Interview with Artist April White
August 2009
Where did you grown up?
Ontario, Canada.
When did you first realize your artistic talent and do you have formal training?
I have been drawing for as long as I can remember. I did a fine arts degree at York University in Toronto, Canada.
Describe your style of art work.
I don’t think I have any particular style. Unless it’s a style (which I can’t put into words) that is constantly being pushed in different directions. I am always jumping between mediums also. Last year I was focused on a series of oil paintings of birds and now I’m doing some mixed media on board and some digital designs for postcards and t-shirts.
Who/what inspires you?
I am inspired but a range of things. Sometimes I see beautiful things in the world that I want to give another life to on canvas, such as in the bird series. A lot of my inspiration though just comes from within. There’s a world of emotion inside me that when put into pictures relieves a bit of the pressure.
What is your advice to other artists?
Just keep creating.
Where do you work/live and what do you like about it?
I live in Newtown, Sydney Australia and I like Newtown for its creative energy. There is a history in this area of vibrancy and freedom of expression. I work in Lennox Street Studios, Newtown, where I feel surrounded by and connected to people on a similar creative path as I am.
What does it mean to you to be a practicing artist?
The great thing about being an artist is creating something original, by hand. There is a sense of adventure about it because I work without a plan, so it is exciting to see what is going to happen next.
With art I get to explore different places within my own mind. These are places that don’t exist, but come out in my paintings. Sometimes they are deeply troubling, but they demand expression and come out on to the canvas (or whatever surface I’m using). The act of giving them representation gives me joy and allows me to be at peace, even if some of the material is itself challenging.
You started your career as a commercial designer in an ad agency. Has this influenced the way you paint?
The thing with art is that I can do what I want; it is a completely separate reality from the commercial world. No one is there telling me what to create and the purpose behind it is way more meaningful than an ad for BMW. The purpose is something I want to do it for. It is about doing something that is coming from somewhere inside of me that I don’t fully understand but just have to do it. It comes from my soul, it feeds my soul and I think the audience for art has a similar connection to it.
Each piece of art is something you can’t find anywhere else in the world; it is original and shows my own inner world translated in to pictures and presented in a different way. There are colours and shapes and patterns all being put together the way I conceived of them. It is something that doesn’t exist until I create it, but yet communicates in the same language with people who respond and relate to it and bring their own stories to go with it.
There is incredible satisfaction in putting artwork out there and seeing how people respond. With art there is no next thing, no action the art work is steering you towards, just the opportunity to respond at any level. Response to artwork is not a tangible thing, but it is very real.
Do you think art patrons want emotionally challenging art work?
Not everyone does! But most art patrons want to get a feeling or a thought process from an art work they live with. If there was no emotional response then people would not buy it. There’s the whole “will it match the couch” thing but original art goes much deeper than that and it enters in to a whole dialogue with the people who walk past it every day.
A lot of art is subjective. We recently had a 9 year old interviewing artists at the studio on a video camera and his questions were straight-up – “do you like hot or cold?”, “do you like circles or squares” and it got me thinking that we just need to admit sometimes our responses to art can be that basic. But basic is often very deep too, so we need to give our basic instincts credit.
Is it hard to paint difficult subjects, but I think it comes down to the depth of connection with the viewer. The work of some well-known artists is noticed and valued highly, not because it is beautiful, but because it speaks of something that their fans want to see. I guess it is because they can relate to the thoughts or feelings expressed and have their own discussion with them. There is something about people wanting to recognise how they feel – myself included. It is cool when art expresses something that is dark or uncomfortable that I feel that I can’t express, and it gets that thing out in the open for the discussion to continue.
You were originally from Canada and have practiced in Australia and Thailand. Does the place you are in affect the art you do?
I am part of the backpacker generation so overt Nationality is not a major influence in my art. Landscape however does inform part of the human experience. I originally come from Canada which is cold and white in winter, then turns green, yellow, orange and red in the fall when the Maple leaves change. Australia has ancient greens and burnt oranges, not enough water, and a big dry desert in the centre that is too hot to be habitat for anything but the most hardy species. Both countries are full of people that come from various places and become affected by the landscape they are in. The places we live in, do affect us but deeply, silently and unconsciously.