D.O.G spends some quality time with his famous sister Jessica Stockholder
It is a little known fact that Robot Salmon author D.O.G. ’s sister is big deal in the art world. Aside from heading up her own sculpture department at Yale University, Jessica Stockholder, ex-Vancouverite and U-Vic grad, has shown her work in countless European and North American countries over her three decade long art career. Her unique painterly approach to sculpture has earned her much praise among artists and her resistance to high concept has earned her the title of maverick within the academic community. No matter how you feel about Jessica Stockholder there is no denying her far reaching influence.
D.O.G. decided to sit down and spend some quality time with his amazing sister and see if she had any words of wisdom to share with The readers of Robot Salmon.
D.O.G : Can you briefly describe your work and what you do?
Jessica Stockholder: I explore the relationship between picture making and three dimensional material. Towards this end I explore the phenomenal experience of color next to its evocative potential. In relation to the materials I use I am interested in the myriad of ways they can be understood – in the gap between the words we hang on them and how they fill up space. I create sites for me and my audience’s to reify internal experience.
D.O.G : The one thing all creatives have in common is that in order to become successful you have to become an expert at self marketing. Do you have any tips for getting yourself out there and seen?
Jessica Stockholder: Know what you care about and take advantage of opportunity. Be aware that in some cases you have the power to alter situations to suit you – to let the world know what you have to offer.
D.O.G : Unlike many contemporary artists, you seem less interested in creating an elaborate story with your work. Designers are also always trying to achieve visual coolness over whatever conceptual problem the are charged with solving. Can you shed some light on your process? Where do you start? How do decide when you are finished? What is the goal of your art?
Jessica Stockholder: I am not interested in story telling in my work – though I do love stories! I’m more interested in how form is meaningful in relationship to how and why we live than I am in coolness. Though on those rare occasions that I manage to be cool it’s not so bad!
My process – I start with ideas and things lying around the studio, or spaces I’ve been offered to work in. I try to have some bit of fantasy idea I have laced together with things in the world. I’m finished when the work oscillates between stasis and motion – in terms of the eye and the brain.
The goal is to make sense of life.
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