“Pay Attention, Pay Attention, Pay Attention,” said Kiki Smith
Artist Lecture: Kiki Smith at Kane Hall, University of Washington, March 4th, 2010
Trying to find parking before a lecture can be torturous. My ticket was in will-call, so my friends dropped me off. Fortune would have it, that since my name falls in N-Z, I could head past several people, have my name checked, get a hand stamp and enter with all the ticket holders, 5th row, near the podium, not bad. My friends showed up and I ran to the bathroom. And who is peeing in the stall next to me, none other than Kiki Smith. I recognized her voice from videos. Her voice is very much her voice. So while washing hands, I asked, “Do you get nervous before these things?” She answered personably, “Oh these talks are fine, it’s just that they can go shitty or really great.”
It was a full auditorium, Liz Brown, Chief Curator of the Henry Art Gallery at the UW made a few thank-yous and gave the briefest introduction to the artist, who then took the podium. It were as though she was talking with us in the kitchen. She talked of being a print maker and how it can get a bad rap in the art world, about the hierarchy of mediums, and the accessibility today of the image, and its reproducibility. She talked about growing up with her father, the sculptor Tony Smith, and made statements like, “life wasn’t worth living if you didn’t make art.” and that inevitably, “it can be inherently dissatisfying, that’s why we keep going back to it.” She recommended that we pay attention, that artists can revitalize their surroundings, and see things in new ways. She said, “Creativity is given to you freely,” and later she joked, “but not all day, every day.” She suggested that we can have quiet spaces in our lives where we open up and listen.
She discussed examining meaning, turning things on all their sides, like in Cubism, ideas can exist simultaneously, they can be wholistic and conflicted. It was liberating to listen, and reassuring to trust one’s own process and just make. Probably what had the deepest impact was her sharing about being a maker, using her hands, drawing, tearing, twisting, cutting paper, making marks. That that is something we need to do. I was reminded of that tonight.
In the end her prediction at the sink was the latter of the two for me. Someone asked her, “do you always know the meaning of what you are working on while working?” She responded, “No, in the unknown we get to blossom, so blossom away.”
March 5th, 2010 at 9:04 pm
Wow, what an amazing opportunity. I would love to hear her speak. I am glad that you had this great opportunity. I like what you have typed and this is something that i keep telling myself. In the end that if you just do, just make, and then listen…. I will discover so much about this world.
Missing you,
Jeffrey