Danielle Oyales- D
Joanne Wong- J
D: So lets talk about the progress leading up to your
current artwork. What are you doing nowadays and how has your artwork from the
past influenced your work now.
J: Well, right now this year I’ve been doing a lot of artwork
that is very repetitive and takes a lot of time. I’ve been doing a sketch of
what I believe to be the interior of these walls, the different wires and
structures that hold together the building. Like how we were talking about the
idea that the walls are swiss cheese, and that there is internet and wires and
electricity everywhere. I’m doing a lot of work about an overwhelming amount of
things compiling together. I’m doing another drawing in response to my
technological drawing, which are sort of stupid drawings like legs with hair
and dinosaurs or whatever. It might not be what we call “art educated” but it’s
what I’m interested in now.
D: No, that’s great! You’re also talking about creating
artwork that is very stream of consciousness.
J: Yes, exactly, I am creating artwork that is in opposition
to what I used to do. I used to do a lot of non-figurative painting, and I
didn’t know why. I really just wanted to a dinosaur with lipstick and I
wouldn’t do it because I didn’t think it was fine art so I forced myself to do
abstract art. Finally, I decided, why not? That’s where that all started. I
also like the idea of things that don’t neatly fit into categories. Like a
lobster, not quite a fish not quite a bug, sort of an alien creature, and I
liked that. It fits a lot with who I am, I’m not really from America, I speak
Chinese, I am a female, I’m not white… but I also don’t associate myself with
the tradition of being Chinese or even what Chinese Americans tend to do. I
like the fluctuating categories.
D: So, how do you associate with fluctuating categories here
in Mason Gross.
J: Well overall I
decided that I’m not one of those girls with long flowing hair wearing tight
jeans and skimpy dresses. The group of people here are much more diverse. We
are closer to New York, we don’t really associate with South Jersey… there are
all different races, there are the feminists a few blocks away, and the
pharmacy majors on the other end of the spectrum.
D: I definitely understand that. This school is definitely
very diverse. It’s not just one kind of people.
J: Do you think that influences the artwork you are
creating?
D: Sometimes I feel like I don’t feel like belong here. The
way you talk about art, I can’t talk the same way with y friends. They wouldn’t
understand what we say. But I can talk in both the art-y way and also in a more
simple way. I subconsciously think about how to communicate my artwork with my
family, friends, and also my teachers and peers. I’ve also always wanted to be
an illustrator, and that has a lot to do with being able to communicate
narrative. So really I’m gearing my art towards others.
J: It’s interesting that you wanted to be an illustrator.
D: I searched for schools originally looking for
illustration, but I took the risk about learning about fine arts and then
learning illustration.
J: How does your abstract work influence your illustration?
I know mason gross sort of discourages that.
D: Well, its hard but I don’t want to make things narrative,
but I’m experimenting on things that I couldn’t do with illustration. I know
people who illustrate and assignments are based on trying to please a client,
which is a very different audience than in a gallery. What we do here is very
specific to gallery people.
J: Yeah there a lot of people come in thinking they can
major in illustration and that’s really not what happens here. A lot of drawing I’ve been doing lately is
very graphic, and illustrative and I think I’ve been getting a lot of negative
feedback for it. It’s funny. It’s cute. But I don’t think there’s anything
wrong with being funny. There’s a fine line. So I’ve been noticing that a lot
of your work is abstract now. How did you get there?
D: I think in school. My paintings up until this year were
very representational. I’m used to painting what I see. And the more people
I’ve been looking at, the more I’ve been being pushed towards less
representational. Last year, my fabric paintings were still representational.
They were about still lives. I’m not sure I’m comfortable with these abstract
painting. It’s hard to describe what I want do to, what I am doing… It’s
something I’m experimenting with. How do I make something abstract in digital
painting, which is something I’m also very interested in.
J: I thought your paintings were so funny last year because
it was a fabric painting on a fabric, so it was fabric and fabric, but after
that you hit that point like, where do I go from here? But why don’t you do
digital painting in the class?
D: I don’t know, how would I do that?
J: project it?
D: Yeah… on a canvas?
J: does it have to be on a canvas?
D: Or on a sculpture!
J: I don’t think what the school wants should dictate what
you do…
D: I’m terrified of teachers not liking what I’m doing. Sometimes I just want to make sure I follow
the school.
J: That’s why people have to take time out of the
institution. The institution has so much to do with what we paint.
