Meg Ojala - Photographer

Meg Ojala

Photographer

Name:  Meg Ojala
City/State: Dundas, Minnesota
Email: ojala@stolaf.edu
Website:  megojala.com

I was born in International Falls, Minnesota. Rainy Lake was my first home. I lived in Northfield, Minnesota until I graduated from high school. I received my B.A. from the University of Minnesota and M.F.A from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. After working for a short while in Chicago in the field of bookbinding and conservation I came back to Minnesota and I have been teaching photography at St. Olaf College and making photographs for more than 30 years.

Tell me about your work? What are you currently working on? How is this different from past projects?

I’ve been making landscape photographs for many years. I often make pictures along the Cannon River near my home and studio. I like to photograph the transitional times, as the seasons are changing. Recently I made pictures with very different subject matter, at my brother’s factory. The body of work is called, “The Plant”. I have always loved the textures and layers of marks and planes at the plant. It is a rich source of found drawings and found sculpture. I also wanted to make pictures of a very particular place that has significance for the people who work there, my family, and me. These photographs reflect interests in common with my landscape work, such as the ambiguous illusion of space and a sense of time that is compressed and transitory. It is very different in subject matter but I think there is continuity with earlier work.

I’m showing a few pictures from a newer project at Groveland Gallery, opening on March 8. The pictures were taken at a site near my home where asphalt and concrete and other rubble has been dumped and grown into a small man-made mountain. I have been there several times to take pictures and will continue working there and continue trying to figure out the best way to show a bigger body of work from the site. The pictures are metaphors for our catastrophic impact on this world and refer to the theory of catastrophism.

How did you decide to become an artist?

I didn’t decide all at once. It’s been a gradual process. I’ve always loved making things and when I was a sophomore in college I decided to major in art because it was what I loved doing the most. Then I decided to go on to get an MFA in art, not because I thought it would make me employable, but because thinking about and making art was the way I wanted to spend my time. I had some good teachers and fellow students and colleagues who were models for me and helped me develop as an artist and then as a teacher. I discovered Agnes Martin’s writings when I was in graduate school and she has been one of my teachers, her work and thought a touchstone for me.


What was the best advice given to you as an artist? 

I like Mary Oliver’s advice to poets. You must be “perfectly serious” and reliable to the cautious and mysterious part of the psyche that our conscious minds need to do creative work. The “responsible and purposeful” part of us must be sure to show up regularly and be attentive to the other part. What it means to me is that practice, discipline, attentiveness and openness are really important. You have to show up!

Many artists struggle to find ways to sell their art.  How do you sell your work?  How do you market yourself?

I am very lucky to be represented by Groveland Gallery in Minneapolis. Sally Johnson and Nicole Watson sell my art. I am not a good promoter of my own work. I tell my students to do as I say, not as I do, when it comes to marketing and getting work out in the world.

http://www.grovelandgallery.com

http://www.megojala.com

Who are some of the Minnesota artists you enjoy?  

There are many. Just a few are:

Jil Evans painting: http://www.jilevanssite.com

Michon Weeks: http://www.michonweeks.com/

Keith Taylor’s Dark Matter: http://www.keithtaylorphoto.com/

Paula McCartney: http://www.paulamccartney.com/

The work of my colleagues in the Department of Art and Art History at St. Olaf.

http://wp.stolaf.edu/art/

I love the art made by teens and young adults in the Art and Autism program in Northfield, MN. The A+ Art Club meets every week at the Northfield Arts Guild. http://www.aplusartclub.com

If I were to follow you around to see art in Minnesota, which places would we go? What would we see?

I look at work in all media, historical and contemporary.

I would take you to the Walker, the MIA, Franklin Art Works, Form and Content, http://www.formandcontent.org/ , Groveland, http://www.grovelandgallery.com , The Flaten Art Museum at St. Olaf College, http://wp.stolaf.edu/flaten/ and the Perlman Teaching Museum at Carleton, https://apps.carleton.edu/museum/ .

