Carrie Ann Baade [BFA 1997] interviewed on Spraygraphic

Spraygraphic Interview with Artist Carrie Ann Baade

By Spraygraphic | February 17, 2010

Spraygraphic Interview with Carrie Ann Baade

SG: Please tell us about yourself?

CB: I’m an Assistant Professor of Painting whose major emphasis is the historic materials and techniques at Florida State University. While I see myself as a painter first and a teacher second, teaching keeps me sane. I am pretty sure I would go nuts if I stayed in my studio 24/7. My degrees are from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the University of Delaware but I also studied classical realism at the Florence Academy of Art in Italy. After traveling around the world a bit, the pursuit of a job took me to Tallahassee, Florida. Most of the year, everyone here wears sandals and there’s romantic looking Spanish moss. I have some great students who distract me from my desire to board a plane to more metropolitan areas, so I might balance the nowhere with somewhere. I could dis Tallahassee but frankly, after exhibiting in Ningbo, Berlin, London, and coast to coast in the US….I have only had 4000 people come to one of my openings here: in Tallahassee. This was a big lesson for me. At any other venue on opening night, I would be happy to see 400 folks. Nothing sold, but there is no replacement for enthusiasm this place has shown for my work.

SG: What mediums do you work with?

CB: The subjects of my work include the gods, rulers, and demons as metaphors for the complexity of absolute states of the human condition. This body of work consists of twelve paintings about extreme states of human existence. "Intemperance” is a body of work that thematically explores states of excess through multiple figure narratives and portraits of women. Each painting is composed from snippets of pictorial fragments. A prototype collage of layered scraps with cut edges is the first completed and establishes the composition (see Figure 3). Some of these are photographs of me while others are torn out illustrations from art history books. Using this collage. The agglomeration is the source for the painting executed in a trompe l’oeil manner: the multiple layers with cut edges are not intended to make a harmonious synthesis. These suggest the complexity of the individual’s psychologies – their exposed masks and their concealed secrets.

Studying with art conservators and looking at the old masters informs the materials and techniques used in these paintings. These archaic processes are used in the hope of preserving these traditional methods. As an artist and subject in my work, I attempt to use and reuse art history for the purpose of reinvigorating the past for a contemporary audience.
I paint indirectly which means that I paint in layers. For this I create a highly rendered ink under-painting (see figure 4). The creation of work with this technique is a statement of uncommon technical skill but achieved with more accuracy through the use ink. This technique is process-oriented and requires time to produce each consecutive layer of oil paint over the ink drawing in order to build the visually rich painted effects (see figure 5). It is possible to see the exactness of the painted work (see figure 6) in comparison with the original collage, which assists my conceptual objective to show the fragmented source imagery of this work.

SG: What kind of things do you do when you get blocked or find it hard to create something?

CB: I do handstands. I find sleep and yoga are what restores my focus, but then it’s sitting down with the problem and not giving up until it’s resolved. I have a tendency to tenacious about things I want.

SG: You have been described as a Surrealist artist. Can you tell us how you perceive that description and what Surrealism means to you?

CB: More specifically, the term being used is Pop Surrealist, a term coined by Kirsten Anderson. I have been showing with a gallery for the past 3 years that is historic in this movement, Billy Shire Fine Art, while Pop Surrealism is a burgeoning art movement, it has it’s roots in Low Brow art which has existed in some form for the past 40 years. This has been an underground, counter-movement, which merits recognition. In the greater art world, "Pop Surrealism” has been finding new acceptance in contemporary art criticism and in major urban art museums. "Since 1994, this ground swelling of lowbrow, surrealistic, pop, figurative, narrative work has coalesced and found a voice in the pages of Juxtapoz magazine published in San Francisco.”

The foundation of this work relies on the artists’ ability to describe the world realistically – in order to then subvert and distort it. Whether the artists’ works are wickedly satirical, bizarre, humorous, fluently painted or crudely conceptualized, there is no doubt of their popular appeal. Through much of the 20th century, representational counter-movements were marginalized. The general population, non-intellectuals, felt at home interpreting figurative art for themselves without the mediation of an art critic or a special education (one reason they liked Dali so much). Viewers are intrigued by the off-kilter, the magical and the imaginative (another reason why Dali’s reputation soared). There are so many tremendously talented artists around this scene. Sometimes I am not sure if I am a "pop surrealist” but I am absolutely certain that exhibiting and hanging out with the artists from this movement is the most fun I have ever had. To name a few: Kathy Olivas, Sas and Colin Christian, Travis Louie, and Chris Mars.

