LandEscape A r t R e v i e w Anniversary Edition C o n t e m p o r a r y Henriette Busch ART SVEN FROEKJAER-JENSEN SETH COLLIER MARY ST.GEORGE THOMAS PICKARSKI RICK BOGACZ MIKE MCCONNELL CHARY HILU SAMANTA MASUCCO HENRIETTE BUSCH
SUMMARY Canada C o n t e m p o r a r y A r t R e v i e w Denmark In my work I attempt to capture the essence of things - places and houses lived in long ago whose vivid colours and scents, whose windows and doorways have lingered at the edge of my memory. I explore the relationship between the reality of the place or object and the imagined reality, in order to transform often quite ordinary images so that they become exotic and mysterious. I want to create an illusion, a feeling of heightened awareness in my images which in their final version often bear no resemblance to the original but have become enhanced and imbued with a dreamlike quality. Our memories too work like that - we often see past events and places in our minds eye in an enhanced way, and give them qualities they never really had. Special Issue Argentina Germany / United Kingdom Land scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW USA My recent work focuses on the subject of abandoned buildings in Portugal. With a background in architecture and art I always gravitate to this theme. There is plenty of mystery and history in decaying buildings and gardens. The textures, colours and sense of materials merging into the undergrowth is evocative. Sometimes there is an element of rebirth when new buildings and their surroundings emerge to beat back the undergrowth and establish themselves again in a new format on the land. I have found that a combination of collage and photo transfer are my preferred media. I dye transparent papers, occasionally find appropriate magazine cuttings and work to splice and glue them together. Sometimes I draw and paint. I work on paper and canvas. I also make videos and have made one that relates to this theme called ‘Trespassing’ where my artworks are integral with the short film. Born and raised in Toronto, Rick has been adhering to an essentialist philosophy for most of his working life. As a journalist, he was focused on the editing process a daily basis, removing what was unnecessary and leaving what was an uncluttered and crucial experience for the audience so that they may gain a better understanding of the world around them.He later followed author Greg McKeown’s view that life is about challenging the core assumption of ‘we can have it all’ and ‘I have to do everything’ and replacing it with the pursuit of ‘the right thing, in the right way, at the right time’. Combined with the Japanese philosophy of Ma - the celebration of the space between things - Rick's goal with his photography is to evoke a calming esthetic that is both gentle and elegant. Negative space becomes as important to developing the image as the key subject matter itself. Behind every painting is a consciousness, and in the consciousness the memories create an identity – and a landscape mixed with memory, like a trunk of treasures. Below here you can find paintings of Danish landscapes. Most of them are created recently, and you can just enjoy them as windows to chosen places in Denmark. But since all these paintings are born as a mix of the memory of the past expressed through the shape of a landscape, maybe you can encounter yourself in the pictures in this book. In this project I have strived to create my memoires form important moments of my past. But instead of just writing it down, as normally done, I have combined the memory with a painting of a landscape. Argentina Chary Hilu’s works are conceived as a response to the sensations, feelings and experiences evoked by extreme situations. Through them she tries to express all the emotions that move her. In the collages she uses materials that he recycles, that she finds or that he has at hand. In his hands the materials transform, they are resilient. They take on a different meaning, have a different destiny. The works emerge from the context. They adapt to the context and are changed according to the context. They acquire an expressive power that results from the combination of technique and emotion. Jorge Rojas Naima Karim Cécile Filipe Samanta Masucco explores the intimate meeting of elements, cycles and poetics. She uses the brush, the camera and other tools to create a visual gesture that later grows into abstraction. In search of the essence of images, she considers both formal and informal compositional aspects, achieving works with powerful intention and emotion. In each one, she undertakes the challenge of uniting the real and the surreal, discovering the private in the public, because everything forms value and uniqueness. She uses black and white as a contrast of living matter and emptiness intertwining and its organic encounter with colours, as a metaphor for the pulse of life. In her works we find strength and determination, movement and also silence. Nature and life claim protagonism. She began her studies in drawing and painting at a very young age. Sven Froekjaer-Jensen Samanta Masucco Henriette Busch Rick Bogacz Mary St.George Chary Hilu