Minnesota Center for Book Arts, http://www.mnbookarts.org/
Highpoint Center for Printmaking, http://www.highpointprintmaking.org/

In addition to www.Local-Artist-Interviews.com, where do you go online for good art resources, whether to find a new artist, or to see what is going on in the art world locally and otherwise? 

http://www.mnartists.org

I follow links to galleries from reviews and listings in the New York Times and The New Yorker.

I look at the New York Times Lens Blog. http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/

Lens Culture. https://www.lensculture.com/

I try to keep up on recent photography books at Photo Eye. https://www.photoeye.com/

Do you have any exhibits to promote in the near future?

I am in a group show at Groveland Gallery with Clara Ueland and Denise Presnell-Weidner that opens on Saturday, March 8 from 2 – 5 PM. Duncan Hannah and Ellen Heck are showing in the Annex. The show will be up through April 19.
grovelandgallery.com

Groveland Gallery - LAI Profile

Image List:

1.  The Plant #2, (painting), pigment print, 26 x 40 inches,2012

2.  The Plant #5, (unplug one at a time), pigment print, 24 x 36 inches, 2012

3.   The Plant #6, (worlds), pigment print, 20 x 30 inches, 2012

4. Catastrophe 2, pigment print, 8 x 8 inches, 2014

5. Catastrophe 97, pigment print, 20 x 30 inches, 2014

6. Catastrophe 84, pigment print, 12 x 18 inches, 2014

Natasha Pestich - Installation

Xylander Exhibition Poster #5, 2011

Natasha Pestich

Name: Natasha Pestich
City/State: Minneapolis, MN
Email: natasha_pestich@mcad.edu
MNartist.org profile: http://www.mnartists.org/artistHome.do?rid=204696


Bio~

Natasha Pestich is a local Minneapolis artist, educator and community artist. She received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec, and her Master of Fine Arts in Printmaking from Tyler School of Art, Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She is currently an Associate Professor at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design, and has spent the last five years developing innovative curriculum in the study of printmaking attracting the attention of the Mid-America Printmaking Journal for whom she wrote an article on the topic of education. Her work has been showcased in both alternative spaces like the Urban Institute for Contemporary Art in Michigan, and the Generator Gallery in Scotland.

Highlights of her community art work includes several projects, most notably the inter-disciplinary project/performance North & Beyond, in Philadelphia, Sidewalks Saving Lives in Minneapolis, and her most recent partnership with the Pillsbury House & Theater which involved, among other things, the redesign of Pillsbury’s foyer, bringing together local artists, MCAD students and alum, MCAD professor George Mahoney and Pillsbury’s staff and community.

Semblances installation detail, Screenprints and Artifacts for Xylander, 2011

Tell me about your work? What are you currently working on? How is this different from past projects?

Since April 2011, I have been immersed in two projects dealing with site through social engagement.

One is the redesign of the Pillsbury House and Theater foyer in collaboration with staff, community, local artists and Minneapolis College of Art and Design student interns, students and Adjunct Professor George Mahoney. The intent of this project was to create a transformative space or “Cultural Community Hub” reflecting the organizations mission of being “a new model for nonprofit human service work that recognizes the power of the arts and culture to stimulate community participation, investment and ownership.” Through the development of specific workshops using art and word play as tools, the Pillsbury staff articulated what the space should be or feel like, which was then translated into wall and column painting, the production of hand-printed couch covers and new systems for accessing information and interacting in the space. Later in the process, MCAD faculty George Mahoney brought in his Design Environment class to make movable tables and walls that would accommodate the multiplicity of needs in the space (gallery, waiting room, classroom, theater reception area, community meeting place). This project was new for me in that I took on a greater leadership role by overseeing most all aspects of the design and by developing the staff workshops, in addition to mentoring the younger artists and student interns through the process of creative place making.

The second project I would like to share is the exhibition “Semblances” with myself, Jennifer Danos and Marcus Young, currently on view at the MAEP gallery in the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. Working within a strict white wall prestigious gallery in a museum space was a dramatic shift for me, as I have been working in community settings or much smaller venues. The scale and command of the environment pushed my use of fictional scenarios (a strategy I often employ in gallery settings) to be much more involved, demanding a large collection of artifacts and layers of myth-making.

