Myartspace Interviews: Bo Bartlett, Alex Golden, Aleksandra Mir

A look at past interviews that have been featured on www.myartspace.com.


Interview with Bo Bartlett:
“I don’t think there is a collective spirit of America. America to me seems fractured. Many people seem marginalized. I think the "America’s heart" concept is really just talking about a larger idea; a mythological spirit or soul of America which has to do with the concept of freedom, individual rights, and the adventurousness we associate with the frontier spirit. People are all longing. We’re all looking for something. On some level, my paintings tend to address this sense of desire. I paint people because I am a person. I paint America because I am American. I’d like to think that I’m a citizen of the world, but at the same time, I can’t deny my nationality. I am not necessarily proud of it.” -- Bo Bartlett
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Interview with Alex Golden:
“I never fully cast aside my questions and doubts about the systems of society, but I try to. I think my work is, at heart, ironic and critical, but I try to get in there and join in what I sometimes perceive to be the absurdity of various belief systems. It is an effort to understand the human propensity to find meaning and then to believe in it, often wholeheartedly and without doubt. Why do we subscribe to the norms that cultures generate for us, even when they seem outdated? Why are we seduced by celebrity and branding? How is it possible for ideological warfare to be waged in the 21st century?” -- Alex Golden
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Interview with Aleksandra Mir:
"The closest I get to religion is in that I try to seriously engage with and maintain certain originally religious traditions and rituals that I like. A lot of my work also has a celebratory aspect to it that perhaps can be seen as verging on ceremonial worship. I also need to have a lot of faith in good weather when dealing with big public and ephemeral events. But that's pretty much it." -- Aleksandra Mir
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Take care, Stay true,

Brian Sherwin

Senior Editor

www.myartspace.com

Myartspace Interviews: Kathie Olivas, Travis Louie, Sas Christian

A look at past interviews that have been featured on www.myartspace.com.

Interview with Kathie Olivas:
“I started exhibiting over a dozen years ago and wasn't really familiar with the term "lowbrow." I was just showing in contemporary galleries. I met my husband in 2000 and he introduced me to Juxtapoz Magazine and started encouraging me to start showing on the West Coast. My work just sort of fit, but I've always thought of Lowbrow as being a very West Coast movement so I guess I still feel a bit like an outsider.” -- Kathie Olivas
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Interview with Travis Louie:
“My work is created in several stages, . . . the first being the idea and or inspiration which can come at any time at any place. When I'm purposefully trying to come up with something, I make many little thumbnail drawings and write little character descriptions or complete little short stories to accompany the concept of a piece before I even get to the painting,”-- Travis Louie
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Interview with Sas Christian:
“When I was about 8 a Japanese friend of mine at school had shown me some dolls she had - they were hand-painted and had these vibrant large "manga" eyes. I was fascinated with them and it stuck.”-- Sas Christian
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Take care, Stay true,

Brian Sherwin

Senior Editor

www.myartspace.com

Myartspace Interviews: Wafaa Bilal, Vito Acconci, Christian Schumann

A look at past interviews that have been featured on www.myartspace.com.

Imbue, Lamda photographic print, Approximately 44 by 48 inches (smaller-sized prints also available)

Interview with Wafaa Bilal:
“Activist art gets a bad reputation; art is political in nature. You cannot separate the two. Even if you decide not to do political art, that is itself a political act according to Adorno. Which comes first, art or politics? I think art becomes the reflection and the record of time…but life is politics, and usually art imitates life, except occasionally when life imitates art.” -- Wafaa Bilal
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Fan City, convertible architectural unit, 1981

Interview with Vito Acconci:

“Everybody uses labels: they give you a handle on things – an over-simplified handle, sure, but without labels, without ads, without words, the world would be an indistinguishable mass, a blur. You can hope, maybe, that people ascribe so many labels to you that none wins out…” -- Vito Acconci
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Plastic Youth, 2007, Acrylic on canvas, 52" x 74"

Interview with Christian Schumann:
“I never make sketches. Everything is developed in an intuitive manner. The approach I developed growing up is derived from a mush of ideas from expressionism and the Beats. In painting, one act creates the idea of the next - it is a conversation of sorts which slowly turns into a frustrating puzzle with my own limited nature. Increasingly, the only requirement I need for working is just to have time to do it in the first place as the whole process requires so much of it.” -- Christian Schumann
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Take care, Stay true,

Brian Sherwin
Senior Editor
www.myartspace.com

Myartspace Interviews: Mark Jenkins, Anthony Lister, BASK

Interview with Mark Jenkins:

"There is opposition, and risk, but I think that just shows that street art is the sort of frontier where the leading edge really does have to chew through the ice. And it's good for people to remember public space is a battleground, with the government, advertisers and artists all mixing and mashing, and even now the strange cross-pollination taking place as street artists sometimes become brands, and brands camouflaging as street art creating complex hybrids or impersonators." -- Mark Jenkins
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Interview with Anthony Lister:

"Rodin makes me cry, Picasso makes me smile, the Chapman brothers make me laugh out loud, Egon Schiele makes me shake my head with admiration, Bacon makes me jump and so on and so forth. But really- my most enlightened artistic experiences are with my children when I see their works on paper." -- Anthony Lister
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Interview with BASK:

"I'm definitely an optimist. Actually a lot of my work pokes fun at the elements around us, good or bad. Unfortunately, most good art comes from struggle and a sense helplessness-- as if your only voice to be heard is through your art. The current state of affairs lends itself to the arts pretty well." -- BASK

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Take care, Stay true,

Brian Sherwin

Senior Editor

www.myartspace.com