ART+LIFE

Sharon Shapiro

HOW DOES THE DAY UNFOLD?

With coffee, always with strong coffee.

Drink another cup of coffee, let the dogs outside and feed them, make a smoothie, check email, make the bed.

On a walk or a run, or to a Pure Barre class. I prefer to exercise outdoors in the morning before I start work in the studio.

To bed between 11pm and 12am.

EXPLAIN ONE OF THE MOST INTERESTING ASPECTS OF YOUR WORK?

We record memories with the assumpti-on that forgetting them is imminent. For over two decades, I have collected vintage print advertisements and magazines; I have gathered snapshots from my own family and from strangers. Recently, I began putting specific search terms into eBay in order to discover more personal, yet random, photo-graphs to source. This has been an exciting trial for me. For instance, a search with the terms “vintage + America + party” brought up a photo of a young woman ready go out for the evening posed in front of a sundial clock similar to the one that was in my childhood living room. What followed was the creation of the piece “ Family Clock“ from a seemingly insignificant photo pur-chased for only a few dollars. (I was pretty thrilled that the painting was subsequently chosen to be part of the backdrop for the Dave Matthews Band current summer tour during the song “Grey Street“) A search for “swimming pools + 1970s + America” brought up the photo that was the inspira-tion for “Above Ground.“ One fascination inevitably leads to another, and in looking for images, I track my own thought process.

TALK ABOUT THE MEANING OF YOUR WORK.

I am compelled by the unspeakable darkness that comes from growing up in coal country. The deeply conflic-ted adults of my childhood still drive me to examine the discord that exists between the inner and outer realms of human experience. Often a person’s placid exterior belies an riotous inner core. My work attempts to crack that shell and explore what lurks beneath that shiny surface; anxiety, aggression, and at times insatiable desire. Photo-graphs, both staged and candid–conti-nue to fascinate me. When inspected closely, they can reveal a deeper ten-sion than what was intended in the moment. I examine figures in discar-ded photos and then place them in the new context of my work. There they can live differently. I paint with bitter-sweetness and I intend to present what we mean not to lose.

TALK ABOUT ANXIETY, AGGRESSION, AND INSATIABLE DESIRE AS IT RELATES TO YOUR WORK.

I think those states/notions inform a lot of artists work deeply. It depends on what is going on in my life as it to how it relates directly to the work.

A STORY...

I was in the 1989 San Francisco earthquake. Longest 15 seconds of my entire life. What I remember most was that my roommate‘s cats both jumped out the window about 5 minutes before the rolling star-ted, and the intense urge I had to go outside, which I did, even though that is the last thing you are suppo-sed to do. And immediately I locked hands with a woman who lived in my building that also came outside that didn‘t speak English and whom I had never met before.

This year, I started a series about blind faith and the sinister side of the Ame-rican Dream. I plan to delve into the removal of people from my canvasses to allow items to speak for themselves and those who possess them. These ob-jects are not limited to the man made: my current ideas not only include pain-ting garden hoses and lawn chairs, but also southern foliage that is endemic to all of the abandoned houses in Appala-chia and further down south.

CURRENT AND FUTURE WORK....

morning…light, coffee, stretch, quiet, wet grass, cobwebs

noon… heat, bright sunlight, Westerns, brunch

night…stars, fire, sleep, lightning bugs, crickets, going out, dressing up, music, talking.

perfect happiness… there are only fleeting moments of per-fect happiness. They happen almost every day if you pay

attention.

preposterous… Trump.

fear…losing my sight.

love… circle.

extravagance… throwing a party.

texture…skin.

comedy… my dogs.

work…moving.

most interesting thing in your wallet/purse… fortunes from cookies past.

in another life, you’d be… a singer.

lucky charm…don‘t have one

prized possession… family photos, I would say my daugh-ter but she isn‘t my possession.

one wish…to swim in open water without fear

your most marked characteristic…intensity, for better or worse.

For over 20 years, Sharon Shapiro’s figu-rative paintings and works on paper have been exhibited in numerous venues inclu-ding shows in Atlanta, Chicago, Boston, New York and Los Angeles. Her work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at {Poem88} Gallery in Atlanta, GA, Brenau University in Gainesville, GA; and Second Street Gallery in Charlottesville, VA. In ad-dition to being published in catalogues pro-duced for these solo exhibitions her work has been featured in two issues of Oxford American and three issues of New Ame-rican Paintings, including as the cover im-age for New American Paintings Volume 39. Shapiro has recently been a resident at the Jentel Artist Residency Program in Banner, Wyoming and has been a past resident at the Ragdale Foundation, Lake Forest, IL; the Virginia Center for Creative Arts, Amherst, VA; the Ucross Foundation, Sheridan, WY; and the Hambidge Center, Rabun Gap, GA. As a past recipient of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts Fellowship, her work is in a number of important collec-tions throughout the United States, such as The Museum of Contemporary Art of Georgia in Atlanta, GA and the Tullman Collection in Chicago, IL. Shapiro has a BFA from the Atlanta College of Art, and is currently based in Louisa, VA.

ABOUT THE ARTIST

“Put your ear down close to your soul and listen hard.“~Anne Sexton

http://www.sharonshapiro.com/