Special Issue Special thanks to Miya Ando, Juerg Luedi, Urte Beyer, Beth Krensky, Rudiger Fischer, Lisa Birke, Haylee Lenkey, Martin Gantman, Ariane Littman, Max Epstein, Nicolas Vionnet, Sapir Kesem Leary, Greg Condon, Jasper Van Loon, Alexandre Dang, Christian Gastaldi, Larry Cwik, Michael Nelson, Dana Taylor, Michael Sweeney, Colette Hosmer, Melissa Moffat, Marinda Scaramanga and Artemis Herber. SUMMARY Land scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW United Kingdom Madness has implications on my work, because I believe the Mad have a necessary prerogative to occupy the limited number of social roles afforded to them. Historically, these are the roles of the shamans, prophets, occultists, psychonauts, and artists. Our typically unspoken social contract permits the Sane to incarcerate the Mad and define them as outsiders, but in exchange, the Mad are permitted to leverage alternative forms of perception and communication in order to observe and critique society from its outer limits. My work strives to incorporate this approach in order to consciously occupy the role of Madman and treat artmaking as an extension of the prophetic tradition – synthesizing historical cultural elements to create visuals which interrogate society and examine psycho-spiritual experience. 4 28 Rick Bogacz lives and works in Toronto, Canada Samanta Masucco lives and works in Buenos Aires, Argentina Mary St.George lives and works in Lisboa, Portugal Thomas Pickarski lives and works in New York City, USA Seth Collier lives and works in the State of Washington, USA Chary Hilu lives and works in Argentina Mike McConnell lives and works in Maryland, USA Sven Froekjaer-Jensen lives and works in Denmark Henriette Busch lives and works in St. Albans, United Kingdom 52 80 108 132 166 194 230 My paintings, drawings, and constructions are fueled by life experiences and nature.I work intuitively, combining, editing, and recombining marks into compositions that are unexpectedly recognizable. I don’t set out to tell a story, but my many years as an illustrator inevitably weave their way into my work. I don’t want to learn anything from what I paint. I often look at things in my work and wonder what I did to make them. What I want from finishing a piece is the confidence to start the next one and know it will end up making me happy. In the process of finishing a piece, I want to step back and giggle USA Joe O’Brien USA The day I moved to a desert as a teenager, someone welcoming me to the area said, “Look how big the sky is!” I became intrigued with how landscapes that are void of most vegetation can strikingly portray the illusion of vast spaciousness, as well as allow for a direct experience with the raw forms, colors, and surfaces that might otherwise be obscured by grass, moss, or trees. For this body of work, I traveled extensively through the treeless arctic deserts of Iceland, the world's driest desert, Atacama of Northern Chile, the deserts of the American West, and the mouth of the ice fjord in Greenland where the most productive glacier in the Northern Hemisphere surrenders to the sea. I've created a series of landscape photographs that offer a glimpse of the most remote corners of the world, while also addressing the climate crisis in unique ways including through a spoken-word short film that is set in an imagined future. These natural and sometimes fabricated fantasy-like settings invoke the beauty and drama of fairy tales when long-ago giants and elves walked the earth. Mike McConnell Seth Collier Thomas Pickarski
Hello Rick and welcome to LandEscape. Before starting to elaborate about your artistic production and we would like to invite our readers to visit https://www.rickbogaczphotography.com in order to get a wide idea about your artistic production, and we would start this interview An interview by Josh Ryder, curator and Melissa C. Hilborn, curator [email protected] Land scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW LandEscape meets Rick Bogacz Born and raised in Toronto, Rick has been adhering to an essentialist philosophy for most of his working life. As a journalist, he was focused on the editing process a daily basis, removing what was unnecessary and leaving what was an uncluttered and crucial experience for the audience so that they may gain a better understanding of the world around them. He later followed author Greg McKeown’s view that life is about challenging the core assumption of ‘we can have it all’ and ‘I have to do everything’ and replacing it with the pursuit of ‘the right thing, in the right way, at the right time’. Combined with the Japanese philosophy of Ma - the celebration of the space between things - Rick's goal with his photography is to evoke a calming esthetic that is both gentle and elegant. Negative space becomes as important to developing the image as the key subject matter itself. Minimalist artists such as Michael Kenna, Christopher Pratt and Peter Dusek have all influenced Rick’s approach to the photographic medium. Early in his career Rick worked exclusively in film but moved over to digital a number of years ago as it grew in popularity and accessibility. He also likes the flexibility that it offers particularly in the postproduction environment where he uses Photoshop and Lightroom interchangeably. And while some of Rick’s landscape images are of man-made structures and nature in urban settings, he will often travel to rural areas north of his hometown of Toronto, Ontario to seek inspiration. It's in these rural locations that he gains a greater sense of space and lines to capture quiet balance, tranquility and stability. Rick recently was part of a group photography show at the Elaine Fleck Gallery in Toronto and was a Featured Fine Art Photographer for Issue #5 of the Noir Black and White Magazine. He has also exhibited at the Blank Wall Gallery in Athens, the Praxis Gallery in Minneapolis, the Black Box Gallery in Portland Oregon and the Capital Culture House Gallery in Madrid Spain. In the 1990s, he also participated in three exhibitions for the long-running annual Contact Photo Festival in Toronto.
