- Hi everyone.
I'm Sheri Castelnuovo,
I'm the curator of education
for the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art.
And on behalf of the museum staff and board of trustees,
it's wonderful to welcome you
the MMoCA opening for Tyanna Buie: After Image .
Generous funding for After Image
has been provided by Mary Ellyn and Joe Sensenbrenner,
Madison Print Club, MillerCoors,
Sara Guyer and Scott Straus,
the Terry Family Foundation, and MMoCA volunteers.
MMoCA openings are sponsored by
Newcomb Construction Company and the Alexander Company,
with additional support from Fresco,
and media support from Isthmus.
We are so pleased that Tyanna Buie
is here to talk about her work,
and the experience of giving shape to her memories
and family history through her art.
Tyanna earned a Master of Fine Arts degree
from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2010.
Among the honors she has received are
a Mary L. Nohl Fellowship,
the Love of Humanity Award
from the Greater Milwaukee Foundation,
and a Joan Mitchell Foundation Painters & Sculptors grant.
Tyanna has actively exhibited her work
in solo and group exhibitions
including at the Urban Institute for Contemporary Arts
in Grand Rapids, Michigan,
the Hyde Park Arts Center
in Northwestern University in Chicago,
the Haggerty Museum of Art at Marquette University,
the Milwaukee Art Museum,
and previously at MMoCA
in the 2013 Wisconsin Triennial.
In addition to these accomplishments,
Tyanna is an assistant professor
and section chair of printmaking
at the College for Creative Studies in Detroit.
Prior to her current faculty appointment,
she taught at the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design,
and was a visiting lecturer at institutions
across the United States.
So we're delighted she could be here tonight.
Please offer Tyanna a warm welcome.
[audience applauding]
- Thank you.
Okay, I'm usually never nervous,
but I feel like there's just so many people in the room
that I haven't been able to get
into the room at once in years,
so this is weird.
So thank you to,
I have a bunch of students that drove from Detroit,
which is awesome.
[audience applauding]
I have my professor, Susan Czechowski,
here who I talk about so much
because she taught me,
I say that she taught me everything I know.
And she would not agree,
but the fact that she's here is like crazy.
But she taught me, so yeah.
[audience applauding]
And then I have professors from Madison
that I worked with indirectly,
that just walked into my studio and talked to me.
And I've got a a lot of feedback
from people I didn't even work that closely with,
and also other important mentors in my life.
I'll just say it took a village to raise me.
I say that. [audience laughing]
So I have some surrogate parents in the crowd,
that I've been with them,
they've with me since I was an undergrad
and kind of took me under their wings.
So it's very--
And I tend to have a lot of shows,
but this is the one show that I made a big deal about.
I was like "I don't care,
"just come to the other ones,
"but really really try to come to this one."
So I'm very excited.
And thank you so much Leah,
Steve, and the MMoCA staff.
Leah, you're probably I think one of the best persons
I ever worked with for a show.
You're so calm, so chill.
[laughing]
[audience applauding]
And thank you for letting me bring a piece
at the last minute on the train today.
[audience laughing] That's my MO.
Yeah, so I say I'm a artist and educator
'cause I started teaching and I do a lot of mentorship,
a lot of mentorships and indirectly as well,
the way that I was taught was just,
it's okay if you're not in my class,
I'm gonna spend time with you and mentor you.
And I also have a student that's sort of my student,
he's gonna graduate,
and it's Feather/John/Jack,
he has three names,
when I first met him he said his name was Beyonce.
[audience laughing] Feather's in the front,
and I bring him up because I just hired him
to work with me for the last two years
and he travels with me.
And it's weird 'cause sometimes I don't know what he does,
and people's like, "What's his job?"
I'm like, "I don't know!"
But he sits in the studio with me
and just play Beyonce in the background,
[audience laughing]
so that I can stay up late working in the studio.
And then when students come in,
'cause I'm the printmaker.
The printmaker in me,
the traditional printmaker,
is to work amongst other people.
So I don't go away and shy away in my studio,
I actually work in the classrooms
in a fishbowl situation.
While they have an assignment,
I'm working, and then so Jack will come in,
and he'll say "Stop talking to her, she has a show!"
So he's my bodyguard.
[all laughing]
So I'm gonna start with the first piece
I made in undergrad back in,
I'm gonna date myself in the best way here,
I would say 2005.
