Interview with:Blakkbyrd [blakkbyrd]
ART
 | What do you do? How do you define yourself as an artist? When people ask I usually tell them I'm a contemporary artist. This tends to generate blank baffled looks.
I work in all media, drawing, painting, printmaking, photography, installation, writing, curating and arts criticism. What I am not is a traditional arts practitioner, or "gumtree painter" though I have been known to paint gum trees on occasion.
Most recently I am interested in what I call "Urban Art" which includes both "street art" and "graffiti". And in case you are wondering, no they are not the same thing. |
| Your biography in four lines. I was born in England and emigrated to Australia as a child. I had a commerce career (I have three degrees) but then moved into the arts when I was injured in an accident. Now I work largely from home. I've been based in Amsterdam for the last few years and travelled all over Europe and Asia visiting museums, attending biennales, viewing exhbitions, meeting artists and writing about it all in my blogs. I'n now back in Sydney setting up a new studio and planning to exhibit my most recent work. |
| Do you upload your work to the web? If so, where could we see it? I stopped uploading my work online because of growing concerns about copyright. There is however a CV with images on Flickr covering 1999 to 2008, and some posts about me on both the Bellebyrd and Blakkbyrd blogs. My most recent work isn't published online. |
| How do you evaluate whether an idea is good or not? A degree in arts criticism and nearly twenty year's experience in the arts gives me a fairly good indication. |
| How should a work of art be evaluated? A work of art should speak for itself, if it has to be explained in detail then it has failed. On the other hand, art without a strong conceptual underpinning also fails. |
| Which websites do you frequently visit? |
BLOGGING
| What is your blog address? What subjects do you deal with? Bellebyrd
http://printaustralia.blogspot.com/
Blakkbyrd
http://blakkbyrd.blogspot.com/
The purpose of these blogs is to bring Australian art to an overseas audience, and overseas art to an Australian audience. I find that most people outside of Australia identify Australian art with Indigenous dot paintings because that is the genre that gets the most public funding and overseas exposure. And I find that what comes into Australia, controlled by the arts stakeholders, usually re-inforces an existing aesthetic. I seek to expose Australian artists to work that they might otherwise never hear about.
Both blogs are useful educational resources, I have little time for blogs in the first person where artists talk about "what I did in the studio today". Who cares? |
| What was it that made you create your blog? On what date did you start it? My first blog covered Print Australia's activities and it was started around 2000 before blogging sites were invented. Bellebyrd and Blakkbyrd were set up on Blogspot in mid 2005.
"blog" is a corruption of "weblog" and blogging has its origins in progamming procedures where a progammer would leave a log within the program noting what changes were made on what dates. |
| How many visits a day do you get? What type of comments do you receive? Between 700 and 1000 visits a day at present. There are over 3000 blog posts and almost 500,000 hits to the sites.
All comments are moderated and most comments fall into the "thankyou for such a great resource" category. |
| What advice would you give to someone who wishes to begin a blog? Be aware that blogging is the internet equivalent of standing in front of a TV camera and dont post anything you wouldnt want your family or employers to read. |
CULTURE
| Places in the world that you have visited recently. From Amsterdam most of Europe. The Netherlands, Belgium, France, Greece, Germany, Italy, Denmark, Sweden, Uk. From Taiwan, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore.
In Australia, Sydney and Melbourne and Tasmania. |
| Do you defend urban graffiti? Yes.
Its a sad reflection on society that people accept a constant bombardment of advertising images in their daily lives, but then object to artworks placed in the streets. Graffiti is an outsider art form with very precise conventions and practices. Its also very difficult to do well and all the best practioners tend to be professional artists in their real lives, frequently the same graphic artists that make commercial art.
Why is it ok for a hamburger company to place posters up and not artists? There's a political element in the graffiti debate that is about individual rights.
Public art such as sculptures are artworks commissioned and paid for by the community. Street art is unauthorised art donated to the community by the artists.
I rather look at a tag wall than an advertisment for beer.
A large part of the Blakkbyrd blog investigates street art and graffiti from a theoretical perspective. The artists featured are carefully selected for their individuality and contribution to the movement. |
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