“Spontaneity” is the wrong word, because that implies lack of forethought or planning, but there is a spontaneous energy at work in the studio of California painter Jeremy Mann. And it has a mesmerizing effect: you just never know what the artist will do next.
HELIX, oil on canvas, 48 x 36"In recent years, Mann has made films, worked in stop-motion animation, continued to produce evocative photography from vintage equipment and has even expanded his work into three-dimensional sculptural pieces, all while still producing stunning painted works of figures and cityscapes. For the artist, this freedom to create whenever and with whatever has led to impressive creative breakthroughs, including some that will be on view beginning January 22 at a major new solo show titled BLOOM at Maxwell Alexander Gallery in Los Angeles. Mann sat down for some of our questions about what he’s been creating and where his work is going.
The House of Failed Dreams, mixed media and electronics, 15 x 15 x 28"
When we spoke to you in 2019, you were thinking about taking a year or more off from certain areas of your studio. But then, of course, COVID hit not long after that and I can imagine things were thrown into chaos a little bit. What have you been up to the last two years, and how do you feel about the places your creativity took you within those two years?
Yeah, navigating life these last two years has been a beautiful nightmare. Eye-opening. What is important and exactly how long do we think we have to live it? The second part we will never know until it ends, but the first part, what is important to each of us, we can figure out now. We have only this one brief moment of existence to experience this gift of life, I’ve learned to see that clearly, but now must navigate toward that shore which suits me best. Attempting new mediums without hesitation, following through on those late evening shower ideas I scribble in my notebooks—following the underlined, circled, starred “you must do this idea!!” is like jumping off a cliff believing you can fly, and finding out that you can (even if you just float a little and fall on your couch pads). I have and still plan to take risks in my art in order to better gauge who I am as an artist, as a person. These creations I allow my subconscious to make for me steer me toward that shore, “the dream” we all wish to reach if we can get rid of “want.” All I must do is stay awake and let the ship take me where it goes; that will be my life. It’s exhilarating to be aware of it happening.
NOVA, oil on canvas, 48 x 36"
What kind of artist do you consider yourself these days? You can’t be described as just a painter anymore. Whether it’s film and animation, sculptural work, and even photography, you are now associated with many different kinds of artwork.
It’s nice to be known for one thing which we are, but I think it’s best to be known for all the things we are. I grew up confused that artist meant craftsman and vice versa, believing like many traditional artists that we must only focus on one medium, perfect it, sell it, and do it again. Yet this contradicted all the dead artists who I keep learning life from and especially the growing awareness and instinct inside myself. An Artist is a creator. There is no other stipulation for being one, and I fully believe that a life spent studying the arts is quintessential to human evolution and more importantly to our daily navigating of our strange, secluded selves (we are all just brains hiding behind mouths). I release myself from limitations in medium, style and technique so I may fully understand who I am as one of these artists, a person who creates from nothing. Whatever comes out will be the most honest I can be, allowing me to grow and evolve freely like a wild weed.
The Muse in Pale Greens no. 2, oil on panel, 13 x 10"
What is your vision for the Maxwell Alexander Gallery show? What kinds of themes are you playing with?
BLOOM. The undeniable beauty, power and mystery of nature we humans can barely comprehend yet are drawn to like a child to its mother and cannot exist without. To me, nature, science, knowledge and how our emotions are linked to it all is profound and absolute, and that theme is embedded throughout each piece. It’s also about myself opening up, exhibiting all these facets of my inner world together in one place for the first time. Films, sculptures, poems, homemade photography, figure paintings, abstract cityscape compositions, peaceful and intimate plein air and a few other surprises will all be in the same room at the same time, exposed like a blooming frantic flower. It’s a little nerve-wracking to unveil myself like this, but I think that is an important quality to confront. Lastly, it’s about asking people themselves to open up and accept the idea that real0life experiences are paramount to real life, contrary to current popular trends and despite what many institutions want us to believe. I wish to show all the artwork at an exhibition which has not yet been publicly mass released in some digital deformation, inspiring people to see art as it is meant to be seen (and with the possibility of getting a free painting to lure them into the light of experiences). The sincere support from Maxwell Alexander Gallery is profound for me as they too open their doors again with this exhibition, fully supporting me and my silly ideas.
Jeremy Mann in his California studio, 2021.There are some new elements at play in some of the works, including floral patterns overlaid on top of the images and also areas that have a burned or fluid-like appearance. What prompted these new textures and how did you achieve them?
