   |
 |
Delving into Character with Kathryn Rodriguez:
A HoboEye Exclusive Interview
by Brad Bunkers
Q. In a recent artist statement you described the central themes of your current work. You stated, " The concept of emotional detachment as a survival method is the core of my recent work. I build a fantastic world using specific characters and a lexicon of personal symbols, developed from roles I and others have enacted in personal and professional relationships." Tell us more about your captivating cast of characters. How did you go about developing the characters visually and do you think they've evolved over time?
A. In my second semester of graduate school at The University of Montana in Missoula, I started looking through a giant cardboard box filled with photographs I had mailed from New Orleans (where I grew up). I selectively chose images of family and friends with which I had strong, positive associations and good memories. I picked the first two characters from these images - one of a guy in a giraffe costume and one of a baby in a bunny suit.
I began thinking about how these characters acted in real life and formed a narrative about their relationship through small scale paintings. The Giraffe Guy wears the costume of a docile animal, which disguises his true, manipulative intentions. The giraffe and the Giraffe Guy are cohorts - both are watching and acting. The Bunny Baby is more passive aggressive. She's subject to the action, but seems bored or detached. We're not sure what she thinks.
The originating images were specific to place, and I wanted to bridge the gap between the Northwest and the South in my paintings. These were the two places I was having the experiences and formulating the memories that fueled the narrative. I wanted to include both. I added the White Buffalo as a mediator between the first two characters and the real and surreal worlds they inhabit. This seemed like a good fit for him - though an actual animal, he has mythical connotations, and so could move between the real world where these images came from and the fantasy world I was painting. He's like the voice of reason who attempts to objectively inform the Giraffe Guy and the Bunny Baby about their actions, but he's typically unheeded.
Costumes, the strange combination of characters, the bright colors with which I paint, food imagery in the "lexicon of personal symbols," and real world vs. fantasy world elements in the paintings gave the work an overall carnival-like quality. Carnival is an escapist event, and seemed a fitting, funny, and somewhat ironic way to aesthetically frame real world ideas in a fantasy realm. I added an elephant character, which helps the carnival nature of the series. He also serves as a symbol for memory (the elephant never forgets) and of family or community. The elephant has no agenda, unlike the other three characters who attempt to serve either themselves or others. He takes in all that the Giraffe Guy offers him - too much information for a figure who can't forget. He and the White Buffalo are the most tragic figures in the series, and also those with the least human figurative qualities.
I use figuration and anthropomorphism to help the viewer identify with the characters. I feel the roles these characters play are general and often overlooked, and I want consideration of these roles. I hope to help that consideration along by putting the figures in the fantastic, carnivalesque context, much like we use fairy tales to discuss difficult issues. Because I make images, I rely heavily on the gazes, gestures, and combinations of characters to convey their personalities and behaviors. I specifically chose figures unfamiliar to the viewer so that he or she could more easily bring personal associations to the work. I want viewers to return more and more often to the paintings to decipher the ideas in the work.
The characters have gradually become more sculptural with time. The paint medium retains supremacy throughout the series, but the characters became physically three-dimensional. The characters themselves have retained their original personalities, but moved out of the comfort of the picture plane. I thought that I could get more consideration of behavior of the characters and the viewer if I created a world in which the viewer had to behave with the work. I also made the costumes or "skins" worn by the characters, so the viewer could put on the roles. These were left near the end of the installation of the work, as though the characters themselves left them. It helped the dream-like nature of the work, but also allowed the viewer to physically become the character with which he or she most strongly identified.
I've gotten comments about the seemingly arbitrary selection of animals, people, etc. from different regions. I think this fits the absurdity of the series, and of the issues it discusses. We're able to selectively choose, attach, and detach from an innumerable amount of images and information, whether we are physically within an event or vicariously experience something through stories. We have an overwhelming amount of access to information. I can select these characters because I have the ability to do so, and this action itself parallels a more general ability in the everyday to pick, choose, and construct a reality. Each character I've selected acts out a role in the story about too much information, and I hope that the viewer identifies with a role by considering his or her behavior with the work and selecting a character to "become."
Q. Out of all of the characters, is there one you identify most with? Are viewers drawn to one character in particular? If so why do you think?
