Artist Interview – Page 23

March 28, 2020March 28, 2020, by Etty Yaniv

Artists on Coping: Kathryn Hart

During the coronavirus pandemic, Art Spiel is reaching out to artists to learn how they are coping.

A dirty old room

Description automatically generated — Kathryn Hart, Installation view of *The Other Voice* in Sala Coll Alas, 2020, Gandia, Spain , Foreground: Site-specific installation, *Self Possessed,* 2020, 148x238x160 inches

Kathryn Hart’s artworks are underpinned in Humanism and Feminism. She expands works beyond their physicality using shadow, reflection, light, dimension, gesture, line and space. Her spatial installations respond to the unique architecture of their environments. Recent solo shows include Sala d’Exposicions Coll Alas de Gandia (SP); European Cultural Centre, a 58th Venice Biennale event; School of Visual Arts (NYC); Politechnika Krakowska; Howland Cultural Center (NY); Galerie SD Szucha 8 (Warsaw); Andre Zarre Gallery, (NYC); and ArtHaus (Denver). Select group venues include Ateneo de Madrid, Chelsea Art Museum (NYC), Oceanside MOA (CA), Archeological Museum, Gandia, and So. Nevada MFA (Las Vegas). Recent features are The September Issues Magazine, Amparo Zacares Publications, Estetica Pedagogica, Gallery&Studio Arts Journal, Diversions LA. Public TV links USA and in Spain.

March 27, 2020March 23, 2020, by Etty Yaniv

Artists on Coping: William Norton

During the coronavirus pandemic, Art Spiel is reaching out to artists to learn how they are coping.

William Norton in his studio. Photograph by Rafael Fuchs

William Norton’s medium of choice is a mixture of drawing and carving, using a dremel and a router to carve lines by hand into large plexiglass sheets, letting light be what illuminates the artwork through casting shadows and reflections. Working from charcoal drawings and photographs all the work is autobiographical in nature, mostly an attempt to understand what it means to be a man, an issue that’s plagued him for decades stemming from the moment his 4 year old son was kidnapped and disappeared.

March 26, 2020March 23, 2020, by Etty Yaniv

Artists on Coping: Andra Samelson

During the coronavirus pandemic, Art Spiel is reaching out to artists to learn how they are coping.

Hardrive:Users:andrasamelson:Desktop:Art Spiel Questionnaire:Circling 2017.jpg

“ Circling”, 30 x 30 inches Acrylic on Canvas 2018 Courtesy of the Artist

Andra Samelson is a multi-media artist whose work explores the relationship of microcosm and macrocosm with imagery associated with molecular and galactic systems. She holds a B.A. degree from Sarah Lawrence College and has received fellowships from the NY Foundation for the Arts, the Corporation of Yaddo, and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. Her work has been exhibited extensively in galleries and museums both nationally and internationally, and is represented in several private and public collections including the Rubin Museum of Art, the Library of Congress, Chase Manhattan Bank, Dow Jones, and the Loyola University Museum of Art.

March 23, 2020July 10, 2020, by Etty Yaniv

Artists on Coping: Kay Sirikul Pattachote

During the Coronavirus pandemic, Art Spiel is reaching out to artists to learn how they are coping.

*Kay Sirikul Pattachote in her studio. Photograph by Pratya Junkong*

Kay Sirikul Pattachote‘s paintings utilize the abstracted forms of flowering plants as a vessel for channeling her daily meditations. These plant forms provide parameters for her interpretive brushwork and within them she is able to record her experienced energies and emotions. Ritualistic actions, such as sewing and repetition, further her meditative practice and deepen her ability to record the ephemeral on her surfaces.

March 16, 2020July 10, 2020, by Etty Yaniv

William Corwin – Flattening of Time

Pazuzu, 2018, hydrocal. Photo courtesy the artist

Experiencing William Corwin’s sculptures may resemble opening a time capsule filled with mysterious objects made of familiar materials like sand, rope, clay and wood. By drawing on references ranging from architecture to archaeology, totems to teeth, Corwin’s sculptures resonate with archaic civilizations — removed yet urgently present. William Corwin shares with Art Spiel what brought him to sculpture, takes a look at some of his projects, and sheds some light on his curatorial and art writing practices.