My contribution to our chosen theme, specifically took the form of a faux exhibition charting the trajectory of a fictitious artist’s exhibition career over the span of 10 years, not through the artist Jan Xylander’s actual work, but rather through the design and display of screen-printed exhibition posters (supposedly made by several different designers, but in fact made by myself) advertising his shows.

Both of these projects mine the potential for design and collective storytelling to influence our reception and interaction with site, whether that be a social service agency/theatre or a respected art institution. For the last few years I have explored how we personally negotiate publicly held ideals for different ends through community projects, site-specific interventions, printed sports jerseys and posters. Borrowing heavily from interior and graphic design, popular printing forms and the history of illustration, I weave stories into carefully constructed scenarios that ask us to consider how experience is culturally and socially mediated, while opening up the field to invent or contribute our own stories.

Semblances installation detail, Screenprints, 2011

"What is Art?" is certainly too big of a question to ask here, but what do you hope your audience takes away from your art? What statement do you hope to make?

I do not know if I would frame my practice as something that makes “statements”, but I would say I am interested in posing open-ended questions through humor, in some cases sensory perception and the poetic, in a manner that may inspire others to question, invent or exercise their own agency.

What was the best advice given to you as an artist?

The best advice I ever got came out my graduate school experience. I actually cannot remember who said it precisely, or if it was a general sentiment filtering in and out of our discussions, but it is boils down to this: Do not try to make art. Meaning, do not try to make your IDEA of what art is. This is not to say you should not absorb EVERYTHING in your midst. It means you need to follow your own curiosity wherever it may lead you, work hard testing out your theories, and take notice when something of value happens.

Tell me about your work space and your creative process.

I work either on site or in my basement studio. Almost all print-based work is done in the print shop at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design (where we recently built a fabric printing table you can use to make repeat patterns or large-scale fabric works- so cool!!). But as I am on sabbatical, I am currently printing at Highpoint Center for Printmaking.

Often at the beginning of a community project, I start with listening to stories- how do people occupy or relate to a given space, what kind of memories surround a site, what are the hopes/fears/expectations/needs being expressed? Where is there conflict, where is there agreement? In the case of my individual studio practice, I invent fictitious scenarios that I then create props for (i.e. posters, wearables, artifacts, environments).

I like to play a lot in the studio- so the images or spaces I construct are often one of many possible versions. I mix, re-contextualize, and respond to what is in front of me. I think this is inspired by my history of working with and teaching printmaking. Printmaking relies on multiple stages or layers and printmakers are always recycling plates, prints and ideas. Even when I work in other mediums, my work is informed by printmaking.

Semblances installation detail, Screenprints, 2011

Who are some of the Minnesota artists you enjoy?

Dennis Lo: http://dloartwork.com/
Jennifer Danos: http://jenniferdanos.com/
Marcus Young: http://graceminnesota.org/
Brett Smith: http://artofthis.net/brett-smith
Paula McCartney: http://www.paulamccartney.com/
Jan Estep: http://www.janestep.com/
Bruce Tapola: http://www.mnartists.org/article.do?rid=173002
Luke Aleckson: http://www.lukealeckson.com/
Andy Sturdevant: http://www.andysturdevant.com/
Andy DuCett: http://www.andyducett.com/
Steven Accola: http://mnartists.org/work.do?rid=247739
Ute Bertog: http://utebertog.com/home.html
Works Progress http://www.worksprogress.org/
Peter Haakon Thompson: http://www.peterhaakonthompson.com/
Seitu Jones: http://www.mnoriginal.org/art/?p=2007
Monica Haller: http://www.veteransbookproject.com/the-people/

If I were to follow you around to see art in Minnesota, which places would we go? What would we see?