A. I identify with each of the characters. I know I’ve acted in each of the roles they represent. In the installation, viewers I knew were typically drawn to a character I would associate with them. But, I think the characters with more human figurative attributes, the Giraffe Guy and the Bunny Baby, are the more “show-boatey” personalities in the series, and viewers are more easily drawn to them. I think as human beings, we’re attracted to things that look like us, particularly if we’re surrounded by an unfamiliar environment. Because these are the characters with identifiable human features, they stand out more. Also, because they’re costumed and therefore their true identities are partially concealed, they act out more (acting out because of concealed identity is part of carnival, too). Their behaviors are more humorous than those of the other characters, and so I think they’re more immediately observable.
Q. Enough about character. Let's move on to process. When I first encountered your works on canvas I was instantly drawn to your wonderful sense of composition and color, a complex latticework of elements. How do you go about constructing these scenes? How have you transitioned your 2-D compositions to your recent installation work?
A. This is a good question, because I’m getting ready to teach a painting class, and I’ve been thinking about how I actually paint in order to explain painting processes to others. Often paintings start as napkin doodles, or a series of thumbnails in my sketchbook. When I have an idea for a character, I draw and paint portraits of that figure. I have an idea of the characteristics I’ll attribute to the figure, and portraiture helps me visualize them. From sketches and portraits, I start thumbnails for more complex compositions placing the different characters in environments. Once I know who the characters are individually, I can imagine how they would interact if forced into relationships with each other in paintings.
I under paint with something earthy like burnt sienna or translucent burnt orange and sometimes viridian and violet. Compositions go through a lot of change during the under painting process, and I try to conserve successful passages of under painting through glazing. I’ve been under painting larger characters with a solid complementary color; for instance, I paint the shape of the elephant first with orange, then finish with blues to give the form punch from underneath. I typically maintain a basic palette throughout the series, but add in colors when needed. I like complementary combinations because they fit the oddness of the subject matter, and I use other saturated colors to give the work playfulness and brightness, to make it visually attractive.
I was dissatisfied with my ability to convey the ideas in my most recent series of work only through painting. I wanted viewer identification with the roles I portrayed, but it was difficult for viewers to suspend disbelief and enter the unfamiliar and fantastic subject matter in the paintings in their two-dimensional forms. By moving the characters out into space, maintaining painting as the primary medium for its link to illusion, I was able to achieve the identification I wanted. I’m still composing the installation space much like I paint – giving myself time for adjustments, and adding color to a basic palette as needed through lighting or elements like flooring – but with installation the work better communicates my intentions. I make elements from the paintings three-dimensionally, or I create three-dimensional elements such as games that fit with the theme of the work and use elements from the paintings. I try to keep sculptural elements specific to the work, because anything arbitrary might confuse the viewer.
Q. Are you more concerned with storytelling or aesthetics?
A. I’d like to think I’m concerned with both equally. I consider myself a narrative painter – I’ve made stories in paintings for about seven years. Because I include myself in that genre, I’m very concerned with how I compose paintings and space to tell the story. I want the paint and the paintings to please my own and the viewer’s eye, though, so I’ve developed my aesthetic to – hopefully – achieve that goal. I want the both the physical characteristics of paint and the compositions of my stories to be visually engaging and pleasing. I hope to draw the viewer into the story through interesting and odd compositions, or through my own personal aesthetic, and through sensual and beautiful oil paint. Because my stories are non-textual, I rely on the surface of paint and the absurdity of the subject matter to entice the viewer to look longer, to try to figure out the story.
Q. Now that you've completed your thesis work, will you continue to develop the characters and narrative or move on to a new series? What's next?
A. I’d like to move on to a different series, but I wouldn’t say that these characters will never show up again. I’ve had some ideas about using the figure in different stories, but not quite sure what will happen. I’m getting ready to make another big move – my boyfriend and I are returning to New Orleans – and so I’m curious about what will happen in the artwork because of that. I’ve stuck with food imagery, the figure, and narrative for a while now, so I think those elements will probably stay in any new series that starts to come up.
Though I love the community feedback offered by academia, I look forward to some self-structured time to paint. I’d like to try some new techniques and media, play around for a little while. I’m looking forward to using more paint!
Visit Kathryn's web site > |
|
|
