my love for you is a stampede of horses.

Studio Visit & Q&A: Ben Venom

Above image by Ryan Hendon.

I caught up with Ben Venom recently to check out his progress on his biggest quilt to date, The Mega Quilt, a 13' x15' quilt made from over 125 Heavy Metal band T-shirts. The quilt will be on display in Yerba Buena Center for the Arts upcoming show BAN6: Visual Arts Exhibition, which opens July 8th, 2011. We also got to chat about the quilt, how he fell into the craft and what's coming up for him. Enjoy! - meighan

Let's get down to brass tacks, quilting isn't a male heavy medium. Why quilting? What brought you to a craft/art medium that is traditionally women owned? And how long have you been quilting? 

In 2008 I was invited to be part of an exhibition in Berlin, Germany and wanted to make a really large piece for the show but not have to pay a lot of money to ship it. I had been sewing large flags and banners while in graduate school at the San Francisco Art Institute and recently saw the Gees Bend quilt show at the De Young. At the time I had a bunch of all Heavy Metal T-shirts hanging in my closet. So...I decided to combine the two: Metal and Quilts!

Are you self-taught?

Yes...I am self-taught. I made a couple of phone calls to my mother and bought a couple of beginner guides to quilting. Basically, I just started designing, cutting, and sewing and learned new tricks along the way.

In your current work you combine a traditionally feminine craft with a male dominated style of music; heavy metal. Tell us how those two come together in your work for you. Why juxtapose the two?

I see it as a high speed collision of polar opposites like Large Hadron Collider, particles are shot at each other at a extremely high rate of speed and scientists measure the resulting explosions. It is at this point when something new is born. In addition, quilts are traditionally made from soft fabric and Heavy Metal music refers to a load, aggressive, and heavy sound. Just in the definition of each you can see the complete opposite sides of the spectrum.

Heavy Metal has always had this over the top mentality with the 70's and 80's dominated by all these dudes wearing makeup and looking like strippers. Dee Synder, Alice Cooper, KISS, the list goes on and on. Even dressed up in some ridiculous clothing and makeup these dudes scored all the babes! So...I was thinking about that absolute contradiction, and thought by combining quilts with Metal I would be able to achieve a similar result.

Sometimes I like to ask artists who they are watching or inspired by as in terms of other artists -- but I'd like to keep this to strictly quilting. Can you tell us about who you've watched in the quilting and fiber world -- who has inspired you and/or influenced your work?

Since the Gees Bend quilt show at the De Young I have been constantly looking through the exhibition catalog and online for ideas. I bought The Architecture of the Quilts book from the exhibition which has some great images of the more colorful and abstract quilts. Also, some quilts made entirely from worn out levi jeans and other denim scraps. They're some really amazing pieces made by some amazing women.

More recently, the De Young exhibited a selection of Amish quilts from the collection of Faith and Stephen Brown. These quilts dealt more with faith and spirituality rather than the creators surrounding [the] enviroment. Both shows have been a great influence to my recent work and continue to give new ideas on how quilts can be constructed. Plus...I've recently been in email contact with Joe Cunningham who wrote the forward to the Amish quilt catalog.

I honestly do not know many fine art artists working with textiles that I admire or am influenced by. However, Erin Riley is someone I see that is definitely killing it right now. Her work takes textiles into the modern day...beer, bikinis, and drugs. Awesome!

Can you tell us about how you educate yourself around the craft?

I have recently made some contacts within the quilt world and have learned a whole bunch of new techniques and shortcuts from a couple of nice ladies. Old ladies love me! Everytime I go to a sewing/fabric store I ask a ton of questions and go home and try out what I learned. I am considering taking a sewing class or two at the Sewing Machine Shop in Walnut Creek cause I was recently asked to teach a quilting workshop at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts and at Workshop SF. So...I need to get my learn on.

Tell us about the quilt you are currently working on.