with a couple of questions about your background. Are there any particular experiences that did particularly influence your evolution as a visual artist? In particular, how does your cultural substratum due to your works as a journalist direct your current artistic research? Rick Bogacz: My dad loved to sketch and paint in his spare time. I think early in my childhood he was one of my biggest influences, always encouraging me to explore art whether it was visually through painting and photography or through writing. As a teenager, while I loved art, I found painting to be a frustrating experience. I just felt I could never get the right tones. It was then that I turned to photography. I can’t really remember when I first picked up a camera but I was intrigued by the results when I first tried it. Throughout my career as a journalist, it was all about editing and removing what was unnecessary to get to the root of the story. That discipline of concentrating on what is essential influenced my work as an artist to a large degree. The body of works that we have selected for this special edition of LandEscape and that our readers have already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article has at once captured our attention for the way it unveils the connection between reality and abstraction within the theme of landscape. When walking our readers through your usual setup and scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Special Edition
Rick Bogacz scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land I Wish I Could Sail Away
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Rick Bogacz scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land process, would you tell us something about your technical equipment? Rick Bogacz: I try to keep the equipment fairlylight. I use a Canon 90D camera with two lens – a 16-35 Zoom and a 28-70 Zoom. I use Hoya Pro ND 1000 filters for my long exposure work. The long exposures force me to slow down and really concentrate on the subject matter and the steps required to produce a decent image. It’s a lot different from street photography or photojournalistic work, where you are looking to capture a specific moment. I find, at least for me, that the landscapes and abstracts are a more deliberate process. With their unique essential quality on the visual espect, your works seem to be laboriously structured to pursue such effective and at the same time thoughtful visual impact: what was your working schedule like? Did you carefully plan each shot? Rick Bogacz: I do a lot of scouting of locations and will often take images with my phone of things that I want to shoot later with the full setup of equipment. I also use Google Maps to look at street views before I head out to a site that I want to shoot. This helps save time and reduces that amount of travel required. Once I get to the location however, it’s often a matter of dealing with certain unforeseen conditions – particularly in winter. But sometimes these can result in a great image that I had not anticipated when doing the
Trees in High Park
scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Special Edition research. So there is always some element of surprise when going out on a location to shoot. With their unique almost dreamlike atmosphere, I Wish I Could Sail Away and Horses Grazing remind us of the concept of non lieu elaborated by French anthropologist Marc Augé. We definitely love such seductive visual ambivalence, that draws the viewers through the liminal area of perception where reality and imagination find such unexpected point of convergence. As a visual artist whose work is focussed on real enviromental images, how do you consider the relationship between reality and imagination playing within your process? Are you particularly interested in arousing emotions that goes beyond the realm of visual perception? Rick Bogacz: It’s interesting. When I shot Horses Graziing and I Wish I Could Sail Away it felt more like photojournalistic moments where you come across a situation that develops right before your eyes. For I Wish I Could Sail Away my initial intention was to shoot sail boats in a Toronto harbor that was shrouded in morning fog. I walked a few more meters and came upon the lone figure on the pier. At that point I began to work quickly to capture that image before the individual moved out of the frame. It all happened rather quickly so my priority was to focus on the reality of the scenario but use composition as a source of imagination. I knew right away I had an image that I would be happy with. The emotion starts there and
Rick Bogacz scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Windswept Pine
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hopefully others who view the work have similar reactions. Your works drawn heavily from the peculiar specifics of the environment and feature both urban and rural environmental settings, more specifically from areas north of Toronto, that communicate deep deep tranquility, as the stimulating Wind swept Pine. What does appeal you of such locations? Moreover, how important is for you to capture the ambiance of locations that are connected to your daily life's experience? Photography to me, perhaps like other art, is a a solitary endeavor. I can work with other photographers in a group setting but even then you are essentially on your own, creating your own vision. I think that is why I am partly drawn to these rural locations. They are quiet and ethereal. There is less stress and less influence by man. In the winters, particularly, I photograph north of Toronto because the environment is untouched, the snow and air are pure. So, no, I don’t think of trying to capture the ambience of locations that are connected to my daily life’s experience because I live in a city that is congested and busy. I feel that I try to move away from that with my work and create a sense of serenity. As you have remarked in your artist's statement, negative space becomes as important to developing the image as the key subject matter itself. How does Japanese philosophy of Ma influence your creative practice? Rick Bogacz scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land
