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MW. What about your process
of working? Do sketches proceed your paintings?
LM: I do sketches and
various drawings. I keep a sketchbook for jotting down whatever
happens. Maybe I'll get a shape that I'm intrigued with in my
head. I'll keep that going, then I'll flip back through the sketchbook;
or other shapes will stick in my head for a long time, maybe
for a month or more, then I'll try drawings of those. Finally,
I'll go to the painting and I'll try to do my painting like the
drawing, but it never comes out that way. I try to plan things
out, but what I think happens is
that some kind of initial relationship is set up between the
attached pieces and parts on the canvas. Because that is not
made real yet in the drawings, this changes radically in the
painting. I just let it go as it wants, otherwise it would be
boring. I always think some symbolic relationship is set up,
some kind of symbol system that then reveals itself more completely
in the painting and it makes a sense. It's really curious.
MW: What do you mean by a "symbol system?"
LM: It can be as basic as a shape. I start to see a certain
shape that relates as a kind of a symbol with another shape.
They are symbolic just in the sense that they allude to something
by coincidence that makes a sense in the context of the painting.
There seems to be some governing relationship that is set up
at the beginning, that appears to be completely non-objective,
and from which everything emerges. Eventually the essence of
that initial concern is elaborated and I can say, "So this
is what it means." I may not be able to say anything else,
at least not out loud, but I know deeply what it is about.
MW. Do you refer to historical meanings of certain
shapes?
LM: I don't look ahead of time. With the last group of paintings,
some of the shapes seemed like some thing that would allude to
something. So I looked them up in The Dictionary of Symbols (by
J.E. Cirlot). What was curious was that there would be a kind
of strange sense to them. In Kathleen Shield's recent article
in ARTSPACE (Winter 1986-87), 1 mentioned a mandorla shape, of
which I wasn't aware of when I was using it. I didn't think,
I must use this because it means the
union of two worlds, upper and lower, heaven and earth. It was
only afterwards that I looked and realized it really functions
like that in the painting.
MW. Do you work on more than one painting at a time?
LM: Well, yesterday, I worked on one painting for six
hours, then took a break, and worked on another. I do work better
at night. The last painting I did, Metamorphosis, was amazing.
I started and worked until the point where I got hooked. Once
I get on that hook the painting just goes by itself. I kept thinking:
this is amazing, I can't stop. I knew exactly what to do. Just
whip, shush -- all down the painting: I didn't even have to step
back to look at it. This was six hours non -stop as fast as I
could go. It just sort of completed itself and came around and
now it has to dry and I'll have to go back to bring up some of
these areas a bit more. It takes awhile as I get closer to the
end. It's really exciting. They have a will of their own How
I know what to do, I don't know. It's relating with the body.
I think this physical thing is so important on deciding these
aspects. It is not my head that is deciding where anything is
going, but it is my body. Once I get onto that hook the whole
painting will fall into place. Until I get that it is agony.
Some paintings I have worked on several months, and I still haven't
found the little key.
MW: Do you ever abandon a work?
LM: No, I can't. I'm too obsessive. Actually, people
have said to me: that was a bad painting. I'll say: No, it wasn't;
it fulfilled its function. It turned out to do what it was to
do, I mean it did what it set out to do, and it makes sense as
itself, but then sometimes there will be this awkwardness, or
something in terms of balance that may not be quite right.
MW: Do you hide these not so perfect children?
LM: So far, I've worked on every painting until it was done.
It is because I am so compulsive. I have to get a painting to
the point where I put it up in my house and live with it. Once
it reaches that point, I'm glad to have it around, and then I'm
kind of sad when it goes away. There is one from last year that
never sold, and I didn't like it either. It worked as itself,
but you couldn't live with it: it just sort of ate up a room.
MW: Is your art gender related?
LM: Sometimes I think, certainly a man would never make
this. And, sometimes there is an aspect of patterning or decoration
and decorativeness that I notice and feel very defensive about.
MW: Why defensive?
LM: There is still a message from outside that maybe
there is something wrong with it -- decoration is superfluous,
etc., although it can be used to heighten certain effects and
is really functional. So in a sense decoration may be a "feminine"
attribute, and unfortunately there still seems to be a skepticism
towards things that are more overtly feminine. I also think the
varied use of materials which creates a very physical orientation
on a sensuous level may accord more keenly with the work done
by women. I think of someone like Nancy Graves -- her sculptures
of the early70s when I say this.
MW: You were guest teaching at UNM in the Fall 1986
semester?
