title my pieces in a certain way. This machine was originally created to be a flight simulator. It was giant and had to be in a cold room so we all wore gloves with the finger tips cut off. These machines were vector based at the time. We had to create shading by layering multiple shapes of slightly varying color next to each other to make something look smooth in color gradation. When we exceeded our artwork space limit (didn’t take much at the time) we would create a digital mask and then use a film recorder to shoot part of the image and they go back to creating the other parts of the images with masks until on film we had several images with masked out areas that would be combined with an optical printer into one piece of 35mm film.
A single image would fill up a large Bernouli disk which looked like an 8 track but 8 times larger. Now we do this all in Photoshop and carry it around on a little flash drive that we could wear around our neck.
The photo-realism in Feature Films now with Computer Generated characters and worlds, the evolution is just amazing.

What is digital painting?

It is the process of painting on a computer. You can do this with a mouse as people did before there were tablets (myself included) or you can use a Graphics tablet so that it feels like you are really drawing. It is a device that has a flat surface to draw on and a pen the interfaces with it to draw with. You have to ability to make custom brushes in Photoshop such as a Calligraphy brush, a chalk brush, a oil pastel brush etc. You can make brushes that look like leaves by scanning in a leave and create a photorealistic tree that way. You can set up various airbrushes and paint a person’s face with realistic shading as you would with traditional tools.

In what forms is it printed out?

Well that depends on the Artist. People in business who sell prints print from the computer onto papers or film and now some fabrics. The papers can be fine art paper commercially prepped for printing so that when you print on them (as long as you have you profile and settings set correctly and you machine calibrated) you will see on paper what you see on screen in terms of color matching.

I print onto anything that will fit through my printer. I prep surfaces of found materials myself with archival coatings that have been tested to allow the colors to print correctly and to keep the inks archival. For example in the show I had at ANKA I started with Arches 88 which is not a commercially prepared paper, I then painted a bunch of texture onto the surface with a big brush, I then covered that with an iridescent acrylic for reflectivity in the final print, and coated it with a rabbit skin glue which allows you to print onto that surface. I think I ran the print through the printer and when complete coated the entire print with a UV Varnish.

What is Synergistic Preservations?

It is a new company I have started which allows me to make custom artwork in collaboration with a client. It starts with them having a feel for what they would like, what color, what materials, what subject matter etc and what size and we go from there. Here is the blurb from my site and a link to my blog which shows an example of work I just completed for Chief Media in New York city.
What is so satisfying about this work is that the client is part of the creation process and they are very happy with the result because they helped design it. Since my work is one of a kind this also gives them a valuable piece of art in the end.

SYNERGISTIC PRESERVATIONS
Collaborative Artwork between Artist and Client

• Synergistic Preservations creates unique, original and archival artwork through an energetic, exciting collaborative process between the artist and the client. This process makes you the client central to the outcome, so that the final piece reflects your aspirations and visual interests. Each custom piece is an archival, original work of art.
• Synergistic Preservations works with interior designers, architects, curators and independent art buyers, creating original fine art with a range of custom media for all environments. Working one on one with me, the Artist, allows you to obtain the exact visuals that you want on your walls , and to invest in Fine Art that increases in value over time. Created with archival materials, these one of a kind pieces make for a quality investment.
• Your original piece will always be a unique creation: in this cutting-edge process, I integrate several media with the Digital Print using all archival materials so your piece can never be reproduced.
• I am a veteran Digital Fine Artist, having approached digital media as fine art since 1980. In addition to my many years as a Digital Fine Artist, I have also worked in production for many years.

http://synergisticpreservations.wordpress.com/
http://www.nancepaternoster.com/hmls/Commissions_BW.html


You teach at PNCA what do you teach?

I teach Compositing and Motion Graphics as well as advanced Photoshop which includes Photorealistic digital painting and photo illustration.
Compositing has to do with combining elements from many sources and making them look believable in the final composition. In the compositing class, we work with motion based elements and in Photoshop we use still images. For Motion Graphics we usee the same tools After Effects, Photoshop and Illustrator and our focus is more about Graphic and type design in motion.

What are the carrier options of your students?

Does this mean what options do they have when they graduate ?

If so, I would say that they would feel comfortable working as a Compositor or a Motion graphics artist in production if they took those classes. If they took the Photoshop class, they should feel comfortable color correcting images and compositing them into scenes, as well as how to approach a photorealistic painting, restore a photo, or create a certain look or style from a certain period. Many new questions come up each semester and since they do a final project of choice they all have a different goal with a professional output.