Rick Bogacz: By creating space, the goal is to ensure the main subject or subjects of the image come to life, in a sense. It’s also a personal preference for me in terms of how I live my life. I am not a fan of clutter or disorganization and I guess that shows in my artistic work. Your photographs feature captivating black and white composition able to orchestrating realism with intimate visionary quality: what were your aesthetic decisions when shooting? In particular, how do you decide to shoot in black and white or color? Rick Bogacz: I became a fan of black and white photography early on, influenced by the work of Andre Kertesz, Mary Ellen Mark, James Nachtwey and Michael Kenna among others. The textures and mood that black and white photographs evoke simply had more of an impact on me than colour images. Yet, later in my life I was influenced by the sculptures of Donald Judd, the paintings of Canadian artist Christopher Pratt and American painter Edward Hopper. The common theme among this trio of artists was their minimalist approach to their work. I then saw the beautiful photographs of everyday objects and urban environments by the photographer George Byrne. His use of pastel colors and lighting really had an impact on me so now I am mixing both the black and white for landscapes and colour for the environmental abstract work scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Special Edition
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that I do. And another factor, quite simply, is the weather. I prefer overcast skies for landscapes and bright sunny days for colour abstracts, where the contrast, shadows and saturation are enhanced. Manipulation in visual arts is not new, but digital technology and related software tools have dramatically extended the range of possibilities: as a photographer who once worked exclusively in film, how did the introduction of digital cameras, as well as Photoshop and Lightroom impact on your practice? Rick Bogacz: I really believe digital technology has allowed me more time and flexibility to create content. It also provides more editing options in the post production stages. However, having said that, I try to be mindful about overusing tools like Photoshop and Lightroom. Burning, dodging and correcting for dust marks are still three of the most utilized practices that I scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Special Edition Orange Vertical Wall Red Garage Doors
incorporate when producing images and these are all holdovers from my film days. In a controversial quote, German photographer Thomas Ruff stated that ''nowadays you don't have to paint to be an artist: you can photography in a realistic way". Provocatively, the German photographer highlighted the short circuit between the act of looking and that of thinking critically about images: how do you consider the role of photography in our contemporary age, constantly saturated by ubiquitous images? Rick Bogacz: Mobile phones have definitely made the act of taking pictures more accessible and the result has been a flood of images that may only hold a certain reverence for a few people. However, like a well-crafted painting, there are a set of esthetics that come into play when producing a lasting photographic image. Those photographs will still have a role in producing a record of our time on this planet. You are an awarded artist and over the years you have exhibited in many occasions, including your recent participation to a group show at the Elaine Fleck Gallery, in Toronto. How do you consider the nature of scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Rick Bogacz Land Parking Garage, The Stock Yards, Toronto Pharmacy
your relationship with your audience? By the way, as the move of Art from traditional gallery spaces, to street and especially to online platforms — as scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Special Edition Stop Sign, Abandoned Shopping Centre
Instagram — increases, how would in your opinion change the relationship with a globalised audience? Rick Bogacz: As I mentioned earlier, new technologies and social media have certainly made art more accessible especially for new and emerging artists. I have developed relationships with people on a global scale through my instagram account https://www.instagram.com/rickbogaczphoto graphy that probably would not have been Rick Bogacz scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Green Brick Wall
possible without these new communication tools. But one has to remember that these are still just platforms, or tools for getting your work out there. The onus is still on the artist to create strategies and tactics to grow new audiences which is something that I am still grappling with. By the way, my advice to younger artists is to learn the scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Special Edition Shopping Carts
