Last week’s New Yorker (October 8, 2007) featured a great write-up on artist Kara Walker (titled “The Shadow Act”) written by Hilton Als. For anyone unfamiliar with Walker’s work, it is a nice piece and talks a bit about the artist and her overall project.
Above, find two images of Walker’s work. The first is titled “Jockey” from 1995.
As found on:
http://www.artcritical.com/gelber/EGAmericanCutout.htm
And the second is “Freedom Fighters for the Society of Forgotten Knowledge, Northern Domestic Scene” from 2005 as found on Artnet:
http://www.artnet.com/artwork/424824222/983/kara-walker-freedom-fighters-for-the-society-of-forgotten-knowledge-northern-domestic-scene.html
The article had me thinking back to about 4 months ago. Every so often, I receive a call to artists— either from Fort Point, or some other means. Well, about 4 months ago, I got one that was a design firm looking for an artist who worked with silhouettes, to help with creating a holiday design for a chain of stores they were representing.
In fact, keep a look out this late fall— I wonder which store it was.
I have tried to train myself to pursue leads that come anywhere close to what I do… without doing much filtering. That is, I don’t think “stores?” or “marketing?”, I just try and be open-minded and do some footwork to see where things lead. I have found that good opportunities and interesting projects come from the most unlikely of places, so why not at least do some initial follow-up and find more information?
I explained in my email back, that while I wasn’t traditionally a silhouette artist, per se, I did use cutouts quite a bit in my work, and pointed to examples like “Precious Gems” for examples of my work in shapes to render human forms.
The reply I got was quite polite, and nice (lots of times you get no return on these things). It explained, something to the effect of: “thanks for your interest, and submitting your work, but we are really looking for someone more along the lines of Kara Walker.”
At the time I didn’t think much of it. I thought, yeah, Kara Walker certainly does a lot with cutouts and silhouettes. If anything, I thought, Kara Walker is very famous and accomplished, I am not sure you are going to find anyone that caliber with an email request, but alas.
But the New Yorker article had me thinking about this again. And basically, how utterly insane that comment was. While I understand that the people were discussing Kara Walker’s technique, her work is so against these ideas of image and marketing— the New Yorker article highlights Walker’s use of the sexual and barbaric in her work to display the atrocities of slavery and American society— that it seems crazy to even mention her name in association with what one would be looking for in a project like this.
I think the other problem is that Walker’s technique, of using these black silhouette cutouts, is so embedded in the message and the ideas conveyed that it is hard for me to separate the style and approach from the finished product.
It is really like the email said “we are looking for someone like Kara Walker— extremely talented and inventive, but without any message.” How weird.
So, the New Yorker also had me thinking of Walker’s work again, and how moving and simple it is. She is the type of artist that when I look at her work I think “of course,” while also feeling an emotional punch in the gut.
I recently finished a bio on Albert Einstein and was thinking so much about how the pursuit of mathematics in that way is much like an artist going to the studio everyday. To parallel Walker, she has designed her own type of mathematics with this creative approach and each equation (piece) is precise and interesting and a revelation in itself. Truly amazing and enjoyable.
As I work on “Summer Clearance” and finish it up for Open Studios, considering Walker has me wishing for cutting paper, which I am sure I will do again soon. In fact, one of the websites I came across featured her cutout work next to Alex Katz… another interesting connection to an artist I have been thinking about (see past blog entries).
If nothing else, go read the New Yorker article. Plus, the cover is one of my favorites in a long time.
Above, find two images of Walker’s work. The first is titled “Jockey” from 1995.
As found on:
http://www.artcritical.com/gelber/EGAmericanCutout.htm
And the second is “Freedom Fighters for the Society of Forgotten Knowledge, Northern Domestic Scene” from 2005 as found on Artnet:
http://www.artnet.com/artwork/424824222/983/kara-walker-freedom-fighters-for-the-society-of-forgotten-knowledge-northern-domestic-scene.html
The article had me thinking back to about 4 months ago. Every so often, I receive a call to artists— either from Fort Point, or some other means. Well, about 4 months ago, I got one that was a design firm looking for an artist who worked with silhouettes, to help with creating a holiday design for a chain of stores they were representing.
In fact, keep a look out this late fall— I wonder which store it was.
I have tried to train myself to pursue leads that come anywhere close to what I do… without doing much filtering. That is, I don’t think “stores?” or “marketing?”, I just try and be open-minded and do some footwork to see where things lead. I have found that good opportunities and interesting projects come from the most unlikely of places, so why not at least do some initial follow-up and find more information?
I explained in my email back, that while I wasn’t traditionally a silhouette artist, per se, I did use cutouts quite a bit in my work, and pointed to examples like “Precious Gems” for examples of my work in shapes to render human forms.
The reply I got was quite polite, and nice (lots of times you get no return on these things). It explained, something to the effect of: “thanks for your interest, and submitting your work, but we are really looking for someone more along the lines of Kara Walker.”
At the time I didn’t think much of it. I thought, yeah, Kara Walker certainly does a lot with cutouts and silhouettes. If anything, I thought, Kara Walker is very famous and accomplished, I am not sure you are going to find anyone that caliber with an email request, but alas.
But the New Yorker article had me thinking about this again. And basically, how utterly insane that comment was. While I understand that the people were discussing Kara Walker’s technique, her work is so against these ideas of image and marketing— the New Yorker article highlights Walker’s use of the sexual and barbaric in her work to display the atrocities of slavery and American society— that it seems crazy to even mention her name in association with what one would be looking for in a project like this.
I think the other problem is that Walker’s technique, of using these black silhouette cutouts, is so embedded in the message and the ideas conveyed that it is hard for me to separate the style and approach from the finished product.
It is really like the email said “we are looking for someone like Kara Walker— extremely talented and inventive, but without any message.” How weird.
So, the New Yorker also had me thinking of Walker’s work again, and how moving and simple it is. She is the type of artist that when I look at her work I think “of course,” while also feeling an emotional punch in the gut.
I recently finished a bio on Albert Einstein and was thinking so much about how the pursuit of mathematics in that way is much like an artist going to the studio everyday. To parallel Walker, she has designed her own type of mathematics with this creative approach and each equation (piece) is precise and interesting and a revelation in itself. Truly amazing and enjoyable.
As I work on “Summer Clearance” and finish it up for Open Studios, considering Walker has me wishing for cutting paper, which I am sure I will do again soon. In fact, one of the websites I came across featured her cutout work next to Alex Katz… another interesting connection to an artist I have been thinking about (see past blog entries).
If nothing else, go read the New Yorker article. Plus, the cover is one of my favorites in a long time.
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