SG: Where are you currently finding your inspiration?

CB: My works leaps out of insomniac hallucinations…out of the pages of the books I am reading. I don’t really paint as a reaction to contemporary culture. I am more inclined to illustrate metaphors for my own confounding relationships most of what I make comes from my the inside of my mind….hmmm I guess you could say, I turn myself on.

Our lady’s rage has gotten the better of her and she is roaring a malediction to the very powers of creation to change her circumstances. Perhaps we have all felt like we were difficult to put up with or that the world around us was reproachable. This three-headed tiger sits on a lotus dais from the Eastern traditions attributed to one who is a god. As she rages, the lotus, a symbol of enlightenment are set afire suggesting that all one’s efforts to be holy and good can be lost in an instant of bad behavior.

SG: Where has your work been seen?

CB: Currently, 3 galleries represent me: Billy Shire Fine Arts in LA, Rosenfeld Gallery in Philadelphia, and Pop Gallery in Santa Fe. I usually have two solo show a year and several group shows.

SG: Where will it be seen next?

CB: My next opening is in Philadelphia March 7th. This show is titled, "Tales of Passion and Woe” and will feature 7 new works and a few from the "Intemperance” series.

SG: What is your dream art assignment?

CB: I would love to have the creation to create a mural cycle in an indoor civic or public building that would be seen by a large group of people over and beyond my time on earth.

SG: What is your favorite color?

CB: The color of peeled and skinned grapefruit as you hold it up to sunlight.

SG: Who is your favorite artist? And Why?

CB: Kris Kuksi. Because he has been consistently blowing my mind for the past 5 years. He has my respect and my attention because he takes the bric-a-brac of figurines and children’s toys and makes an original vision rich with political satire and reflections of the decadence in our society. As a sculptor, he is one of the most original and poignant artists of our time.

SG: What book/magazine are you reading this week?

CB: Coil House, Modern Painters Magazine, Maxfield Parrish, by Coy Ludwig, and a book on medieval materials and techniques of tempera painting.

SG: Have you ever done a self-portrait? Where is it now?

CB: Most of my works are self-portraits. This is the one I am working on currently:

The Temptation of the Penitent Medusa

In this self-portrait as my alter ego, I am painting and trying hard to stay on task as I am assaulted by several demons that wish to provoke me away from my work. This painting combines elements from four historic painting subjects: The Penitent Magdalene, The Temptation of St. Anthony, St. Luke Painting a Portrait of the Virgin Mary, and Medusa. Medusa was an innocent, who was punished by being turned into a monster, and she was rehabilitated like Magdalene, however; the demons in her midst may lure her back to evil ways against all her efforts to be pious.

SG: Where is your favorite place to hang out?

CB: Regretfully, I don’t get to hang out. I am happily attached to my easel with a ball and chain, or sneak a cigarette after class and mentor my students. But if I get out…I am on a plane going to somewhere awesome. I just booked a ticket to Bali to take a workshop with Alex Grey.

SG: Any final words of advice?

CB: Staying in your studio and working your balls off makes art…. going out 3 or more nights a week does not. Talent is bullshit; it’s a myth. You can do anything (with art) if you practice. Make 500 bad paintings to make 15 good ones. Don’t give up. The competition wills all eventually quit to go off and become massage therapists, and YOU will be the last one standing. Art is good for your soul…being a frustrated artist is bad for you, and everyone around you, so I challenge you to stop the self-doubt and realize your potential! Remember: Hitler was a failed artist!
If you are scheming to be the best you are in competition with all the best, be yourself…exploit your flaws, they are what make you uniquely you and no one can compete with that. If you are lazy, make work that exploits your finesse. If you are self critical, make-work where you work yourself in a way that satisfies you in a way that only you can be perfect. 20 years ago, I was cutter and kleptomaniac; somehow, I think I resolved my own character flaws and satisfied my deviant ways within the process of being a productive artist. Someone could imitate me, but I don’t think they would find it anywhere near as gratifying to cut up books…steal imagery…and make them my own.