business side of your vocation. It will prove invaluable. On the flip side of new tech, however, it’s hard to beat the physical real time interaction with art that galleries provide. I am hopeful that people will always want to support those spaces, particularly the smaller galleries which are great at creating a sense of community. We have really appreciated the multifaceted nature of your artistic research and before leaving this stimulating conversation we would like to thank you for chatting with us and for sharing your thoughts, Rick. What projects are you currently working on, and what are some of the ideas that you hope to explore in the future? Rick Bogacz: In September I will be attending a photographic workshop in northern Ontario where the Canadian Group of Seven artists painted and captured this beautiful country’s landscape. I want to keep developing my craft and perfecting my use of the tools that I have at my disposal to create lasting images. I also want to continue to straddle the world between black and white long exposures and the colour abstracts and look to the possibility of a solo show in the near future. scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Rick Bogacz Land An interview by Josh Ryder, curator and Melissa C. Hilborn, curator [email protected]
Hello Samanta and welcome to LandEscape. Before starting to elaborate about your artistic production and we would like to invite our readers to visit https://www.behance.net/samantamas3cc9 in order to get a wide idea about your artistic production, and we would start this interview with a couple of questions about your background. You have a solid formal training: you graduated from the National University of Arts and you are nurturing your education with a Post-Graduate Degree in Combined Artistic Languages: how do these formative years influence your evolution as an artist? In particular, what role does play intuition in the composition of your pallette? Samanta Masucco: First of all, I want to thank you for the opportunity to be in this wonderful space for artistic exchange. The artistic career entails a deep responsibility Samanta Masucco (Buenos Aires, 1980) is an Argentine artist who builds her artworks from contemplation, dialogue and interaction with nature and socio-cultural reality. The artist explores the intimate meeting of elements, cycles and poetics. She uses the brush, the camera and other tools to create a visual gesture that later grows into abstraction. In search of the essence of images, she considers both formal and informal compositional aspects, achieving works with powerful intention and emotion. In each one, she undertakes the challenge of uniting the real and the surreal, discovering the private in the public, because everything forms value and uniqueness. She uses black and white as a contrast of living matter and emptiness intertwining and its organic encounter with colours, as a metaphor for the pulse of life. In her works we find strength and determination, movement and also silence. Nature and life claim protagonism. She began her studies in drawing and painting at a very young age. Graduated from the National University of the Arts (Argentina), she is currently studying a postgraduate degree in Combined Artistic Languages at the same institution. She works autonomously as a painter, visual artist and Fine Arts teacher with twenty years of experience. Directs and carries out projects with interdisciplinary art groups. She participates in individual and collective exhibitions in different public and private spaces. An interview by Josh Ryder, curator and Melissa C. Hilborn, curator [email protected] Land scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW LandEscape meets Samanta Masucco
templo de aire andino, oil on canvas, 40x60cm, 2022
and commitment to myself and to the environment, it requires a lot of work and perseverance. At the same time, the artistic path is not unique or static, on the contrary, it is multiple, dynamic and flows and each experience makes me learn and grow personally and professionally. So, when I work, the meeting between formal training Samanta Masucco scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land templo de aire andino, oil on canvas, 60x60cm, 2022
and personal experiences is decisive. I discovered my vocation when I was very young, during early childhood and that strong impulse needed to be channeled. I began to study to make it grow and find its best expression. I studied at the National University of the Arts and then continued studying new media and specializations. The scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Special Edition aereo, oil on canvas, 60x60cm, 2022
challenges and lessons were many and the interesting thing is that they never end. I believe that such studies enhance my creative intuition. It is not possible to separate the intuitive and the formative, both are always present and interact. But, somehow, I play with them, I give each one a leading role at different moments on my Samanta Masucco scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land cantemos, oil on canvas, 60x60cm, 2021
creative process. So, the spontaneous and intuitive always take the first step in the creation of my works and then allow the concepts acquired in the academy to participate more strongly. A very clear example is my latest series of paintings and photographs in which I address the concepts of internal and external, journeys scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Special Edition Elementos, oil on canvas, 60x60cm, 2020