Walker Art Center: http://walkerart.org/
Rochester Art Center: http://rochesterartcenter.org/
Minnesota Institute of Arts; MAEP Galleries: http://www.artsmia.org/
Intermedia Arts: http://intermediaarts.org/index.php
MCAD Gallery: http://mcad.edu/events-fellowships/gallery-exhibitions
Weisman Museum: http://www.weisman.umn.edu/
Juxtaposition Arts: http://www.juxtaposition.org/
Dressing Room: http://dressingroom-aot.blogspot.com/
Midway Contemporary Art: http://www.midwayart.org/index.php
Franklin Art Works: http://franklinartworks.org/
Soap Factory: http://soapfactory.org/
Hightpoint: http://www.highpointprintmaking.org/
Minnesota Center for Book Arts: http://www.mnbookarts.org/

I Need A Hero, Screenprint on fabric, construction, embroidery, 2005

Where do you go online for good art resources, whether to find a new artist, or to see what is going on in the art world locally and otherwise?

MnArtists: http://www.mnartists.org/
Contemporary Art Daily: http://www.contemporaryartdaily.com/
Printeresting: http://www.printeresting.org/
Art in the Public Interest: http://www.apionline.org/

Do you have any exhibits to promote in the near future?

MAEP galleries at the MIA
There is a presentation in the MAEP gallery on Thursday 12/15 at 7:00 PM.
The exhibit runs through 1/1/2012


March 2012: Seerveld Gallery, Trinity College. Palos Heights, IL.
Fall/Winter 2012: Solo Exhibition, Schaeffer Gallery, Gustavus Adolphus College,
St. Peter, MN

Madeline Crew - Photographer

Danie. Hands and Feet. Weapon of Choice.

Madeline Crew

Name. Madeline Crew
Email. Madelinecrewphotography@gmail.com
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Madeline-Crew-Photography/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/madelinecrew/
MNArtists page. http://www.mnartists.org/artistHome.do?rid=263930


Bio~
Madeline Crew is a young photographer woking in St. Paul MN. With photography as her medium, she hopes to bring attention to contemporary issues that range from violence towards women, the economic crisis or water pollution in Minnesota. Although she enjoys creating a scene to photograph, she believes that photography is the best tool to examine our society and our world in attempt to present something about it, rather than focusing internally.

Crew is currently a junior photography major at the College of Visual Arts, in St. Paul. She has been instructed by many of the outstanding professors at CVA and is excited to be a graduate from such an excellent Bachelors program. Looking forward to senior year, she expects her work to continue to evolve through out the process of senior thesis. Upon graduation, Crew hopes to be living in the Northern Warehouse Co-op in Lower-town St. Paul, and become a part of the art community.

Circuit City 2010. Economic Crisis as Place.

Tell me about your work? What are you currently working on? How is this different from past projects?
My work usually revolves around a contemporary issue, and most of my projects are ongoing, I always want more out of them. For example, a series called, Weapon of Choice, where I look at the presence of violence towards woman and examine the choice for woman to carry weapons in order to protect themselves. Creating the series, I met woman from around the twin cities area who actively carry a weapon to protect themselves and then photographed them each with their, “Weapon of Choice”.

Another example of my work is a series I created called, Economic Crisis as Place. In this body of work I examine how our economic crisis has changed the landscapes and environments that surround us. With a 4x5 view camera, I photographed many run down businesses from around the twin cites and some in Madison Wisconsin to re-asses what the architecture represents now. Now stripped of what they were before the crisis, the buildings represent something completely different than what they had before, say when it was a Circuit City.

Currently, I have been working on a series that provides visual and textual information about the Superfund Sites of in Minnesota. A Superfund Site is a location that has been deemed chemically hazardous and contaminated, the list for Minnesota includes about 80 sites. The soil and ground water at these sites are contaminated, the groundwater is where most cities get their drinking water from. For the series I have been visiting each site and photographing them. I then have mounted the photographs to sheets of metal, over the photograph is a transparent overlay which has the hazardous level and information about each site. Then each piece is slid vertically into a metal box, that was a missile carrier from 1942. With this project I really wanted to stray away from the old frame on wall presentation, and present it in a way that the viewers become apart of it and experience it hands-on.

