Today we’d like to introduce you to Hilja Keading.
Hilja, we’d love to hear your story and how you got to where you are today both personally and as an artist.
I wonder if every artist has a variation of the same story – an artist’s sensibility combined with motivation to take a good look at, and try to understand, the world we live in and our actions within it. From about fifth grade through high school I took painting lessons from an elderly lady on Saturdays. She would set up still lives for me to paint and I’d lock into another world for a few hours. Those hours were such a relief and I felt great comfort in it – it was all about shape and color and light. Everything was right before my eyes and there was something profound about the silence of observing it. Focusing on still lives brought me to a place outside of time, with a silent connection between me and that which I was observing.
When I was 18, I moved to Los Angeles to go to art school at UCLA. I thought I wanted to be a painter. By my second year of grad school, I realized that I had to abandon what I thought I knew. At first I started with sculptural installation, then I began using video – once again looking at what was right before my eyes. The combination of sculptural installation and video evolved into what is now defined as “video installation.”
We’d love to hear more about your art. What do you do and why and what do you hope others will take away from your work?
I am mainly known for my video installations and about eight years ago I returned to painting and drawing to keep engaged with direct processes. I prefer a direct approach – there is no script, rehearsal or soundtracks in the videos, and for painting, drawing and me are direct processes. When I was younger I focused on that which I found unbearable and tried to make it tolerable by finding something beautiful within it. Now, with an understanding of simultaneously literal, symbolic, and metaphysical realities, and my focus is on something positive that persists along side it all. My intention is to create the possibility for visitors and viewers to experience an understanding of this kind; something outside the ability of language to express. I believe it is possible for visitors to an installation to experience what Margaret Morse defines as “kinesthetic insight,” where understanding is experienced physically as well as cerebrally and emotionally.
After a precognition of a near death experience and years of psychic understanding (clairvoyance, clairsentience and clairaudience,) I have embraced these gifts and they are now a big part of my life and art.
How can artists connect with other artists?
Luckily I made lasting friends with some very talented and wonderful artists in Grad School and the arts community at large. If you want to connect with other artists, go to talks or shows or events that interest you, and learn about others’ work you appreciate. Reach out to people. All you need is to develop a few good friendships. I don’t know where I would be without the support of friends.
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?
Currently the video installations are necessarily exhibited in museums although I have ideas for possible broadcast in the future. I have a video installation at the Tom Bradley International Terminal titled “Splash” and my latest video installation titled “Backbrace” is in LACMA’s collection. I am in the middle of an awesome video project now that required two years to record. After having to suspend work on it from 2015 – 2018, I am putting the footage together now, and every day I am astonished by what I see and hear. Painting and drawings are in process. I actively use my clairvoyant gifts in my work. Outside of my artwork, I use my clairsentient and intuitive psychic gifts to assist people in experiencing deeper levels of understanding and trust, and hopefully, freedom from fear.
Contact Info:
- Address: 5076 Highland View Ave
- Website: hiljakeading.com
- Phone: (323)533-2312
- Email: hiljakeading@gmail.com
Image Credit:
Production Stills: Marya Alford, Hilja Keading Portrait: Peter Kirby, all others: Hilja Keading
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