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February 2017
Interview Kristie Atwood Catalina, Arizona |
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Kristie Atwood
Kristie Atwood is a southern Arizona artist who works in the mediums of photography and artist’s books. She has a BFA in Drawing and Painting from Northern Arizona University, and she earned her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Arizona. She is active in the Genius Loci Foundation.
SAN: Kristie, are you a native Arizonan?
Kristie Atwood: I am. I was born in Tempe and raised in Flagstaff from the age of two. After college I moved to the Tucson area and have been here since.
SAN: Your primary artistic pursuits are in photography and artist’s books. What drew you to these two mediums?
SAN: Kristie, are you a native Arizonan?
Kristie Atwood: I am. I was born in Tempe and raised in Flagstaff from the age of two. After college I moved to the Tucson area and have been here since.
SAN: Your primary artistic pursuits are in photography and artist’s books. What drew you to these two mediums?
KAtwood_Journeys_
KA: I have long been interested in photography. I like that I can record things that have a story and meaning. However, when I left college I lost the use of a dark room. It took the advancement of digital photography for me to return to it. In many ways I’m a Luddite, but digital photography has been a real blessing. It’s difficult for one to create a darkroom at home so digital photography gave me freedom. Before this, I concentrated primarily on writing fiction and poetry. When I returned to photography it opened up something marvelous in me.
As for book arts, I was really drawn to it by a friend, artist, and teacher Cerese Vaden. I was in Italy with my husband, who was teaching art, and Cerese was teaching a class called Book Concepts/Libro Concetti. I was blown away by what I saw coming out of her class. I hadn’t considered making my own books. It was a eureka moment. This was in 2008. I had photography, but now I saw a way to combine it with writing through book making. It brought back the craftswoman in me. I love the world of craft, growing up creating little dolls, books, ornaments, sewing, pottery, etc., but when I was in art school, craft wasn’t considered valid. I think this is changing now but in my time at university, no one suggested bookmaking as an art. I learned to draw and paint but was constantly pushed to be more conceptual, a.k.a. abstract. All art is conceptual; it needs not be abstract or obtuse.
The next year, I took a mixed media book class with Cerese at the University of Arizona. My ideas exploded under her tutelage. She not only taught us book structures, but how to coalesce them into our concepts. I have been working along this vein ever since, and have dropped the adage that to find a voice as an artist, we must pick a genre or field. I now take photos, make books and assemblages, work with clay, draw, paint, craft - I do everything and mix it together, or not. What a joy!
SAN: Let’s talk about the environmental themes in your artist’s books. Tell us what inspired “Silent Spring” and “Poe and the Hollow Crown” and how you developed the ideas in these books.
KA: The environment has been a concern of mine since I was a child. I grew up at the edge of Coconino National Forest. My father used to take me hiking behind our house on Mount Elden, and he would point out to me the different trees and their sizes, often alerting me as to how long it took for a ponderosa to reach a great height and circumference. He stressed to me how fragile these trees were in what was really a very dry place. In June of 1977, Mount Elden caught fire. It was human caused. It burned out of control and took half the south side and the entire east side forest with it. Even today, not much grows there. It’s been forty years. It was catastrophic. The whole town mourned. I was seven and it affects me still. I can’t look at pictures of it or read about it without becoming emotional.
As for book arts, I was really drawn to it by a friend, artist, and teacher Cerese Vaden. I was in Italy with my husband, who was teaching art, and Cerese was teaching a class called Book Concepts/Libro Concetti. I was blown away by what I saw coming out of her class. I hadn’t considered making my own books. It was a eureka moment. This was in 2008. I had photography, but now I saw a way to combine it with writing through book making. It brought back the craftswoman in me. I love the world of craft, growing up creating little dolls, books, ornaments, sewing, pottery, etc., but when I was in art school, craft wasn’t considered valid. I think this is changing now but in my time at university, no one suggested bookmaking as an art. I learned to draw and paint but was constantly pushed to be more conceptual, a.k.a. abstract. All art is conceptual; it needs not be abstract or obtuse.