Ring Leap. Dancer.

"What is Art?" is certainly too big of a question to ask here, but what do you hope your audience takes away from your art? What statement do you hope to make?
A lot of my work is very specific in subject matter, so I would like for the viewer to understand what the concept is and what issue I am presenting. Additionally, I want my viewers to have their own experience while observing the work and hopefully see that we are all connected through these issues, and reflect where they might fit into the topic.

Rather than making only a statement on these issues, I want to address and present them so the viewers are looking outside of ones self and at visuals that document our society.

What was the best advice given to you as an artist?
To do what you are passionate about, whether or not it is accepted by others, because that is the work that will speak and be successful.

To trust your gut instinct and run with it, don't be scared.

Wishing wont get you anywhere, you have to do it for it to happen.

Comfort. Nymph Series.

Tell me about your work space and your creative process.
Still a student, I do not yet have my own working space but am privileged to have great working spaces and facilities here at CVA. I have all the tools I would need to make any type of project I would like. My creative process usually begins with something I have recently become aware of or angry with, to be honest. From there I brainstorm in my process journal how I can make and present the idea visually by writing and roughing out thumbnails. Once I have that down, I decide what process of photography best works with or matches the idea by deciding on negative size, color or black and white, digital or analog, or a mix of both. Then it kinda takes of from there.


Who are some of the Minnesota artists you enjoy?
Rhea Pappas- www.rheapappas.com
Amy Anderson- http://www.AmyAndersonPhotography.com
Lindsay Paczkowski- lpaczkowski.com
Angela Strassheim- http://www.angelastrassheim.com/
Evan Baden- http://www.evanbadenphotography.com/
Paula McCartney- http://www.paulamccartney.com/


If I were to follow you around to see art in Minnesota, which places would we go? What would we see?
We would go to:
Franconia Sculpture Park- http://www.franconia.org/
Northern Warehouse on First Fridays- http://www.nwacartists.com/
Chambers Bernet Gallery- http://www.lemeridienchambers.com/art
College of Visual Arts Gallery- http://www.cva.edu/gallery/
Minneapolis Institute of Art- http://www.artsmia.org/
Walker Art Center- http://www.walkerart.org/


Where do you go online for good art resources, whether to find a new artist, or to see what is going on in the art world locally and otherwise?
Actually, I do not surf the web for resources as much as I find them in the real world or through speaking with other artists I know. One website I do go on a lot though, is springboardforthearts.org, they have a lot of great posts for artists whether for employment or open calls.

Open. Nymph Series.

What things do you have going on now and in the near future?

I have work up at Altered Esthetics for this month (July 2011) as part of the "Hope of the Union" show, and was mentioned in the City Pages for that show. I also have received a position as an Art Director at the St. Paul University Club. I have been working with filmography and may have more showings of my films in near future.

Paula McCartney - Photographer

Excerpt from A Field Guide to Snow and Ice, 2008-2011

Paula McCartney

Name: Paula McCartney
City/State: Minneapolis, MN
Website: http://www.paulamccartney.com


Bio~
Paula McCartney creates photographs and books that explore the idea of constructed landscapes. She earned an M.F.A. in Photography from the San Francisco Art Institute in 2002. McCartney has received an Aaron Siskind Photography Fellowship and a McKnight Photography Fellowship. Bird Watching was recently exhibited at the Klompching Gallery in Brooklyn, NY and the Museum of Contemporary Photography in Chicago, IL. Princeton Architectural Press published a monograph of the project in the Spring of 2010.

Excerpt from A Field Guide to Snow and Ice, 2008-2011

Tell me about your work? What are you currently working on? How is this different from past projects?
I’m working on a project called A Field Guide to Snow and Ice, which is currently on view in one of the MAEP galleries at the MIA. The project is my interpretation of the idea of winter. After moving from San Francisco to Minneapolis I spent the first winters inside and afraid that I now lived in what felt like the arctic. Several years ago I decided to brave the elements and explore the snowy landscape, however, at times without being out in the cold.

