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Kunst Speak With Brask - Mira Dancy · Kunst Speak With Brask

0:00
Speaker 1: Dear guests, Welcome to the third episode of Kunst Speak
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Speaker 1: with Bresk. Our honest guest is Mirror Dancy. I'm going
0:10
Speaker 1: to see Mirror at Night Gallery. You have a solo
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Speaker 1: show now. I'm looking forward to see Mirror, see all
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Speaker 1: the new works and hear this story behind all the works.
0:21
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to count Speak with bresk Mirror,
0:26
Speaker 1: thanks so much for taking your time. We are not
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Speaker 1: in your studio, we are in your show at Night Gallery,
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Speaker 1: Los Angeles. We know each other from I bought one
0:36
Speaker 1: of your paintings. I think the Vida said yesterday. That
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Speaker 1: was in twenty fifteen at Freeze.
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Speaker 2: Oh wow, eleven years ago. And when I came to
0:45
Speaker 2: New York, on the list was that I had to
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Speaker 2: see your show. I came yesterday and I love the
0:50
Speaker 2: new work so much. And I was talking to the
0:52
Speaker 2: Vida and she said you are around, and I'll talk
0:55
Speaker 2: to the Vida Lata and said, let's do a podcast.
0:58
Speaker 2: So here we are.
0:59
Speaker 3: I know, it's great, it's great to see you again.
1:01
Speaker 2: It have been a while. Maybe you could introduce yourself.
1:07
Speaker 3: So I'm Mira Dancy and my career sort of goes
1:12
Speaker 3: back to around you know, I went to Bard College
1:16
Speaker 3: for undergrad and became a painter there, and then moved
1:21
Speaker 3: to New York City and went to Columbia for my
1:25
Speaker 3: MFA program. And at Columbia I met Davida and we've
1:29
Speaker 3: kind of just connected and wanting to build an art
1:33
Speaker 3: community since then and have just been riffing off of
1:38
Speaker 3: each other and finding new ways to show work. And
1:43
Speaker 3: our whole community of friends have really come up together,
1:48
Speaker 3: and we're still surrounded by so many friends from the
1:51
Speaker 3: early early aughts. And I've also been showing with Chapter
1:57
Speaker 3: in New York and we did Chapter and Night Gallery
2:02
Speaker 3: Share a few artists too from our friend group. And yeah,
2:08
Speaker 3: since Divida and I sort of traveling around doing shows
2:14
Speaker 3: for the last fifteen years, and eventually I sort of
2:18
Speaker 3: migrated out here to Los Angeles myself with my family
2:21
Speaker 3: in twenty twenty and just you know, finding ways to
2:26
Speaker 3: make artwork from life. And this past this past year
2:34
Speaker 3: has been such a challenge of living. My family moved
2:37
Speaker 3: to Alta Diina, so once the fire happened, it was
2:41
Speaker 3: kind of this whole cataclysmic. We've just found myself in
2:45
Speaker 3: the middle of this huge, this huge event and trying
2:51
Speaker 3: to pick up the pieces, and its sort of just
2:55
Speaker 3: let that moment into my work, which has sort of changed.
2:58
Speaker 3: This whole year has been a kind of revelation or
3:02
Speaker 3: revolution of my work. And you know, at first, when
3:06
Speaker 3: I started making these paintings, I was like, oh, I
3:08
Speaker 3: don't know how I will well. I even showed these
3:12
Speaker 3: like they felt very private, very personal, very emotional, and
3:16
Speaker 3: I think it was maybe April was the first time
3:18
Speaker 3: that Divita came over to my studio, and just this
3:24
Speaker 3: happened numerous times, but just her belief and her response
3:28
Speaker 3: to the paintings, we just share that sort of kinetic
3:32
Speaker 3: belief and I was like, Okay, we're doing this, and
3:36
Speaker 3: just gave me the support and the inspiration that I
3:41
Speaker 3: needed to let my work evolve once again.
3:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, because these guys something new compared to what you
3:52
Speaker 2: have been doing. And of course, like you said, because
3:56
Speaker 2: of the fire, then your studio burned down with all
3:59
Speaker 2: the works that correct.
4:00
Speaker 3: Or it didn't. My studio didn't burn down. All of
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Speaker 3: the houses on every side burned down. Our house was
4:09
Speaker 3: you know, contaminated and toxic, so it had all the paintings,
4:14
Speaker 3: and I had this sense of like all of my
4:17
Speaker 3: paintings in there and my house, like they just witnessed
4:20
Speaker 3: the fire. And I had this wall painting I had
4:24
Speaker 3: made in my studio and was kind of for months
4:27
Speaker 3: before the fire happened. This figure had appeared in my paintings.