LM: I noticed that it was only after Christmas that I
could work, where it just flowed out of me. Before I felt as
if I was blocked up, dammed. I
think maybe because of trying to feel that I had to explain or
justify or have reasons for everything. And then I started feeling
that way about my work and feeling very defensive. It was weird.
Some people can balance it, and teaching can energize them.
MW: Why did you come to New Mexico?
LM: As an undergraduate at the University of Wisconsin,
Madison, I was studying prints and I thought this was a good
school. Also, it was so cold there and expensive -- those were
two major factors. I just wanted to get away from everything.
There were too many distractions out there, and I couldn't sort
out what I wanted to do. I'd see things and think, this is great,
and I'm going to do this, and I'm going to do that. Maybe at
the beginning that is good, but I needed time to just be alone
and sort everything out.
MW: Is this home?
LM: I really like it here. I don't have a desire to move,
but, of course, that changes.
MW: Ideally artists should be able to live anywhere,
but don't you think you'll have to leave for a larger arena?
LM: Right now, it seems to be going very well here, so
it depends on how it continues. It does seem there is both a
trend toward isolationism and that New York and the United States
is not necessarily the place anymore. But who knows, there does
seem to be a logic to one's life, and to find out what that is,
is the thing. It will work out however it is supposed to.
MW. Is there a community of artists in Albuquerque
that you relate to?
LM: I'm a hermit.
MW. Do you go hiking, or to Indian dances?
LM: I don't make any effort in that direction. What I
enjoy is having all this space above my head. I notice that.
I don't really go out into the land. Once in awhile I feel guilty
about that. Really, once I get working, I'm obsessed And, in
Albuquerque you don't feel any sort of tradition or conformity,
as opposed to a place like Boston, where the architecture is
historic.
MW. Where did you grow up?
LM: Minneapolis. My parents weren't very art oriented.
In high school I took art classes, and in my mind the ideal was
to be a newspaper illustrator. My parents thought that was great.
I remember going to read up on cubism when I was 15. I couldn't
understand it, and I was fascinated, and so I brought home all
these books on Picasso and Braque, trying to figure that out.
MW: Did you figure it out?
LM: Somewhat, to a degree. I was doing my own projects
to understand it. I'm just so used to
working, since I did it from the time I was little -- painting,
drawing, and making things,
that I wouldn't know what else to do.
MW: The first time we spoke, you mentioned that
you felt a kinship to the spiritual focus of the Transcendental
Painting Group founded by Raymond Jonson in 1938?
LM: My work is similar in attitude, in the sense that
their work is a bridge to another realm. It differs from other
early 20th century work concerned with the transcendental or
spiritual in terms of surface. Rather than being ascetically
oriented and anti material, say like Kandinsky, I have developed
the physical side a bit more. Actually, Malevich even has a little
bit more of a sense than Kandinsky. I tend to extend the bridge
further so it becomes easier to relate to the paintings because
of the strong physical attraction, and it makes the allusions
more credible.
MW: You are building a stronger bridge then?
LM: I like that notion. The idea of having the painting
as a means and not as an end in itself.
MW: You want to prompt people.
LM: I'm interested in the strange paths the mind is led
down and that the painting is a catalyst for, whatever they may
be.
MW: So, you have intentions for the viewer?
LM: Basically, I make the paintings for myself. It is
the way that I understand things going on in my life and make
sense of my world. So, in that sense it is completely personal
and one wonders if it can get beyond that realm. But, if nothing
else, it does seem that there is some value in attempting to
create a beautiful -- in a kind of off way -- object. I hope
that there is some value. But, basically I do it for myself.
I can't do it for others.
MW: Your qualification that it be beautiful but
"off " seems key to understanding your work. The "offness"
does not seem confrontational, but rather an underlying weird
humor.
LM: I see that too. It is a part of my personality, my
way of looking at things. In books and movies, humor is a way
to get at real strange things. It is the tragicomic situation
that intrigues me. Sometimes you have to laugh at something even
though it is sad or pathetic, not in a positive way either, but
because there is a kind of absurdity, almost a kind of a madness.
In the work, it's fun to do. It's kind of a diabolical aspect
that gets in there. I get a great kick out of it. Like when you
are a kid, you'll think up something and you feel like clapping
your hands together. The ridiculous with dignity -- its an attempt
at that.
Malin Wilson, "Interview: Lucy
Maki and Malin Wilson," Jonson Gallery, UNM, Albuquerque,
January 21, 1987
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