Elaine Crowe scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land from the landscape to the interior of the psyche. Later I discovered that these paradoxes were similar to Lacan's term “extimacy”. From there, new creative ideas emerged in me so, far from having finished the series, I think it is just beginning. Many times, that which flows spontaneously, accompanied by other knowledge, ends up nocturno, oil on canvas, 60x60cm, 2020
growing even more, opening new possibilities and messages. As for the color palette, I can say that it is extremely important because it builds climates and with them, symbols and messages. The choice of colors is also a reflection of my interior, of my moods. I believe that everything is linked and manifested in art, scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Special Edition no te detengas alma sobre el borde, watercolor, 50x40cm, 2021
from the studio to the work, from introspection to social empathy and our bond with nature and the environment. I went through different artistic stages and I want to continue experimenting with various techniques, visual elements and their expressive, compositional and discursive possibilities. For this special edition of LandEscape we have selected your triptych Templo de Aire Andino a stimulating work — that our readers have already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article — that as at once captured our attention for the way it unveil the connections between ordinary life experience and the dreamlike dimension, highlighting at the same time the uniqueness of the viewers' response to the work of art. When walking our readers through the genesis of Templo de Aire Andino, would you tell us something about your usual setup and process? Samanta Masucco: I work from ordinary life experience, own and shared paths, landscapes as a cultural linkage. Umberto Eco explains that every artwork is an open work and I attach great importance to the role of the viewers and their return, the way my works resonate with others. Templo de Aire Andino arises from the contemplation of nature and the poetics of its elements and cycles. Although I live and work in Buenos Aires, these paintings are inspired by the Valle de los Molles, Mendoza Province, southern Argentina. There, the landscape changes a lot in each season so I tried to represent those changes with the color palettes and the intensity of the brush strokes. In the Andes Mountains, the air is extremely pure and you can breathe a kind of ancestral connection between nature and the culture of the place. That is the configuration of Templo de Aire Andino and of my artistic production in general. I keep Samanta Masucco scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land respiradero volcanico, oil on canvas, 120x60, 2022
in me the landscapes, colors, climates and sensations and I think that is the reason of dreamlike and poetic sensation. The tones of your works — be they intense as in Contrapunto, be they marked out with such thoughtful, almost meditative Black and White ambiance — create delicate tension and dynamics: how does your own psychological make-up determine the nuances of tones that you decide to include in your works? Samanta Masucco: Colour is one of the most important elements in my works and I really enjoy combining and mixing them, varying their hue and brightness. Colour has great power and its symbology can say a lot. So I don't choose them capriciously, because they are very important signifiers. Black and white can be tense and reflective at the same time, I seek to give them a dynamic condition, as a contrast of living matter and emptiness intertwining, they represent an organic and free encounter. The colours as light and the impulse of life and, finally, the figures as elements of transformation. The act of painting transports me to a very special and intimate place and being able to share it and know that it is appreciated in that sense pleases me very much. scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Special Edition Viñetas, mixed technique on canvas, 40x60, 2021
We dare say that your artistic production capture the essence of reality and you use your sensitive observation, paintbrushes, colors and textures as creationist instruments of your visual gestures: how does your everyday life's experience and your memories fuel your creative process? Samanta Masucco: We can understand the creative process as an act of remembrance that returns to the essence of things, places or situations experienced. All experiences, past and current, happy and sad, make me grow as a person and, of course, as an artist too. For example, the memories of my childhood and motherhood, in all its stages, are crucial for me, they are my pillars because they fill my life with emotion and strength. We highly appreciate the way your works address the viewers to dive into the dreamlike dimension, helping them to discover its connection with ordinary experience. Scottish painter Peter Doig once remarked that even the most realistic paintings are derived more from within the head than from what's out there in front of us, how do you consider the relationship between reality and imagination, playing within your artistic production? Samanta Masucco scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land
Samanta Masucco: I deeply admire the work of Peter Doig and Armando Reverón, as well as other great masters such as Hokusai, Nolde, Van Gogh, etc. I admire the way art can connect so many things, build bridges in many ways. Landscapes foster this connection. My works arise scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Special Edition cueva de azufre
