R.J. Preece

Metropolis Records’ Dave Heckman:
The dark interview

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R.J. Preece - 29 Apr 10 He’s the entrepreneur behind the music label specializing in post-industrial music. In a frank, revealing and dark interview, Dave Heckman talks about his achievements—and also how the Internet is imploding the music industry. And the result? Get ready musicians: it looks like more of you will be...

Daphne Wright:
Doubt and other serious matters (2010)

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R.J. Preece - 01 Mar 10 Daphne Wright. Stallion, (2009). Marble dust and resin, 160 x 380 x 140 cm. Daphne Wright’s work maneuvers things into what her biographical statement calls “well-wrought but delicate doubt.” Shifting between “taughtness and mess,” it sets “imagery, materials, and language in constant metaphorical...

Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation:
Interview of Nicole Chevalier, Program Director

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R.J. Preece - 02 Jan 10 This foundation based in Meriden, Connecticut is funding professional practice training via its Marketplace Empowerment for Artists (MEA) Program in the US on a national scale. Professional practice issues often create the greatest challenges for artists. For a select few, resources are in...

Silvia B.: Celebrating "misfits" (2009)

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R.J. Preece - 01 Sep 09 Dutch artist Silvia B. creates striking figures that cross the boundaries of gender, species, and age. Beyond their high-fashion gloss, however, her hybrid beings aim to question constructions of beauty and value. Silvia B. has had various solo exhibitions in the Netherlands, at venues such as...

Fergus Martin: Pipe Dreams (2009)

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R.J. Preece - 01 Jul 09 Dreamscapes are often the subject of artworks, and Fergus Martin’s Pipe Dreams 2 takes dreams to a fundamentally visual level with a “floating raft of color in space.” But how was this visual solution achieved, and what decisions did Martin make when creating the work? Fergus Martin was born in...

The lawyer/critic:
When appropriation becomes copyright infringement (2009)

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R.J. Preece - 08 Jun 09 What started out as a general interview of a copyright lawyer to advise artists, quickly turned into a unique, specific compare / contrast— with examples of works by Damien Hirst, John LeKay, Cartrain and Vincent van Gogh. Forget the concept-oriented "he stole my idea", Paul Tackaberry lays down...

Daimler Art Collection: Interview with Renate Wiehager (2009)

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R.J. Preece - 01 Jun 09 Originally formed in 1977, the Daimler Art Collection includes about 1,800 works by approximately 600 German and international artists, focusing on abstract and geometrical painting. In the 1980s, the collection also began acquiring sculpture by internationally recognized modern and...

Lynne Hull interview: Heart and soul (2009)

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R.J. Preece - 03 Feb 09 Lynne Hull. Twist (detail), (1993). Wood, 30 ft. high. Click to see a 2011 Twist update. Lynne Hull specializes in sculpture that doubles as wildlife habitat. She has made safe roosts for raptors in Wyoming, butterfly hibernation sculptures in Montana, salmon-spawning pools in Ireland, and...

Shirley Trusty Corey & Mary Len Costa:
Learning from New Orleans (2008)

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R.J. Preece - 01 Sep 08 Kenneth Snelson’s Virlane Tower at the Besthoff Sculpture Garden at the New Orleans Museum of Art, bent by Hurricane Katrina. While images of Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath are well known, other behind-the-scenes aspects of the devastation have not received much media attention. For...

Mischa Kuball:
The powerful emotion of light

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R.J. Preece - 01 Jul 08 Artists, like other professionals, sometimes hit key turning points in the development of their work. Such is the case right now for Mischa Kuball, who has built an impressive practice by “generating a certain awareness about streams of interaction in terms of a psychological dimension in urban...

Museum of Installation: Interview with
Nico de Oliveira & Nicola Oxley (2008)

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R.J. Preece - 01 Mar 08 No research on installation art is complete without a conversation with Nico de Oliveira and Nicola Oxley. As founding directors of London’s Museum of Installation (MoI, 1990–2005), an influential non-profit exhibition space, and authors of the equally influential books, Installation art (1994)...

Marcus Bering: What’s the point? (2007)

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R.J. Preece - 01 Jul 07 Some viewers of contemporary art, particularly Minimalist art, have been known to ask the question, “What’s the point?” but it is highly unusual for artists themselves to raise the issue. However, such is the case with German artist Marcus Bering, whose minimalistic work draws from a variety of...

Puck & Pip: Design by Mark Pimlott (2007)

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R.J. Preece - 29 Apr 07 Interview-feature with the designer of Diederik van Lieshout’s Puck & Pip restaurants in the Hague, the Netherlands. Imagine having the opportunity to design the interior of your favorite restaurant. That’s in fact the opportunity that designer/artist Mark Pimlott recently had, using the...

Deej Fabyc:
Gender, Space, and Forensic Biography

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R.J. Preece - 01 Jan 07 Gender, space, and forensic biography are the three themes that British-born, Australian artist Deej Fabyc has crisscrossed and crafted together in her performative installations over her 15-year career. She aims to interrogate the viewer with a range of work that is often demanding,...

El Anatsui : "Out of West Africa" (2006)

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R.J. Preece - 01 Jul 06 El Anatsui. Earth cloth, (2003). Aluminum bottle tops and copper wire, 487.7 x 457.2 cm. A “cloth” made by sewing thousands of recycled, crushed, and flattened liquor bottle tops. A 10-foot-tall installation of redundant newspaper printing plates used for obituary pages and re-used as...

Mark Bain: Sonic Interventions (2005)

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R.J. Preece - 01 Sep 05 Sometimes Mark Bain produces small earthquakes, sometimes he installs systems to “attack architecture”, and sometimes he releases what look like poetic, alien aircraft into the gallery. These are just three outcomes of his diversified artistic practice, which incorporates sound, three-dimensional...