|
[ September 1, 2003 ]
Nothing, according to illustrator Victoria Kann, is more horrifying than a white sheet of paper. But give her a yellowed, stained, crumpled up piece and she has the opposite reaction: She's inspired, hence the contents of her East Village studio office. Upon entry one is immediately enveloped in Kann's passion for history, artifacts, and of course, paper. Remnants from flea markets, tag sales, and curbs are neatly arranged so that their origins are hardly discernible. "There is a certain energy to paper that has been touched and utilized by someone else," Kann says. "I always feel like I am peeking into someone else's life. I like to take those things and make up my own story."
With storage being an elusive commodity in New York City, Kann's eclectic stash has proven to be worth the time and space. Her client list includes America Online, American Medical Association, American Airlines, McMillan/McGraw Hill, and such national publications as Business Week, Network Magazine, Investment Advisor, Harper's, and Rolling Stone magazine. Kann does collage, three dimensional constructions, and digital. She says she fell into collage while attending Rhode Island School of Design. After a long struggle with a homework assignment for painting class, Kann decided to create a collage instead. "I said the heck with this serious art thing, I'm going to turn this ugly painting into an ugly collage and have some fun." After juxtaposing the images she had collected for gluing onto the canvas,"My painting was transformed," she says, "it expressed exactly what was in my head." A few years ago Kann began collaborating with her industrial designer husband, David Dear. Combining Dear's technical expertise and Kann's artwork they created a range of original products sold in gift shops, museum stores and online at ilikeart.com. City Compass is one such product, a working compass for urban explorers. While Kann created the collage artwork in the center, as well as the packaging, Dear took care of the technical side. In addition to New York City, their compasses are being sold in Boston, Chicago, San Francisco and Washington, D.C. "It's a good balance,"says Kann, "David's very technical so he figures out how everything works. He's 3D and I'm 2D."
While Kann may consider herself 2D, she certainly isn't when she's teaching Collage Illustration at the School of Visual Art's in New York. "As an artist you tend to work alone," she says. "When you go into a classroom you have to share and articulate what it is that you are doing. Talking to people for hours who love the same things you do is a nice exchange." When she's not working, searching, collaborating, or teaching, Kann can be found pontificating one of her unfulfilled, dreams of illustrating a series of billboards along Route 66. Altpick spoke to Kann about this and one of the most important art forms of the new millennium. After graduating from R.I.S.D. what did you do? I began showing my portfolio around. No one wanted to hire me because I had just gotten out of school. I dropped off my book at Rolling Stone, which was publishing an article on the psychologist Marie Louise Von Franz. Most of the images in my portfolio had to do with dreams and perception so it was a perfect match. They had me do a page illustration and a spot. After that I got a lot of work. What do you think the role of collage is as art form of the new millennium? I think collage is really important because it is working with a lot of diverse elements at one time. You can incorporate painting and drawing and actual elements. It is breaking up the space in a different way, in the same way that we are used to having our personal space broken up by a multitude of various activities, such as watching TV, reading, listening to music all simultaneously. So our lives have become much more fragmented and as our lives become more fragmented so does our art. I really feel art reflects the culture and as our lives become more of a collage, our art becomes more of a collage.
The editing process is really important. Getting rid of all the things you love and want to use but don't necessarily pertain. You need to have a lot of patience to finally be able to use that object that you've had for years. You know, sometimes I'll get something and I'll stare at for a number of years until it finally speaks to me and then I know what to do with it. When you reach the editing process, have you just placed the items or have they been adhered in some way? A lot of people do have a process where they glue as they go. For commercial purposes I can't. An art director might want a change. So I like to arrange the whole thing and then go back and glue it What is the first thing you do when you are given an assignment? When, for example, I get an assignment to illustrate an article, I often don't get the article, I get a sentence. I really play with the language. I write down what the words inspire and appropriate words that go with it. For Passive Optical Solar Networking, I wasn't familiar with the technology so I really had to dissect the language. What is solar? Light? What is networking? Branching out from one source and the communication of data from that source. A tree becomes a computer with circuitry on it. I play with the words that way. At the same time I have an idea about what it is I like. I really like gardens, I like plants, and architecture so that imagery is often in my work. I'll try to figure out how can I take Passive Optical Solar Networking and make into something that interests me. Maybe I have an object or an image that I really want to use and it will inspire me.
It really depends on the assignment. I just worked on a big corporate job and I had to do over 100 sketches. It was a huge amount of sketches. The problem was that the person purchasing it couldn't really visualize. It is difficult to visualize how a thumbnail is going to translate into a collage. Though I see it exactly. Usually I just have to explain an idea on the telephone. As you build a relationship with someone, they begin to trust your ability. How has technology influenced your process? I really enjoy working on the computer, being able to manipulate images, change the color or size of an element in my collage. It's just so much fun. Yet at the same time it has made me run back to my desk to make things by hand. It's made me appreciate the tactile objects in life as well as helped me become more flexible as an artist. What would the Route 66 billboards be? A lot of stuff that I am attracted to- very American, Americana type things. So I would love to do a play on American themes. When I think of billboards, the most obvious ones are the south of the border ones where it is almost like you are reading something as you get closer to. I would love to have something that has a message while you read it, give you something to think about while you are driving. Where do you see yourself in the next five years? Hopefully continuing to do what I love, which is to make artwork for publication. - Contributed by Mary-Beth Holland >> See more work from Victoria Kann >> See other member spotlights on the member spotlight index >> Find out more on how to become an altpick.com member |
