Conversations with Artists

I started my Marion Fellowship research with a week at the Chautauqua Institution in western New York state. I had never been to Chautauqua before and wanted to immerse myself in every possible way. I signed up for several special studies classes which might be applicable to my project, and planned on attending a week’s worth of noteworthy lectures and performances.

In addition I had the good fortune of having been acquainted with a summer faculty member at the School of Visual Arts, Yasmeen Siddiqui. Yasmeen is an editor, writer, and creator of exhibitions. Her platform, Minevera Projects, supports artists and curators who have expressed the desire to analyze their practice in light of historiographical, political, philosophical, or spiritual frameworks.

Yasmeen and I had dinner on my first evening on campus and she suggested that I could meet with the artists in residence. It was an exciting prospect and I jumped at the chance. Since my project concerns both artists and non-artists, this seemed like an important opportunity to explore some of the ideas of my project while talking with these emerging artists.

My teaching work often involves speaking with artists about their own work and this special kind of conversation is my most favorite part of teaching. There are so many ideas about what artists are supposed to be doing that I often find, especially artists at the beginning of their careers, that they are overwhelmed by all of the thinking surrounding their work that they can easily lose the thread of what is important to them as artists. 

I had the opportunity to meet with twenty of the artists in residence as well as a couple of faculty members about their work and artistic practices. I always begin these conversations saying that the conversation can be anything they would like it to be, and that to begin I would love for them to tell me whatever they would like about themselves and their practice. After that I mention that it is helpful to know how I can help them?

One of the artists that I met with, Anna, showed my some very well executed work that had hard-hitting political content. In the effort to explore a new direction she had spent the summer developing a drawing practice, but as she showed me the drawings I felt she somehow didn’t love them as much as the other “more serious” work she had shown me. It was something about the way that she handled them, or described them that showed me they were “lesser”. When I mentioned this she admitted tearfully that it was true. She said that she didn’t consider this more personal work, work without the same political weight, to be as important as her larger works.

Some artists want me to simply tell them what I see when I look at their work. Some want career or educational advice. Some just need support. Most just want to talk and in the process of talking I get to know what is working and not working for them in their practice. I try to listen very carefully and often hear how I can help.