Engage with new and returning artists before visiting the Cathedral Square venue to see their amazing array of work. Learn about the artists’ personal stories and creative ambitions through five enticing art-related questions.
This week: Zach Mory
Zach Mory, 25 Circles and Diamonds, 2014, graphite on paper series, 21 x 21 inches each
New to our venue, Zach’s work has come to focus on the abstract and non-objective possibilities of drawing. Mory’s 2014 graphite entry, “25 Circles and Diamonds”, is a series of precise, repeating movements on paper that culminate into varying graphite designs. His intention behind the process is to distinctly follow the given rules associated with each piece in the series, where no two outcomes are the same. While his initial ideas generally experience natural distortion, the challenges and rewards of his process reflect an illusion of control, a balance of human influence, and a sentiment that we are as ingrained with the kinetic outer world as our own inner rhythms.
What themes do you pursue?
First off, my practice revolves around drawing. In my case, I think the media informs the process. That in turn informs the themes I'm interested in. Because I draw in a particular way (borderline obsessive mark-making) this seems to align me with minimalism, though I’m not huge on labels. Basically, I am interested in systems, labor, mark making, process and drawing. Though to be fair, I do have another body of work that is more illustrative in nature with nods to underground comics, psychedelic art, outsider art, medieval manuscripts, and post-modern myth making.
What got you interested in art?
My artistic influences started at a young age. While growing up, I always loved building things with Construx and copying my favorite comic book characters and baseball card profiles. My uncle owned a comic book distribution company in Madison, WI and he would inundate my siblings and me with all sorts of strange and fantastic comics…mainstream stuff as well as graphic novels that kids of 10 or 11 probably shouldn’t have been reading. My older brother is a cinema fanatic and I spent a lot of times watching great films that he would dig out of the crevices. Movies and comics played a huge role in my love of all things visual. When I went to college, I went in as an art major and spent a lot of time taking life-drawing classes. I think I took eight semesters worth in total as an undergrad. I learned a lot from a technical perspective, especially from Bob Schultz, who is absolutely amazing when it comes to life drawing. Slowly my interest veered away from life drawing and into non-objectivity, but the technical chops and work ethic stayed on and really defined the trajectory of my work in the future.
What is your preferred medium and why?
I love graphite and am comfortable with it, so it has become my main vehicle of choice. The nature of creating works with graphite from a pencil (as opposed to powdered graphite or charcoal where you can cover large areas more quickly) requires a substantial amount of labor in order to get the desired results. Part of me not deviating away from a pencil tip or marker nib stems from pure stubbornness (I have zero interest in painting, for instance), but that familiarity with the media has opened the door to the underlying questions that really inform my work. The Sisyphean nature of my work brings to the forefront existential themes about how we define meaning in our lives.
What is the hardest step in creating work?
With the way I work, starting is never really an issue. I usually have about 10-15 future drawings always on queue in my head. The hardest part for me is time. My work, by design, takes a long, long time to create. This means I have to get really creative with my time, often getting up and out the door by 5 on the weekdays to get drawing time in before work and then finding whatever time I can in the evening and on the weekends. Finding time, especially with a three month old baby, is a bit tricky...but I like the challenge.
What is integral to the work of an artist?
Solitude. Conversely, it’s just as important to have lots of people to discuss work with, or at least a few trusted people with whom you can be unashamedly honest. There has to be a balance of both things.
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