Wendy Edsall-Kerwin, a jewelry and metals artist who is also featured in this year’s Art of the State: Pennsylvania 2014, has started a running series of artist interviews that she’s doing in conjunction with the show. She reached out to me a few weeks back and the resulting interview was posted to her blog yesterday. Here’s a snippet:
1. How did you get started in your craft? (using your media)
I’ve been making art since I was a kid. I started to take it seriously in high school and then pursue it in college, where I was first introduced to the ideas of creating non-representational art. In the sculpture studios we used to collect raw materials to eventually use in our work. In the beginning of my sophomore year, one of my classmates had come in with some wood and he put a piece down in front of me, which probably didn’t measure any bigger than 10” square. It had layers upon layers of peeling and cracked paint, was all worn and dried out, and looked like it had been run through the ringer… something he probably found in a dumpster somewhere. The back of it still had a couple nail heads stuck into it and paint splatters. He threw it down on the table in front of me, pointed to it, and sarcastically said, “That’s art.” I can still remember it like it was yesterday. It was like an epiphany and it just opened my eyes like they had never been before. That you could find beauty in something old, weathered, or worn out. … something that was accidental, or that otherwise looked like it just happened naturally over time. The art I make today is still a reflection of that.
You can read the entire interview on Wendy’s blog.
Art of the State: Pennsylvania 2014 can be seen at the State Museum in Harrisburg, PA through September 14th.