The Mega quilt! It measures 160" x 180" and has over 120 different Heavy Metal band T-shirts sewn into a Medusa Skull design. I had to buy a new sewing machine (Juki F-600) cause my previous one is too small for all this fabric. Think bitchin Camaro compared to a shitty Honda Accord...that is one hell of an UPGRADE!

This quilt will be the largest I have made thus far and also the most expensive. I have been using the floor space at Guerrero Gallery to lay it out and position all the pieces together. Andres (owner of Guerrero Gallery) has been very helpful in allowing me unlimited access to the gallery in the evenings. Many thanks to Andres Guerrero (the Janitor)!!!

The quilt consists of a detailed Medusa Skull surrounded by a sun shield and smaller stars. Heavy Metal band T-shirts form the Medusa head and surrounding star shapes. At least 3 different quilting patterns are used to accentuate the design and add another level to the piece. This design combines the interest of Metal music with Mythology and the Occult while simultaneously attempting to represent the B movie Horror film style. By addressing the softer side of Heavy Metal this piece plays with the idea of tension between the grandiosity of Metal music and the more domestic nature of craft.

You have also worked with embroidery -- are there other traditional crafts you have utilized in your work, or that you would like to work in?

I've been thinking about learning to crochet or knit some pieces to wear. However, in the near future I plan to make a couple more embroidered pieces influenced by Metal and Occult culture. I like to watch football while I embroider...the new season starts in August. Time to get to work!

What is coming up for you, both professionally and personally?

Three of my Heavy Metal quilts will be on view at Wolverhampton Gallery in Birmingham, England June 18 for Home of Metal: You Should Be Living. This show is in conjunction with a couple of other events put on by the Home of Metal organization. The Mega quilt and two other new pieces will be on view July 8 for Bay Area Now 6 at Yerba Buena Center for Arts. I have been working on these pieces for the last 5 months and am looking forward to the exhibition...should be a good one. As part of my work in the exhibition, I am hosting a Heavy Metal concert September 22 at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. Black Cobra, Hightower, and Walken will be playing in the gallery in front of my quilt with Glass Coat Photo Booth on site offering FREE polaroid pictures to attendees. Its gonna make your head EXPLODE!

Aside from the art exhibitions...I just returned from Atlanta, GA where I taught a 2 day printing intensive class at the Atlanta Printmakers Studio and gave a lecture sponsored by the online magazine Burnaway based in Atlanta. This summer I will be teaching Screenprinting to High School students at the San Francisco Art Institute and to adults at the Kala Art Institution in late August. Somewhere in between I may be assisting a  3 hour quilting class at Workshop SF. Thats all for now. 

One last thing, will you make me a quilt for my birthday next month?

HA! One jamming Bday quilt coming up!

Studio Visit & Q&A: Aaron Nagel.

A few weeks ago I headed over to Oakland to check out Aaron Nagel's studio as he prepared for his upcoming show, A Thin Line at The Shooting Gallery. It was great to spend some time with Aaron and see his work in such an intimate setting. The pictures you see here are a combo of my own, along with images of Aaron's. And for this visit, I also combined a Q&A for your reading pleasure!

A Thin Line opens June 11th - July 2nd, 2011 at The Shooting Gallery.

Can you tell us about your inspiration behind your newest body of work for your upcoming show, A Thin Line at The Shooting Gallery?

I'm really inspired by the models that lend their time and likeness to me. Trying to capture the beauty of these women is something that I don't think I'll ever get sick of, it's an amazing jump off point for the direction I want a given piece to follow. "A Thin Line" is a nod to a new graphical element and a reference to the issues I had putting the show together. 

You are an atheist - yet a lot of your work deals with religious iconography - can you give us a peek into the symbolism you paint? Are you exploring something in particular?

I've always been intrigued by religious art, both because I find so much of it appealing despite it's motives, and because I'm endlessly fascinated by the frequent use of torture, suffering, and violence, to serve those motives. The symbolism I paint; halos, arrows, etc, are all common in European iconography of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, but I'm trying to take them out of context a bit by placing them around figures who, instead of appearing as martyrs, are unaffected.