4:31
Speaker 3: That's kind of a figure in revelation and revolution, like
4:36
Speaker 3: doing a kind of backbend, this kind of and it's
4:38
Speaker 3: kind of modeled after like the Goddess of the Egyptian
4:42
Speaker 3: Goddess of the Sky is kind of in this figure,
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Speaker 3: doing like a backbend, and I had painted that on
4:49
Speaker 3: the wall in my studio and from the window just
4:53
Speaker 3: imagining this figure, the fire was kind of burning all around,
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Speaker 3: and I kind of imagine that this figure was a
4:59
Speaker 3: kind of of pass over or kind of this blessing
5:04
Speaker 3: or a charm over. I mean, there's so many reasons,
5:08
Speaker 3: and nothing about it was fair at all, but this
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Speaker 3: work that I had been making did survive. It's all
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Speaker 3: sort of toxic and needs, you know, needs to be
5:22
Speaker 3: disposed of. But I had this sense of just a
5:27
Speaker 3: responsibility to witness, Like I don't know if I could
5:31
Speaker 3: have made this work if I had experience. It turns
5:35
Speaker 3: out like not losing your house is almost is as
5:39
Speaker 3: complicated financially and a lot of other ways as losing it.
5:43
Speaker 3: But the fact that it was still there but it
5:45
Speaker 3: couldn't really go into the studio, I was like, well,
5:48
Speaker 3: maybe I'll just work in the driveway or like I
5:51
Speaker 3: will still find I felt a responsibility to be there,
5:55
Speaker 3: and a lot of people that had nothing like kind
5:58
Speaker 3: of was too intense to go there. So I kind
6:00
Speaker 3: of felt I went every day and just kind of
6:05
Speaker 3: being these eyes around the town because I could be
6:10
Speaker 3: and just started going on these walks every day. So
6:15
Speaker 3: all of the work kind of like traces from my
6:18
Speaker 3: front door, kind of walking my dog in this kind
6:22
Speaker 3: of like circle of several miles around Alta. Dina.
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Speaker 2: Wow, interesting, I also said yesterday when I saw the
6:30
Speaker 2: paintings from the first time, I can see your callar
6:33
Speaker 2: scheme in the paintings, and it's fun to see you
6:36
Speaker 2: when I know the body of works of yours before
6:38
Speaker 2: it like figures us. And then you got these landscape
6:42
Speaker 2: with all these bright collars and they are so beautiful,
6:44
Speaker 2: and I'm like, interesting, I could really see when I came,
6:47
Speaker 2: and it's like I know.
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Speaker 3: That it's still still in there. I mean, I think
6:52
Speaker 3: there was a kind of there hadn't been since I
6:56
Speaker 3: moved to Altadena in twenty twenty. The environment was influencing
7:02
Speaker 3: my work, and the bodies and the landscape were kind
7:06
Speaker 3: of merging in this complicated almost like cubist way in
7:11
Speaker 3: a way, or like the figures were becoming these even bigger,
7:15
Speaker 3: like as big as the mountains. So in my daily
7:18
Speaker 3: life the kind of mountain range and like trying to
7:22
Speaker 3: know every ridge of it and walking each ridge and
7:26
Speaker 3: from the vantage point of my yard looking at the mountains,
7:29
Speaker 3: and I was trying to like trace where during the
7:31
Speaker 3: in the mornings I would go up and walk. So
7:33
Speaker 3: I'm kind of like learning the mountains as as a body,
7:38
Speaker 3: and very much the trees that I started painting are
7:43
Speaker 3: also bodies. And like the colors there are, believe it
7:48
Speaker 3: or not, or at least to my eye, like in
7:50
Speaker 3: Altadena around a certain time of day, there is this
7:53
Speaker 3: like magical pink color that takes over the take It
8:00
Speaker 3: takes over the mountains.
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Speaker 2: So interesting. And in this painting, you're going to always
8:05
Speaker 2: se a bird in the middle of the painting.
8:08
Speaker 3: I mean that is kind of a kind of a ridge,
8:11
Speaker 3: but that the birds when I first moved to California.
8:14
Speaker 3: The crows became this subject in a lot of the paintings,
8:17
Speaker 3: and because of they have this vantage point, I just
8:20
Speaker 3: kept imagine or I was like making paintings from the
8:23
Speaker 3: vantage point of imagining being the crow and like looking
8:26
Speaker 3: down and kind of seeing this. I felt like for
8:31
Speaker 3: a few years I was in the process of this,
8:34
Speaker 3: like mapping, and I didn't quite it was like working
8:38
Speaker 3: into the paintings and kind of muted ways. But then Yeah,
8:47
Speaker 3: with this body of work, I was like, Okay, I
8:49
Speaker 3: know why I have been mapping this, and then I
8:52
Speaker 3: just like literally going to these places that I'm charting
8:57
Speaker 3: and revisiting, you know, places that burned, places that didn't burn,
9:03
Speaker 3: kind of checking up on every place that I've painted
9:06
Speaker 3: is a place that I have a relationship to from
9:11
Speaker 3: before the fire and after the fire.