The series includes images of snowfalls and wildflowers, frozen waterfalls and stalagmites, snowdrifts and piles of gypsum sand, as well as other icy forms in order to explore and reinterpret natural structures and the way they can reference multiple ideas on both micro and macro levels. The ambiguity of scale and substance helps the subjects transcend their source. With less there is more. I now see winter everywhere, in every environment, in every season and categorize it by pattern, shape, and line rather than merely by substance.

I’ve always been interested in constructed landscapes. This project differs from my last one, Bird Watching (in which I placed craft store songbirds in the landscape and photographed them), in that all of the elements in the photographs are natural. However the images don’t accurately document an actual landscape, but rather present elements that I have subtracted from it. I think a viewer would have difficult time finding the scenes that I’ve photographed. The photographs reflect how I want to see the world rather than how it actually is. The construction in this series lies in the suggestions that I am making through juxtaposition and sequencing.

"What is Art?" is certainly too big of a question to ask here, but what do you hope your audience takes away from your art? What statement do you hope to make?
I hope my work suggests and encourages a wider and more open way of looking.

Excerpt from A Field Guide to Snow and Ice, 2008-2011

What was the best advice given to you as an artist?
Be disciplined in your practice. Being an artist is a(n amazing) job, and making the work is only a part of that job.


Tell me about your work space and your creative process.
My studio is in my home, which I love. I can spend a full day in my studio on the days my son is at school, or 10 minutes some other time considering new prints. Right now, I have a lot more time than I have had in the past year to make new work. I can work on a project in my head but sometimes it takes a year to get it out in a tangible form. I just finished two book mock-ups of ideas that I’ve had in the back of my head for some time.

Installation view of A Field Guide to Snow and Ice, 2008-2011, MAEP Gallery, MIA

Who are some of the Minnesota artists you enjoy?

Margaret Pezalla-Granlund (http://www.mpezalla.com/)

and Gregory Euclide (http://www.gregoryeuclide.com/) are two artists that illustrate an environment in a really unique way.

I’m also interested in the books that Alec Soth (http://littlebrownmushroom.com/index.html) has been making-both his own and other artists, and Location Books (http://www.locationbooks.com/) published by Ruben Nusz (http://www.rubennusz.com/Art/rubennusz.html) and Scott Nedrelow (http://nedrelow.com/)

If I were to follow you around to see art in Minnesota, which places would we go? What would we see?
I recently saw the Goshka Macuga installation at the Walker (http://calendar.walkerart.org/canopy.wac?id=6103) and after reading the (free) catalog that accompanied the piece, I’m looking forward to going back and spending more time with it. Nan Goldin’s slide show, The Ballad of Sexual Dependency (http://calendar.walkerart.org/event.wac?id=6193) is also at the Walker now and is something I see every time I have the opportunity to. And of course, to Franklin Art Works in June to see the McKnight Photography Fellows exhibition that includes new work by my husband, Lex Thompson (http://www.lexthompson.com/).

Where do you go online for good art resources, whether to find a new artist, or to see what is going on in the art world locally and otherwise?
I’ve been thinking a lot about books lately and these sites are good resources-Indie Photobook Library (http://www.indiephotobooklibrary.org/), Buffet (http://andrew-phelps.blogspot.com/), The Photobook (http://thephotobook.wordpress.com/), Conscientious (http://jmcolberg.com/weblog/) I also look at the New Yorker’s listing of current exhibitions so I can then go to the gallery or museum website to see an artist’s new work.

Installation view of A Field Guide to Snow and Ice, 2008-2011, MAEP Gallery, MIA

Do you have any exhibits to promote now?
An installation of A Field Guide to Snow and Ice is on view in the MAEP gallery at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts through July 3.


