CARMINE MAGAZINE

Carmine Magazine: What drives you to create? Also, what inspires you and your work?
Laura Pelick: Everything drives me to create. Emotions, watching a movie, going for a walk outside, a dream, bored at work… As for inspirations, I am very visual (Words as well as seeing images). My childhood movies of Dark Crystal, Labyrinth, anime cartoons on Saturday mornings. I’ll often look at the clouds and see something growing out of it, or see a certain shape of a tree and think I could merge it with the body of a female. My husband is also an inspiration, since we often write stories together and I’ll get ideas from a line he says.

CM: Were you formally trained in art or self taught? Do you think it has helped you or hindered you?
LP: I am both… I drew when I was a little child (according to my grandmother, I started as soon as I could hold a pencil), but from the age of 8 up until graduating from SUNY Alfred, School of Art & Design, I have taken lessons/classes. In Elementary school, once a week I was in the basement of a retired crossing guard’s house, copying pictures of animals from Ranger Rick or calendars.
College was a struggle for me, but it is where I developed my tree/human merging ideas, as well as goddesses, and there are some memories of working with grad students that will eventually get out of my head and onto paper. But, the teachers thought I had too much information in my work and wanted me to paint like THEM, not my like myself. Senior year, for example, my adviser’s critique was “You should draw the sky as a line, and perhaps leave out these trees.”

CM: What mediums do you work in the most? Do you have a particular brand that you love working with? Why do you use them?
LP: Tea, watercolor, acrylics, gouache, pencil are all what I use the most. I love the flowing of mixing paint with water and seeing what happens when I let them puddle and dry up over time. They layer wonderfully, though I am itching to try my technique with oils as well, one day. I’m a fan of Windsor Newton, it’s just one I’ve used for many years and never seem to worry if the color I want is really what is in the tube.

CM: At what point did you realize that creating was going to be a large part of your life?
LP: I always liked to draw, play the violin, write… Art has always been supported by all of my family, and seeing the grins on faces when I was growing up helped push me to stay away from struggling with becoming a math teacher or doctor. But, really dawned on me in High School, with my art teacher Mr. Bishop REALLY pushing me to work on learning how to handle various mediums and letting me help do backdrops and making me think that this could be something I could do to support myself AND love doing the work at the same time.

CM: If there was one style of art that you could take up, what would it be?
LP: Anime. It comes through a little sometimes, and my work usually involves lines like you’d see in a cartoon, but I’ve always enjoyed the almost realistic, yet not, style that comes out of Japan. And some of the strange ideas in the movies.

CM: How do you deal with creator’s (or writer’s) block?
LP: I take a break from it, I tend to read more books, or write more. Or I’ll play video games. I see creator’s block not as a wall keeping me from making work, but a sign that I need to stop, take a break, and ‘restart’. It’s always good to sudden sit down and go Ahah! I have an idea! and work’ll start flowing again.

CM: How do you prepare for art shows where your work will be shown?
LP: I procrastinate like crazy! Everything is last minute for me… sometimes even the day of the show I’m still putting images behind frames and hoping they’ll stay up on the wall.

CM: How do you define you style? Does it represent an inner you or something completely different?
LP: Sinuous is a good word to describe it… I’m not sure what kind of style I can attach to my work, but fantasy, surreal, storytelling. I enjoy seeing lines marking where one object ends and the next begins, so there’s a little comic book/cartoon in there as well. It definitely shows my love for line, for curves, and nature.

CM: What kind of environment do you need to create in?
LP: One with a window. I do not work well if there is no ‘outside’. And depending on my mood, there needs to be either complete silence or blasting music.

CM: What does your workspace look like? (Pictures or a description work for this one)
LP: My work spaces are a mess. I have pages to the graphic novel on the floor, drying or just sitting in a pile. The page I am working on is on my desk, which I work on while I keep the computer on (quick access to references, or talking to people while watching ink dry). I also have a table set up downstairs where I draw while keeping the tv on for news or half watching a movie. There’s a pile of books down there, as well as more boxes of paints and brushes stacked in old glassware. My kitchen table currently has a piece of paper on it, waiting for me figure out what to do with it. Usually I stain paper there, which takes a few days to dry.

CM: What was your worst experience with art? And the best?
LP: Worst is when someone ripped my artwork in half. I’ve had a few pieces stolen before, but showing up for my critique in college to see a 20ft long ink painting with only 10ft hanging and the other 10 three stories down the stairwell hurt inside. The best is going on right now, I’m busy with a lot of commissioned pieces, so much that I don’t have time to do work for myself to sell at shows. It feels as if my work is finally -going- somewhere.

CM: What movies, books, music, etc get your creative juices flowing the most?
LP: I am a very big fan of classical music and soundtracks, anything that feels like you’re staring at mountains or riding a ship through a stormy sea. Sibelius, Beethoven, and Arvo Part are my favorite composers for evoking images or relaxing me as needed.
I tend to lean towards ‘fantasy’ movies when I want to get ideas, like Dark Crystal, Mirror Mask, or Day Watch/Night Watch, movies that tend to be adventure, saving the world from evil.
Same thing for reading books, though for inspiration, I flip through my collection of art books (spectrum Fantasy/Scifi art books, various artists like Chuck Close or Mucha, Klimt, Medieval Celtic history books with pictures)

CM: Do you think the internet, technology, media, etcetera are helping or destroying the art world?
LP: Helping! Definitely helping! Sure, there’s art theft online, but you get that without the internet as well, there will always be thieves, sadly. But without the internet, I wouldn’t know so many artists, and I’d be bogged down by just local work, and not talking to people across the world. It’s a great way to connect with people like they used to do ages ago in cafes, though ours are chat rooms or forums, or communities like Live Journal/Myspace.
I also enjoy using digital as a medium, though I prefer traditional. It’s just another way to create ideas that would probably be next to impossible to get the same look and feel you would in Painter or Photoshop.

CM: Aside from art what do you do with your time? Is there anything else that drives you or that you’re passionate about?
LP: I write a lot of stories on my time off with my husband (one of which I am thinking of turning into a graphic novel), I also play video games when I need a break from staring at a piece of paper. I used to play the violin, though it’s been collecting dust for a while now, and I’ve been meaning to look about for a community orchestra to perhaps join back up with and give me new work to learn.

CM: Do you have any upcoming shows, events, releases, etc. you would like our readers to know about?
LP: I have GenCon in August (GenCon ) over in Indianapolis, Indiana… Also, I am working on illustrating a graphic novel by Coral Drisko (Eyes of the Dragon) which has plans on being published once finished. Three fish paintings I just created will be in a film by newbabel.

Find Laura’s work at these places on the web:
Fallenlights.net
Shadowgirl on DeviantART
gymnopedie on Livejournal

Some artwork from Laura Pelick: