Today we’d like to introduce you to Annelie McKenzie.
Annelie, we’d love to hear your story and how you got to where you are today both personally and as an artist.
My uncle was the first one to explain to me that it’s easier to get forgiveness than to ask for permission. And it’s what I had in mind when I decided to risk painting narrative scenes on my bedroom walls when I was 10 years-old.
I painted a boy hanging off the doorframe as if it were a cliff, and he was trying to pull himself to the top where a girl was sitting. I was afraid of getting in trouble, but my mother was only upset by the corner of ripped wallpaper where I painted yellow eyes looking out of a black shadow. She thought it was demonic. I was delighted to get such a powerful reaction!
As a kid, making art was my main play activity. I arranged stickers on furniture, painted on pieces of scrap cardboard, and taped paper grocery bags together so I could work larger. I sewed images of faces and animals onto my clothing using pieces of cloth, beads, and embroidery.
I also painted my face with my mom’s lipsticks and took Polaroids. And I hid bits of cereal all around friends’ houses for them to find for months. I don’t really know what prompted me to do these things, I was just always defacing things in an artful way.
In high school, I didn’t take any art classes soI could concentrate on music instead, but at home, I would draw portraits of my favorite drummers: Wil Calhoun, Neil Peart, and Bill Bruford. I also drew my family members and homeless people (I was volunteering at a shelter downtown).
I had a hard time choosing between art and music in college. I was very religious at the time and believed the only acceptable careers for me were missionary, nurse, or teacher — I chose art teacher. I attended the University of Calgary in my hometown and earned a BFA and a BED.
I began a teaching career, working on my art and music during in my free time. A teacher shortage in California brought recruiters to Calgary. I was hired and they sponsored my visa. I didn’t know anyone in Los Angeles — it was very scary to move here alone at age 26, but I believed I could somehow do it. And I did.
I eventually went back to school for my Masters of Fine Arts. In 2013 I graduated from California State University, Long Beach, and have been focused on making art ever since.
I’m mostly a painter. I use oil on canvas, oil on decorative picture frames, and most recently, oil on thrift store purses. I also make works on paper.
Small, intimate pieces are made by accumulating tiny blobs of paint slowly over time. They are colorful impasto paintings incorporating craft items such as rhinestones, stickers, barrettes, and pompoms.
These little paintings then become the still life subject of a second, larger version — a big painting of a small painting. The large copy combines illusionistic shadows painted with glazes next to thick passages of textured paint.
To explain a bit more, we must enter the matrix: the subject matter of my small paintings often pull images from art history. For example, I’ll paint a goopy version of Marie Laurencin’s “Young Woman with Dog” onto a small, decorative, dollar-store frame. And then my small painting becomes the model for a large painting. The artworks multiply — I paint a painting of a painting which refers to a really old painting! Ha!
So why do I follow this reiteration process? It’s partly an attempt to paint my foremothers back into the canon of Art History.
I’m constantly seeking out information on women artists of the past. It can be hard to find because a lot of this history hasn’t been preserved. Women artists who were successful in their time were often left out of the history books. Sometimes their work was mis-attributed to their fathers, other male artists of the time, or to Anonymous and Unknown.
My work functions to echo theirs, repeating the signal in order to strengthen it. I move painting into a feminine space, heroizing the ways it can be intimate, small, and vulnerable.
There is a tendency for us to distance ourselves from weakness, and the feminine is seen as weak. I would like my work to challenge this and allow my viewers to feel joy and a sense of validation in being fully human, fully themselves. I hope to root out the unspoken, unacknowledged ways that we oppress femininity and/or the female in painting and in ourselves, and celebrate it.
The stereotype of a starving artist scares away many potentially talented artists from pursuing art – any advice or thoughts about how to deal with the financial concerns an aspiring artist might be concerned about?
There are all kinds of ways to support your art practice. Make it work for your situation and try not to compare yourself to others. Some artists have trust funds or other types of good fortune in their lives, but that doesn’t mean you can’t succeed in other ways. (And don’t waste time resenting those with financial support — it’s great when a family can support their artist!)
A gallery owner once said to me, “I really admire artists who really focus on their art and don’t have other jobs.” I think he succumbed to the notion that this makes one a “real artist” — it fulfills a romanticized ideal.
For a moment it made me want to hide the fact that I’d taken a part-time teaching job. But that’s total bullshit. Real artists often have day jobs, and they’re completely worthy of admiration. There should be zero shame in “having other jobs.” I could have answered him by saying, “I really admire gallery owners who sell so much art that their artists get to quit their other jobs.” But I didn’t.
Which brings me to another suggestion — don’t rely on gallery representation to create an income for you. Learn the business side of art and take an active role in that aspect. Balance this out with the fact that monetary compensation does not validate or invalidate your art practice. Be you, regardless.
Do what you got to do to support yourself and keep making your art!
Do you have any events or exhibitions coming up? Where would one go to see more of your work? How can people support you and your artwork?
Please join my newsletter! I try to keep it interesting with art history blurbs and stories about my work. Sign up here: shop.anneliemckenzie.art/
On December 15th, 2018 I have a solo show opening up at Fisher Parrish Gallery in Brooklyn, New York. It’s called Beaded Talisman for Unwell Daughter and is curated by Adrianne Rubenstein. It’ll run until Feb 3rd, 2019.
Also, I have an online shop where I sell both original work and prints — check it out! shop.anneliemckenzie.art
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Address: Los Angeles, California
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Website: shop.anneliemckenzie.art
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Email: art [at] annelie [dot] biz
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Instagram: @anneliemckenzie
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Facebook: www.facebook.com/AMcKenzieArt/
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Twitter: twitter.com/__AM_
Image Credit:
Don Lupo
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