You work has been featured in different kind of magazines
How did you approach them and are their trends you have to be aware of ?

Well, I have been fortunate to have started in this field so early so the magazines that still exist from years ago for Digital Art such as Computer Graphics World and know who I am because they have published my work and they pursue me.
The New York Times reviewed my work a few times when I was younger and the field was so new. Now there are so many talented Digital Artists that I would be more interested in showing them something that I felt was a new an innovative process or series.


You also worked for film and television what are the differences between commercial Art and fine Art or is this old fashioned way to look at?

Well again, I feel like I have been lucky because even though the Film and Television world have a commercial focus there are so many incredibly talented artists in this field. I have learned so much from working in production at this level and this has made me more efficient and skilled in my Fine Art work.

For example, when I was hired to be a photo realistic paint artist on Starship Troopers, I had to paint a photorealistic bug (since the film was about bugs) to land the job. This caused me to figure out how to do this digitally. Now I can confidently paint photo-realistically on the computer and teach students how to do this. Production also teaches you to be fast – which gives you more time to make art – always a good thing!
Right now I am happy to be teaching and creating. When working in production it is extra hard after 12-14 hours on a computer to want to spend even more hours to do something creative on a computer –though I did it. I prefer this schedule right now.
With the group of people involved in these project being artists there is a lot of creative ideas that go into a final product, but ultimately the designs are make by directors, producers and writers so there isn’t very much creative freedom vs. Fine Art where it is all about that.

http://www.nancepaternoster.com/hmls/StudentWorkStill_BW.html

How involved are the Art pieces time and process wise?

They all differ. I am definitely a collector of images, textures and materials as well as concepts. I carry things around with me for years. With the show at ANKA, each stage was a challenge. The piece are mounted onto a brushed aluminum frame and attaching the acid free foam core to that frame in a way where the acid free element remained in tact was one challenge with integrated the advice of the tech support dept at Golden Art Supplies as well as Art Media’s framing team here in town. I am always at Winks or some hardware store to find the perfect way to frame or hang some of these pieces because I integrate some many materials that aren’t straight forward. That to me is part of the excitement

It sometimes will take a year or two to complete a series and sometimes it is faster than that, but the idea and the concept is usually something that I’ve had in my sketch book for a while.



Synergy 11:11 do you feel your life is guided and is there a higher purpose
How do you align yourself with this purpose?

11:11 is such an interesting thing for me because I have always felt that this number was in some way guiding me to where I was supposed to be in life. When I did the 11:11 series in 1992, I was blown away to find that many other people feel this way as well. Which led to the Angel portraits. It has to do with the fact that if you were to follow your intuition in life you will end up in the right place and when you see this number it is a reminder that you are doing that.

There is an explanation on my website and links to other 11:11 sites that are informative about the whole idea.

http://www.nancepaternoster.com/hmls/AngelGallery_BW.html

I find that when I follow my intuition things work out. I was excited to know this was true for other people as well and the great thing is that once someone begins to see it , they keep seeing it. To this day, people still email me and let me know that they are having this experience as well.


How can one use Art to inspire others to do likewise?

Art, to me is such a nourishing element to have in your space. It feels good to look at and it feels great to make. I am always interested in trying to create art where people wonder, what is that and how was that done. Something that holds their interest conceptually, visually or texturally. If the concept is something that they can relate to that’s even better. Art is a language they we are all free to interpret as we wish so if it can be moving in any of these ways, than to me, that is inspiring.

How important is funding for the Arts?

Receiving a couple of RACC grants has not only propelled my career, but has given me an incredible amount of inspiration and motivation. They are a wonderful organization with people who really seem to care about Artists advancing in their work.
Art is something that allows our society to have insight in a different way as well as pleasure. It is essential that we not only continue to fund Art but that we also try and find even more ways to do so that our community as a whole can benefit and thrive.

Do you feel connected to an Art community here in Portland ?

I absolutely do. It’s funny I’m not sure if it is the size of Portland or the fact that it rains so much that we have such an eclectic community of people in not only the Fine Art still world but in the Animation field as well. There is such a great collection of artists in this town for how big it is, it’s very exciting. The greatest thing is that people are really nice and also open to collaboration and support each other.

What is your next or current artistic project and how do you find time besides teaching?

I have several and thanks for your interest!

