ART, WHATEVER IT TAKES
Since the early pandemic in 2020, Rome Art Program has conducted a series of interviews, “Art, Whatever It Takes.”
Artists, Art Critics, and Art Historians living in Italy, the U.S., and U.K., share their insights during these powerful times.
Interview with Susan Grabel
Susan Grabel is a Feminist, figurative, multimedia artist and curator. Her work speaks to the human dimensions of social issues and has addressed issues of consumerism, homelessness, alienation, aging women’s bodies as well as a vision for the future titled Forward Together.
RAP: What is your definition of “Art” today?
Susan Grabel: Art is the visual expression that emerges from our need to make sense of the chaos of the world.
RAP: Art is the visual expression that emerges from our need to make sense of the chaos of the world.
Susan: Art changes along with the cultural, social and political environments as well as scientific and technological advances. We are all products of our time, and we react and interact both consciously and unconsciously with it.
RAP: When (and how) did you understand that art was becoming very important in your life?
Susan: When I was at a summer session at the University of Wisconsin in Madison at the end of my sophomore year at Brooklyn College in 1961, I took 2 courses to determine whether I would be majoring in either English Literature or Mathematics. After 2 days of Analytic Geometry and Calculus, I decided to major in English Literature. I found a sculpture course to replace the math course, and I was smitten. I spent day and night in the studio, and that was it! When I returned home, I went to the Brooklyn Museum Art School and studied with Joe Konzal, Tom Doyle and Jolyon Hofsted. It was a wonderfully dynamic place to be in the early 1960’s.
RAP: What role does art play today? What are the “great figures” who have recently changed it? Do you feel close to any of these figures?
Susan: Art represents the soul of a people, and I don’t think that has changed. It takes us beyond the minutiae of our daily lives and connects us with a universal spirit. The forms of art have changed but our reach for connection and meaning hasn’t changed. Käthe Kollwitz, Alice Neel, Eva Hesse, Hannah Wilke, Marisol, Ursula von Rydingsvard, Senga Nengudi are artists whose work I have felt close to.
RAP: Are there still traditional figures such as collectors, muses, philanthropists and patrons, in today’s art and society interaction model?
Susan: Yes there are some gallerists that function that way, but most artists that I know just plug away and make their own possibilities.
RAP: How have the new technologies and media culture changed art today, improving or worsening it…? What do you feel are your biggest challenges?
Susan: It’s not a question of improving or worsening art. Technology and media are merely tools that provide new opportunities for creative expression. I find new technologies to be very exciting. Through my involvement with MakerSpace NYC, I have been able to translate my collagraphic prints and cast-paper sculptures into larger works in wood and steel. This has sparked so many new ideas! My biggest challenge is that I am 80 years old, and there is not enough time to explore all of the possibilities.
RAP: Art as a mirror of man, in this moment of emergency seems to be shattered …what do these fragments reflect now?… Shadow or light of the moment?
Susan: I don’t think that art is shattered. Rather, I find it in an exciting phase of openness and growth.
RAP: Understanding, interpreting, and then possibly judging the work of art; which is the right path when we are in front of a piece of art?
Susan: Understanding and interpreting a work of art can deepen one’s connection to it, but the first step is to commune with it. Let it in. While judging a work of art, it is important to judge it on its own terms. For instance, what was the artist trying to do? Alice Neel’s first museum show at the Whitney in 1974 was criticized, because she did not tell the whole story of humankind. However, that was not her intention, and I doubt there is an artist who can reveal the entire story of humankind.
RAP: Which is the real role of Academies and Art schools today? What can artists learn from these institutions today?
Susan: What Art schools and Academies can do is teach basic skills and expose students to the possibilities of materials, technologies and methodologies. At their best, they can help students see, unlock their spirits and give them a community to grow and share with.
RAP: Art too has undergone a complex process of globalization; can having an authentic and genuine style be an advantage or a drag for an artist?
Susan: The art market is different from the life of art. It is very fickle. The only way to proceed with making art is to be authentic, to make art from your soul.
RAP: How do Art Galleries and Museums position themselves today, and, in your opinion, how should they?
Susan: Art galleries are struggling because they are commercial enterprises in a crazy, unstable art world. Museums are struggling partly because they are underfunded and their challenge is to balance themselves as repositories of culture while also trying to reach out to many communities without trivializing either the art or the institutions.
RAP: “Figuration” vs “Abstraction”: which of the two is better descriptive of the period we live in? Which one will have a better future?
Susan: I don’t find that to be a meaningful dichotomy. All art is basically abstract. The issue is whether it touches people and reaches them on a deep level. That has nothing to do with the level of figuration or abstraction. I feel that those days of rigid dogma are gone. The Feminist Art Revolution of the 1960’s and 70’s ushered in this new age of pluralism.
RAP: Today we often speak of “emerging artists”; what advice based on your experience do you feel you can give to young artists?
Susan: Don’t do art unless you have to. There are many other ways to express your creativity. To sustain a life in art over the long term, through all the creative and career ups and downs, you have to need it in your life. You have to feel that you’re not complete unless you do it.
RAP: Art as a lens for reading the present, can it modify the space and time we pass through? …will art save us?
Susan: Art won’t save us, but it can remind us to see and feel.
@susan_grabel