Interviews with Artists

In 2017, as part of our ongoing commitment to arts dialogue and education, we began archiving interviews with the artists we have worked with at the Arts Research Collaborative. It is our hope that the collected conversations will continue to be a vital resource for all who visit.

From 2018-2019 UML student Dana Cram worked as an intern and preparator for the ARC. He interviewed Meredith Fife Day in November 2018.

Meredith Fife Day 2018

Your artist statement is very democratic about art making, though our culture can feel like it is antagonistic to that belief. How was this fundamental belief you hold about art making formed?

MFD: The making of art must come from a very deep and human place where art is embraced as necessity, not as commodity. Living artists are subject to being valued according to the prices and the patrons they bring, which can be huge factors in gallery representation and critical reviews.

My thinking is that when the work is authentic and transcends current aesthetic trends, popularity and publicity-fueled critical response, then something essential to growth and transformation is happening. That “something essential” should be as likely to happen to what I call “an artist under a rock” as it is to an artist with all the right networks and economic or academic advantages (that is where the “democratic” part of my statement comes in).

To whom do you look up to in art history: Matisse? Diebenkorn?

MFD: Oh, there are so many! … Yes, Matisse is a longtime, consistent inspiration, though commercial overexposure has given me reason to be somewhat defensive about the way I relate to his work. Diebenkorn is a painter I looked to for many years for his emotional mark-making, spatial sophistication, and translation of light into color. I loved seeing Matisse in his work — the window views and his painterly way of making graphic arabesque overlays.

Almost all my painting is in homage to painters who have come before me! I look at Cezanne, Klee, Giotto, Vuillard, van Gogh and Morandi all the time. I love children’s art, the Gee’s Bend Quilters (a big Influence on my collage work, especially), Watteau, Horace Pippin, Henri Rousseau and Jacob Lawrence.

I never, ever tire of Bonnard. Or Bob Thompson, an African-American artist whose intense seeking led him from Louisville, to Provincetown and New York, and to Europe, where he died in Rome shortly before his 29th birthday in 1966. His work has captivated me since I first saw it in New York prior to his exhibit at the Whitney Museum in 1998, which knocked me out!

Teaching in a diverse community college and living through a staggering number of social changes have raised my consciousness and expanded my influences to include many amazing female painters (I bring the work of Gabrielle Munter, Mary Cassatt, and the living painter Lois Dodd to my students, who respond very enthusiastically), and the work that comes from cultures beyond the Western European painters I was exposed to from early on.

The artist statement for the show refers to the struggle of making art. The work in this exhibition has a sense of immense tranquility (to the interviewer). What do you struggle with in your process?

MFD: I struggle with getting out of my head. I must impress on myself that in facing a new canvas or continuing a painting in progress, my job is not to expound on what I know, but to let the process lead me to discovery and revelation of something I do not know. I recently read a statement by Degas that describes this perfectly: “Nothing I know can help me now.”

Beyond that philosophical struggle, most of my struggles in practice are with form, size and proportion — getting things to work in pictorial space without being too photographic. I want to see things in a new way, which requires struggling to get to what I do not know. This is all quite humbling, but it is also exciting and compelling. For me, both struggle and affection are essential to the sincerity and authenticity of painting. .

Artists thrive when encouraged, “When someone believes in them” (Artist’s statement). Who believed in you and supported your interest in visual art?

MFD: My parents supported me from the very beginning and continued to do so their entire lives. When my mother discovered a mural the length of my bed etched in the plaster wall behind my mattress, the first thing she did was to enroll me in Saturday free art classes. Taught by volunteers who were professional artists, these lessons set me on my life’s journey and provided me a lifelong incentive to see to it that other children of modest or low household income had comparable opportunities.

Both parents could see how much I loved art and they respected my passion. I had very good teachers, especially a [public] high school teacher who believed in me, in my motivation.

My desire to learn more and continue to paint led me to study studio art as an undergraduate, then graduate student. I did not stop there! To this day I continue to take workshops and classes by artists whose work and teaching reputations I admire.