I am working on a series called “MADE IN CHINA” which integrates Silkscreen and Digital Printing. The series takes a look at how we got to where we are today with consumption. I started with ads from the 1940s advertising to buy many pounds of butter since it’s only 3 cents a pound, as well as scans of hand made shirts from when I was a child, with the lable made in the USA, to a child’s plastic pacifier – made in china. The silkscreen prints also include a giant golden pacifier, a pink plastic hula skirt, plastic army soldiers as well as oversized bar codes, made in china logos and made in Japan logos as well (there was a period where we imported a lot from Japan).
The silkscreens will have digital imagery as well as statistical quotes of how much we actually import, how much is inspected etc integrated into them. I am sure other mediums will be used in the final prints as well.

Another series I am working on has to do with Americana type environments, like camping. I have photographed people camping for about 4 years now in the same campground. My idea was to combine these representative images in a way where they had a feeling of stills grabbed from a running film so they are layed out in rows cinematically with occasional close-ups for emphasis.
In conjunction with the Camping series there is also a Swimming series where I used an underwater camera and photographed people partially underwater and partially above in pools, hot tubs and other bodies of water in the US and in Denmark. These images are then woven into each other so the viewer can see 2 scenes in each image both under and above water. I am working with weaving on-screen as well as weaving with the printed images on either paper, canvas or fabric and potentially building a lighted enclosure.

With my experimentation with printing onto Veneer I have started a series of Woodland creatures that are made up of parts of peoples faces and elements you would find in the woods. They tell a fairy tale in the compositions and are printed onto Veneer in a way where the wood grain is part of the composition.

There are a few more…but I’ll save that for next time ;O)

contact at
http://www.nancepaternoster.com

also check out my interview with Nance
and Julianna Paradisi
at
www.PDXArtScene.com

PDX Art: "East West Project" Josh Arseneau

Josh Arseneau (galleryHOMELAND/ West Coast, USA), Mark Andreas & Cris Dam (Dam Stuhltrager/ East Coast, USA), Kathleen Vance (galerie open / Berlin, Germany), Steve Schepens (Brot und Spiele Galerie / Berlin, Germany)

September 19th - October 18th

Opening Reception
September 19th 8p

w/ performances by Portland's own Blue Cranes
Reed Wallsmith on alto sax
Johannes Haage on guitar
Robert Michler on drums
and
This Frontier Needs Heroes



From Sept 19, 2009 - March 31, 2010 EAST/WEST BERLIN will be in the heart of Mitte within two blocks of Berlin's major transit hub and famous TV tower, ideally located among some of Germany's most recognized emerging art galleries and museums.

The project encourages cultural exchange by establishing a short-term (six months) project space for international artists to share, develop and progress contemporary ideas. Selected hot emerging artists from the East Coast (Brooklyn/NYC) and the West Coast (Portland/Seattle) will be traveling outside the United States to Berlin.

Visit the website here.

For more information please contact Paul Middendorf paul@galleryhomeland.org.

PDX ART: "The East/West Project" Gallery Homeland in Berlin

Founded by Dam Stuhltrager/ Williamsburg, Brooklyn and Gallery Homeland/ Portland, Oregon, The East/West Project supports the advancement of global understanding through initiating long term relationships among multinational cultures.

Far more than just a gallery annex, The EAST/WEST Project is a 501(c) international artist residency and exhibition program that travels to different communities around the world recognized for their emerging art scene. The project encourages cultural exchange by establishing a short term (about six months) gallery and residential space for international artists to share, develop, progress contemporary ideas and build long term relationships.

From Sept 19, 2009 - March 31, 2010 EAST/WEST BERLIN will be in the heart of Mitte within two blocks of Berlin's major transit hub and famous TV tower, ideally located among some of Germany's most recognized emerging art galleries and museums.

Venue: The EAST/WEST Project BERLIN
Dates: Sept 19 - Oct 18, 2009
Ribbon Cutting Ceremony: Sept 19 (8pm - on) w/ This Frontier Needs Heroes
Inaugrial Exhibit: Urban Nature
Artists: Mark Andreas & Cris Dam (Dam Stuhltrager/ East Coast, USA), Josh Arseneau (Gallery Homeland/ West Coast, USA), Kathleen Vance (galerie open / Berlin, Germany), Steve Schepens (Brot und Spiele Galerie / Berlin, Germany)
contact
http://www.damstuhltrager.com/

East / West Project is a nonprofit initiative that encourages cultural exchange by establishing short term project spaces for international artists to share, develop and progress contemporary ideas.

Traveling annually to a different city with an unique emerging art identity, EAST/WEST Project provides leading contemporary art communities with worldwide access to each other, the ability to collaborate and a physical axis for developing ongoing cultural dialogue.

