Garett Yahn

June 11, 2011 Leave a comment

In mid-March, I sat down with artists Daniel Cevallos, John C. Gonzalez, Garett Yahn, and Kirk Amaral Snow during their group graduate thesis show at Lufthansa Studios, an artist-run exhibition and studio space in Dorchester, MA.  As of the publishing of this interview, the four have now graduated from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston & Tufts University.  We discussed the collaborative process of putting together their exhibition at Lufthansa and each of their individual art practices and thesis projects. This is the third installment of our interviews.

Garett Yahn (b. 1981, La Crosse, WI) has recently earned his MFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston / Tufts University (May 2011), where he was a recipient of the Springborn Fellowship.  He received his BFA in Printmaking and BA in Art Education from Viterbo University in La Crosse, WI (2005).  In 2010, Yahn attended the Homestead AK artist residency situated in Sunshine, Alaska.  Recent exhibitions and performances include “Infr’action 2010” (Sète, France), “Boston Young Contemporaries” at Boston University (Boston, MA, 2010), and “Carry Out” at MEME (Cambridge, MA, 2010).  He is a co-founder of Lufthansa Studios in Dorchester, MA. 

Garett Yahn and "Salon", 2011.

Andrea Evans:  So Garett, I think maybe it would be best if you could talk about the performance you did for the opening, and then describe what is here in the space still.

Garett Yahn:  The performance is a continuation of a series of works I have been doing for the last year, in which I have been collaborating with my parents on work about the intersections of my art practice and their work practices.  And so the piece that’s here in the show: I built a representation of my mom’s hair salon in the gallery.  She is a barber and hairstylist, and owns a salon in La Crosse, Wisconsin.   The piece is an installation, and is sort of sculptural in the way that it definitely differentiates itself from the architecture of the building, but it’s still very much on the wall.  There are a couple of mirrors, a barber chair, fluorescent lights, so that’s here…and that was here for the performance on the opening night.   My mom, dad, brother, and some of my other family were here, and my mom gave me a haircut during the opening, in front of a very large group of people.

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John C. Gonzalez

May 16, 2011 1 Comment

In mid-March, I sat down with artists Daniel Cevallos, John C. Gonzalez, Garett Yahn, and Kirk Amaral Snow during their group thesis show at Lufthansa Studios, an artist-run exhibition and studio space in Dorchester, MA.  The four are MFA candidates from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston & Tufts University.  We discussed the collaborative process of putting together their exhibition at Lufthansa and each of their individual art practices and thesis projects. This is the second installment of our interviews.

John C. Gonzalez (b. 1980, Providence, RI) earned his BFA from the Rhode Island School of Design and is currently enrolled in the MFA program at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston/Tufts University (anticipated graduation May 2011).  His work has been exhibited at Arthouse at the Jones Center in Austin, Australia National University, Boston Center for the Arts, Gasp Gallery in Boston, Boston University’s 808 Gallery, Emerson College, the Museum School, and RISB.  He is co-founder of Lufthansa Studios in Dorchester, MA.  Gonzalez has attended artist residencies including the Vermont Studio Center and the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, and this summer, he will be heading off to both the Jentel Artist Residency (Banner, WY) and the MacDowell Colony (Peterborough, NH).

John C. Gonzalez, “Self-Portrait Project”, 2009 – 2011 (Anonymous artists working within a painting manufacturing company in Dafen, China were hired to paint an image of him or herself. Gonzalez also painted a self-portrait of himself and sent it to the company. The photograph within the frame shows the manager holding this painting.) oil paintings on canvas each varying in size, photographic digital print, wooden frame

Andrea Evans:  To start, could you describe your project?

John C. Gonzalez:  I found out about these painting companies in China a couple years ago.  They manufacture oil paintings.  There is one village, called Dafen, in Mainland China.  Dafen village manufactures oil paintings, but there are other villages that specialize in lampshades and ironing boards and so forth.  And these are all made for export, obviously.

So as someone who is trained as a commercial illustrator, deciding to come into a grad program, I wanted to question a lot of things about industry in art, and my role in those things.  So this piece here is 52 oil paintings that are made as a response to my question.  I contacted an oil painting company in Dafen–the general manager is named Yu Lin–and I asked him if his workers could make a self-portrait of themselves.  So each worker would make one self-portrait of him or herself, and then I could then collect and display them as images of each and every one of the artists that work as part of his studio.  So there are 52 paintings, one from the boss, and 51 for the rest of the workers.

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Daniel Cevallos

April 13, 2011 Leave a comment

In mid-March, I sat down with artists Daniel Cevallos, John C. Gonzalez, Garett Yahn, and Kirk Amaral Snow during their group thesis show at Lufthansa Studios, an artist-run exhibition and studio space in Dorchester, MA.  The four are MFA candidates from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston & Tufts University.  We discussed the collaborative process of putting together their exhibition at Lufthansa and each of their individual art practices and thesis projects. This is the first installment of our interviews.

Daniel Cevallos (b. 1982, Quito, Ecuador) has been living and working in Boston, MA since 2008.  He is an MFA candidate at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston/Tufts University (anticipated graduation May 2011), where his work has focused on interactive sculpture, video and sound installation, digital animation, and performance. 

Daniel Cevallos, “Check Room”, 2011.

Cevallos’ “Check Room” is the first piece one encountered upon entering the Lufthansa space.  This fully functional coat-check room was constructed within the gallery space, complete with revolving coat rack and attendant: the artist himself.  Daniel was present working in the space during the opening reception and all gallery hours.

Andrea Evans: I think starting with your piece makes sense, because it’s the first thing you encounter when you enter the space, whether or not you recognize it immediately as art.  Daniel, your work is really project based; you get an idea and see it out.  I’m curious what the trajectory of this piece has been, from the original idea to what it turned into.

Daniel Cevallos: My process is really about sitting and thinking a lot.  I’m not the kind of artist that sits in the studio and tries things and tries things, and gets to something.  I feel like in grad school I wanted to try projects that were a little more challenging, and to push myself in every aspect, technically, conceptually, all of that stuff.

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