The late Jake Berthot was one of those artists. I loved his work and eagerly enrolled in workshops with him two summers in the late ’90s. I could see that Jake had a real dialogue with the paint, and I wanted that in my work. He taught me to trust my touch, my slow and measured pace, and my belief in what I was doing. He did what all good teachers do — he encouraged me.

Do you refer to your work in this show as paintings, collages — both, neither?

MFD: I think the title of my 2017 Art New England workshop at Bennington College is the best way to refer to my work: Painting with Movable Parts.

Collage has become quite inclusive and was cited in a review of open studios in Brooklyn as reflecting “the mashup of our times.” Still, I continue to think of my work as painting.

How does collaging your paint impact your decisions about color?

Drawing with pencil or charcoal to make preliminary studies for my paintings helped me make decisions about what I would paint and how I would approach composition, but did not provide me with information I needed about color. So I began to paint swatches of color to hold up against the surface of the painting. Little torn scraps of colored paper or big painted swatches… In the beginning, I used swatches from Home Depot or Lowe’s.

I hold colors against one another to see if they work together. Cutting or tearing the colors into shapes seems to activate the painting’s surface, as does hand painting each of the pieces. I neutralize all my colors. Mixing the paint is a big part of getting color to do its work and unifying the fragmented parts of the painting.

Do you ever make work that is more three-dimensional?

MFD: I build up and excavate, then rebuild my paper collages to a point that when framed a rather deep spacer is often needed to offset the glass from the layered surface. This kind of building takes on a low relief quality. I have always loved relief sculpture; it makes me think of a three-dimensional painting.

The layered mosaic quality of my collages may lead me to more three-dimensional work. As they currently present, I have concerns about the shadows cast by paper buildup looking like sloppy craftsmanship if the lighting is slightly off.

In your traditional drawings I see/feel the same motion, almost turbulence, of your paintings. When and why do you sit down to draw instead of paint?

MFD: It’s been a long time since I’ve made drawings that were not studies either for a painting or for my own understanding of another artist’s structure and value rhythms. These are probably best described as sketches, and, like most painters, I have sketchbooks full of them.

The drawings in this show were made outside the studio, meditatively. My paintings are more physically engaging for me.

Recently my practice has been drawing, painting, redrawing into the painting, and on, until I get it right, etc. Pencil on gouache feels nice and is a really fun way to work. I’m thinking about picking up pencil again but I’m just in love with color – and mixing paint!

Referring to the framing of your work. Do you choose these pairings to alter the perception of the color in your work?

MFD: I actually frame to give the work the viewer’s eye and attention. Simple frames of superior craftsmanship are my preference. I find frames that call attention to themselves do so at a cost to showing the work to the best advantage.

I was able to see an excellent exhibit of van Gogh’s paintings from several museums recently. One museum in Holland had all its van Goghs in beautifully designed and crafted simple wood frames. I thought these frames were more compatible with van Gogh’s paintings and subject matter than the ornate gold frames from other museums.

At your opening reception for this show, I saw you get on with everyone in attendance like old friends. What does the art community in Lowell mean to you?

MFD: Lowell is a warm, welcoming, and tolerant community. It’s not overly competitive, and people appreciate one another. The art patrons and community volunteers are exceptionally generous and democratic in their support.

I think that because of the number of groups who gather as community, it is important to keep our expectations flexible, with the understanding that community can be present as a moment to be valued as much as an obligatory participation in ongoing groups to foster a sense of belonging.

While that sense of belonging can be supported, I do not think it can be forced. Artists whose work and life require hours of solitude or independence must reach out in ways that are not usually associated with group identity. I love the moments of connection that come with friendship – old and new – but often find it challenging to participate and volunteer for the many activities and events that come with expectations of community.

Postscript: I wish to thank Dana Cram for his attention to my work and words in writing the questions for this interview. I am grateful to Denise Manseau for transcribing and editing his notes, and especially for giving me the opportunity to put some of my rambling answers into more cogent form.

– Meredith Fife Day