9:14
Speaker 2: Makes totally sense. I think it's really interesting to see
9:18
Speaker 2: some of these guys have a frame run and some
9:21
Speaker 2: of them don't have.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, that was a decision that sort of came about,
9:27
Speaker 3: and it's sort of a question mark too, Like I
9:29
Speaker 3: kind of felt like there's this way of with the
9:32
Speaker 3: smaller ones. I felt like we did frames so that
9:36
Speaker 3: you could be in it or like it didn't want
9:39
Speaker 3: you like seeing the edge of it while you're standing
9:43
Speaker 3: in front of the painting. But all of the bigger
9:45
Speaker 3: paintings really have the large paintings have a kind of
9:49
Speaker 3: one to one relationship where you're like standing and are surrounded,
9:55
Speaker 3: and so I kind of didn't want the frame to
9:58
Speaker 3: end that experience. And yeah, especially this scorpion weed one,
10:02
Speaker 3: they're kind of like this full body experience of the
10:06
Speaker 3: plant or like on the edge of the trail, both
10:08
Speaker 3: of these. Yeah, this swallowing fog painting is also like
10:13
Speaker 3: on the edge of this kind of cliff that goes
10:17
Speaker 3: down below.
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Speaker 2: Do you take pictures befall and have it kind of
10:21
Speaker 2: like a sketch or is it out of your memory?
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Speaker 3: It's funny. Yeah, this was the first before the fire,
10:28
Speaker 3: and I really I have this like magical dog who
10:31
Speaker 3: is kind of I feel like in retrospect my teacher
10:36
Speaker 3: in a lot of ways, and taking her on these walks,
10:38
Speaker 3: and she started when it was just me and her,
10:40
Speaker 3: like stopping at certain spots and just like she and
10:45
Speaker 3: beautiful spots, like beautiful vista. I'm like, oh my god,
10:48
Speaker 3: my dog loves a vista, And so she started doing
10:52
Speaker 3: this to me. At first we would walk like seven
10:54
Speaker 3: or eight miles like a day. Then it started being
10:57
Speaker 3: like just a couple and then she would just stop
10:59
Speaker 3: and be like a stat And so I started bringing
11:02
Speaker 3: sketch a little notebook with me, and when she would stop,
11:07
Speaker 3: I would start drawing. And then then I kind of
11:14
Speaker 3: really got into that, and that was then I started
11:17
Speaker 3: making all of these ink drawings in my garden this
11:22
Speaker 3: summer before the fire. I was kind of like just
11:25
Speaker 3: putting paper down in the kind of like mulch in
11:28
Speaker 3: my garden, and from it felt like I was grounding
11:32
Speaker 3: myself because but I was like sitting on the ground
11:35
Speaker 3: and making these ink drawings of plants. And then with this,
11:41
Speaker 3: I started for the first time taking some photographs while
11:45
Speaker 3: I was walking. And I have never worked from photographs before,
11:53
Speaker 3: but I felt like because I had these preparation of
11:57
Speaker 3: these little drawings and these ink drawings that I was
12:01
Speaker 3: able to it felt like they were so such specific.
12:05
Speaker 3: Even though I have been such an intuitive painter for
12:09
Speaker 3: twenty something, you know, twenty five years, this time it
12:13
Speaker 3: was very important something about the collective experience that I'm
12:19
Speaker 3: representing here, for like the whole community, the whole community
12:23
Speaker 3: of Alta Dina that I really wanted these did not
12:26
Speaker 3: be just needed them to be absolutely specific places, and
12:33
Speaker 3: so the photograph became something that then I was taking
12:38
Speaker 3: to the studio with me and working from that. And
12:45
Speaker 3: several of these have a kind of silver base to
12:48
Speaker 3: the paintings and the silver to me, well, one it
12:51
Speaker 3: kind of references the Los Angeles, the sort of classic
12:55
Speaker 3: Los Angeles like mourning. A lot of these are in
12:57
Speaker 3: the morning and the kind of marine layer and you're
13:02
Speaker 3: in especially up in the mountains in Altadena, there is
13:05
Speaker 3: this like you know that takes a couple hours for
13:08
Speaker 3: the sun to emerge. But also the silver is kind
13:12
Speaker 3: of a reference to the photographic, like just that process
13:18
Speaker 3: changing in the painting and like this honoring of the
13:22
Speaker 3: photograph a little bit. But I felt like I was
13:25
Speaker 3: able to work very loosely, I think from the ink
13:28
Speaker 3: drawings and this is like a return to oil painting
13:31
Speaker 3: for me that you know, just very physical and gestural needing,
13:39
Speaker 3: you know, just really focused online and this kind of
13:42
Speaker 3: silver glow. I was able to like do these looser
13:46
Speaker 3: interpretations from the photograph but kept it the information specific for.
13:52
Speaker 2: Me, interesting, like I said before, I really really loved them.
