October 6, 2011
Obsessive Observation
Gage Hamilton returns with his second piece covering the art world in Portland. In this interview, he speaks with artist Michael Salter.
Anyone that wants to make it as an artist needs to have a mentor of sorts. Michael Salter has been mine. His work is equal parts smart, funny, perverse and beautiful, and his critical embrace of consumerist media is visible in everything he makes. Now please, familiarize yourself.
You describe yourself as an “obsessive observer”. What do you mean by that?
All my life I’ve been visually obsessed with the world that I live in. That might mean something different to my work if I lived in Provence or Antarctica, but my experience has been mostly C+ cities and suburbs. This means the food for my head has been devoured through my vision in big discount stores, thrift stores, dollar stores, movie theaters, TV, the internet and the mall. It’s everything I see and therefore everything I do. From the characters on the boxes of gummy fruit treats at the grocery store, to the Play-Doh rip off at the dollar store, to that really awful movie that Samuel L. Jackson was in with the sharks that eat through metal and are super smart, I tend to be drawn to the lowest element of the cultural food chain.
L.L.‘s best role EVER! So your work’s informed by visual cues we’ve all been bombarded with in America. Is that style universally legible?
…for better or worse western visual culture, primarily from the U.S. has infected the entire planet. I’m cruising down the street in Brussels one day and outside this corner store is like 20 stickers of these fantastic creepy little monster guys, so I rush inside to see if I can buy the stickers or the gum or whatever it is they come in and the guys says, “oh those? We haven’t had those in years”. I took a picture of them anyways. In Jinan China outside a restaurant I saw this huge neon sign. The neon sign was of a bare foot and the big toe of the foot was wearing a cowboy hat and a bandana, the other 4 toes were each wearing a bandana. This is the kind of stuff that sparks my cognition like rocket fuel. So, yes, the language is universal, and it is primarily so because the world seems to like to sell stuff. It’s the language of commerce most often. Apparently, money makes the world go around.
Ha, that’s what they tell me. One thing that’s always impressed me about you is your ability to subvert that design associated imagery in a fine art context. Very few do it as well as you.
Thanks Gage. I hope my perspective comes from one who truly sometimes suffers with the commercial paradigm and one who totally loves the art platform. I love stuff and yeah I wish I was filthy rich, but when it all comes down to it I love intelligent discourse more. Sometimes not much more, but always more. Perhaps my long time persistence has also benefitted me. I’ve been addressing the same issues about the power and poetry of the graphic reductive language for like 10 years and I believe that length of time is significant.
I remember the first time I saw your work in person was your Formula 1 race car a few years back, but it wasn’t until I saw one of your Styrobots up close that I realized how recognizable the pieces were as electronic packaging materials. How important is the material to the piece itself?
I am one of those artist who refuses to be corralled into one media area. A contemporary practicing artist can and should use anything and everything they want to, to say what they must. You know the thing about the found/reclaimed styrofoam shipping pieces is their transformation once I make something with them. I really like the idea that we can have a familiar, understood relationship with something and then BAM it can be changed forever. I never take anything at face value and I enjoy weighing possibilities all the time. I love material for its honesty and its charming ability to flex its honesty. That full scale F-1 race car was a test in media translation and desire. I lust for my own real F-1 car, so what would happen if I made my own out of a material like styrofoam? Would my lust be quenched? Would the car still be desirable? Could an object reserved for princes and celebrities be possessed my me?
Is there any one piece that you’re most proud of, or feel has been under-appreciated?
I did a show in Brussels a couple years ago that came and went without much fanfare. I see my work as discrete pieces that are all elemental to the installation, and its the installation that’s the most important. It’s this entire environmental experience that matters most to me. That show had it all, including a human sized giant yellow banana whose pants had fallen to his ankles while he appeared to be singing, god I thought that piece was pretty cool.
[Laughs] It was, on so many levels. Alright, before I go, can you describe the American Dream for me?
All my buddies in high school went on to be tech guys, bankers, lawyers, surgeons and architects. Growing up in the 80’s we were kind of fed the idea that being rich was the most important thing one could pursue. I even tried to make it as a marketing major in college so I could try an expensive car one day myself. Once I listened and heeded my fascination for the way things look I was able to find a focus and professional trajectory that have been completely and thoroughly rewarding. I suppose that is my idea of the American dream, search for what you love and then do it with love.
Michael Salter