Artist Praxis

In this in-depth conversation on painting and the family archive, artist Erin Raedeke shares about the act of creation as a means to record and commemorate the elusive and hidden parts of our existence. In the making of Mary Augusta, Erin dives into the deeper layers of mind and matter, creating a new surface for old memories to resurface, adding paint for layers for history to uncover, mixing colors for nuances to unfold. She strikingly uses long-lasting materials for an eternal version of a new narrative–a story of her own, empowering, genuine, and vibrantly alive.

Mary Augusta, 2021

Oil on board

10 x 8 inches / 25,4 x 20 cm

Red Bird, 2021

Oil on board

8 x 7 inches / 20,3 x 17,8 cm

www.erinraedeke.com

www.instagram.com/erinraedeke/

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In his delightful interview with Artist Praxis, New York-based artist Frank Chang offers wonderful insights into his installation work "Things We Knew." Referring to Frank's established collage practice, this newer work shows the leftover, transpierced board rather than its extracted parts. We see a composition of missing objects leaning against the wall, casting soft shadows off the plywood's clear-cut edges. What we don't see makes us wonder. What do the empty shapes represent? Will we ever be able to guess what missing parts, losses, and forgotten memories they refer to? The absence and presence of symbols in Frank's artwork, the negative and positive spaces within the piece, and its both soft and hard qualities point to the ambiguous state humanity finds itself in. We hold both knowledge and uncertainty amid a climate and humanitarian crisis in a delicate and precarious balancing act.

Things We Knew, 2021

Acrylic paint on plywood

44 x 59 inches / 111,7 x 149,8 cm

www.frankchang.net

www.instagram.com/frnkchng

www.artistpraxis.com

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In our joyful conversation with Brooklyn-based painter Lesley Wamsley, the artist reflects on the personal and historical consciousness of place and time. The painting was made in the summer of 2020 while wildfires were raging on the West Coast. On this day, the air in NYC was thick and heavy. The pollution conditions created enough haze – almost like a veil – that she could look directly at the sun. She created a composition that focused on its color, intensity, and apocalyptic quality. As the sun was setting, she stopped. Her painting was done. Much later, Lesley noticed a striking resemblance to Monet’s revolutionary painting Impression, Sunrise

Fire Sign, 2020

Oil on panel

12 x 9 inches / 30,5 x 22,9 cm

www.lesleywamsley.com

https://www.instagram.com/lesleywamsley/

www.artistpraxis.com

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Kahlil Robert Irving's large-scale collagraph sets the scene for fact and fiction to collide and coexist by simulating a bird's eye view on garbage brimming asphalt landscape. In Kahlil's printing process, the stage is set for human-made residues to float like jetsam on a multitude of (deeply embossed, fossil-like) layers, suggesting an ever-flow of traffic and consumption. However, the ghost-like color palette appears as dreamy as a memory, as intangible as the starry night sky, and as eluding as the mental image derived from the latest news story. The trompe l'oeil-Esque urban imagery remains an abstraction, a vague depiction of an unspecified place, universal in its densely textured vision of 'the street.' In contemplating this artwork, we are invited to meditate on the true nature of our existence and to question our meanderings in between the realities that we inhabit, touch upon, or ignore.

“COMING” ≤≥ “Going” [Movie & Murder] Imbedded Symbols + Cosmic Myths, 2019

Collagraph with found objects.

94 5/8 x 42 3/8 x 1/4 inches / 240.3 x 107.6 x .6 cm

http://www.kahlilirving.com

www.intagram.com/kahlilrobertirving

www.artistpraxis.com

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https://www.instagram.com/besouroaline/

https://www.besouroaline.com/

www.artistpraxis.com

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Berlin-born and based painter Anne Schreiber reflects on the notions of a ‘precarious equilibrium’ and the ‘good struggle’ in painting. While she thoughtfully differentiates between harmony and kitsch, she further elaborates on the differences between a painting (Gemälde) and an image (Bild). She explains that a painting invites the viewer in and keeps their attention unpretentiously, while an image kicks them out before too long. In our interview, Anne Schreiber reflects on the artist’s innate presumptuousness as they are handling inherently complete material and the necessity to make art despite the perfection of all things. She speaks about the studio as a safe place where she can experience chaos, overwhelm, and malaise, all while being in touch with her deeper, truer self in a sublime state of awareness.

Staffage, 2021

Oil, alkyd, and spray on cotton

70.8 x 66.9 inches / 180 x 170 cm

https://anneschreiber.de

www.instagram.com/anneschreiber1

www.artistpraxis.com

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Oscillating between alluring closeness and deceiving distance, the tightly knit weave of Graham Lister’s painting raises the question of what we are actually looking at… or through.

As we perceive the equal, rhythmic interactions of positive and negative space, fore and background, we realize that the artwork uses the visible architecture of the medium and the non-visible structures in and around it to come into being. The object acts as a stage set or a prop to signify beyond the image and towards the reality it exists in.

Blue and Silver, 2020-1

Oil on board

8” x 12” / 20,3 x 30,5 cm

www.grahamlisterart.com

www.instagram.com/lister_art

www.artistpraxis.com

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Simone Osthoff returns to the creative process of a drawing that she made more than twenty years ago to reflect on the importance of drawing in her art practice. An artist in the expanded field, Simone has dedicated her creative practice in the last years to writing, gardening, and cooking, as well as institution-building, teaching, and academic research. In her ever-curious and dialogical thinking, Simone compares the experiences and contributions between her many creative endeavors and plots her return to art-making in the studio, where she hopes to find new sustainable and pleasurable directions.

Coffins with Drawers for Classical Virtues, 1998

Mixed media on paper

30 x 44 inches/ 76 x 111 cm

https://arts.psu.edu/faculty/simone-osthoff/

www.instagram.com/sosthoff/

www.artistpraxis.com

www.instagram.com/artistpraxis

In a non-human-centered version of time, Madelaine Corbin notices, investigates, writes, and then collects, forages, builds, glazes, dyes, and weaves materials into scented and beautifully crafted artworks. She honors transformation and loss as natural aspects of our abundant world by reorienting her body and mind to processes that cycle beyond her lifespan. Sun Breathing invites us to attune to the subtle changes resulting from continuous exposure to light and dust and encourages us to embrace grief to enable healing.

Sun Breathing, 2020

Naturally dyed wool, linen yard, cobalt-glazed ceramic, walnut wood, medicinal plant-infused wood finish

8 x 2 x 4 feet

www.madelainecorbin.com

www.intagram.com/madelainecorbin

www.artistpraxis.com

www.instagram.com/artistpraxis

Looking back at a painting done two years ago, Pallavi Sen speaks about how her work stays fresh in her memory, as it marks specific moments of her life. In a painting that helped her imagine new artworks, plan teaching syllabus, think about the value of art, and deal with the intangible, we see how images go beyond symbolism in the artist’s experience. After years of bringing artmaking into all of her activities, Pallavi talks about separating her artmaking from other activities in life and the restfulness she experiences while doing that.

Teaching and Thinking about Color Theory, with Rubber Snake and Mobile, 2019

Watercolor on paper

14 X 10 inches / 35,5 x 25,4 cm

www.hoophouse.org

www.instagram.com/superfeministgirl

www.artistpraxis.com

www.instagram.com/artistpraxis