13:57
Speaker 2: And of course you can see kind of how they
13:59
Speaker 2: all work together, but they are all of them so
14:05
Speaker 2: unique and when you look at them, they could just
14:08
Speaker 2: be like one. It doesn't necessarily need together. I know
14:11
Speaker 2: they are sold and will be have new homes, different homes,
14:14
Speaker 2: but when when you look at them together and imagine like, Okay,
14:18
Speaker 2: this guy will be that home, and that they are
14:20
Speaker 2: really really gorgeous.
14:22
Speaker 3: Thank you. I know this is it is hard for
14:25
Speaker 3: me that this is I mean, it has been a
14:27
Speaker 3: very prolific year and this is just a very small
14:33
Speaker 3: selection of what has been. I mean, I think ultimately
14:37
Speaker 3: was I think in the last year I made about
14:39
Speaker 3: like fifty paintings of you know, it was just a day,
14:44
Speaker 3: you know, a daily thing, not making a painting a day,
14:46
Speaker 3: but just felt so inside of it and needing to
14:52
Speaker 3: like access that place of it really became and some
14:56
Speaker 3: of the looser, I mean, the ones at the beginning
14:59
Speaker 3: this show ended up being more. Uh. I think like
15:04
Speaker 3: five of these are actually like twenty twenty six, like
15:07
Speaker 3: brand new, brand new, brand new paintings, like you know,
15:11
Speaker 3: still like each one that you make, I feel like
15:13
Speaker 3: I'm getting better and able to. You know, there was
15:17
Speaker 3: a lot of new language that I was working out
15:19
Speaker 3: in here, but mostly just this like freedom of line
15:23
Speaker 3: in them felt so much like so many moments in
15:26
Speaker 3: these paintings have felt like handwriting almost and really felt
15:30
Speaker 3: like writing a kind of love letter to Alta Dina.
15:36
Speaker 3: And you know, there have been mostly there about these
15:38
Speaker 3: moments of like so many times in the year where
15:41
Speaker 3: I'm like, can we even move back there? Like we weren't.
15:44
Speaker 3: We just moved back into our house like last like
15:48
Speaker 3: right before in November.
15:51
Speaker 2: So why did you say?
15:53
Speaker 3: We were lived in various places. We had Airbnb for
15:56
Speaker 3: six months, we traveled, we stayed with family, we lived
15:59
Speaker 3: in a hotel like so these paintings were kind of
16:02
Speaker 3: a real bedrock for me. Like I mean, at first,
16:06
Speaker 3: I was like, oh my god, I guess I'll just
16:07
Speaker 3: paint outside. I don't know what I'll do and where
16:10
Speaker 3: did you? Then I rented a studio in February, and
16:15
Speaker 3: when I went to the studio, I was like, you know,
16:19
Speaker 3: going to try to like continue what I was like
16:21
Speaker 3: working on before, but I was just like, I can't
16:24
Speaker 3: think about anything else. And I could see I was
16:27
Speaker 3: like in Elhamborough, so I was like ten miles away
16:30
Speaker 3: from the mountains and I could still see them in
16:33
Speaker 3: out my window, and I was just like, I just
16:35
Speaker 3: have to paint. I have to paint that, and started
16:39
Speaker 3: painting just every The first paintings I made were just
16:43
Speaker 3: like of my neighbor's house across the street, my yard,
16:47
Speaker 3: just like little by little, just what you could see
16:51
Speaker 3: outside of like every like the landscape from my house
16:55
Speaker 3: was just completely changed and so just and there was
17:00
Speaker 3: a sense, you know, then the Army Corps came in
17:02
Speaker 3: and every day some new some some landmark was disappearing
17:07
Speaker 3: every single day, and so I just had this kind
17:09
Speaker 3: of like panic, like I need to record this. So
17:12
Speaker 3: it was taking photographs because I was like I couldn't
17:14
Speaker 3: paint as fast as everything that was just changing and
17:20
Speaker 3: all these moments that you just want to hold onto
17:23
Speaker 3: and and the question of can we live here? And
17:27
Speaker 3: the more time, even though the whole town, you know,
17:30
Speaker 3: had sort of turned into this cemetery, like the whole
17:34
Speaker 3: like every house, every schools, everything that you would see
17:39
Speaker 3: was was so devastated. But I started just picking up
17:44
Speaker 3: on this these beauty of things, or you know, I
17:48
Speaker 3: didn't want to there's so much news coverage and like
17:51
Speaker 3: every day like this inundation of the devastation, and when
17:55
Speaker 3: you're hanging out there, there's drones. You can hear the
17:57
Speaker 3: drones going over their takeing overhead shots of just the
18:03
Speaker 3: you know, the level of devastation. And so I started
18:06
Speaker 3: going on these walks to just find things that we're
18:09
Speaker 3: still beautiful or we're giving me like what was still
18:13
Speaker 3: there and what was like saying no that we actually
18:16
Speaker 3: still are going to live here, And how is.
18:20
Speaker 2: It to get back both to live there and be
18:22
Speaker 2: in the studio.