Talk to me about the hands dipped in black, there is something extremely sexy about this - and I have no idea why. Can you help me understand why I think this ;)? What do they symbolize/signify?

I came upon the black painted hands entirely by accident. First and foremost, [I] paint them because I love the way [they] looks; more specifically, the way [they] reflect light and flesh tones. (I think it's almost taboo for an artist, but i'll happily admit that my first concern is always whether or not the image is aesthetically pleasing to me). The more I painted them though, the more I started to think of the painted hands as a metaphor and/or as a symbol. What they represent isn't so specific, I'd rather that the viewer make up their own mind...but I find that it adds depth to an image without being overbearing or too obvious. I have no idea why the painted hands can be sexy in their own right, even without taking the rest of the figure into consideration. I could come up with a whole bunch of possible explanations -- but no one explanation has ever struck me as definite, and I do love the uncertainty.

What are the words in your work?

They're all different, I mainly use them for the look more than the meaning of the text, but it's usually creepy latin phrases. Of the two with text in this show, one is a quote from Satyricon in Latin, and one is a passage from a book that I coded with an enigma machine. Nerdy!

During our studio visit, you mentioned to me that this group of work was particularly hard for you. You said you struggled a bit around your first few paintings - can you tell us about that period and how you got through it?

I did have a really hard time planning for the show, and after a few months and a couple failed paintings, decided that the problem was that I didn't really know what I wanted to paint. More specifically, I was torn between wanting to do much more elaborate and narrative pieces with complex reference shoots, lots of compositional elements and more straightforward portraiture. My brain couldn't really make a decision and more often landed somewhere in the middle, which wasn't what I wanted to be painting either. While I still haven't gotten into making paintings as large and elaborate as I hope to one day, I finally discovered that if I did both the larger surreal pieces and straightforward portraits, instead of trying to mush the two ideas into one piece, the two directions I was being pulled were more or less satisfied. 

You are self taught, which is incredible after seeing your work in person. How did you get to where you are now?

I'm a very obsessive and disciplined person, often to a fault (like, real often). That is probably the one thing that's helped me most. Once I decided I wanted to be painting, and once I decided how I wanted to be painting, it was fairly easy for me to lock myself in a room for the better part of 8 years and figure it out. I don't mean to say that painting is easy, because it certainly isn't -- or that spending so much time in a room with only a cat and an audiobook for company is easy, because that can really suck too (not the cat, he's fresh) but making myself do things (or attempt to do things), particularly if they are very hard...that's easy. 

Having no formal instruction has hurt me in some respects I'm sure, but it's also allowed me years of trial and error, without anyone to regularly step in and point me in the right direction. It's certainly not the fastest way to learn to paint, but It allowed me time to come up with my own system and made me a whole lot less prone to discouragement. This is all conjecture of course, but it might be true. 

I should point out that even though I didn't go to art school, I do a lot of reading up on oil painting techniques and theory, and try my best to pick the brains of those in the know every chance I get. Plus, there are hundreds of years of fantastic paintings to learn from. So I don't consider myself entirely without education, it's just not terribly formal. 

Aaron's little friend, Ty -- the fresh kitty. ;)

That brings me to my next question; having been self-taught, how do you continue to educate yourself?

Lots of reading, lots of blogs, lots of museums, lots of art shows...that's the plan anyway. It's easy to get stuck in the studio, but simply being around art that I really admire, is hugely educational.

When doing research reading up on you - one of the things I have read a lot is this: "he is entirely self-taught; a fact at odds with his classical approach to surrealism" - what does this mean?

I'd like to think it means that my technique appears to be traditional. I'm not really trying to break any new ground with figurative painting as far as the execution is concerned. I do try my best to capture the subject exactly without too much deliberate interpretation. I think that's where the comparison to traditional/classical painting might come in.

Then there [are] all the halos and black hands and things I add that pull the piece away from just straight representational work, that usually lands me in "surreal artist" territory. This is part explanation of the latest show title; as in a thin line between realist and surrealist directions. That's my interpretation anyway, I'm really not sure -- odd, because I think I may have even wrote that.

