Kelly Price-Colston
psychepreserved
PaperBallet.com (Official Site)
Myspace
Flickr
1) What drives you to create? Also, what inspires you and your work?
Usually my drive to create is born from inspiration via nature, animals, relationships and loss/fear/sadness. Not all of my work is depressing, per se, but I do enjoy intensity. I think above all else, I value truth in emotions and my art seems to find a home within that honesty.
2) Were you formally trained in art or self taught? Do you think it has helped you or hindered you?
I am self-taught, though I have had color & 2-d design classes as well as painting and drawing. but the current mediums I use I learned from experiential means.
3) Do you have a ritual, quirk or superstition that influences you and the way you create? (example: I must where the green underwear when I paint hair or it will look horrid, etc.)
I have a really strict routine. I am up at 7 am to get my daughter ready for school. I then go to my studio across town and walk my dogs for an hour. I then come back and work in my sketchbook and eat breakfast. Then I work until lunch and after lunch I work more until 3 pm when I go get my daughter from school and then she and I hang out. Routines are important for people with depression and artists especially. I think it can become very easy to get behind in your work and ambition if you don't create an atmosphere of professionalism for yourself.
4) What mediums do you work in the most? Do you have a particular brand that you love working with? Why do you use them?
Because I am a collage artist, I would have to say I prefer old magazines the best. The paper has become worn and slightly brittle and it's very easy to tear and shape in the hand, as opposed to newer magazines. I also like watercolor paper to collage onto for it's strength and texture. I am all about details, so I love that watercolor paper will take splattering with gouache well. The color and beauty of the paper is beyond comparison. I swear by ebony pencils for sketching and a pair of micro-tipped Fiskars scissors are a MUST in my studio. I also prefer the glue sticks that are purple and not clear glue. I like to know where I am putting my glue.
5) As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up? And now?
As a child I wanted to be a floral designer, fashion designer and singer. I still sing in my car and in the shower, but I am afraid I do not enjoy the limelight as much as I once did. Dare I say, I am even a bit reclusive... I was a floral designer for years but I kept fucking up my hands & wrists so I stopped. When I became fully disabled from my mental illness, I had to learn to occupy my time with something that was important to me, but that didn't put an obnoxious amount of stress on me or my family. I had always written and made art, but I didn't start to take myself seriously until a few friends online took note and bought work from me. One of them later gave me a few spots in her gallery.
And now? I want to be free from depression and anxiety. I realize that having obsessive compulsive disorder and post-traumatic stress disorder are not easy to recover from fully. But I don't lose hope. An enormous part of my art is grounded in the faith I have in miracles and learning to trust myself again.
6) If there was one style of art that you could take up, what would it be?
Mixed media. Ha!
7) Do you think the internet, technology, media, etcetera are helping or destroying the art world?
I love this question because I use photoshop and digital art is my biggest profit-producing medium. I don't think technology destroys anything. I think poor standards destroy art. And that happens, unfortunately, in every single medium and has since Leonardo and before. Some dipshit will ALWAYS try and create "art" because they just want to be an artist/art scene type. Me, I think art is in my bones. It's just at the core of who I am. Media and technology have not changed me; they have helped me. Whereas, new art accoutrements have helped artists for ages, so does the mouse. I certainly know that my art career wouldn't have taken off had I not had the internet at my disposal.
8) How do you deal with creator's (or writer's) block?
Sketchbook, sketchbook, sketchbook. I also have a library of art books I refer to. My studio tends to lend itself to working, but when I don't feel it, I don't force it. Sometimes, I only have that one sketch in my sketchbook and the rest of my time I flip through magazines or books. I am always learning and reading. But I think the sadness from not working keeps me from really letting artists block work me into a rut.
9) How do you prepare for art shows where your work will be shown?
I just try and keep my daughter close to me that day. As someone with social phobias and high anxiety levels anyway. It can be tough. I mean, an art show is usually what artists wait for- it's our chance to shine and show off, but that's just not who I am. I like to work, alone, and play with my doggies and my kid. Art shows are about 90% bullshit and 10% sales. Everything else is a potential contact and I treat it as such. I wish I had more time to prepare for shows and events, but it's just as well that I wait until the last minute, I've learned. You can invest a ton of money into matting, framing and work- only to not sell a damn thing. That can burn you. I think once that happens, you learn to take an art show at face value and not invest all of yourself into it.
10) At what point did you realize that creating was going to be a large part of your life?
When I was 7 or 8 I had one of those fashion designer change-plate kits. You could change out the skirt and the shirt and the faces. You turned the plates over and rubbed crayon on the textures and you could make your outfits have flowers or checkered or polka dotted. That was around 1980, I believe. At that time I wanted to design more than anything. I spent hours and hours with that little toy and I have been making things ever since.
11) What was your worst experience with art?
When my college special projects professor in art told me everything I painted looked like a vagina or had a "penetration" quality to it. I felt ill for days. Like, as a female artist, I was going to always be limited to my vagina and femaleness. I gave up art for years after that. it was only when my daughter went to kindergarten that I finally decided I HAD to work.
12) What was you best experience with art?
After I had many classes in art history and studied at the college level, I began to start seeing art in its many forms and with all the idealism behind the work. It wasn't just pretty pictures. I remember seeing many of Henry Moore's work in Kansas city at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art and just being blown away. There were just so many little treasures there. T communed with the impressionist room for an hour. But I think seeing my first Caravaggio painting was the best. For the first time, I appreciated not only the beauty of a painting, but I understood the historical context of it. The vast importance of that piece melted my heart. it was like standing in front of a time line of the world and seeing it, that exact place, visually marked by this important object. It represented to me how holy and sacred creation really is in art.
13) How would you define your style? Is it an extension of yourself, or something else entirely?
My style is very paperballet. I just don't think I can explain how to make my style happen. Nor do I know why it has evolved into what it is. I can say that I add a lot more in the beginning than what I need to work with and then I end up whittling away the pieces that don't fit. I am not sure I understand what "the self" is, so I can't be sure who creates it. I just know that when I don't do it, the shit inside my head gets really fussy and makes me feel like clawing out of reality and holing up in the studio for hours until I can feel real again.
14) What does your workspace look like? (Pictures or a description work for this one)
15) Aside from art what do you do with your time? Is there anything else that drives you or that you're passionate about?
I love my daughter. She's amazing and totally smart. She is five years old and takes a lot of energy because I refuse to be a lay-in-bed "tv babysitting" type mom. I am involved and I really love talking to her and watching her make things. I love my dogs, too. Walking them daily and playing with them has developed my sense of "play" which was limited for a long time. For many years I thought being a grown-up meant being a boring asshole. I think differently now.
