Quick Draw Artist Interview #6: Talia Chetrit

Quick Draw Artist Interviews is a new series of interviews conducted by Otino Corsano using Facebook's IM Chat feature. Spontaneous conversations with international artists are recorded and documented specifically for publication on this blog.

Quick: flash, so brilliant - inscribed in my eyes, so now I see through your blue lenses, so now my vision is cool you; just real and raw. Draw: art about art.

Photo by Gigi Gatewood

Talia Chetrit lives and works in New York, New York. She received her MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2008 and previously earned her BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Talia Chetrit’s recent exhibitions include The 13th Annual PRC Exhibition at the Photographic Resource Center in Boston, The Form Itself at Priska Juschka Fine Art in New York, and Full of Light, an exhibition in Memory of Bruce Conner in Los Angeles. In September 2009 she had her first solo show at Renwick Gallery, New York. Her work is currently featured in a group show titled "Tactile Gaze" at Unosunove, Arte Contemporanea, Italy from April 14th - May 15th, 2010. 
www.taliachetrit.com www.renwickgallery.com www.unosunove.com

Clear Chat History

9:21pm

Otino

Hi Talia.

I'm a good friend of Van (Hanos).

I conduct interviews.

9:21pm

Talia

Hi

Right, I remember.

9:22pm

Otino

Is Van home?

9:22pm

Talia

haha.

Van at home

9:22pm

Otino

So I do these on-the-spot IM Chat sessions I like to call "Quick Draw" interviews.  I publish them on my blog.

9:23pm

Talia

oh god!

gotta go!

9:23pm

Otino

You sound like a contestant on the old "This is Your Life" tv show.

Are you that terrified of mild critique?

9:24pm

Talia

This isn't my life.

9:24pm

Otino

Or better yet - conversation about your photography.

9:24pm

Talia

No, well maybe. Now that you ask...

Self-Portrait

9:24pm

Otino

Let me guess:

The photos speak for themselves.

9:25pm

Talia

No, not at all. They're only pictures. So they don't talk much.

9:25pm

Otino

I've been interested in speaking to you because I see so many references in your work…

then it appears the references melt away to reveal something very new

and then I'm left wondering what you have captured.

Do you draw from photographic paradigms?

Machine / Hand, 2009

9:29pm

Talia

Well, I use historical references, or historical iconography like vases and hands because they have lost so much meaning. These objects are so widely used that we don't even really see them anymore. So I use them almost like they are abstractions.

9:30pm

Otino

Are you a fan of Man Ray? I see your work associated with the Surrealists on some level:

Photograms mixed with tabletop commercial photography?

Man Ray, Rayograph, 1922

9:31pm

Talia

Yes, definitely. I think about Surrealism and Realism and how we understand images.

Man Ray is one of my favorites.

9:32pm

Otino

And then there's the crazy op art modernism...

9:32pm

Talia

hahaha

Primary Colors Flashed at White, 2008

9:32pm

Otino

Primary lights on art

9:32pm

Talia

it's all over!

9:32pm

Otino

Primary-colored lights on cut paper

Black Velvet... etc.

What's going on?

Primary Colors Flashed at Cut Paper, 2009

9:33pm

Talia

Those works were in part about exposing the mechanics and poetics of the medium.

Exploring the complex nature of the basic material.

9:34pm

Otino

Are you familiar with the Canadian artist Michael Snow and his similar photographic experiments?

Michael Snow, Slidelength, 1969-71

9:35pm

Talia

I think it's hilarious you randomly chat with people you've never met! haha.

No I haven't seen his work.

I'll look into it.

9:35pm

Otino

I think we've met - you just don't remember.

9:36pm

Talia

When?

9:36pm

Otino

Or maybe Van has told me so much about you I have a perfectly accurate picture of you in my mind.

All good things mind you.

Michael Snow, Light Blues, 1974

9:36pm

Talia

That's sweet.

9:36pm

Otino

You are the reason why all artists should date artists:

because they "just understand."

9:37pm

Talia

That's nice.

Michael Snow, Slidelength, 1969-71

9:37pm

Otino

O.k. enough sweetness

9:37pm

Talia

These are great images you're sending me

9:38pm

Otino

My molars are aching now.

They are of Michael Snow's photographic work.