What's coming up for you next, both professionally and personally?

I have A Thin Line opening June 11th at The Shooting Gallery, then a 3 person show in LA with Thinkspace Gallery in September. After that I'd like to see if I can get a show planned for NY next year. Personally, I'm just going to keep at it and continue to keep myself way busy and avoid injury and neurosis.

Thanks Aaron!

Studio Visit: Pakayla Rae Biehn.

I met up with Pakayla Biehn at her home in the Sunset on Friday night to get a look in person at her signature, double exposure paintings. Pakayla was finishing up for her upcoming show, Being There with Jeff Ramirez at Thinkspace Gallery in LA. She was so gracious to let me come over the night before she was leaving - I am so glad I got to see the show in such an intimate setting. I was floored by the beauty and depth in her pieces. As Pakayla took out each painting one by one, I was focusing on the detail as I got my camera ready - snapped the pics, and then BOOM - I turned to Pakayla with my mouth open. Once I stood back and took her work in - it was mindblowing to see the many layers that appear suddenly. I have seen Pakayla's work before through a studio visit Jillian Mackintosh did for ML4U last summer - but seeing them in person was something else. They literally transform before your eyes, playing tricks as you focus all the while remaining utterly breathtaking.

Being There featuring Pakayla Rae Biehn and Jeff Ramirez opens at Thinkspace gallery on May 21, 2011 from 6-8pm and runs through June 4th, 2011.

Above image courtesy of Thinkspace gallery.

Collaboration with Mike Giant.

Studio Visit: Jovi Schnell.

I stopped by Jovi Schnell’s studio on Sunday. Oh man. What a wonderful experience. Jovi talked to me about her latest group: she is working fate into her newest work or getting her ‘geek on’ as she called it. Jovi numbers her paint after working from a palate she creates and throws a die to call out the color she’ll use. LOVE it.

See more on flickr, where my full visit is.*

*This was originally posted on the tumblr in November:

Studio Visit: Meryl Pataky.

Contributror, Jillian Mackintosh takes us into the world of neon artist Meryl Pataky. I was really moved at how passionate Meryl is about her craft and process behind it. I think you will be as well. - meighan

I was recently invited to visit neon artist, Meryl Pataky, at her downtown studio. I watched in awe while she created new neon works for here upcoming solo exhibition Metaphysics at a.Muse Gallery opening November 11th 2010, from 6-9pm. Neon is the process of heating glass tubing to bend it. Each of the gasses used to illuminate Pataky’s work are elements of the noble gas family.  Housed in glass tubing, they breathe and flow under the influence of electricity. Since they simply exist and react because of their surroundings, they share a common metaphysical thread with humans and animals. By using neon, Pataky sheds a light on the commonalities of basic nature - a battle between resistance and growth. Check out some pictures shot by Shea Greene of Meryl's neon processes and get a sneak peek of her new works.

Pataky’s work, entirely in neon, is based on Plato’s writings on “the first principals of things,” or in other words, “What does it mean to be?” Balancing the two strands of Metaphysics: one which holds that what exists lies beyond experience and the other which holds that objects of experience constitute the only reality, the artist attempts to address the human condition.

Choosing to recognize origins of linguistics and its evolution, Metaphisics references and is influenced by the writings of Kurt Vonnegut Jr: “Literature is a unique combination of words by an artist that express emotions and reflect our reality in poignant ways. Sometimes, nobody can say it better. It is my opinion that this is especially true with Vonnegut and I mean to acknowledge his influence on my being.”-Pataky

The letters in the sculpture titled “Metaphisics” consists of different typographical characteristics such as ligatures (when two letters share the same stem or stroke) and historical characteristics such as the long "s" where they are appropriate. Patterns on thin tracing paper show wear with burns and markings reflecting the process and maximize the translucence of the neon behind it. In this extensive collection of neon sculptures the artist also uses materials such as with wood, found objects and even home furnishings.