From Sept 1,2009 - April 1, 2010 EAST/WEST will be in the heart of Mitte within two blocks of Berlin's major transit hub and famous TV tower, ideally located among some of Germany's most recognized emerging art galleries.

Jonathan Brilliant Josh Arseneau
Cris Dam Damien Gilley
Anna Frants Dan Gilsdorf
Devrim Kadirbeyoglu Sean Healy
Ruth Marshall Christoph Heuppi
Brose Partington Victor Maldonado
Carol Salmanson Vanessa Renwick
Raphaele Shirley Ethan Rose
Ryan Wolfe Joe Thurston


Leah Stuhltrager (director/curator) Paul Middendorf (director/curator) East West Project BERLIN
(SEPT 2009 - MAR 2010)

PDX Art: "Lizard Lounge"

more info at
www.lizardloungePDX.com
Art by J. Shea

PDX Art: PNCA Faculty Biennial

PNCA’s faculty represent some of the leading local thinkers in the field of Visual Arts.
This exhibit is a showcase of the 2009 Faculty Biennial displaying works of the current 85 faculty members.

Exhibition
August 31–October 17

PNCA Main Campus Building, Swigert Commons, 1241 N.W. Johnson St.

PNCA is also the host for the last two PICA TBA@PNCA events this weekend.

contact
http://www.pnca.edu

PDX Art: TBA

Pica can be a disorder characterized by an appetite for a substance not necessarily nutritious or can be a strange appetite for some things that may be considered foods, such as food for thought
In this case PICA refers to The Portland Institute for Contemporary Art which allows artists to explore the limits of artistic creation. PICA challenges the audiences to open their preconceived notions of what Art should be like a can of worms to throw them into the ocean of past conventions.

http://www.pica.org














I am a moving image a hybrid of action and contemplation on someone else’s screen
a time based event a blurb captured like a rare animal in the brains data bank
only for a brief moment to be released again back into the wild of an image jungle.

I am more than just a penis walking talking
At least I want too
I am more than a time based event with a beginning and a pre-defined end
At least I pretend too
I am more than a feeding organism that excrement's what it can’t digest
At least I wish too
I am more than a bag of flesh and bones that can’t protect itself
At least I hope so

It is futile to try to depict time in Art to capture the moment of contemporary morbidity.
With my eyes closed I am just a floating something with my eyes open I am a nation with borders and rules.
Form without reason is none described I might as well have no form at all.

Down on my knees I revel in the leaves that gave their life to provide oxygen as absurd that may sound and that sound is only an afterthought of an action that has already happened just like in Art the moment of creation has already transpired but we are still able to linger in its aura in its after effect and as the organ that observes we become its final witness.
From then on it is in us where this moment finds a semi permanent harbor and lives on by docking on to our brains interior and by altering its capacity.

It is not given to us to step inside of our brain or outside of time still conscious but Art can provide such rapture that moments collapse like colossal fragments to dissolve into pure experience.
The self forgets its division even its existence for a brief period and the sap of creation is mingling with our blood stream to reach beyond the brain barrier for a higher elevation where time is so thin that it is impossible to trace it back to its starting out point and it stops to be relevant.

Lost in vowels I retreat into the void the void which has been left by a memory that has no memory but is like a feeling like an imprint that something occurred out of the ordinary of our force field because the witness had become one with the event so no observation was recorded only pure experience still illuminates the horizon like the sun that has set but keeps on shining on the other side.

TBA short for time based Art is like masturbation you have to experience it alone to reap its totality otherwise the watcher will disturb the ripples of pleasure and judge the technique and grade the result.
Time based Art exists because there still exists a need in us to do something without a commercial or monetary benefit. TBA is a place outside the time space continuum where the only sense we try to make is to be one with our senses.
It is a place where the hand has stopped making the mind has left thinking and doing has stopped existing.
When the floater becomes the float survival of time based art is guaranteed and the audience has ceased to exist as a separate entity but is now the water that carries its creation.

TBA is
PICA Portland Institute for Contemporary Art’s yearly convergence of cutting edge performance, dance, music, new media and visual arts in Portland, Oregon.
The Time-Based Art (TBA) Festival happens from September 3-13, 2009
with an array of visual art display in multiple old and new disciplines
until October 18 in various venues all over Portland

go to
http://www.pica.org/tba

PDX Art: Interview with New York's "CULTUREHALL" founder David Andrew Frey

Hi David welcome to PDX Art Portal
Culturehall is a free online art gallery and artist portfolio website, helping artists share their work with other artists, curators and collectors. Culturehall is curated with a specific interest in early to mid-career artists.

