In April 2018, we transitioned our blog from Blogger to WordPress. With over 5 years of content, including more than 150 Artist of the Week interviews, we’re throwing back to a past #AotW post each week. This week, we are featuring our August 2016 interview with Kate Holcomb Hale. Kate is an Arlington, MA based artist, and was the Best in Show prize winner in our 2016 National Prize Show, juried by Paul Ha (Director, List Visual Art Center at MIT). You can see Kate’s work this month in our Kathryn Schultz Gallery, as part of our 2018 National Prize Show!
What are your earliest memories of being artistic?
One of my earliest memories of being artistic is my parents constantly telling me to use both sides of the paper. It appears I that I would burn through any pad of paper I could get my hands on with my endless drawings.
When did art become a pursuit?
I actually have a Bachelor of Science in communications. I worked in advertising in client services for a bit after college and decided it wasn’t the career for me. That’s when I turned my attention to making art again. It had been my minor in undergrad. Once I left advertising I decided to apply to grad school and pursue art as my career.
Are you self-taught or formally educated in visual art?
I have my MFA from Maine College of Art in Portland, ME. Since I didn’t have an undergraduate degree in art, I went for my MFA. I wanted to experience one really immersive period of art instruction surrounded by other artists that I could learn from.
How did you first become involved with CAA?
The 15th National Prize Show was my first exhibition with Cambridge Art Association. I’ve actually applied to other CAA shows but this is the first exhibit for which my work was selected.
In what other ways are you involved in the local art community?
This past year I became part of Boston Critique Group. It’s an amazing group of Boston artists who meet once a month to share work/progress and glean insight from one another. http://bostoncritiquegroup.com/
I also volunteer with a group of young women at Youth Villages in Arlington, where I live with my husband and two young sons. Youth Villages is a therapeutic home and school setting for young women coping with behavioral or emotional challenges. I work with them once a week on various art projects.
What medium do you currently work in and how did you choose this medium?
I’m currently working with charcoal on paper and painted vinyl. Although it’s a messy and delicate medium, I always gravitate to drawing with charcoal. The painted vinyl came about in response to a gallery asking that I not paint on their walls. I reluctantly started experimenting with decal vinyl and paint. It ended up being a new and interesting way to create the painted parts of my installations. I observed that viewers found the material perplexing. From far away the paint appears to be a painted directly on the wall. Upon closer inspection, one realizes it’s some other material affixed to the wall. I often see viewers lean in close to get a better look at it.
What is your creative process?
My current body of work, Where Edges Meet?, is a series of installations and works on paper exploring edges: the edge of a room, the edge of a sheet of paper, the boundaries of identity where a former self falls away. Drawing is the backbone of my work as each piece begins with an abstract charcoal drawing on a rectangular sheet of paper. Eventually I cut into/tear away pieces of the drawing. I then move the drawing to a corner in my studio, playing around with it’s orientation until I feel it activates the space. Finally I turn my attention to the remaining hard edges of the original sheet of paper. They feel unresolved to me. It’s at this point that I bring in paint and charcoal and expand the drawing onto the walls, ceiling and floor.
How do you choose your subject matter? Is there a reoccurring theme that carries throughout your work?
Although my work is abstract I hint at meaning in my titles: No Cars Falling Down, He asked for a pair of scissors and pointed to these, Hands Held Loosely Closed. As I create each charcoal drawing I’m thinking about a moment/instant where your sense of who you are shifts beneath you. It could be due to a birth, an illness, a childhood memory unearthed or any significant life event. I feel that who we are is fluid and these psychological shifts compile throughout a lifetime shaping our subjectivity. My installations are an effort to give form to these fractures. I’m attempting to create a space for contemplation – whether it be contemplating form, space, architecture or the concept of one’s continually shifting identity.
In your opinion, what’s your best/favorite piece you’ve made?
The installation, Caked, I created for my MFA thesis show is one of my favorite works. The reason it is a favorite is because of the scale of the piece (it filled 2 rooms) and it showcased my sense of the absurd. To create the installation, I floated 20 birthday cakes in a bathtub for 12 hours. That performative act resulted in an animation, a room tiled in images of disintegrating cakes, a floor consisting of uneven table tops and table legs protruding from the walls. While I’m invested in my current exploration involving drawing and paint, I can see myself revisiting this style of work which also explored fractures in subjectivity.
What is one of your artistic goals for 2016?
To make artwork consistently and push my concepts further – that’s pretty much my goal every year. And to get the work outside my studio so people can interact with it. It’s unbelievably rewarding to witness people physically walk around the work and take it in. I love hearing people’s impressions and interpretations of my installations. An added benefit to art making is the human connection that can result from putting your work out into the world. It could be an email, a conversation in a gallery or a new friendship that results. For me connecting with other people is one of the best outcomes of being an artist.
What living artists are you inspired by?
Sarah Sze, Amy Silman, Jessica Stockholder, Mona Hatoum, Doris Salcedo, and Annette Messenger.
Do you own any art by other artists?
My husband works for Invaluable.com – an auction site connecting users to auctions/artists worldwide. It’s another whole facet of the art world that I’m learning a bit about through him. We’ve acquired a couple of paintings and prints through Invaluable. It’s been fun to be a buyer and experience the process from another perspective. I’ve also been lucky to acquire some works by artist friends.
Do you have any shows coming up?
Yes, one of my installations has been selected to be part of On The Map at 3S Artspace in Portsmouth, NH. The show runs from August 5th – September 3rd, 2016. Opening reception is Friday, August 5th from 5-8:00pm. 3S is located at 319 Vaughan Street, Portland. http://www.3sarts.org/
Website: carbonmade.kateholcombhale.com
Facebook: facebook.com/kateholcombhale
Instagram: intagram.com/kateholcombhale