12/2012/L10

Peter Happel Christian - Photographer

Black Holes & Blind Spots, No. 8 , chromogenic print, 2010

Peter Happel Christian

Peter Happel Christian
sekondsight@yahoo.com
www.peterhappelchristian.com

Bio~
I grew up in eastern Iowa and spent some great times living in Oregon, Arizona and Ohio over the last ten years. I’ve lived in St. Cloud for about a year and a half where I teach at St. Cloud State University.

Tell me about your work? What are you currently working on? How is this different from past projects?
I make a lot of photographs where I’ve staged objects or situations to be photographed. I also make objects when a picture won’t work for what I am after. I have also done some collaborative projects that take me outside or become installations.

The materials I use can be really varied, but I always seem to come back to photographs in someway or another. I struggle with the idea of just going out and taking pictures; that action seems so passive to me at times, but I still do it—it just usually isn’t the end point for me. So I guess I keep making photographs because I keep having different questions about them; what they can and can’t do. I’m interested in referencing that natural world in my work and looking at how people think of the landscape and experience it.

I draw a lot of motivation from my own experiences of being outside, as well as scientific information and historical accounts of the natural world.

Black Holes & Blind Spots, No. 13 , chromogenic print, 2010

I just finished up preparing for an MAEP show that opens Jan. 20, 2011. I spent the better part of the last year working on the show, making all new work except for one piece. My MAEP show really isn’t all that different from my past projects. Except I think I’ve approached some of my work from a broader perspective, and at the same time a much narrower perspective, regarding popular thinking about the landscape and natural world. Also, with this one I knew exactly where it was going to be shown as I was making the work and how much space I would have to work with. That was really unique; usually I am making work and not sure where or when it may be shown.

In the Black Hole and Blind Spots images, there is a big black hole burned into the center of the image. Is there a hole in the print or a big spot on the image? What idea do you hope to get across with this technique?
No, there isn’t a hole in the print. I’ve digitally applied a black spot roughly in the center of each picture. The Black Holes & Blind Spots series is about me being curious, confused, and sort of desperate in a residential landscape. Almost all of the pictures were taken while on walks in my neighborhood in St. Cloud. I usually set-up things to be photographed and this series is a departure from that approach; I haven’t staged anything in the series, everything pictured is exactly how I found it.

What I’ve photographed are things that seem like evidence of peoples’ relationship to the landscape – sometimes a loving or curious relationship, sometimes a pretty boring one and at other times a seemingly aggressive one. For instance, in image No. 14, I photographed this plant in my backyard. It is a beautiful, flowering plant with succulent-like leaves. I would see similar plants in my neighborhood, but I have no idea what it is called so for me that plant exists in this wild, unknown space because it doesn’t have a name (at least to me it doesn’t have a name). I don’t know what to call it and I think that is really exciting. To know this plant in a way that has nothing to do language, but to know it because I see it often, through repetition – in my backyard and around my neighborhood. I can only point it out and describe it, and so the act of photographing it is out of curiosity and desperation.

The black spots on the images are applied digitally afterwards. I first made one while giving a demo in one of my classes about using tools in Photoshop beyond what they are intended to do. So, I had an image on screen and put a large, black spot on the demo image with the burn tool, almost obscuring the whole picture, and mentioned, really off-the-cuff, that if you wanted to make work about black holes this is a way you could start. It was a completely intuitive thing and it really stuck with me. I didn’t save that demo image, but I started putting black holes in images I had taken while on walks, of things in the landscape I had noticed that had made me stop and think.

Black Holes & Blind Spots, No. 14 , chromogenic print, 2010

I was also reading a lot about American Transcendentalism (mostly about Emerson and Thoreau) at the time so I was in this mode of thinking about what these moments of pause and contemplation while being outside might mean on a grander scale beyond what the subject matter was in the photograph. So my thinking was primed in a certain way while I was experimenting with applying these black holes. The addition of the black holes became a way I could also cancel or negate the actual image and better characterize my experience of being outside photographing. The subject matter is stuff I’m drawn to, like a black hole, but the act of photographing is really inadequate at conveying my experience of it to my viewer. As blind spots, the black spots cancel the images; acting like a blind spot in my field of vision as well as the viewer’s. I really enjoy how one black spot could have two very different, and really engaging, connotations and become a metaphor for me being outside, walking, and looking around.