18:24
Speaker 3: So I'm still not in my home. My studio is
18:26
Speaker 3: not usable, but still not I have another. I rented
18:31
Speaker 3: another studio that's in Pasadena, so not too far away,
18:35
Speaker 3: and I'm sharing the studio with a good friend of
18:38
Speaker 3: mine who lost her home and her studio. There's so
18:42
Speaker 3: many artists that are experiencing this, and yeah, this little
18:48
Speaker 3: complex of studios, there's a number of people that have
18:51
Speaker 3: just just landed there. But living in our house is
18:57
Speaker 3: really like we have no neighbors, Like it's dark, like
19:02
Speaker 3: at night, it's owls outside and it's so dark. The
19:07
Speaker 3: rebuilding is starting kind of on all sides of us,
19:10
Speaker 3: So as soon as it's like seven thirty am. It's
19:13
Speaker 3: construction crews and it's stressful. You know, it's dust, it's
19:21
Speaker 3: still there's lingering questions about how toxic it is, and
19:25
Speaker 3: every time someone is digging something, it's it's a lot
19:31
Speaker 3: and a lot. And there are you know, as many
19:33
Speaker 3: standing houses as there are around town, but since we
19:36
Speaker 3: moved back, you like, oh, they're empty, like you would think,
19:41
Speaker 3: like you can walk down around the neighborhood and you
19:44
Speaker 3: see some houses and you're like, oh, there's no there's
19:46
Speaker 3: still even where there are houses, there are not people
19:49
Speaker 3: living in there. So we have about a few neighbors
19:53
Speaker 3: down the street and like every time you see a neighbor,
19:56
Speaker 3: you hug them. Everyone is looking out for each other.
20:03
Speaker 3: We're all like we live across the street from a park,
20:06
Speaker 3: which was like a very active park. The park is
20:09
Speaker 3: like the park burned. It's like just mostly it's older gentlemen.
20:17
Speaker 3: They're like seventies and eighties who've stayed. And there are
20:22
Speaker 3: neighbors and our friends. But yeah, it doesn't feel quite
20:26
Speaker 3: like we're back like schools.
20:28
Speaker 2: It's kind of like a ghost yard in one way,
20:30
Speaker 2: I guess.
20:31
Speaker 3: Yeah. And the more that we're there, You're like, Okay,
20:34
Speaker 3: well maybe five. I mean it really is going to
20:36
Speaker 3: be it's going to be five years, it's going to
20:38
Speaker 3: be ten years.
20:39
Speaker 2: That's a long time.
20:41
Speaker 3: So and I know when I think about this body
20:44
Speaker 3: of work and this part of it that has been
20:46
Speaker 3: like so accessing such a raw, like such a raw
20:50
Speaker 3: and fresh place for me, and I'm kind of like, oh,
20:52
Speaker 3: is it going to end? And then as I've been
20:54
Speaker 3: home the last couple month, You're like, Oh, it's actually
20:57
Speaker 3: there's no danger of of that. It's going to be
21:02
Speaker 3: along recovery.
21:05
Speaker 2: And I guess your studio of course is now because
21:07
Speaker 2: all the paintings are here, right.
21:10
Speaker 3: There's no there have been a lot, so there's like
21:13
Speaker 3: some of the very beginning ones are are still there.
21:17
Speaker 3: But it is so wonderful to get these paintings, to
21:22
Speaker 3: be sharing them and like this moment like it wasn't
21:25
Speaker 3: exactly on the schedule, but I think like the anniversary
21:28
Speaker 3: of the fire, and I'm so happy, and it was
21:30
Speaker 3: like really amazing to have so many of like my
21:35
Speaker 3: daughter's friends, families, like all the people from Altadena, like
21:40
Speaker 3: sharing the paintings with people who know each of these
21:44
Speaker 3: places or recognize.
21:47
Speaker 2: And what what are you going to work on when
21:50
Speaker 2: you get back in the studio.
21:51
Speaker 3: I still I've been keeping a list, you know, I have,
21:54
Speaker 3: and I have like some like this painting over there,
21:57
Speaker 3: this is called Anniversary Elderberry. And one is this amazing
22:02
Speaker 3: tree that's behind my good friend's my good friend's house,
22:06
Speaker 3: and I've made a couple paintings of that. So I'm
22:08
Speaker 3: still some of these places and some of these subjects
22:11
Speaker 3: and the paintings, I'm kind of checking, like checking on
22:15
Speaker 3: them and seeing how it changed. Like that bark of
22:20
Speaker 3: that elderberry was like completely blackened, and this was from
22:24
Speaker 3: the actually the anniversary of the fire, and the bark
22:27
Speaker 3: started peeling peeling off in this magical way, and on
22:31
Speaker 3: the family who lived there, they made this amazing labyrinth
22:35
Speaker 3: at the foot of the tree with this path that
22:39
Speaker 3: they're lining it with the bark. So I'm still on
22:43
Speaker 3: my little on my little map of places, and I
22:47
Speaker 3: have like my little notes of like this which tree
22:52
Speaker 3: and thing like I that I still need to I
22:55
Speaker 3: still need to record. Yeah, And I have a sense
22:58
Speaker 3: of like another like a larger book project with all
23:04
Speaker 3: of the with all of the painting, like all of
23:07
Speaker 3: the larger body of work that I want to make
23:11
Speaker 3: and working, Yeah, working on that. So it's continuing.