The next year, I took a mixed media book class with Cerese at the University of Arizona. My ideas exploded under her tutelage. She not only taught us book structures, but how to coalesce them into our concepts. I have been working along this vein ever since, and have dropped the adage that to find a voice as an artist, we must pick a genre or field. I now take photos, make books and assemblages, work with clay, draw, paint, craft - I do everything and mix it together, or not. What a joy!
SAN: Let’s talk about the environmental themes in your artist’s books. Tell us what inspired “Silent Spring” and “Poe and the Hollow Crown” and how you developed the ideas in these books.
KA: The environment has been a concern of mine since I was a child. I grew up at the edge of Coconino National Forest. My father used to take me hiking behind our house on Mount Elden, and he would point out to me the different trees and their sizes, often alerting me as to how long it took for a ponderosa to reach a great height and circumference. He stressed to me how fragile these trees were in what was really a very dry place. In June of 1977, Mount Elden caught fire. It was human caused. It burned out of control and took half the south side and the entire east side forest with it. Even today, not much grows there. It’s been forty years. It was catastrophic. The whole town mourned. I was seven and it affects me still. I can’t look at pictures of it or read about it without becoming emotional.
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Nature should be a part of our everyday lives and growing up right next to it, it was certainly a part of mine. It seemed natural that we should be protective of it. The forest was my play place, and a place I ran away to when I didn’t want to clean my room. It was mysterious. I see the natural world as an entity with its own soul that harbors the souls of the living creatures who reside in it. I see people as equal with nature, that we are no more important or valuable than it is. Many spiritual teachings state that to husband something means to care for it, that it is not only for human benefit. Each tree, bird, mammal, insect, fish, etc. is our responsibility to care for and protect. I have never really understood why others don’t feel this way. I can’t put it merely on politics, since two of the people who drove this belief into me were my parents who were both Republicans. My mother kept a vegetable garden and gave me my first copy of Silent Spring by Rachel Carson.
In my artwork, I hope to share this ideal with others, with the idea it might stick. I also need art as an outlet and as a way to honor the natural world. As soon as I was old enough to see what a profound and terrible impact people could have on our environment, it has been a thorn, one that has caused pain and anger. Sometimes I just want to shout and say, “Don’t you see what you’re throwing away? Don’t you see the value?” I guess pieces such as the “Hollow Crown” and “Silent Spring” are my way of shouting. My art is a way to say to others and myself, that all life is not only precious but transient, including human life, and we must not destroy entire ecosystems for our own comforts our even for our lives, because we won’t live forever. The idea for “Hollow Crown,” involves power and how that affects our natural environment as well as how futile it can be in the lives of people when they grasp for it for its own sake. It’s a never ending game of chess with everyone as a pawn, facing off for who knows what. “Silent Spring” is inspired by Rachel Carson’s book. It addresses the idea of science, and how it can be both a tool for good but also one for great destruction. It is science after all and the over use of pesticides, that inspired Carson to write Silent Spring. When thinking out this piece, I was thinking very much of those huge glass cases from the Victorian era filled with butterflies and beetles, bats and birds, and stuffed tigers. They were at the height of the Industrial Revolution. It was already causing great destruction to people and the planet, yet there were still so many places that were wild and unexplored. Their way of seeing that fragility was to kill it, put under glass, and in a museum, so it would be saved for future generations. It was also, in a strange way, a way to honor nature. |
KAtwood_Poe and the Hollow Crown_
KAtwood_Poe and the Hollow Crown_ (detail)
KAtwood_Silent Spring_
KAtwood._Silent Spring_ (detail)
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KAtwood
The displays are beautiful and haunting. I intended for “Silent Spring” to work in a similar way, putting behind mica the things that are at risk not only in Carson’s time but now. It’s an homage to her for her courage - for standing up and putting so much work into it. You know, she was dying of cancer as she completed and promoted the book. It was that important to her.
I should mention that all the creatures, feathers and such in the piece were found as is, not taken.
SAN: This might be a good place to tell us about your involvement with the Genius Loci Foundation? Please give us an overview.
