Ute Bertog, Artist

Hello everyone! This is Jackson and welcome to the fifth interview on my art blog, 3 Art Questions With Jackson. This time I interviewed Ute Bertog. She is a really great artist. I really like her art and I enjoy talking to her.



Jackson: Why do you think you became an artist?

Ute: Hmmm, there are so many influences I can think of that made me pursue art. First of all I had an aunt – and my favorite aunt at that - who was an art teacher and I spent many afternoons just making things with her. She was very creative in the arts and all sorts of crafts. She instilled this possibility in me to pursue this life as a career. Also going to art museums as a teenager was a magical experience, simply because it was so different than the surroundings I grew up in. Not that there was anything wrong with where I grew up. On the contrary, I had a very happy childhood. I am from a small town, which gave us children a lot of freedom to just roam in the surrounding fields and woods. Still museums gave me the whiff of the wider world and as a child there was nothing more exciting than to imagine living in a different environment just because of the potential for adventure. Museums were a promise for that potential to explore and stretch beyond the known.

Jackson: What is your favorite artwork and why?


Ute: That is a really difficult question since I don’t have one particular piece of artwork that I’d call my favorite. There are just so many. I do have several artists that I’m returning back to on a regular basis though and that I am always happy about seeing in a museum. Amy Sillman comes to mind and Philip Guston.


Jackson: In what ways is art different in Germany than it is in the United States? 

Ute: That is an even more difficult question since when I left Germany I hadn’t pursued art as much yet. Back then it was more of a private endeavor and I hadn’t explored much of the wider art scene. Plus, in my hometown there just wasn’t an art scene, just the museums that were in the bigger cities. Now I would love to show there again and maybe even spend more time there to work just to see how I’d experience the difference if there even is one. One time I was listening to a radio show about a theater production directed by a British guy. He was asked how the production in America was different from the one in the UK and he said that here the audience was very inquisitive, wanting to know and understand every little detail, whereas in the UK they were much more at ease about taking in the whole thing and being okay with the uncertainty of not-knowing.

Elaine Rutherford, Artist and Fine Arts Professor

Hello! This is Jackson and welcome to the fourth interview on my art blog, 3 Art Questions With Jackson. This time I interviewed Elaine Rutherford. She is an excellent artist and also a fine arts professor. I recently met her and she is a nice person.



Jackson: How old were you when you first realized you wanted to be an artist?

Elaine: I don’t remember a time when I didn't want to be an artist Jackson. I was always drawing as a kid, back then it was horses and fashion designs, and then when I was about 7 I had a longish stint in the hospital and so spent a lot of time drawing. So I don’t think I ever really seriously considered doing anything else.

Jackson: How is art in Scotland different from art in the United States?


Elaine: Hmm, that’s a tough one. I’m not sure if it is. I mean I think that artists everywhere are processing and reflecting the world that they live in and their environment so some things are more universal, like questions of the human condition. Others might be more location specific and I do think that the climate and the culture have an effect on the art made so maybe that is how we might see differences? I’m not sure.


Jackson: Where do you get the ideas for your cool art?


Elaine: Well first of all, thank you for thinking that it is cool, I am flattered! My ideas come from thinking about the place that I came from, my homeland of Scotland. I think about the light and the landscape there, I think about how wherever you are you are always close to the sea. I love the sea because it makes me feel small and insignificant. I love landscapes that are bleak but beautiful, that are rugged and not easy to live in. I like to feel the elements. In my work I am always thinking about these things and then also about being lost, not in a sad or negative way but how we discover things when we take the wrong road or veer off of the map that we would never otherwise know. I love being lost when I am in a beautiful landscape. Being lost while driving is just a pain. 

Carolyn Payne, Executive Director and Chief Instigator at SooVAC

Hello! This is Jackson and welcome to the third interview and first interview of 2017 on my art blog, 3 Art Questions With Jackson. This time I interviewed Carolyn Payne. She is Executive Director and Chief Instigator at SooVAC and a nice person. I have known her for a long time.