Who founded Culturehall and what is its purpose?

I founded Culturehall to provide emerging professional artists a place online to easily promote their work.

How inclusive is Culturehall?

Culturehall is curated. The basis of our decision-making has to do with sustaining the community. Our members generally have a formal art education with many participating in a graduate level program. There are quite a few professors also sharing work on the site.

What is your job description and what is the reality of it?

I wear many hats. Founder, Director, Curator and Software Developer would be titles for some of the jobs that I currently handle.

You are based in New York City, what are the pros and cons of being in an Art capital?

New York is amazing. The only negative that comes to mind is the lack of time to see everything that I would like to. Just keeping up with the museums is more than a full time job.

How successful have you been establishing connections with international art sites and what are the ramifications?

Culturehall has not been pursuing partnerships with other art websites, but this is something that we are considering.

What are the potentials for web based on-line art communitys?
The web is still in its infancy and we are already seeing what an amazing tool it is for bringing together people who have a similar set of interests. The international art community is one of those niches that the web can serve especially well.
Hopefully on-line art communities become another viable way for artists to gain exposure to audiences that they would otherwise not encounter.

What is your curatatorial criteria for the site and is there also a physical location?

As mentioned before, I really consider how the work will fit within the community as a whole and in the various genres represented on Culturehall when making these decisions. We do present a wide range of genres and mediums, from conceptual performance to realist painters. Regarding physical space – currently Culturehall exists primarily on the web. Occasionally we participate in events where there is more of a physical manifestation. Existing offline as well is a pillar of our service is in the future.

What does Culturehall offer its artists?

For selected artists, we offer a free web-based portfolio, a place to share their biography and present their events on the homepage. Culturehall is designed to enable artists to present their works in as round a way as possible via the Internet by mixing images, video and audio.

How was your experience as an exchange student and does culturehall have any plans to include an artist exchange program?

I really treasure the time I spent studying in Berlin. The people and the city are amazing. I had been to Germany a few times before, but living there was a very different experience. Sponsoring an exchange program is not currently on the radar for Culturehall, but something interesting to explore.

What qualifies as contemporary art work in your opinion?

I generally subscribe to the definition of artistic production that occurred from the late 20th century to the present. Whether supportable or not, I feel like the term “Contemporary Art” has a bit of a bias towards the strain of art that at least has a toe in conceptualism. When I think about “Contemporary Art” in this way it feels like the term should exclude sub-genres like Street Art, Outsider Art but my tendency would be to allow these to exist with this same sphere as long as there is some sort of self-awareness of the greater art world.

I see that you also work in diverse Medias. How do you counter the preconceived notion that an artist has to work in either or to be taken seriously?

The Constructivist ideal of Factura where materials should stay as pure as possible is where my thinking has been for quite awhile. I feel that the idea behind a work of art is the most integral part of the piece and materials exist to serve the idea.

What has informed your personal art practice lately, what do you think of the hyper commercial attitude that prevails as of late in the Art market and where do you fit into this picture?

Unfortunately my personal art practice has been the victim of my work on Culturehall for the past several years. There are few pieces that remain in limbo, but I just haven’t had time to execute them.
The stance that the current times will make art better has some validity but it ignores all of the great spaces that are now “reorganizing”. A more culturally responsible society that has a better support system for creativity via grants and other programs would make the biggest difference. Either way, I don’t think we will be seeing too many more diamond encrusted platinum skulls in the near future.
Beyond the implosive reality that we are all now experiencing, that hyper-hyper market did serve to expand the audience and that should be considered a net positive.
In all of this mess, Culturehall obviously cannot provide a replacement for these lost venues, but does provide a good alternative for artists to get their work out.

Final words?

We look forward to your visit. If you are interested in becoming involved please take a few moments to submit an application. Your application and membership are free.


thank you David for this insidefull interview

contact for more info at

www.culturhall.com
email: david@culturehall.com
portfolio: http://culturehall.com/david_andrew_frey
blog

http://palmaire.blogspot.com/2009/08/culturehall-news.html
4821 5th Street, Suite 4I, New York, NY 11101, USA

PDX Art: TBA 2009 "Art for lunch" PICA's Labor Day Picnic

Art plus Community
the best of both worlds today
at TBA 2009
celebrate with PICA
at Washington High School

info at

www.PICA.org








PICA is serving us Time Based Art again this time at Washington High School