March 9, 2020July 10, 2020, by Etty Yaniv

Denise Sfraga: Constructing and Disclosing

:cARtSpiel:Art Spiel opener.jpg — (left) Malignant 40” x 32” flashe, pastel on paper 2019, (middle) Gone (series of 9) 8” x 6” each colored pencil on paper 2018, (right) New Mourn 40” x 32” flashe, pastel on paper 2018

The NYC based artist Denise Sfraga intersects in her work photography, drawing, and painting. The evolving processes, history, and aesthetics of photography altogether inform Denise Sfraga‘s thought process and practice. This results in an abstracted biomorphic imagery resonating with botany and other organic life forms. At first glance her well defined colorful shapes appear as beautiful abstractions but as you spend more time with them, you may realize that their beauty is a camouflage for darker, mysterious and disorienting undercurrents. Denise Sfraga first elaborates for Art Spiel how her way of thinking came about and then takes us through different series of work to reflect on her process in depth.

March 3, 2020November 15, 2020, by Etty Yaniv

Yasue Maetake – Intersubjective Narratives

A picture containing indoor, wall

Description automatically generated — *Urethane Flower on Steel Stem Clad with Foam* (2013-2019), H91 x 110 x 67 inches (H233 x 284 x 177 cm), steel, polyurethane resin, epoxy clay, burnt and varnished Styrofoam, photo by Mark Waldhauser

The Japanese born Brooklyn based sculptor Yasue Maetake largely draws on laws of nature like gravity, as well as on her Japanese cultural heritage like Butoh dance/theater. The artist describes for Art Spiel her artistic impetus, layered ideas, and elaborate process.

February 27, 2020May 30, 2020, by Peiyue Wu

Controlled Entropy, Taher Jaoui at 81 Leonard Gallery

*Taher Jaoui: Controlled Entropy installation view, photograph by Hannah Rozelle, photo courtesy of the artist*

One might find Taher Jaoui introverted the moment meeting him. It might be less about an aloof temperament commonly found in an artist than a reserved and prudent character often associated with a science person. The way in which Jaoui’s artworks act out follows a similar interpersonal pattern. Those scratchy mathematics signs and formulas are the most prominent elements of the new series of monochrome paintings featured in Taher’s current solo exhibition Controlled Entropy at 81 Leonard Gallery, co-hosted by Uncommon Beauty Gallery. The juxtaposition of the handwritings of mathematical formulas and the gestural brushwork in an abstract expressionist manner not only prompts questions about Jaoui’s background, but also problematizes the hostile split between art and mathematics. Reminding viewers of a lecturer running a mathematical calculation across the blackboard with chalk, this series of paintings highlights the performative elements in mathematics, as well as the craft aspects of labor invested in this intellectual activity.

February 10, 2020November 15, 2020, by Etty Yaniv

Kit Warren – Moments of Recognition

*Altered States (untitled),* 2019, Acrylic, flashe on birch panel, 36 x 36 inches, photo courtesy the artist

Kit Warren‘s works on paper present complex and elaborate visual cryptography – patterns of lines, dots, and bold colorful shapes. They evoke layered associations ranging from microcosmic to cosmic. Kit Warren shares with Art Spiel some of her ideas and work process.

January 28, 2020November 15, 2020, by Etty Yaniv

Todd Bienvenu – Stories within Stories

A picture containing canyon, valley, colorful, building

Description automatically generated — Todd Bienvenu, Bain de Pâquis, 88x76in, acrylic on canvas, 2019 .
Courtesy Todd Bienvenu Studio

No matter what Todd Bienvenu chooses to depict in a painting – a male nude lying on a bear skin rug in a Venus pose, a fearless female city bike rider, or a crowded water-park vista- his surfaces consistently pull you in by their bold vitality and idiosyncratic humor. Todd Bienvenu shares with Art Spiel some insights on his process, ideas and studio work.