KA: The Genius Loci Foundation is an environmental not-for-profit founded by my husband, David Christiana, and myself. Our mission is “two fold - to restore, enhance and preserve riparian habitat and to champion art and nature as profound symbiotic forces.”
Feeling as strongly as we do about our natural world, we moved to a home, after about five years in Tucson, that had two acres, near Catalina State Park and Coronado National Forest. We have lived here for 21 years now. When the vacant ten acres behind us went up for sale, we were terrified to see it built on. So we went into debt to buy 7 and a half acres of it. We couldn’t afford the whole ten.
This little enclave we live in is special in the sense that it is set between state trust land, the 50 year trail, Coronado National Forest, and Catalina State Park. As development from the south creeps up towards us, we see the need to preserve a wildlife corridor along the Sutherland Wash, which runs not only through our private property but others as well. The Sutherland comes from up near Charloux Gap and runs into the state park, then into the Canada Del Oro. It’s an important riparian area and water shed. The land around us has been heavily grazed so part of our mission is to help steward the watershed with native plants and erosion mitigation.
We also want to create a place for artists to work in a natural setting, to show their work, and to teach. We have started an artist residency and as of last spring our first resident, Bobbie Long, shared the results in an exhibit called “Groundward.” We are working to build a tiny house for residents to stay and work in. The tiny house will make use of grey water, solar power and water harvesting.
We hope to expand our mission as we go along and include more of the scientific community, giving them an opportunity to study and teach here as well. Already we are partnering with The Sky Island Alliance, The Coalition For Desert Protection, and The Native Plant Society. May I say? Please check our web site at www.geniuslocifoundation.org. I put a lot of time into it! And the blog has a record of many of the workshops and events we have already held.
I should mention that all the creatures, feathers and such in the piece were found as is, not taken.
SAN: This might be a good place to tell us about your involvement with the Genius Loci Foundation? Please give us an overview.
KA: The Genius Loci Foundation is an environmental not-for-profit founded by my husband, David Christiana, and myself. Our mission is “two fold - to restore, enhance and preserve riparian habitat and to champion art and nature as profound symbiotic forces.”
Feeling as strongly as we do about our natural world, we moved to a home, after about five years in Tucson, that had two acres, near Catalina State Park and Coronado National Forest. We have lived here for 21 years now. When the vacant ten acres behind us went up for sale, we were terrified to see it built on. So we went into debt to buy 7 and a half acres of it. We couldn’t afford the whole ten.
This little enclave we live in is special in the sense that it is set between state trust land, the 50 year trail, Coronado National Forest, and Catalina State Park. As development from the south creeps up towards us, we see the need to preserve a wildlife corridor along the Sutherland Wash, which runs not only through our private property but others as well. The Sutherland comes from up near Charloux Gap and runs into the state park, then into the Canada Del Oro. It’s an important riparian area and water shed. The land around us has been heavily grazed so part of our mission is to help steward the watershed with native plants and erosion mitigation.
We also want to create a place for artists to work in a natural setting, to show their work, and to teach. We have started an artist residency and as of last spring our first resident, Bobbie Long, shared the results in an exhibit called “Groundward.” We are working to build a tiny house for residents to stay and work in. The tiny house will make use of grey water, solar power and water harvesting.
We hope to expand our mission as we go along and include more of the scientific community, giving them an opportunity to study and teach here as well. Already we are partnering with The Sky Island Alliance, The Coalition For Desert Protection, and The Native Plant Society. May I say? Please check our web site at www.geniuslocifoundation.org. I put a lot of time into it! And the blog has a record of many of the workshops and events we have already held.
KAtwood_Fire:Coils and Springs_
N: Another theme in your work is impermanence. You’ve combined your photos with your artist’s books to create works like “Fire: Coils and Springs.” Do you have more books with your photography planned for this series on impermanence?
KA: Absolutely. Impermanence feeds into our whole world, and I think it is one of the hardest things in life to accept. Really, the theme of impermanence finds its way into most of my work. As I look back through these answers, I see the theme was planted in me way back during the Radio Fire on Mount Elden. Art can be a way to accept loss in our lives and cope with it.