Jackson: How old were you when you first realized that art was important to you?

Carolyn: Oh, that’s a hard one. My mother is an artist and my grandmother was an artist and I grew up going to museums and looking at art books. I probably didn’t start going to anything on my own until I was a teenager and haven’t stopped since. I found so much solace hanging out at the MIA as a teen when I was a bit of a misfit and I think that’s probably when I started to realize how much art meant to me.

  

Jackson: What is the best part of working in an art gallery?

Carolyn: I love working with artists and getting to know their work in a deeper way. And of course, to be surrounded by art all the time. I also really love designing and installing shows. My coworker, Alison Hiltner, and I have developed our own language and the days we spend laying out shows that have been in the works for a year or more are some of my favorites.

Jackson: I like to paint but I like installation art best. What kind of art do you like best?

Carolyn: I don’t know if I have a favorite medium. I seem to be drawn to painting lately, especially watercolor and gouache. I just curated a show that included a lot of paintings by Lindsay Smith at a CITIES Market Studios, one of our outside exhibition spaces, and I still can’t stop thinking about them. I become so immersed in the layers of color and feel transported into those places she has created.

Katayoun Amjadi, Artist

Hello! This is Jackson and welcome to the second interview on my art blog, 3 Art Questions With Jackson. This time I interviewed Katayoun Amjadi. She is a very talented artist and a very nice person. I like her.


1) What is the biggest difference between making art in Iran and making art in the United States?

I think art is a function of individual’s idiosyncratic biography, memories, and ideas around objects and associated meanings laden in them. With the change of context in geographical location, clearly audience changes too. The new audience would read and view your art based on their own subjectivity that may not be as easily graspable. I find myself struggling to hold American audience’s hand and walk them through my work and make it more accessible for them, while this was never my concern when I was making art in Iran. 

  

2) How do you get your ideas for making your art? 

I have a certain obsession with visual history of decorative objects, patterns and motifs which I typically decontextualize and put my own meaning into them. My biggest source of inspiration is of course our visual culture, museums, and books. 

3) What is your favorite artwork and why?

This is a very difficult question! My favorites tend to change based on where I am at in life. The only artwork that had haunted me since childhood and it’s burned in my memory is Fransisco Goya’s “The Third of May 1808”. 

Teresa Engeltjes, Director at Circa Gallery

Hello! My name is Jackson and welcome to my art blog. I will ask people in the Minnesota art world three questions and my Dad will publish my posts because I don't understand how to do that part yet. My first interview is with Teresa Engeltjes, the Director at Circa Gallery. I have known her for a long time and she is very nice.

Jackson: What is your favorite artwork and why?

Teresa Engeltjes: I am having a terrible time trying to come up with a favorite -- there are so many! I can, however, tell you about a painting that made the earliest impression on me. When I was a child, I saw a print of it in an abandoned farmhouse that my friends and I would frequently "explore." (No, really. I can't make this up!) It is one I've come to think of as a childhood friend who I regularly stumble upon - I never know where she'll turn up next. And I once had the rare opportunity to sit and spend time with her -- again, purely by accident -- in New York City.  It is Andrew Wyeth's "Christina's World." 

I'm guessing most people feel quite melancholy viewing the work, but Wyeth wanted to convey his neighbor Christina Olson's determination and strength (no longer able to walk, she chose to crawl around her home and grounds instead of using a wheelchair). I appreciate the meticulous brush work and the limited palette. I also appreciate that it takes me home. 

Jackson: What is your favorite part of working in an art gallery?

Teresa Engeltjes: My favorite part of working in the gallery is being able to help artists make a living doing what they love. I also really enjoy talking with people about our artists and their work, and it's especially gratifying to work with someone who is so moved by a piece of art, that they choose to take it home and enjoy it every day.

Jackson: What kind of art do you make? If you you don't make art, what kind would you make if you did?

Teresa Engeltjes: I occasionally take photographs, but almost always only with my phone. I would really like to get back to black and white photography.