23:16
Speaker 2: Nice. When will the book come out?
23:18
Speaker 3: Oh, I don't know. It hasn't It hasn't started. I
23:21
Speaker 3: haven't started yet, Okay, but I feel like or just
23:25
Speaker 3: what the editing process of was for this show, and
23:28
Speaker 3: like there's so many images that I think it's not
23:32
Speaker 3: totally a show experience. I think it is more more
23:37
Speaker 3: of a book or like there's this kind of daily
23:40
Speaker 3: walking quality, and there's some writing and other things that
23:44
Speaker 3: I think would make sense, and I'd be interested to
23:48
Speaker 3: include some of these other preemptive kind of psychic work
23:53
Speaker 3: that was going on before and some of these drawings
23:56
Speaker 3: of plants and stuff that were that that pared me
24:00
Speaker 3: for this body of work.
24:02
Speaker 2: And will the drawings as well be in the bugo
24:04
Speaker 2: on the paintings, you don't, I think.
24:06
Speaker 3: I would like to try, because I mean there was, yeah,
24:09
Speaker 3: there was this sort of project that I was kind
24:12
Speaker 3: of hiding out a little bit. Like I felt like
24:14
Speaker 3: after starting like the end of twenty twenty three and
24:18
Speaker 3: all of twenty twenty four, I kind of like had
24:20
Speaker 3: this sense I was like I need to pull away
24:25
Speaker 3: a little bit and wasn't like showing work. I had
24:27
Speaker 3: this sense of like this new body of work that
24:29
Speaker 3: I really like privately needed to work out. And yeah,
24:36
Speaker 3: I think it's like a bigger project that then now
24:40
Speaker 3: I've just been I mean, what I've so powerful about
24:43
Speaker 3: this work is it just really planted me in the moment.
24:46
Speaker 3: I think my work at other times has sort of
24:48
Speaker 3: connected me to other ancient stories and ancient mythologies and
24:54
Speaker 3: future times, but this work has really is really just
24:59
Speaker 3: you know, plan me in this present moment, and I'm
25:03
Speaker 3: it's a very satisfying place to be to just feel
25:09
Speaker 3: in control, you know, like letting go and just feel like,
25:13
Speaker 3: you know, the ideal feeling for a painter is to
25:16
Speaker 3: be the kind of channel or the messenger. So I'm
25:19
Speaker 3: hoping to keep focus on that and that's my priority
25:23
Speaker 3: and keep that going and then yes, slightly start to
25:28
Speaker 3: work on this other book project at the same time,
25:30
Speaker 3: but still, and.
25:32
Speaker 2: I guess to be an artist and let go and
25:36
Speaker 2: do all the stuff that your normally used to and
25:39
Speaker 2: completely changed. That must have been really like scaring in
25:42
Speaker 2: a way because you're like, what am I doing now?
25:45
Speaker 3: Absolutely? Absolutely, But it also feels like this work has
25:49
Speaker 3: allowed me to like scent. You know. I was like
25:51
Speaker 3: when I got this dog, I was like, go on
25:53
Speaker 3: these long hinks. I'm like, how am I gonna This
25:55
Speaker 3: is using up all my time, like this certain anxiety
25:58
Speaker 3: and like, you know, mothering is like another way and
26:01
Speaker 3: to find a way to bring it into one moment.
26:05
Speaker 3: And now I can be out there and going on
26:08
Speaker 3: these long walks and knowing that I'm feeding you know
26:11
Speaker 3: that that I mean. I felt that it was part
26:14
Speaker 3: of the work before, but I didn't know how. And
26:17
Speaker 3: so now I feel more incorporated. And so this this time.
26:24
Speaker 3: You know, why I moved to California was to be
26:27
Speaker 3: outside and closer to nature, and now have found the
26:31
Speaker 3: way to put that channel that into my work.
26:35
Speaker 2: It makes a sort of sense. And I think in
26:38
Speaker 2: the book there should be some pictures of your dog
26:40
Speaker 2: as well.
26:40
Speaker 3: Then oh yeah, I mean, and she is like a supermodel.
26:43
Speaker 3: So it was the first day that I went back
26:48
Speaker 3: to Altadina with her after the fire, you know, because
26:51
Speaker 3: there was the National Guard and we couldn't get to
26:53
Speaker 3: our house for weeks. And the first day that I
26:57
Speaker 3: took her and we snuck in to this one trail
27:01
Speaker 3: that hadn't burned. So we went over there, and the
27:05
Speaker 3: first thing that she did, I think this for me, like,
27:09
Speaker 3: you know, it's a trail that she goes all the time,
27:11
Speaker 3: but she walked in like five hundred yards and next
27:15
Speaker 3: to this like stream and she just sat there absolutely
27:19
Speaker 3: still and just listening. And for me, that was the
27:25
Speaker 3: moment that I was like, this is what you know?