The pictures in “Fire: Coils and Springs” are taken on the site of another fire. It’s a house that burned to the ground in the forties. It’s very near where my parents live now in Flagstaff. Most don’t notice it even though it’s along the urban trail. But if you do, you can still find pieces of melted glass in the rubble, as well as remnants of furniture and appliances. I have other books planned for this same subject, plus one that is nearly done called Fire: Workers.
KA: Absolutely. Impermanence feeds into our whole world, and I think it is one of the hardest things in life to accept. Really, the theme of impermanence finds its way into most of my work. As I look back through these answers, I see the theme was planted in me way back during the Radio Fire on Mount Elden. Art can be a way to accept loss in our lives and cope with it.
The pictures in “Fire: Coils and Springs” are taken on the site of another fire. It’s a house that burned to the ground in the forties. It’s very near where my parents live now in Flagstaff. Most don’t notice it even though it’s along the urban trail. But if you do, you can still find pieces of melted glass in the rubble, as well as remnants of furniture and appliances. I have other books planned for this same subject, plus one that is nearly done called Fire: Workers.
SAN: You seem to have a love affair with Italy going on your life. Tell us about that. Have you lived or traveled there extensively? What is it about Italy that draws you in?
KA: Yes and Yes! I love Italy and have been there many times. It holds a huge place in my world. It’s formed many of my ideas about art and life. My husband and I lived there for 5 months in 1999, in Florence. We had been there twice before so I thought living there would be a cakewalk. Boy was I wrong. It was hard as hell. I had to learn everything about functioning in a society all over again. Before this, I thought Americans had no culture to speak of. Living in Italy taught me we did indeed have one. It was strong, vital, and loved clashing with everybody else's culture. In the end it was a period that sparked much personal growth. I would never take it back and in 2005, we started going to Italy on a regular basis.
KA: Yes and Yes! I love Italy and have been there many times. It holds a huge place in my world. It’s formed many of my ideas about art and life. My husband and I lived there for 5 months in 1999, in Florence. We had been there twice before so I thought living there would be a cakewalk. Boy was I wrong. It was hard as hell. I had to learn everything about functioning in a society all over again. Before this, I thought Americans had no culture to speak of. Living in Italy taught me we did indeed have one. It was strong, vital, and loved clashing with everybody else's culture. In the end it was a period that sparked much personal growth. I would never take it back and in 2005, we started going to Italy on a regular basis.
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My husband was presented an opportunity to teach summers in a small hill town, Ovieto, Umbria. It was a totally different experience than living in Florence, a much better one. Still, on our first visit back to Florence, I kept crying: I cried at the movie theatre we used to go to, I cried at Vivoli eating gelato, I cried in the cloisters of Santa Croce. I cried standing at the front of our apartment building in the Piazza Santa Croce and kissed its brass number plate. Number 11.
So many of my pieces are about Italy because it has such a pull on my heart. “In Termini,” a Jacob’s ladder structure is about the main train station in Rome. For many years they still had the old split flap to show the times of the incoming and outgoing trains. I loved the sound of it. That “click, click, click.” I wanted a book structure that would represent this very important aspect of Termini, so chose the Jacob's ladder; it falls rather like a split flap and makes a slapping sound. The arrivals and departures sign is now digital... again, impermanence, which makes me sad. For several years, we went to Orvieto every year and traveled around Italy. Over the last sixteen years, I was introduced to the Venice Biennale and my favorite sculptural garden, the Daniel Spoerri Gardens in Tuscany. “Bella Italia,” a recent work, was made as a gift for a friend. She visited us In Orvieto in 2015, and we found a lot of freedom together. The book is a compilation of my photographs during her visit. It was rather difficult to discover the best structure and how to paginate the book, as well as being quite time consuming to work and arrange the photos to my liking. I finally decided on a Japanese side-stitch and attached the photos back to back. It took over a year to complete. It was finished for her 50th birthday. One of our most lovely days together is documented in the book. We went down to the Etruscan Necropolis to draw and all the trees were heavy with fruit. This area in Umbria is so fecund; you’ll be walking through a forest that seems to have gone wild again and there will be a pear tree with fruit, then a persimmon, a fig, cherries etc. Amazing! So in the necropolis we began to pick the fruit. It was beginning to grow over-ripe under the sun and there was so much of it. We couldn’t waste it. We ate it right off the trees and then collected more to take back to our apartment, filling our bags with apricots and cherries. Steffanie made a delicious cobbler that night. Oh, and we did draw and inspected the dirt that some archeology students dug up. |
KAtwood_Bella Italia_ (cover)
KAtwood_Bella Italia_ (detail)
KAtwood_Termini_ (detail)
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KAtwood_Shelves_
SAN: Would you agree that your theme of impermanence comes out in your Italy photos as well as in your Arizona photos?
