Art & Perception

I’ve been reading a lot about how certain conversations and comments have a way of halting the progress of an artist. I was surprised to learn that a positive remark has the same or similar effect for some artist

What happens is that our (individual) need for approval shows up and unconsciously we try to replicate the applause. In both cases, negative or positive, the artist moves away from his or her personal intent to “what can I do that will please others or at least avoid ridicule”. As result the artist becomes “Stopped” and avoids creativity in his or her work.

Does this ring true for anyone? I ask the question looking for ways to support the teaching of art and creativity.

I have made my living with a camera for over 20 years. Photography has been at the center of my life for perhaps double that time. Having the day job also be my creative life has lots of interesting implications.

My father prides himself on the fact that he has never taken money for his photographs. He started photography as a teenager, headed the local camera club, and at 83 he is conversant with scanner settings and monitor profiles. He is in love with the creative act of making images, and has never wanted to be hemmed in by the requirements and dictates of doing it at someone else’s behest.

It is a common solution to the dilemma of “whose work is this anyway.” There is a kind of purity in the amateur’s approach to any medium, and it is to be respected. Creative activity is an important piece of a well rounded life for many of us.

I chose a different course, because I was a really intense kid, and because I wanted no barrier between who I was and what I did. That said, it took a long time to accept that my creative voice was something I could rely on to be at the core of my livelihood. There was about a ten year period of scratching at the margins, trying to get a foothold in the profession, before it finally took hold. It wasn’t until I stopped trying to be a “commercial success”, trying to fit into a mainstream image of what my work should look like, and instead pursued the photographic vision that was most compelling to me, did I finally begin to achieve a measure of professional success and security.

There is an inevitable, and useful, tension between being a commercial photographer and being an artist trying to push against boundaries. My success as a commercial shooter is contingent upon replication–I am hired to do the same thing over and over. My economic life is dependent upon regular praise for it. But without my alternate life as an artist, pushing at new ways of seeing, the commercial work would lose its edge and quickly become stale.

I have always had personal work that I did just because I had to. I have a continuous photographic trajectory I have followed in that vein, things and environments I work on, processes I master, print quality that I value. That specific work is not what built my commercial career however. Clients don’t hire me because I can manage chaotic complexity in landscape photographs. Nonetheless, because I have my particular attentiveness to a photographic sensibility, and a relationship to my surroundings because of my camerawork, I can bring that to bear when the job is to fulfill a client’s need. It has more juice behind it, even if what I am hired to photograph has no apparent bearing on my personal work.

It means I can be both very attached to the manner in which I make photographs, be completely engaged in the situation and the way the photographs come about, while having no attachment whatever to how the photography gets used in the end. That’s what they pay me for—to stay out of the room where those decisions are made. I have a blast on assignment. I love being completely engaged on a job. I may like seeing the finished product in print, but I never think of that as the “real” work. It pays the bills, and keeps me in equipment and in frequent flyer programs. But it’s not how I identify myself in the end.

Jennifer Hoes at her self-wedding in Haarlem, The Netherlands, 2003.

KARL ZIPSER: Jennifer, why did you marry yourself?

JENNIFER HOES: I married myself at the moment I was prepared to embrace my own life and agree on the responsibilities that come with that. I married myself at the age my father died, I decided not to stay in the shade of his death at thirty.

Jennifer Hoes in her studio in Haarlem speaking, about porcelain objects cast from her body, with her mother.

KARL ZIPSER: Is it not a bit self-centered to marry yourself?

JENNIFER HOES: I believe if a person is loyal to him- or herself, he or she he has more to offer to others — to be active, straight and involved in relationships. Therefor, by no means, is marrying yourself a self-centered act. In my wedding I needed my family and friends there as my witnesses and it was also a celebration of my relationships and intentions with them.

Installation at a big plant and flower fair in Holland: Jennifer Hoes is “Eva” in a back-projected movie within the installation; her porcelain objects represent the animals in paradise.

KARL ZIPSER: Marriage is of course more than a ceremony. There is also a wedding night . . .

JENNIFER HOES: The wedding night I spent alone and slept like a baby! I feel my wedding-night was the most logical one after a hectic day!

KARL ZIPSER: There is also a honey moon . . .

JENNIFER HOES: Unfortunately I had no money for a honeymoon, that would have been nice and welcome after the hard work.

Jennifer Hoes’ porcelain vases based on cast of her thighs [photograph: Eric van Straaten]

KARL ZIPSER: Also there is the rest of your life “together.” How does self-marriage affect your life on a day to day basis? Do you find yourself a good life-partner so far?

JENNIFER HOES: My wedding ring says “I will return to my heart every time.” I read this every day. I think the values to an individual life are pretty much the same as in a marriage, it is about how you’ll behave, about taking responsibility, about being a loving person. The promises you make in the ceremony concern good intentions. The intention to do your best, be involved, be sincere, etc. and the ceremony is something you do for the moment later when you’re making a mistake in the relationship, to remind you of your promises and to make up for your mistake. To always try your best. Of course, I’m not always happy with myself and the things I do.

KARL ZIPSER: Does your self-marriage preclude you from a traditional marriage with another man or woman?

JENNIFER HOES: I can still marry a partner. But I do feel I had my moment in white, so I’m not eager to take the trip to the city-hall again.

A nipple montage by Jennifer Hoes

KARL ZIPSER: Would it be fair to say that your wedding was an “art event”?

JENNIFER HOES: I don’t claim my work (or wedding) is art. I do, and make, what I feel I have to do or to make. The “art” label is given by others. The media, because of the wedding, tried to own me, make me say or do things. I had to verbally fight with reporters and kept most of them out of my wedding ceremony. I did not invite them. The truth is I did not reject them altogether when they did come. I enjoyed the attention, but to an extent.