27:28
Speaker 3: And there were birds tweet. I felt like she was
27:32
Speaker 3: all the chaos of how the fire had completely turned
27:36
Speaker 3: our lives upside down. We're living somewhere else, like and
27:39
Speaker 3: she knows we're going back there. She can feel that
27:42
Speaker 3: everything is different. But I felt like she was listening
27:44
Speaker 3: like that the birds and the water and just the
27:47
Speaker 3: environment was telling her or she was getting her read
27:50
Speaker 3: on what had happened. And I mean I was like,
27:55
Speaker 3: oh my god, she needs her own like YouTube channel.
27:59
Speaker 3: She was like here, but I'm like, but she's telling
28:02
Speaker 3: but she's this is my sign, this is telling me
28:04
Speaker 3: what to do. And she was just listening and just
28:08
Speaker 3: sitting there absolutely still, and you know, it felt like
28:14
Speaker 3: she was that was how to deal with this kind
28:19
Speaker 3: of trauma. And so that became at that moment, I
28:22
Speaker 3: was like Okay, I'm gonna I have to emulate this
28:27
Speaker 3: kind of this kind of deep listening that these paintings.
28:32
Speaker 3: So all of these paintings she's with me.
28:34
Speaker 2: Is she in the studio as well?
28:36
Speaker 3: No, she hates the studio. She hates she hates the
28:39
Speaker 3: new studio. Yeah, that I'm the temporary studios just feel
28:42
Speaker 3: because before I was working at my I had like
28:45
Speaker 3: a separate studio at my house so she could come
28:48
Speaker 3: and go and be in the garden. But where I'm
28:50
Speaker 3: working now is like more industrial, and she's just very
28:55
Speaker 3: uncomfortable interesting, okay in there.
28:58
Speaker 2: So she's definitely looking forward.
29:00
Speaker 3: To returning home. But yeah, these but in each moment
29:06
Speaker 3: of these paintings, she's she's with me.
29:10
Speaker 2: I love that. And when do you think you will
29:12
Speaker 2: be back working at the studio of the house again.
29:17
Speaker 3: It's yeah, it's hard to it's hard to say. I
29:20
Speaker 3: mean personally, I'm kind of enjoying this like separate because
29:23
Speaker 3: it's it's such an intense environment at home and like
29:27
Speaker 3: anything that happens, you're kind of like you hear there's
29:30
Speaker 3: like this crazy rumbler. Whole houses vibrate, you run outside,
29:33
Speaker 3: like I feel like there's so much going on in
29:36
Speaker 3: Alta Dina right now to make the work. It's kind
29:39
Speaker 3: of good for me outside that has been Uh yeah,
29:45
Speaker 3: there's so much, there's so much going on there that yeah,
29:49
Speaker 3: right now, I'm like, okay, this is I'm going to
29:51
Speaker 3: hold on to this studio for as as I can,
29:55
Speaker 3: but I'm bringing I'm certainly making the studio feel like
29:59
Speaker 3: you know, I'm filling it with with Altadena.
30:03
Speaker 2: And how do you feel do you feel like a
30:05
Speaker 2: lot of artists when they go into a new studio
30:07
Speaker 2: they kind of have to adjust to the new studio
30:10
Speaker 2: and some can paint, of course immediately, somebody can take months.
30:14
Speaker 2: Can you go in and paint in a new studio
30:16
Speaker 2: immediately or do you have to kind of feel the room?
30:19
Speaker 2: Do you know what I mean?
30:20
Speaker 3: Yeah, I feel like this body of I mean, I've
30:22
Speaker 3: just been and I think a lot of people being
30:25
Speaker 3: set in such a like survivalist way. You're just like,
30:30
Speaker 3: I don't you know as I just need you kind
30:33
Speaker 3: of I know so many of my friends, you know,
30:35
Speaker 3: losing all of your possession, you know, just it kind
30:38
Speaker 3: of rips you open in this kind of or like
30:41
Speaker 3: losing a person that you love, like grief kind of
30:44
Speaker 3: does amazing things to you, and you kind of I've
30:49
Speaker 3: just been feeling it turned on, you know, and you
30:52
Speaker 3: have this this studio feels like a safe space, and
30:55
Speaker 3: so I haven't been been less picky or and it's
30:58
Speaker 3: kind of freeing to like not have any of your
31:00
Speaker 3: things or you know. I was like, Okay, I'm getting started.
31:03
Speaker 3: I just need like I think I just started with
31:06
Speaker 3: like twelve tubes of oil, you know, little tubes of
31:09
Speaker 3: oil paint, a little bit of like the most basic supplies,
31:12
Speaker 3: and that you could just start with that a certain
31:15
Speaker 3: freedom to just let go of all of your little
31:19
Speaker 3: hang ups.
