There was a lady named Ruth Ettling in my church who was a fairly well-known artist. She made beautiful prints and collages. I got to visit her studio when I was in high school, and I remember wanting to have a studio like hers. She went to Rhode Island School of Design and was thrilled for me when I was accepted to go to college there.

I studied painting because I wanted to master color, but I’ve evolved into a sculptor. Now I make this hybrid between painting and sculpture where I build surfaces of color with weaving, sewing, and beading instead of paint.

LO: Please explain the themes in your work as well as your working process. For instance, some artists are very methodical while others are more instinctive. Please elaborate.
KD: The idea of a garden in paradise influences the organic abstractions I make. I worked at the Metropolitan Museum of Art for many years in Asian and Islamic art, and that time deeply influenced my work. The symmetry in jewelry from India, the balance between realism and abstraction in Japanese screens, and the beauty and fantasy of the borders in Persian paintings really connected with me.

I work instinctively but in a very orderly and organized manner. I organize my materials so that I have a sense of color, scale, and a goal of what I want to accomplish, and then I dive in.

LO: You are a painter, sculptor and also create public works. Are there any differences with each way of working?
KD: I approach each medium differently.

With painting, I have an idea about a size, palette, and compositional approach, but it’s pretty loose. I usually can’t articulate what I am doing in a piece until after I’ve done it.

With sculptures and installations, I usually gather together materials that I want to work with and start organizing the colors and forms until I develop a compositional plan.

I can usually say what direction I’m going in if not the final destination.

With public work, the site rules all of those elements. I look at the site and try to imagine how I can bring my visual voice to the space, history, and requirements of the place.

Public art requires that you fully articulate what you’re going to do before you find out if you are going to get the opportunity.

LO: Who are your favorite artists and why?
KD: I love Calder’s use of color and play, Lee Bontecou’s articulation of nature and abstraction, the way Kiki Smith and Louise Bourgeois use materials. Judy Pfaff’s compositions are so dynamic. Having worked at the Met, I developed a long, close relationship with the collection there. The Tiepelos at the top of the main staircase blow me away every time I see them; I’m awed by the color and compositional dynamism of those paintings.

LO: What advice would you give younger artists on how to mark success as an artist? Success seems to be marked by big galleries making big money. Do you think that there are other ways to mark success as an artist?
KD: Not everyone is going to get rich or even get by, and very few artists will always be “hot stuff.”  My advice: commit to a life of making art, with success being measured by your satisfaction with a piece or body of work. Make making art and building a body of work the priority; then, you need to find a balance in which you are creating the work, showing it, and engaging with the art world outside of your studio.

The post Leah Oates in Conversation with Katherine Daniels appeared first on NY Arts Magazine.

Here are a few of my favorites:

I hope Judy Pfaff had as grand a time creating Night Blooming Ceres as we have in experiencing it.  It hangs on the wall, lit from behind, with florescent tubes expanding its delicacy and translucence. Pfaff ‘s wry humor is in full display as we recognize her unlikely materials. Ranging from honeycomb cardboard, melted plastic, paper coffee filters, and Chinese lanterns.  They brilliantly create a glowing flora of texture and light.

Structural Detour 13 is a fine example of Nicola Lopez’s eloquence with the chaotic geometry of urban structures. With a bright red orange background, she has layered printed remnants of girders and steel beams, fragments of an exploded construction site.

Delicate plastic filaments and cooper wire shimmer like jewelry in Nancy Cohen’s Contradiction in Terms. In the soft green and aqua colors of sea-tossed glass, a multitude of gem-like transparent and opaque surfaces are entangled together, as though they were caught in seaweed and found washed up on the shore.

Imaginary constellations are formed in Victoria Burge’s lyrical meditations on space. Ink washes over the faint echoes of a map to give depth and the impression of clouds within her illuminated skies. There is ample room for conjecture as interpretation can veer between stars, flight paths, or city lights; those secret connections in the darkness.

In stark contrast, Susanna Heller’s work bursts with the frenzied use of paint, impasto strokes and drips of the expressionist hand. With a strong color palette, variations of warm and cool grays are a background to teals, pale yellow, sienna, and the occasional shock of red.  Necklace of Stones depicts the violence of demolition at the edge of a city. Urban imagery is shown at a high point of disorder and transmutation.

Melvin Edward Nelson brings a sense of spiritual fervor and intimations of transcendence. His dreamlike, visionary images are riveting. Planetary Ladder, 1964 is a work of pastel pinks and vibrant violet watercolor. A strong black grid dominates the center of the page as it reaches towards an otherworldly sphere. If you look closely you’ll see faint lines and handwriting showing through from the back side of the paper. It has obviously had a prior life.

By A. Bascove

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