AMY PLEASANT

Cityscape, oil on canvas, 72 x 60

 

 

 



What are you working on in your studio right now?

I have just come off my first solo exhibition at whitespace gallery in Atlanta, GA.  It included paintings, drawings and clay objects.  This was the first time for me to show sculptures and I was really excited about it.  So there was a good deal of post-show follow-up and "cleansing the studio".  I am now working on new paintings, drawings and a few new objects.  

 

Can you describe your working routine?

My routine is always centered around drawing with ink and brush.  All the work comes out of the small daily drawings.  So I usually start by making several small works on paper and then work on larger paper pieces and the paintings.  It always depends though.  Sometimes it is clay work or monotypes etc...

 

 

 

 

 

Can you describe your studio space and how, if at all, that affects your work?

 

My studio is a ground floor space on a busy street in downtown Birmingham.  I am very private so my windows are frosted but I still get great light.  No one really knows what goes on inside that space and I like that. My home studio is very different.  I am a gardener (I don't mean vegetables), so my backyard is my "other studio".  When I work there I love to have the doors open, to hear the birds, and see the space that I have created there over the years.  It feels like an extension of my inside practice.  It is an activity that is quite precious to me.



Head VII

 

 

 

 

Tell me about your process, where things begin, how they evolve etc.

 

The process as I stated above is that all the work comes from small ink on paper drawings that I make.  I explore an image over and over until I find how it works best.  Sometimes that is all it needs to be and sometimes I have to take it to a large work, painting or paper or clay most recently.  It is a process of finding an image through repetition.  I love the xerox machine so I take my small works and copy them again and again, blowing them up, shrinking them down, cropping them, collaging and copying again.  The paintings go through a much longer process of painting and erasing and I usually work on a few at one time at different stages of completion.  



 

Untitled, On the Ground Below, ink on paper, 24 x 22

 

Untitled, Two Figures with Shadows

24 x 22, ink and monotype on paper

 

 

 

 

What are you having the most trouble resolving?

 

I make things too hard on myself.  Making things harder than they need to be. 

 

 

Do you experiment with different materials a lot or do you prefer to work within certain parameters?

 

I do like to experiment.  I just recently made my first clay pieces which was thrilling and now working on some new works with wood/clay.  

 

 

What does the future hold for this work?

 

In the long run I have no idea.  I never know what life it will live once I make it. But in the short term, I will have work in a group show, Roving Room, co-curated by Kelly Kaczynski and Cori Williams, that will be installed in the historic Habersham Mills May16th-July 31st and then I will be working towards my next solo show in NYC at Jeff Bailey Gallery. 

 

 

 

Sunshine on my Face, oil on canvas, 24 x 18