Als Ick Kan, 2011, oil on linen, 48 x 36 inches |
Release, 2011, oil on linen, 16 x 12 inches |
Thought from Afar, 2011, oil on linen, 20 x 16 inches |
One, 2011, oil and spray paint on canvas, 20 x 16 inches |
Say the Other, 2011, oil on canvas, 68 x 52 inches |
Doves Pigeons, 2011, oil on linen, 48 x 36 inches |
Studio views |
PB: How are things going in the studio and is
there anything new to you out there in our culture that you've come across
that's working its way into your work?
JS: Things are going well in the studio. I
recently finished a bunch of new paintings that are headed to Steven Zevitas
Gallery in Boston. Things that are providing starting points for the latest
work include 3D images, commercial printing techniques, children’s drawings, magazine
advertisements, quilts, excised images & documents, and basic shapes
(triangle, square, rectangle). It’s a collection that comes from culture and
what we produce to mark our environment and try and communicate with others.
PB: I remember a couple of years ago when we were
talking, you brought up the phrase, "image making by any means necessary," could you elaborate
on that?
JS: As I set to work, I can say, “Do whatever it
takes to make the work”. There is a liberty implicit in that, however the
choices can also be overwhelming, and have consequences. The spirit of that
statement resides in being aware of limitations, using those limitations to
react. Sometimes the result is
efficient, sometimes it is elegant, sometimes it is introspective, and
sometimes it is brutal.
PB:
You've been mentioned in a few articles
lately as a "provisional painter" and in other similar terms. What's your
take on that?
JS: I think it’s an interesting label.
Contingency is an element in the painting process and also definitely in the
air when the stock market can swing wildly, or the news cycle can jump from one
concern to another at break-neck speed. The paintings are purposefully open in
the way that they are constructed. Even
when a painting is finished, not all is locked into place. Things are shifting.
Whether
a “provisional painter” or a “new casualist”, when I go into the studio I try
not to think about that, I do not want that to affect the work. In the studio
it is about what the painting needs and wants. It is wonderful that people are aware of some commonalities among several
artists work; that is a place for the discussion to start.
PB: So in the studio, you're keeping yourself
open to what's going on there, pushing forward and giving each painting what it
needs. When you speak of constructing a painting that's purposely open in the
way it's constructed, does that mean that you're leaving room for contingency
to flourish?
JS: When I start a painting, there is often a
structure, system, or image that I am reacting to. The paintings are not
planned out; in effect I am constantly introducing contingencies to each work.
Limits and unexpected occurrences are barriers to be embraced, challenged, and
creatively addressed. If I look at the logic that resides in a particular painting
or work of art, there is what is known and unknown. It is that play between the
two that creates a poetic challenge that we have to wrestle with, just like the
known and unknown of life.
PB: How do things change for you when making
large works vs. smaller works?
JS: I generally work on several paintings at one
time. Three or four large ones and ten to fifteen smaller may develop in the
studio at the same time. I think about the difference in scale and how we
relate to them with our bodies. The 8’ x 6’ painting envelopes the viewer. The
20” x 16” painting draws you in to a more intimate space. A 48” x 36” canvas is
a difficult scale, it cannot quite envelope you, nor is it that same intimate
space that a smaller canvas creates. Recently, I have been really trying to
figure out this size around 48” x 36”. It sounds silly but it is a complicated
size, also exciting because of the challenge of figuring out a painting that is
neither small nor large.
PB: Are there any other artists you're excited about
or draw inspiration from?
JS: Morandi’s work is so wonderful. It seems so
simple and limited, yet he scrapes out this amazing territory, with a handful
of vessels and bottles, using some brushes, paint, and canvas. The paintings
are unassuming but completely transfix the viewer. I keep lots of books and
images around me in the studio. They keep me company and challenge me. Ellsworth
Kelly’s “Plant I” (1949) is such a hauntingly elegant painting, fourteen inches
high, black and white and all that presence.
This
summer I had a chance to meet Nicole Cherubini and Mike Andrews at Ox-Bow in
Michigan. They both have a way of using materials and tradition and get so much
out of it. Nicole works in ceramics primarily. Mike uses fiber/yarn to make
tapestries. Both make work that I want to spend a lot of time looking at and
thinking about. They start with the familiar and take me into new territory.
PB: I'm familiar with Cherubini's work and I
count myself in as a fan, and thanks for shedding light on Andrew’s as well—JoshFaught is another great weaver I've been impressed with. How has a
cross-disciplined perspective of a painter looking at ceramics and tapestry
enriched your own practice of painting and taken you to that new territory
you've mentioned? Also, how do other contemporary painters figure into things
for you—the German painters and, just throwing a name out there, how about
Twombly and his contribution?
JS: I think Mike Andrews and Josh Faught are both
making interesting work that comes out of fibers tradition and certainly deal
with painting, drawing, sculpture, and installation. I like how Nicole Cherubini
and Mike Andrews have this wonderful sense of history as it relates to their
work. They know the traditions from which their work comes out of, and they are
pulling from painting’s discourse and further afield to enrich their work. It
is so important as artists to understand our creative heritage, to in fact own
it. That said, by looking outside of art or discipline and importing new or unexpected
ideas is how one maps new territory, invents new ways of working.
If
we start talking German Artists, it is hard to know where to begin. Richter,
Polke, Oehlen, Kippenberger, Blinky Palermo, and Joseph Beuys are all amazing
and influential for me. Then you have artists like Eberhard Havekost and
several other younger German Artists. There has been a lot of amazing painting
from Germany. Tomma Abts. Anselm Reyle. So many of them have an amazing rigor
to their work, while at the same time having incredible breadth.
Cy
Twombly is really amazing. The constant presence of handwriting in his work is
brilliant. His drawing, mark-making, helped me understand and think about the
larger types of “hand-writing” in the world around us. How we mark, design, alter
our environment and the things we place in it. Each
painting is like a monumental whisper. He uses this epic subject matter that is
scrawled on his walls (paintings). Seeing the Twombly room at the Philadelphia
Museum of Art is an overwhelming experience.
PB: What's on your reading/listening list
lately?
JS: Mira Schor’s Decade of Negative Thinking
Mira
Schor’s blog http://ayearofpositivethinking.com/
Marilynne
Robinson’s Absence of Mind
I
have been reading W.G. Sebald’s Rings of Saturn and I just started
reading Harold Bloom’s The Anatomy of Influence.
What
is playing in the studio...The National, The Cold War Kids, The XX, Darcy James
Argue’s Infernal Machines, and Jonny Greenwood.
Also watching the TV series Friday Night Lights,
but not while I’m painting.
To see more: jeredsprecher.com
On view at Steven Zevitas Gallery in Boston, Sept 8th--Oct 15th, 2011:
Jered Sprecher | Als Ick Kan
Jered Sprecher | Als Ick Kan
It was nicely painted. Looks really awesome! Fence Company Amarillo, TX
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