KA: Absolutely. It all ties together. I am actually very drawn to photographing abandonment and decay wherever I go. It has a great sadness to it but also real beauty; and it has a story, an important one. My parents took our family on a trip to Bora Bora in 2015, and there were quite a few abandoned resorts. They were so great that I spent much of my time there photographing them. So in a place like Italy, where everything is so old, you can find many abandoned buildings. Every time we’ve been there I want to stop, explore inside and photograph. The problem is that no one else wants to. In 2015, I overcame my fear, rented a car and took off on my own. I had the most wonderful time and that is when I found the house where I photographed “Shelves” and “School Chairs” in addition to many others. I never felt so proud of crawling through pigeon poop.
KA: Absolutely. It all ties together. I am actually very drawn to photographing abandonment and decay wherever I go. It has a great sadness to it but also real beauty; and it has a story, an important one. My parents took our family on a trip to Bora Bora in 2015, and there were quite a few abandoned resorts. They were so great that I spent much of my time there photographing them. So in a place like Italy, where everything is so old, you can find many abandoned buildings. Every time we’ve been there I want to stop, explore inside and photograph. The problem is that no one else wants to. In 2015, I overcame my fear, rented a car and took off on my own. I had the most wonderful time and that is when I found the house where I photographed “Shelves” and “School Chairs” in addition to many others. I never felt so proud of crawling through pigeon poop.
KAtwood_School Chairs, Umbria_
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KAtwood_Abandoned Farm, Umbria_
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KAtwood_All Things Venetian_
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KAtwood_The Lottery_
KAtwood_The Lottery_ (detail)
KAtwood_Plagues_
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SAN: Your MFA is in Creative Writing. Do you do much writing these days? Do you include your writing with your books?
KA: I don’t do much creative writing these days, but I do still include it from time to in my work. Words are still very important to me, and they like to show up. I still write poetry, but when I do it just comes and I consider it a gift. I don’t rule writing out though. It could raise its head again at any time. SAN: What are you working on now? KA: I am working on several things. I am working on an altered book from James Michener’s Hawaii, where I am particularly looking at the section about Bora Bora. It’s my favorite section of the book and now having been there I see the Bora Borans preparing to leave their beautiful island in search of peace and religious freedom, gathering all the things they will take to Hawaii, such as flowers, pigs, chickens; and of course their gods, Tane who is gentle, the god of Bora Bora and Pere the goddess of fire and volcanos. I recently finished quite a large assemblage based on Shirley Jackson’s short story “The Lottery.” It’s really my first and I quite proud of it. The work caries her title, and I consider it a case from an archeological find. This time we have found the lost village that Jackson writes about and created a museum piece with some of the objects found there. You know, stones, the Farmers’ Almanac, old barn wood. I am also working on a new series of small assemblages titled “Plagues.” SAN: What do you think would make life easier for the artists of southern Arizona? KA: That’s a tough question. Places to work that inspire. Places to show that work. We are trying to do that through the Genius Loci Foundation. I think the most important thing is to support one-another emotionally. Spending a day working along side another artist can be a lovely thing. See more of Kristie Atwood’s work here: http://www.kristieatwoodbooks.com/ |