Friday, October 7, 2011

Fay Ku, and why I love Quaytman

Last night was the Fay Ku artist lecture at Weber State. She is amazing, and I absolutely loved her work. She does large-scale drawings with graphite, ink and some paper collage. I loved the way she talked about her work. She is very intelligent person and has a lot of knowledge of art history, greek mythology, and she is also really in-tune with world events. I really need to make myself informed of those things, especially of world news. Her work seemed so precise, but at the same time it was open to a lot of interpretation. It seemed like she had a reason for every mark and color, which was really spectacular. She made me really think about how I need to stay on top of my research. I also thought Fay was just adorable and very funny. She can admit when she was too tired to work, or just couldn't produce a new concept. I think that was good for myself and the other art students to hear. Sometimes it's ok NOT to reinvent the wheel.
Woodmen II by Fay Ku

See What You Do by Fay Ku
On a related note, In painting class yesterday, I think I realized why I finally love R.H. Quaytman's work. She and I are on polar ends of the spectrum when it comes to art making, but she is my idol. I love how archival she is, and that she is so intuitive to the context of her work and she has a meaning for everything. She is constantly diving into texts, images and filling her head with all kinds of information. She also sometimes copies images from other sources, which was kind of cool to think about. It gave me validation for copying my own small forms and enlarging them to a bigger canvas. So in all, I love the way Quaytman thinks and how that affects her work. I want to be that kind of artist. I don't just want to be skillful, I want to be a thinker like her, and like Fay Ku. Of course, I like the work Quaytman puts out as well.

Distracting Distance, Chapter 16 by R.H. Quaytman


No comments: