beinArt Interview with Heidi Taillefer by Elspeth McIntosh
Heidi Taillefer‘s work combines gentle balance of her love of nature with the aesthetics of the machine where ‘a new paradigm looms close on the horizon and promises a redefinition of what it means to be human.’ Given this theme, her approach is not typical of the usual dystopian vision that artists portray of our future with the machine using ghoulish imagery filled with indistinguishable individuals. Far from it. She still retains the balance of our nature, forming a new world of possibilities where all kinds of fauna assimilate with objects and gears to have the viewer rediscover what it means to be in their most natural state. She reignites many themes of old such as the myth of the Birth of Venus without creating an anthropomorphised goddess as well as individuals such as the Marquis de Sade in I put a Spell on You to examine our bizarre nature as ‘Romance and seduction are loaded with power struggles, mind games, and control tactics, all of which create a torturous interplay of pleasure and pain, reward and punishment.’ None of the subjects are completely pure or evil, but are born into the world with Taillefer’s brush, adapting to a new life using what they have.
The Canadian began drawing at the age of three and today incorporates her love of the sideshow, of kitsch and oddities, the bizarre and fortean to harmonise into the each individual subject.
Elspeth McIntosh: Heidi, it would seem that anything is possible with your work! Do you have a scenario in your head as to how this new world began with animals and the machine in sync with one another or would you prefer to think of these characters within an alternate universe?
Heidi Taillefer: I don’t have a particular scenario as of yet, although I am considering coming up with a story line which features a world of such creatures, in keeping with the origins of the work when it touched mainly upon our impact on the environment. But maybe in some sense there was a scenario, albeit satirical. When I first began painting the more robotic watercolour images in the 80′s I was reacting to reports of environmental destruction I came across, and especially the flagrant and abusive disregard for other animals be they wild, domestic, or for the purposes of research. Before I realized, on practical terms, how deeply integrated this attitude is with the mental and spiritual health of a society as well as the individual, and how it can define the quality of a civilization as considered either backward/barbaric, or advanced/civilized, I was proposing a ridiculous solution to a problem clearly out of proportion. Robotic creatures were surrogates designed to replace the crucial disappearing links in the vastly complex chain of connections that exist in the wild, and depictions of machine-like animals appeared sterile as if they were only machines, waiting to be used or studied by humans, such as in the mouse painting Cartesian Logic, framed with severed rat heads acquired from a university psychology research lab.
By now, as the work has evolved away from strictly animal rights/environmental issues toward the larger and more ‘daunting’ arena of the human condition, but I don’t see them as being part of a distinct world elsewhere. They aren’t so many creatures as philosophical musings put to paper, and they are figurative because that’s what I lean towards aesthetically, but they capture a force or feeling which is much more fluid and difficult to define than species extinction or environmental destruction. They explore the intangibles, morality and meaning, in order to find some kind of absolute truth in the increasingly bizarre and confused reality which characterizes life if you are pitted against certain realities, where nothing is black or white… and the grey areas just get greyer all the time. And for a while they clarify, that’s what I’m after now, and it’s likened me to a Buddhist in the process … what else can you do in the midst of ambiguity.
But the ‘creatures’ could definitely act as a cast of characters in a separate universe, similar to the staging found ancient Greek mythology, whereas I’m aiming at finding a higher solution that overcomes inevitable tragedy, maybe incorporating the larger Buddhist vantage point with the various foibles of real life dramas. Like Buddhist mythology… wait that might be Hinduism… with all the strappings of today’s technology.
EM: Do you enjoy the idea of our world having to go through a renaissance and to start learning about our behaviour and habits all over again?
HT: Yes very much so!!!! Not to sound cynical, but when I was painting the watercolour robots during my adolescence I thought nothing could benefit the world more than a massive cataclysm which would wipe out all of humanity. Those demons are long gone (well, almost), and knowing more about the ‘Will’ and the nature of good and evil being a choice (unless you’re insane, where choice is moot), there’s always hope. Not hope where the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and religious groups are teams pitted against one another and their particular dogmas curtail a greater good elsewhere, but wisdom in general. As much as there are people everywhere who want goodness and justice, somewhere down the line, the world doesn‘t seem to even want love, it isn‘t here among us, and there are countless ways in which people block it from the scene even if they think they’re all for it. Ego and vanity and pride and stupidity and fear, all the sins outlined in the Bible in fact, so people have known but the wisdom to choose hasn‘t arrived, even among those doing good works at times. And of course we’re all guilty of it, I think the only redeeming factor is an examined life and hopefully personal evolution. And those who don’t block love, aren‘t numerous enough and just get steamrolled by the loveless, so to speak, so they have to adopt a lower stance and fight back and roll back true love to survive. That is where the painting Complicated Shadows comes from, with a quote by the Marquis de Sade which states that: “Virtue, however beautiful, becomes the worst of all attributes when it is found too weak to contend with Vice, and that, in an entirely corrupted age, the safest course is to follow along after the others”. So we are forced into a kind of sadism so to speak, just to be able to put up with one another. But a renaissance might require the most vastly coordinated, synchronized step taken in unison by everyone all at the same time, so that nobody reacts to another’s “misstep”, which is impossible. That choice between ‘good or evil’ is possible, and to suffer the initial inconvenient sting out of step until everyone gets a rhythm going, without retaliating, with a trusted and respected cooperation… or maybe it’s another impossible utopia.
So, what if there were a way to harness technology to help move things along… the best way would be to understand the other and what they’re thinking, where they’re coming from, an intellectual aid of some kind, which might only be possible through technology or a greater understanding of how the mind and thoughts work, scary as that is because it would mean allowing oneself to merge with something which could be hijacked for the wrong purposes as well.
EM: You are concerned about the environment and the impact of technology on society. What do you believe the youth of today are missing out on?
HT: Play. Real play, which involves bare feet, and found dead or living creatures, and daydreaming, and imagination, and role playing, and mischief, and invention, and pushing boundaries, and failure, and success, problem solving, fantasy and imagination, leave the computers, but take the game boxes and televisions away until the age of 5 or 6 or older.
EM: I adore your exterior car design of the Ligozzi Infiniti G37 for the Cirque du Soleil. Did you enjoy working with them?
HT: The Cirque is one of the best companies I could work for, their philosophy is to leave the artist to their craft and allow them to provide a vision to accentuate what the Cirque is already doing. I have worked with them on a variety of projects for the past 11 years, and it’s still ongoing and I hope could broaden into bigger things still. Their employees also enjoy a great working environment from what I saw, its not as extensive as with Google but their comfort and enjoyment is key it seems, and it’s rare to find such a large company with such a deep respect for artists, rather than consider them merely difficult creatures to have to deal with. They champion the artist, and those I worked with seem deeply sensitive to the artist‘s sensibility, all the while posing some of the toughest creative or working challenges which always makes it exiting.
I also worked with Nissan/Infiniti on the project, which was an awesome company to work with as well, as the luxury arm of a car company you wouldn‘t expect such a progressive side but the art car was actually THEIR concept, and it’s they who approached the Cirque with the idea to begin with (they are one of the Cirque’s sponsors).
EM: Design is such a strong arena for you to explore. Apart from this particular designing project, can you envision yourself designing anything else apart from car exteriors?
HT: I was seriously considering a toy line for kids, or specialty toys, which I might still do but I would have to dedicate myself to something entirely different on the business end of things, and lay the paintings to rest for a while, so it’s still a possibility depending on where things take me.
EM: I can’t describe why, but your work does have that French aesthetic to it like Cirque and the puppetry company Royal de Luxe (from Nantes, France). Would you say that French counterculture has influenced your work?
HT: I’m not sure what has influenced my worki; it’s an osmotic mishmash of aesthetics I explore here and there, whenever the mood catches me. Since I am drawn to mechanism, and puppetry has certainly played an influence, as well as automats, but so do carousel horses and carnival shooting targets, calliopes, really anything under the sun… especially miniatures. I had a general store dollhouse as a kid, and would collect mini coke bottles and make different fruits and vegetables along with balsa wood crates, tiny grandfather clocks, scales, gum ball machines, candy jars, fabric rolls, chandeliers, utensils, rocking horses, paint cans, tools, tires, it was great. They were painstakingly arranged along shelves and counters, up staircases, along banisters, and so small… So somehow that all finds itself into the work I think, mechanism and intricacy… maybe miniaturization was foreshadowing with the advent of nanotechnology, hahaha.
EM: Of all of the characters that you have painted, which would you like to be for a day and why?
HT: Salome, because she finally got what she wanted. Or the car!
EM: If you were able to put it into one hard-hitting statement, what is it that you would ultimately like your viewers to learn from your work?
HT: A deeper understanding beyond appearances, and therein lies the love.
Paintings (from top to bottom): Knee Jerk Reaction, 1997-8; I put a Spell on You, 2005-6; Ligozzi Infiniti G37, exterior car design for the Cirque du Soleil; Frustration Attraction, 2005-6
Ink transforms into paint and leaps off the body onto the walls with the opening of Flesh to Canvas 2 on Saturday, May 15th at Manhattan’s Last Rites Gallery. Flesh to Canvas 2 will feature more than 30 pieces of canvas art work by more than 25 world-renowned tattoo artists who create works aside from ink on skin. The exhibition will be on display from May 15th through May 30th.
TOP