It’s the result of a restless addiction to solving new challenges and having my dirty paws in many other dishes at the same time. Pursuing a creative life as an unlimited artist is revealing itself in cross hybridization of these elements. Granted, my life spent studying composition, harmony, balance, color and other fundamentals of painting naturally transitioned into the photography and film work. As the tide endlessly stirs the ocean, the elements which arose in my processes in the darkroom homemade photography, the 16mm film sets, themes, the self-study and exposure I’ve been practicing for my own soul is revealing itself in the techniques used to create the oil paintings. In order to grow straight and true, I needed to do some pruning, cutting away the old and trusted techniques and jumping headfirst into new materials and new approaches to my art. Instead of creating a painting for a show, I spent time creating a show with paintings. Working on each piece whenever they called for it, letting them sit and stare back at me. Questioning when I decided a painting was “complete” gave me time to develop them even further. I invented a system of destruction between layers based on my undergrad experimentational paintings I was doing before my understanding of “artist” was warped by the traditional painting institution. Painting on the floor instead of on the easel. Painting with tools that prevented me from physically touching the surface for much of the distressing process. Air guns, heat guns, chemicals and gravity have returned to the toolbelt. Most important, inspired by my wife, was to allot dedicated time for my subconscious to have full control of my emotions, decisions, and hands as part of the painting process, allowing the subconscious to trace what it sees. Always accepting the results, learning to fight doubt and learning to overcome inhibitions in painting, though I am nowhere near her expertise in that matter. All aspects of artistic and emotional growth are important to implement and try. This intense focus on evolving these last two years is exemplified in these visual changes.
MYRRH, oil on canvas, 48 x 36"
Seven, Polaroid negative, 3 x 3"
HELIX is especially wonderful. Tell me more about that piece and how it evolved on your easel.
The four large canvas works in the show began directly from analogue references after I had pushed the reference photography to its own level of fine art. Each of them was created more subconsciously than representationally and I think they tended to evolve around the typical theme of the seasons. But as I worked on them and they in turn informed me of the direction they wanted to go, HELIX became the piece dedicated to the profundity of nature’s mysteries. The DNA double helix design has (as of yet) no known purpose for its beautiful, twisted staircase. The dynamic and lovely structure is just a result of chemistry and physics. There is no reason, despite our desperate need to place a reason for things we don’t yet understand even if that reason is absurdly wrong and fantastical. It simply is beautiful because nature is beauty, in all its forms of life and death. The twist which binds the code that creates us and everything which lives is simply the calligraphy to nature’s language. I look at the nebula of stars like that emitted in the painting NOVA and the curled hairdo of our DNA and their mysterious allure alone is all we need understand to know our place in life. My oil paintings do not try to make loaded comments on our screwed-up modern society, they exist to cover the space between the walls we erect to keep nature out and the eyes tethered to our minds with beauty. Their point is simply to inspire us to enjoy the immensity of nature’s profundity. There are no lies, nor greed, nor injustice in nature, and I think that is all the inspiration we need to live up to and instill in others.
Hope, mixed media and electronics, 7 x 7 x 14"You have several sculptural pieces in the show and they have some fantasy elements in them. How did these pieces develop in your studio?
When I took a recess from just painting for exhibition sales, I found that my inner demons, my worldly concerns, can be expressed with a clarity and ease not possible with my figurative traditional oil paintings. When the impetus for creation is from love alone, the result is surprisingly revealing. These two sculptures were gifts to my wife, and then instantly became the groundwork for the making of a new personal poetry of stop-motion and live-motion film on 8 and 16mm, revealing new worlds I never knew I could bring to life if I just leaped off the cliff and tried. I was concurrently inventing electronic devices to overcome film obstacles and these sculptures with their simple electronics were the proving grounds to unleash more complicated projects like intervalometers, external viewfinders and variable voltage drive motors for the antique film cameras. But the emotions which these sculptures emit is probably the closest one can get (until the film is finished) to my true innermost child. There I am, exposed. It’s exhilarating because it feels good to be candidly vulnerable, and you build up a tough skin this way, where every stinging breath on our open wounds serves to remind us of who we are despite how much we try to cover it up or hide. I believe it can be beneficial to many people these days, finding the strength in the self-acceptance of the individual.
Composition 187, oil on panel, 48 x 48"What are you searching for as an artist? What drives you to keep creating?
It has grown to the forefront of my attention in this life I live, that we individuals tend to know very little about ourselves…practically avoid it, and therefore know even less about others we share this earth with. The more we understand ourselves, the better person we can be to others.I could ramble off a novel’s worth of reasons why the study, practice, theory, science and emotional understanding required to be a dedicated artist correlates to an overwhelming awareness of our purpose in life: to improve. Having arrived at this realization after many mislead years of ignorance, I intend to pursue it with great fervor until I expire. —
Jeremy Mann: BLOOM
When: January 22-February 26, 2022
Where: Maxwell Alexander Gallery, 406 W. Pico Bouelvard, Los Angeles, CA 90015
Info: (213) 275-1060, www.maxwellalexandergallery.com
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