Hi Everyone,
I started a new section of my blog called The Interview. Where I interview people I know, artists I work with, and anyone I find interesting. We start with Micah Lidberg who has some fabulous things in The Shiny Squirrel.
What is the process both physically and mentally that you go through before creating a piece?
The most important part for me, or at least the most entertaining, is getting myself in a daydream before I work. The feeling of being in a dream is a very special feeling and I love for my work to carry that signature. I think it has something to do with exploration and adventure. In terms of physical preparation, I generally get all the technical stuff set up and taken care of before anything else. I don't like worrying about those sort of details when I'm working.
CURRENT WORK
If you could paint/ draw like one famous artist who would it be? I'd love to paint like Thomas Hart Benton. I love the motion and color of his work and the content is something very close to my heart. He also painted on very large scales and I really like doing 'big art'. What is your favorite period in art and why? Baroque maybe? I don't know as if I have an absolute favorite, but baroque art is just so fantastic. Everything about it is very charged up and somewhat gratuitous. That's something that is very appealing to me Who are your favorite contemporary artists? With the advent of blogs, it's hard for me to focus on just a handful of people. There's a lot of very talented people out there making so many great things. With that said, I really like Mike Perry's work. It's very light-hearted and thoughtful. It has a great energy to it. I also really like Mario Hugo's work, especially his more personal pieces. He has a lot of subtlety and beauty and that's something I admire.
INSPIRATION
Does your environment affect your work? Absolutely. In fact, I'd say my environment not only affects but generates a lot of my work. It's always there to flow with or push against. What is the next step for your artistic career? Being more social - I love sharing my work with people! I'm always looking for ways to collaborate and make things that will energize people, and energize myself. It's a pretty great dialogue.
STUDIO
Recommend any great books or movies to see?
I haven't read any really great books lately, however, I have to recommend the movie, The Fall. It came out last year and it is absolutely stunning. It was directed by Tarsem Singh, and it's definitely worth your time.
Can you recall any moments that defined you as an artist? Well, I feel that the accumulation of all the small moments have defined who I am as an artist more than any one big moment. I've only had one memorable epiphany. A professor I had in England, Japser Goodall, told a bunch of us students to draw whatever we wanted to draw. It sounds silly that that sparked my epiphany, but it did the trick. I've been drawing furry dinosaurs and deranged clouds ever since.
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