I'm not unique in this regard, it happens to everyone....and for a short while it made me fear success....it was like anytime something good happened to me a friend would voice their resentments.
When I first made the push to get my artwork seen and I was befriending curators and even started dating one. This curator who I was seeing decided to have an after party at a neighborhood gay bar that I frequented and they happened to be showing some small paintings of mine at the time. Someone came up to me at the party and said to me "It must be so great to be dating this curator and having shows like this...." I was speechless....It's pretty easy to have a show of your artworks in a bar you frequent....you really only have to be mildly talented and just ask.....so to think that this person assumed that the only way I could have a show in a bar was by dating a famous curator sowed a little seed of doubt in me.
I'm reminded of a time a few years ago when I had a f**k buddy in the neighborhood, he came over around valentine's day and brought me a chocolate heart. So we ate some candy and then he wanted me to piss on him......it could have been romantic, but it wasn't.
Then there was the year when a friend invited me to his post opening dinner on Feb 14. This was his first solo show with a great gallery he had just joined and that gallery had a custom of renting out a restaurant and feting the artist with a nice dinner filled with collectors and friends, I was really happy for my friend and glad he invited me. My boyfriend at the time was none too happy with me but a few years later he broke up with me in Paris, on Valentine's day.
I considered bumming a cigarette, I remembered how much I used to like sitting at a bar smoking a cigarette, feeling my senses numb as I smoked and sipped my cocktail, I used to like that a lot. It had been 7 months since I quit smoking and this would have been a great excuse to light up, but then I would have had that monkey on my back again. I remembered how I hated having to hide from my Friends, family and boyfriend that I was still smoking a couple of years after I had professed to have quit in 2008, it wasn't really until February of 2011 that I had my last cigarette.....I went months without smoking in 2008, 2009 and 2010 but there was always some reason to pick up again.
I was traveling a lot in 2008, 9 and 10, I went to Brazil, Hungary and China to visit friends and lovers, where cigarettes were cheap and everyone was smoking, I couldn't resist rubbing the balm of Nicotine on my feelings as these close relationships were changing in ways that I didn't understand and making me uncomfortable.
Thank god I didn't bum a cigarette that night, I did enjoy the camaraderie of the bar though. I remembered how during another emergency here in NYC, the blackout of 2003 I also went out for a walk and ended up in a gay bar, "The Bar" on 2nd ave and 2nd street, it was a lot of fun, lit by candlelight and one of the bartenders who lived upstairs had brought down his wind up victrola and was playing 78 rpm records on it....good times!
Funny how I felt the need to go somewhere safe and known during those emergencies. This time however, I wasn't that concerned....I figured I'd get through this just like I had gotten through all the others. I didn't feel the need to be around people where I could let down my guard as I'm not really feeling so guarded these days.
One of the many paradox's as an artist is that you've got a full time job, your art career.....but you need a steady income to pay your bills. Ive had a number of different jobs from bartending, to painting the faces on mannequins and a lot of positions in between.
In the past, when going on a job interview I've tried to guess....."who do they want and what person should I be for them?" I am always my authentic self in my studio, just doing work for me there but I always used to think I needed to play a role outside of the studio, that my authentic self was not enough. In the last couple of years Iv'e gone on a lot of job interviews and had some amazing jobs, some of which worked out and led to other jobs and others which didn't go too far, which ended just when they were supposed to.
I would love the opportunity to share my experience with students. I had a fantastic experience at columbia in the 80s, reading Dante’s Divine Comedy with Prof. Joseph Mazzeo was a mind blowing experience. My education there opened me up to the idea that Art could be so much more than paintings on a wall..I had a fantastic public school education in Minnesota My high school art teacher Brad Nuorala was an exhibiting artist and all of my teachers from kindergarten on up encouraged me to be an Artist, consequently I let the other subjects slide without reading a single book in high school, just concentrating on art. While in high school I exhibited at the Minneapolis Institute of arts, apprenticed with an exhibiting sculptor and took college level art history courses in a joint program with the university of Minnesota.