31:21
Speaker 2: So you could just go in just can just paint
31:25
Speaker 2: and do it.
31:26
Speaker 3: Yeah, that has been That has been my EMMO. And
31:29
Speaker 3: like I've had to be dealing with so many other
31:31
Speaker 3: insurance things, so every moment just feels like precious and
31:36
Speaker 3: and you know, I've been scaling the work down a
31:38
Speaker 3: little bit, but it's also just like it has been
31:41
Speaker 3: so free because I feel like I need more images.
31:45
Speaker 3: I need more, So there's been less of these bigger
31:50
Speaker 3: paintings and more there's just like more of the story
31:53
Speaker 3: that I want to tell. And so scaling the size
31:57
Speaker 3: of some of the work down has allowed me to
31:59
Speaker 3: just keep going has been the most has been necessary.
32:04
Speaker 2: I can hear that everything happened, and then finding a
32:09
Speaker 2: new studio, doing all that, and then you end up
32:11
Speaker 2: with this show that is so beautiful that I'm really
32:14
Speaker 2: impressed because I could definitely not have done. I have
32:17
Speaker 2: to get used to things. I'm not an not to
32:20
Speaker 2: say it, but I can feel not to say. They
32:22
Speaker 2: have to get in put all kind of small things up,
32:26
Speaker 2: you know, made all that you just came in with
32:29
Speaker 2: them all in some chemises.
32:30
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, yeah, literally, I mean my first thought
32:33
Speaker 3: when we were moved into an airbnb like the end
32:36
Speaker 3: of January, and I was like there was like a
32:38
Speaker 3: little deck off the bedroom and I was like, oh, yeah,
32:41
Speaker 3: I can use this, so like this will be this
32:43
Speaker 3: will be my new stand Like what are you talking about? Insane?
32:47
Speaker 3: But yeah, getting getting a new studio, getting is just
32:52
Speaker 3: any space was immediately.
32:56
Speaker 2: And did you bring any clothes anything from the house
32:58
Speaker 2: or at that all talks?
33:00
Speaker 3: Yeah we didn't. I mean when we yeah, we we
33:03
Speaker 3: had a kind of a harrowing escape because in the
33:07
Speaker 3: middle of the night, like we'd have just brought our animals,
33:11
Speaker 3: like nothing nothing, nothing else, nothing with us.
33:16
Speaker 2: So wow, pretty pretty scary. I'm sorry to hear.
33:21
Speaker 3: But it's I mean, and it's in I mean, it's
33:24
Speaker 3: just the scale of it and the fact that our
33:27
Speaker 3: whole time, you know, that the whole town disappeared in
33:30
Speaker 3: six hours is just like something. And then you're like
33:34
Speaker 3: and that it's going to be more like ten years
33:37
Speaker 3: getting back and just but I just want to witness
33:40
Speaker 3: and see each little change, and like being tuned into
33:45
Speaker 3: the plants and the trees and the birds has been
33:50
Speaker 3: a way to like, you know, it's more the human
33:53
Speaker 3: the human strata that is suffered the most. And you
33:58
Speaker 3: know when you walk in the mountain and all the
34:01
Speaker 3: plants that burned right now, they're all coming back, Like
34:04
Speaker 3: there's this regeneration that is that is happening, and just
34:10
Speaker 3: like tuning into that other scale hus been necessary to
34:18
Speaker 3: make it feel livable.
34:21
Speaker 2: Thank you much for your time. Pleasure to see you
34:24
Speaker 2: again and congrets with the show.
34:26
Speaker 3: Thank you JP. I mean, it's amazing. Yeah, it's amazing
34:29
Speaker 3: to see and I've been hearing a lot of people
34:32
Speaker 3: that you know, I was sort of scared about showing
34:36
Speaker 3: this new body of work. Is anyone going to even know,
34:39
Speaker 3: like recognize, but from what I'm hearing, you know, even
34:42
Speaker 3: the bodies are are.
34:44
Speaker 2: In here, and you can definitely feel it, you.
34:47
Speaker 3: Can feel the life. So that is very affirming for
34:51
Speaker 3: me to Oh, I.
34:52
Speaker 2: Was so heavy when yesterday when I walked in and
34:55
Speaker 2: that's all the works, I was like, damn, I really
34:58
Speaker 2: love them, man. So I'm glad we got the talk,
35:01
Speaker 2: and I'm looking forward to still following you and see,
35:05
Speaker 2: well what will happen. And I'm looking differitely forward to
35:08
Speaker 2: see the book and the new paintings. Thank you, You're welcome.
35:12
Speaker 2: You great to see Mire again.
35:15
Speaker 1: Great to see a very very nice show at Night.
35:18
Speaker 2: Gallery in Los Angeles. I hope you enjoyed Speak with Brisk.
35:25
Speaker 1: Please share it with all your art friends lovers so
35:29
Speaker 1: we can get more listeners. Thank you so much for
35:32
Speaker 1: listening to come Speak with Brisk.