Jennifer Hoes beside a nipple montage

KARL ZIPSER: Jennifer, you indeed got a lot of media attention because of your self-marriage. You present your “wedding” as an important personal experience. Wasn’t it just a publicity stunt to promote your art?

JENNIFER HOES: Today people still ask me when the next big “stunt” will be. I am hurt when people degrade my very being to a stunt. The wedding cost me a lot of time, effort and money. Also, very important, I did not make any money out of it, would also not justify it being a stunt for the sole purpose of entertaining others.

Karl, I don’t make a distinction between my life and work. Therefore my wedding can be considered “work.” It also explains why I can so easily use my own body as a tool. I believe life is a matter of design — for the biggest part we are the designers of our own lives. I believe we have more influence on our own lives then we sometimes realize. It is about taking responsibility and accountability. I use this concept in my work. At the physical level the work is based, sometimes literally, on the from of my own body. But the work is also is a projection of my heart and mind. The wedding, as something of heart and mind, is just as relevant to my work as a cast of my nipples.

Jennifer Hoes in her “Summer dress made of silk and silver.”

KARL ZIPSER: Will you take questions from readers here on Art & Perception?

JENNIFER HOES: Yes.

Maurice Ploem found the “official gallery circuit” to be empty and sterile, so he started his own gallery in his home in Haarlem’s Proveniershof.

Maurice’s gallery, called De Provenier, is to the left of center in the photo above. Maurice wanted to provide exhibition opportunities to good artists who had not yet become “famous.” I had my first show here in the year 2000. I have another exhibition starting next week.

Maurice works in a broad range of media — bronze, oil on canvas, painted wood. He says of his gallery: “Here one can see how work looks in a home environment.”

Above is an example of one of Maurice’s painted wood objects. He was inspired to make pieces like this when he was sitting by the fireplace on a cold December evening. He picked up an old piece of wood to throw on the fire. Looking at the object in his hands, he said to himself, “No, I’m not going to burn this.”

. . .
Does it make sense for an artist to show work in a gallery like Maurice’s, or is it better to stick with traditional galleries?

Vincent Van Gogh, Starry Night

It’s not much of an observation to say that a lot of artists are crazy, but it’s interesting to observe that few successful ones are.

That is contrary to commonly held myths about artists. That’s what makes it interesting.

It was my recent experience on Whidbey Island that prompts me to say this. I met a lot of successful artists there. They were successful on every count. They were doing exactly the art they wanted, and they were making decent money.

By “decent money” I mean over fifty thousand a year. Of course, that’s not a lot of money in terms of what it takes to own a home and raise a family in many parts of the US, but if you’re able to live where the real estate is not too expensive and you’re reasonably thrifty on top of that, it can be done. Many people manage on less. Most of the pro artists I met on Whidbey were doing much better than that.

But what struck me about that Washington group is something I’ve noticed again and again in other places with other publicly successful artists. They were not just calm and friendly people, they were genuine social adepts. These people were all highly tuned to their audiences; indeed, what was singularly remarkable was not their ferocious independence but their sense of community with the human race.

I don’t know if we can thank Freud for the notion that neurosis is helpful to an artist, but that notion does not accord with my own experiences with artists.

I look at the crazy ones with their messes and incomplete projects compared to the order of the power studios; I look at the nervous smiles of poor sellers compared completely natural engagement of the big sellers, and I know.

I’m on to something.

So to complete the list of why artists don’t make it we have:

1. The art is technically inferior.

2. The message is either boring or disagreeable.

3. The artist does not even try to sell.

4. The artist does not produce enough.

5. The artist wants too much money.

6. The artist is crazy.

The last undercuts them all.

Freud was wrong. Success in the arts is directly proportional to sanity.

The best and most successful artists are some of the sanest people you will ever meet.

Of course, one might ask, how is it, exactly, that craziness reduces one’s chance for success?

I can think of a recent example from my own life in which I tried to help an excellent artist but was rebuffed by insane suspicions about my intentions and unprovoked attacks on my character.

A guy can only take so much.

But that’s something crazy people do. They live life like it’s a script for suicide, and so they always make wrong choices at critical junctures — like ruining friendships by failing to understand social boundaries.

How does one handle such people? I genuinely want to learn because it’s obvious to me that a lot of artists are troubled beings, and if they could just get it together socially, they’d have so many more chances to win.

If a Tree Falls in the Forest Does it Make a sound? Only to the trees with ears. I am not at all being funny. Everything is dependent on a tuned in listener. When it comes to art, sometimes there is no one there, meaning that those who can or want to understand what it is that you are up to, are not in the room. There will be others in the room who find your work similar to learning that there is “only” broccoli left in the refrigerator to eat. (Sorry broccoli lovers). This is not the feedback you need.

When having your worked critiqued, here are two questions that need to be in the mix

1. Ask the person who is doing the critic “What does this work (the art, what ever it is) mean to you?”
2. Then ask “What does my work say about me?”

If the answer to number 1 is nothing, then by-pass 2 and go directly to finding another critic.

Now for some Turkey.

Walter Bartman was my art teacher in high school in 1984-86 in Bethesda, Maryland. Students of “Mr. Bartman” were ten times more likely to become Presidential Scholars in Visual Arts than students in other art classes in the United States. Although he retired from high school teaching in 2001, Walter Bartman continues to teach landscape painting in Maryland and in workshops across the U.S. and in Europe.

Artwork in this post is plein air painting by Walter Bartman [click images to enlarge]. This interview was edited for publication together with Leslie Holt
more… »