When I graduated from Marshall - University high school in 1977 I was Ill-prepared for college, I tried a year at the University of Minnesota, getting straight A’s in all my studio arts classes and failing all other subjects, I was not invited back for a second year so I worked hard, saved money and traveled for a year through europe and the middle east, and I did a lot of reading. I came back to NYC in may of 1983 and got a job as a carpenter on the workshop production of “Sunday In The Park with George” and applied for Columbia’s school of general studies where the worlds of literature, science and languages opened up to me. I made dean’s list my first semester there in the fall of 1983.
I chose Columbia for the core curriculum, even though it was always my goal to be an artist I thought it was a great chance to make up in the areas of my life that I've neglected to develop in high school…..reading literature science math …..all the professors I encountered at Columbia helped me get over some of the blocks I had constructed, keeping me from becoming a more well-rounded human being.…. I treasure my experiences …..I'm sorry that I ran out of money and I was not able to finish my degree there….still, my life is a dream come true …when I was a little kid I told my parents I was going to move to NYC and be an artist and now I’ve had seven solo shows here in NYC and been in group shows at various institutions around the world including PS1/MoMA ….it's what I’ve always wanted to do……and it took a long circuitous route to get here with many years spent on the outside looking in. It’s great to be part of the Nyc art world, and I would love to share my experience with students .
I’ve spent the last couple of years teaching in a variety of positions. In 2011 I was hired at The New Museum to help visitors navigate the Carsten Holler “Experience” exhibition where I stayed on through 2012. Then In 2013 I was hired by Fete Paradiso to teach about the origin’s of the antique french carousels on display on Governor’s Island and Ron Athey asked me to participate in his "Gift’s of The Spirit” Performance at Participant Inc.
From Fete Paradiso I was recruited by The Museum of The City of New York where I now give a talk to visitors 3 times a week about creativity in NYC and what it’s like to be an artist in the NYC art world. I enjoy talking about this and sharing my experience with visitors as I remember how it felt to be on the outside looking in and wondering how I could ever be a part of it. At the end of 2014 I was hired by Artwork NY to give walking tours of SoHo and The Bowery talking about the art that grew up in these areas and how. Participants find me knowledgable,open and engaging. I’m excited to share what I know and I’m turned on by curiosity, and the challenge of finding a way in for those curious about the art world.
Ive been doing all of this teaching while maintaining my studio practice which I recently moved to Bushwick where I’m working on some Needlepoint versions of some Abstract photographs of music for a show curated by Marco Breuer at Yossi Milo gallery this June.
I’ve taught about all these other subjects that are close to me but I think I could do the best job teaching about the subject that’s closest to me, art making, being an artist, helping other people achieve their dreams like so many other’s at Columbia helped me to do back in the 1980’s.
I'm an artist, I make visual work and show it regularly in museums and galleries in NYC and all around the world. It's a real job and I love it.
I work in many different styles and mediums, I've had 7 solo shows in NYC and they often look like group shows. The one consistent thing in my work is that it's often a record of an ethereal experience, there's usually a story behind everything I make. Wether it's my high school girlfriend's love of Judy Garland or the first time I heard The Pixies, there's a lot of myself in my work and my life, I try to be as authentic as possible and I like the fact that I'm unique.
I don't really live in an Ivory tower though, I grew up in Minnesota solidly middle class and luckily I was exposed to art, music and dance all throughout my childhood, so I believe art is really for everyone.
I used to keep my art and my "day job" separate, then, a few years ago I was asked to come help out at the New Museum on Bowery, the were overwhelmed with visitors for the Carsten Holler "Experience" Exhibition. The museum basically just needed bodies to control the crowds. I learned that I liked interacting with the public in this kind of environment.
From there I went to "Fete Paradiso" a carnival of Antique French Carousels on Governor's Island. I did all the things that one does at a carnival from cleaning up baby vomit to helping an 8 year old find the carousel horse of their dreams. I also read and learned some of the history of the carousels and willingly shared that with the visitors who asked, I was pretty good at that and people liked me.
Then, I was asked to come speak at the Museum of The City of NY about what motivates creative people to move to NYC....for me it was a postcard of beatniks in Washington sq. park that my 3rd grade teacher gave me back in Minnesota, that prompted me to tell my parents "When I grow up I'm going to move to NYC and be an artist".