Recently saw this HuffPost interview with William Bailey, via Painters' Table. Bailey is not a painter I love, but I do respect him.
Two things Bailey said strike me in different ways.
first:
"It is a remarkable time because there is a culture of young artists who are surviving somehow without the recognition of the larger art world."
Yes, that is remarkable. I guess I often focus on the frustrations of the situation, but it is still remarkable that we work and paint without that recognition. This is an encouraging statement.
second:
"Both the still lifes and the figure paintings come from my imagination. They are not done from life: they are done from memory and images in my head. So since they both have their origins in the same place its not that hard to switch from one to the other. "
This, I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around. He paints still life from his imagination! He makes them up. That just seems to be against the whole point of still life. When I was a serious still life painter, I needed to work from life. Great things happen in the spaces between your eyes and the objects and your hand. Unexpected things, lively things. I just really can't imagine making still life such an important part of my life's work, and working from imagination. His work is completely different to me now. Imaginary objects! Wow.
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