Michael Snow, Immediate Delivery, 1998

9:38pm

Talia

Yea…

I figured.

They look nice!

9:39pm

Otino

There are better examples - I just can't find them now.

So how did you create the "Gradient" photo series?

I'm a huge PhotoShop fan & user.

Gradient Tool (Installation View), 2008

9:41pm

Talia

Well, I made the gradients in PhotoShop and exported them onto 8x10 film with a film recorder and printed those in the traditional black and white darkroom. Essentially it was the reversal of the contemporary photographic process.

9:41pm

Otino

Starting with print and ending with a negative.

Yet with a gradient - a negative and positive only differ in direction.

9:41pm

Talia

Starting in PhotoShop and ending with a Silver Gelatin print.

Exactly.

haha.

Gradient Tool, 2008

9:42pm

Otino

Is there an over-riding conceptual statement the process points to?

9:44pm

Talia

It's basically about how we categorize and decipher images.

9:44pm

Otino

How do we?

Gradient Tool, 2008

9:44pm

Talia

We can't.

They're all manipulated.

Indefinable.

9:45pm

Otino

Is the gradient like a test pattern: an anti-subject, frustrating any concrete reads?

Is this a satirical comment on the perfection of "zone" photography?

Gradient Tool, 2008

9:46pm

Talia

The anti-subject in ways - more the subject turns inward.

9:48pm

Otino

Would you admit your work carries a type of modernist conceit in regards to the slick aesthetic you employ?

Cube Corner, 2008

9:49pm

Talia

Sure.

It's not really that it’s slick, in my opinion, but straight forward.

9:49pm

Otino

I hope your B&W photo "Tie Dye" is meant to be at least a little funny.

Tie Dye, 2008

9:51pm

Talia

It is in a way. It's a straight photograph that is usually mistaken for a photogram. I was interested in documenting something relying on color but subtracted. Kind of funny?

9:51pm

Otino

I think so.

What is going on in the "Palomar: Experimental Photography" series?

Drawing Series (Installation View), 2009

9:53pm

Talia

Those are photograms titled "Drawing Series".

They're made with shipping materials in the darkroom.

I'm working on more "Drawings" now actually.

9:54pm

Otino

Like bubble wrap, cardboard and styrofoam pieces?

Are you still using shipping materials to create your new "Drawings"?

Drawing Series, 2009

9:56pm

Talia

No, the idea has evolved. I'll send you some images of those soon.

9:56pm

Otino

My favorite work of yours is "Vase/Grid".

Vase / Grid, 2009

9:56pm

Talia

Thanks! I'm glad you like it.

9:57pm

Otino

It is one of those simple ideas I wish was mine.

Seems like it is about photography in a way: vase as lens - or is that too simple?

10:00pm

Talia

No that's true, I was also thinking about the expectation of the grid - about the abstraction and interruption of the line.

Reading (Installation View), Renwick Gallery, 2009

10:00pm

Otino

Any shows coming up?

10:03pm

Talia

I'm in a couple group shows right now: one in Miami and one in Berlin. I'll be part of a really fun show at the Dumbo Arts Center in June (I think) with our guy, Van.

I'll keep you posted.

Primary Colors Flashed at Glass, 2009

10:05pm

Otino

I saw Van is in a new three person show in Italy @ pianissimo.

10:05pm

Talia

I know! It's going to be a great show! I'm so excited about it.

Primary Colors Flashed at Black Velvet, 2009

10:06pm

Otino

Thanks so much for taking the time to speak with me tonight Talia.

10:06pm

Talia

You just caught me straight from teaching. We had our midterm critiques tonight. OOF!

I'm happy to chat.

Thanks for your interest.

Sun, 2008

10:06pm

Otino

See - it wasn't too scary I hope.

10:06pm

Talia

Not at all.

Moon, 2008

10:06pm

Otino

This was your own midterm critique to come home to.

Sorry.

You get an "A"

Okay maybe "A-"

: )

10:07pm

Talia

Awesome!

boo!

Spectrum, 2008

10:07pm

Otino

ha.

Thanks Talia

10:08pm

Talia

Talk soon! Nice to get to know you a bit.

Photo by Gigi Gatewood

10:08pm

Otino

We already knew each other remember?

10:08pm

Talia

I know but now we know each other better.