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Of course a couple of things happened between that kindergarten hallway and landing jobs for corporate clients like McDonalds or the LA Times. After graduating from UCLA's painting department in 1979, Nimoy embarked on the traditional post-graduate journey--she moved to New York. After a bunch of wacky job interviews, she landed a spot in a mid-tier fabric design studio "doing floral draperies for bad hotels." The work may have been boring but the environment was just the ticket for Nimoy's eavesdropper's eye--drawings from that period still infuse her work today. Living in the city also gave her the opportunity to keep studying--at the School of Visual Arts and Parsons. In 1982, Nimoy returned to Los Angeles to study full-time at Art Center College of Design. Two years later, portfolio in hand, she began her career in freelance illustration.
If you had only one word to describe your work what would it be? Fast. I can think about things for a long time. But I draw really fast and when I paint I keep things rather...loose. It still may take a few shots to get that abbreviated look, but that's what I like. Even when I work in scratchboard-a material often used for precision-I kept it very gestural, and that's how I inadvertently ended up striking what's called an "ethnic" note-it truly looks more like a woodcut, and therefore it can be African or Latin, depending on the job. This funky look has led to reggae CD covers, book jackets for Mickey Hart's World Music series...rain forest shampoo packaging...stuff like that. Of course when the job calls for a more precious, refined approach...i.e., Four Seasons Tokyo, I'm always happy to do that. Frankly, I feel lucky to have had the fine art background at UCLA-I can trot out the academic painting when I need it, abandon it when I want to. And just the experience of living in NYC for a few years helped me hone a more personal and quirky vision...nothing like landing there after college.
It just lets me do MORE of what I do. But it took awhile to reach a comfort zone on the computer. When Photoshop first came out, I think a lot of us traditionally trained artists were afraid of it. I know I was. When I purchased my first MAC about eight years ago, it literally sat for a year! In reaction to the daunting task of learning to draw with a mouse and a fake pen...I headed straight for the oils. Did more painting that year than I had in a while. Then...slowly, I started scanning my own stuff...the scratchboard illustrations, the paintings, and I started seeing the opportunity for manipulation. Several years into it, I now get the same response I did with the scratchboard. People say: " Wow, how did you do that?" The answer is in what I *don't* do. I don't use all the bells and whistles of Photoshop to make things perfect and precise, just as I never did with scratchboard or paint. I keep it loose and fast....I show what I'm doing. I crop pieces of my own painting and plunk them all over the place-leaving gesture marks along the way. Basically, I still leave a huge trace of the human hand--- which I guess doesn't happen a lot in Photoshop. It has so often been used to fake stuff and trick the eye. I prefer to leave the accidents IN and experiment a lot ...truth is, I'm extremely reckless! Photoshop has become just another set of paints and tools to splash around despite the fact that it's a program designed to take out peoples wrinkles or put a sparkle in your eye. And I particularly enjoy that I can now do 20,000 incarnations of things-- monkey with all color /hue levels , lift my own brush strokes, splice and dice my own drawings. Only problem is I've become truly addicted to the computer as I never imagined I would. Good on the job; bad when you're supposed to be home cooking dinner for the family. Do you think artists try to hide the fact that they are using Photoshop? Not necessarily...but all the new and evolving programs are so technologically dazzling, I think it's tempting to over-use PS for it's tricks and fake-texture filters. I could be wrong, but seems to me that Photoshop was initially embraced more by tech people than true artists, who were afraid of it, as I was initially. But it's changing. And frankly, as David Hockney points out, artists have always used photography in some form or another, even dating back to the Renaissance. Photoshop is just the latest incarnation. And now it can be used as an end in itself... between my scanner and my digital camera, I can download an image and immediately start working into it, whether it's a piece of reference or the beginning of a new painting. And since I do a lot of Website illustration in addition to print work, I have far more options with PS...more opportunities to work the painting, do the job, attack the project from whatever angle seems best.
I do everything, every which way. I have a large Wacom tablet so plenty of times I draw straight into the computer. Other times I start with a painting, usually in acrylic because it dries fast and I can scan it almost immediately. I'll give you an example: I was doing a piece for the LA Times, tight deadline, the whole bit. I did all the comps on the Wacom...then I did an original painting which I scanned and sent off to the art director. It was close to approval but I decided the woman's face was wrong. So I took the original painting and worked back into it. I got the face where I wanted but I lost some great stuff elsewhere. I sent him that...having kept digital files of both incarnations. We ultimately decided we wanted the face and body of one painting and the background of the other...so voila, that's what I did. And I made a newspaper deadline! How has your work evolved? I am a painter at heart. So even when I was having a very good run with the scratchboard, it started to feel limiting to me. I'm thankful to have had opportunities where I could dive into the computer, learn on the job and expand my world. It was very difficult and frustrating at times...and a drag to initially feel so lost and not-good at one of the tools of my trade. But I must say, I kept at it and eventually my recklessness (and curiosity) paid off! Now I mix it all up, which is extremely gratifying. What do you do to keep yourself inspired? Look at LOTS of art, keep painting...and take whatever job comes my way because I always learn something new. My kids are a great resource too...they helped me channel the look we established on the ImagineThatChild.com website. Whether I'm doing a quick painting of my daughter or lifting one of my son's funny doodles, they keep me open to stuff, yet on a schedule. All the more reason to work FAST. Regarding subject matter , I still like to be a mole or double agent-infiltrate environments, then make notes afterwards-always snooping around for funny things to write about or draw. Where do you see yourself in five years? Doing more of the same with even more abandon.
- Contributed by Mary-Beth Holland >> See more work from Nancy Nimoy >> See other member spotlights on the member spotlight index >> Find out more on how to become an altpick.com member |