D: Next semester I’m not taking a painting class, so it
would be interesting to paint next semester where I’m not really moderated
except for in Thesis class
J: And you do a lot of work on your comics too, right?
D: Yeah I think that’s a good background to have, because if
I want to do an illustration masters, I have at least that portfolio.
J: Cartooning also had a very fine arts background. In Japan
there was manga, but manga was sketches of gestures. And then it became a
sketch of daily life and then a comic. The drawing style for the face was very
plain because it allowed people to put their own personality onto the
character. It’s interesting because we totally don’t even think of manga as
art. It’s looked down on, but it’s a very interesting background.. If anything
that shouldn’t discourage you, it should encourage you to make it different.
D: That’s funny, I totally look at anime as a huge
influence. Even Miyasaki films, the background is all painted. His work is so
beautiful. And I really want to get into digital painting, because it has that
fine arts background but it communicates to a larger audience. I want to bring
that into my studio. Pixar requires fine arts background as well as
illustration. But I don’t have a guided illustration background… but I really
want to get into that because I love the at of movies. That really inspires me.
It’s hard to connect the fine arts to what I’m interested in.
J: Have you tried doing an animation before?
D: Well a few short ones, not really…
J: Well you could just get a tripod and a lame camera and
capture what’s happening in between the actions of your painting and that is an
animation. It’s not quite what you have in mind, but to be able to collapse
time into a couple frames, you can see how something is morphing over time. It
takes a life of its own. If you are interested in animation, painting is so
broad now. The surface can be anything. A canvas, a computer screen, the wall…
you can really do anything with painting.
D: Yeah, I agree. Painting is a very loose term. Maybe I’m
still stuck on the mindset that painting is supposed to be on the wall. I’m
afraid of something coming off the wall because I don’t know how to talk about
it as a painting.
J: I’ve definitely run into the problem about how to talk
about a painting. I guess maybe you deal with color a bit more than anything
else… What do you think about that. Are your paintings more sculptural, or
paintings?
D: Well I think of them more as paintings. I spend most time
on the painting, not the sculpture making.
J: I definitely do think your artwork is more like painting,
but the way I think about it, painting can be a sculpture but a flat surface in
a rectangle is not very interesting to talk about, so we choose not to talk
about it as sculpture. You can talk about a sculpture as a painting, but if its
only one color its not that interesting at all. But yours are both colored and
sculptural and I would be interesting to see when you complicate both of them
so much that you can’t really tell which is more important over the other, the
painting or the sculpture.
D: Sure, sure! Well, so what do you think about your outlet
installations right now? Are they an installation, or are they painting?
J: Well, literally
they are being installed around the building, but not only am I painting on top
of the surface, but I’m painting a sort of abstract painting of what our
society is. Like, why aren’t outlet covers painted? They really frustrate me.
Outlets are everywhere. It’s standard for outlets to exist on every single
wall. I want to draw attention to that. Instead of literally painting an
outlet, I’m trying to get people to look at these outlets. Sort of like social
sculpture. Trying to get people to look at these things by the way I am
painting them. I’m trying to think about what I think about as outlets. I’m
drawing and painting wires and circuits and grids on top of these. All these things
that remind me of what is behind an outlet. So they are sculpture, drawing,
painting, etc.
D: So you are still doing post-it notes right?
J: Yes definitely. I know a lot of people don’t like them,
but I’m going to keep making them.
D: NO, I really love them, you should make them until you
die and then bury yourself in them.
J: Oh yea, definitely I’m doing to keep on doing them
because I do think they are very interesting to look at as a sketchbook. You
can see when I’m interested in dinosaurs or water or even polka dots. You are
really interested in pattern as well, right? Why?
D: Well I like the meditative process of making these
patterns. I feel like a robot. I forget that I’m hungry. It sort of sucks you
in. Himalayan art had a lot of patterns in their mandalas. It’s supposed to be
meditative. I’ve always kept that in mind. I don’t know if it actually passes
off to other people but I do think they are really meditative.
J: I do think they are very meditative. Maybe because I’ve
had that experience as well, but I think it has to do a lot with viewing
distance. If you can just control how close you are to the wall… I think your
work is much more successful if you can get people to really stand right up a
few inches away from your work. Then you can get the sense of how long you
stood there just painting the same thing over and over again.
D: Hm. That is interesting. Yea I’m so used to looking at
them up close, that when I look away it looks completely different.
J: yea I think the strength is in its meditative process.
D: yay patterns!!!
J: YAY PATTERNS!