from that encounter, from that dialogue and, therefore, I don´t work with photographic realism in my artistic production, because they are images that were born outside and later internalized to finally be shown again. They are no longer the same landscapes, they are something different, something new. scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Samanta Masucco Land dentro
Your artworks convey such stimulating visual ambivalence, that invites the spectatorship to such participative effort in order to realize their own interpretation. Austrian Art historian Ernst Gombrich once remarked the importance of providing a scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Special Edition cueva d’ eazufre
space for the viewers to project onto, so that they can actively participate in the creation of the illusion: how important is for you to trigger the viewers' imagination in order to address them to elaborate personal interpretations? In particular, how open would you like your works to be understood? Samanta Masucco: The meeting with the viewers is a great challenge, I give a lot of importance and value to their interpretations. I can't predetermine their answers, and I don't really think about it while I'm creating. So, it's always a big surprise and I like that a lot. There is a very important playful aspect on this and I am convinced that abstraction offers even more possibilities for interpretation, it offers greater openness. At the same time, when I show my work, I feel very exposed, from the most intimate. It is wonderful to be able to reach people through art, to see them contemplate a work and imagine what they are thinking or feeling. It is an invitation to explore a new space together. Marked out with balanced sense of geometry, your works — more specifically Cantemos — feature recurrent smooth contours and shapes that we dare say essential on the visual aspect. Would you tell us something about such refined geometric feeling? Samanta Masucco: Geometry is amazing, I choose to understand it as a universal language that is present in everything that surrounds us. Particularly in my artistic production, it appears as a very important spatial indicator that adds to chiaroscuro and tonal composition. I use geometry in an intuitive way, I could say that it is closer to what we see in the art of the native cultures of Latin America or Asian art. I take on the challenge of generating the sensation of multiple spaces within the work and feel that they invite you to walk through them, to enter them, to be inside them. Cantemos is a painting inspired by the homonymous poetry of the Argentine poet Juan L. Ortiz, it proposes a new way of going through his work as well. Your production encompasses also digital works: how do you consider the role of digital techniques playing within your artistic process? And how important is for you to experiment with different techniques in order to create? Samanta Masucco: I´m always ready to experiment with new techniques. I consider that any technique is opportune to create, as long as it doesn´t break the ethical limits. Technological tools expand creative possibilities and I really enjoy using them, they allow me to create with great dynamism. I use brushes and photography in the same way and I find their combination very attractive and stimulating. In addition, working with technological means opened up wonderful possibilities for teamwork with other artists, for example, with musicians. We speak of multiple practices that are combined and articulated. You are an established artist and over the years your works have been exhibited in many occasions: how do you consider the Samanta Masucco scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land
nature of your relationship with your audience? As the move of Art from traditional gallery spaces, to street and especially to online platforms — as Instagram — increases, how would in your opinion change the relationship with a globalised audience? Samanta Masucco: It´s important to recognize the tireless search of the artistic community for new alternatives that open the horizons of cultural exchange. It´s a new dynamic of communication and plurality. Presentations, fairs, interviews and digital exhibitions are excellent opportunities for artists and viewers. Although it is always wonderful and essential to be in direct, material presence with the works, these new modalities open paths of communication and growth. My relationship with the public is very varied, in my country the bond is built mostly from face-to-face, but at an international level the virutality is greater, the technological media shortened the distances in an agile way. I am very happy and grateful for the reception and circulation of my work in my country and internationally as well. Always ready for dialogue and exchange, I invite readers to find us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/samantamasu cco. We have really appreciated the multifaceted nature of your artistic research and before leaving this stimulating conversation we would like to thank you for chatting with us and for sharing your thoughts, Samanta. What projects are you currently working on, and what are some of the ideas that you hope to explore in the future? Samanta Masucco: Thank you very much, I feel honored by this wonderful space, so thank you again for your work, professionalism and warmth. I really like to experiment, I´m restless. I´m working on several projects at the same time and, in some cases, transdisciplinary with other scape CONTEMPORARY ART REVIEW Land Special Edition