What was the best advice given to you as an artist?
I don’t remember a specific quote or anything, but over time I’ve learned to just keep making work no matter what—to keep some sense of momentum in the studio and to keep asking questions. I think I learned that indirectly from past teachers and other artists/friends. I’m confident that one idea will always lead me to another if I let it happen.

Tell me about your working space and your creative process?
I have a studio in my home that I spent last summer really getting into shape. It’s a good little space where I can really focus, leave messes and test out installing work. I also end up working in my garage and back yard when it makes sense for what I am doing at the time. My wife and I have a young son so I don’t usually have big chunks of time to spend in my studio. Between my family life and teaching, I sneak in studio time whenever I can. Beyond working in my studio, my creative process includes a lot of reading and note taking and sketching/drawing – sometimes those activities directly factor into new work and other times those things just keep me on my toes.

Organic Action, prescription eyeglasses, 2010, Image Credit: Minneapolis Institute of Arts

Which Minnesota artists do you enjoy?
I’m pretty new to Minnesota and don’t know too many Minnesota artists quite yet. I have to say, I work with about half of the people listed below at St. Cloud State and they were a big reason I wanted to move here. However, there is a slightly larger batch of people I am familiar with, some much better than others. I enjoy all of their work and how they seem to think about making things. I’m excited to meet more people over time.
Julie Baugnet
David Bowen
Allen Brewer
Adam Caillier
Keith Christiansen
Jan Estep
Bill Gorcica
Hardland/Heartland
Alexa Horochowski
Shana Kaplow
Paula McCartney
Justin Newhall
David Petersen
Justin Quinn
David Sebberson
Joe Sinness
Alec Soth
Bruce Tapola
Margaret Wall-Romana
Rosemary Williams

If I were to follow you around on an “art day” in Minnesota, which places would we go? What would we see?
It’d be an epic day: MIA, Walker Art Center, Midway, Soap Factory, Franklin, They Won’t Find Us Here Gallery, and Dressing Room.

I’d also have us check out Kiehle Gallery and The Gallery Vault both up in St. Cloud (Gallery Vault is a new student-run space in downtown St. Cloud). I’d also probably ask you to take me a couple places that I didn’t know about or haven’t had a chance to get to yet. Sometimes smaller historical society museums are pretty great.

A Time Remembered, chromogenic print, 2010

Where do you go online for good art resources, whether to find a new artist, or to see what is going on in the art world locally and otherwise?
I check these resources pretty frequently. Each one does something a little different and helps me find new work or points me in a direction for more information.

I Heart Photograph
http://iheartphotograph.com/

Little Brown Mushroom. LBM has a ridiculously good amount of photo-related links.
http://littlebrownmushroom.wordpress.com/

BLDGBLOG
http://bldgblog.blogspot.com/

Conscientious
http://jmcolberg.com/weblog/

e-flux
http://www.e-flux.com/

Hyperallergic
http://hyperallergic.com/

Art Fag City
http://www.artfagcity.com/

Eyeteeth
http://eyeteeth.blogspot.com/

MPLSART
http://www.mplsart.com/

I Like This Art
http://www.jordantate.com/blog/ilikethisart/

Nate Larson – Nate keeps a good list of links without trying to be exhaustive.
http://natelarson.com/links.htm

Witness Tree, archival pigment print, 2010

Do you have any exhibits or any interesting things going on in your life or coming up in the near future?
I mentioned the MAEP show that opens in January. I have four photo-based books in a show called Small Magic: Photographic Transformations at Maryland Art Place in Baltimore. I’ll be heading out there to do a talk at MICA (Maryland Institute of Art) and a workshop at Maryland Art Place in February. I’m also headed to Atlanta for a photography conference in March where I’ll be part of a panel talking about how photography, science and suspicion connect together. And my son turns two in the spring, which seems like a big milestone for him and for my wife and I.

Shots Magazine