And Suzie you can correct me if I'm wrong, 2005, 2006.
Back story is, I grew up in the foster care system.
I'm the youngest of four.
And a lot of my family is coming tomorrow, actually.
So I went to undergrad at Western Illinois University,
and it's cornfield area, which I like.
I like my cornfield.
So I went there.
And I actually just hopped in a friend's car
on a college tour, they were going.
And I was like, "Where you going?"
They was like, "We going to tour some colleges."
I just jumped in the car and went with them.
And I saw this university,
and it just made sense that I would be there.
I didn't even know what kind of art program it was,
I just thought the campus was pretty.
So I go to this school and I study graphic design
and I study marketing,
I did metalsmithing for a little bit.
And then I met Susan who introduced me
to screen printing,
I had no idea what printmaking was.
I would go to a museum and see like a lithograph,
I'm like, "What is that?"
And when I got into screen printing,
I appreciated the labor.
Printmaking is all about labor
and the intensity of it.
And so I got to branch my labor with metalsmithing
and my graphic design background
and a way of looking at designs
with screen printing in particular.
And I think why I'm drawn to screen printing
is probably because it's water-based, I'm not sure.
But also it's a lot of cleaning,
there's a lot of cleaning constantly.
And so I found myself being able
to work quickly with the medium.
And quicker, like when I think about making work,
I immediately think about making a print.
And that's quick to me,
versus drawing sometimes.
So I think that's kind of interesting.
So I'm gonna start with this piece.
And I remember,
so because I grew up in the foster care system,
we moved around between Milwaukee, Chicago, back and forth.
And with one aunt in particular,
we moved about 20 times,
and I changed schools in the middle of the school year
so much so, and as we'd go to different homes,
everyday we would just lose something.
Lose a baby doll that I had,
or lose the photographs,
or we didn't have them.
And my mother was incarcerated in and out.
We were split up, the four of us.
So my older sister and brother was somewhere else,
we didn't know.
And my middle sister and I were somewhere else.
So having to navigate that and going to college,
and being an artist,
or thinking about, "What do I want to make art about?"
So I got a rare photograph of myself,
and I thought about the significance of printmaking
and how you can do multiples,
so maybe if you only have one photograph,
how do I share this with my family?
So if I make multiples.
So this one was the first time,
you know I made a piece that was about my background.
Before I did this,
I was doing a bunch of landscapes.
I was just like, "Ooh pretty, landscapes."
And so then my professor, Susan, pushed me to go deeper.
And then I started to think about all the foster homes,
and this was my ideal home growing up.
Like this is how I drew my house growing up.
And then these were all like,
foster children in waiting.
And it was the first time I kind of tapped
into that narrative, I think, socially.
And also I thought everybody grew up in foster care
for some odd reason.
And I got to college and my friends was like,
"What's foster care?"
It was like, "Oh."
And or people having two-parent homes.
Like that was very foreign to me.
So then moving forward from undergrad,
so this was a very pivotal piece
that launched I think this work that is here today.
So then I go to graduate school.
So I go to UW-Madison.
My colleagues were great,
the professors were great,
and especially the people that did not do printmaking.
They were very good at telling me things that,
like one professor in particular was like,
"You know there's a lot of things in the world.
"I don't think we need to make anymore things.
"You should think about performance."
[all laughing]
And then I was like, "So what you're saying is
"there's too much stuff in the world,
"make better stuff, got it."
[all laughing]
And so that right there really helped
me think about being considerate,
and not to take it exactly like he said
'cause he was like, "Stop making art,
"and just make art in a different way."
So then that's an image,
I started to get images from my mom in particular,
and I would take that image, reproduce it,
so this is a screen print.
And then I started thinking about iconography,
what are some visual links that we could talk about?
So if I'm doing this, if I'm doing work,
how does everyone be a part of it?
Even if your story's not that you grew up in foster care,
but we all have to deal with loss at some point.
So I was thinking about McDonald's being the signifier,
and how foster children,
and even kids who come from a divorced home,
they always tell them to take them to a neutral place.
So in foster care you would always take a kid to McDonald's.
And I did a talk in Milwaukee to a bunch of social workers,
and they were like, "Yeah they tell us that.
"They tell us to take foster kids to McDonald's."
And that was-- living with my aunt,
she was physically abusive growing up,
and I'll talk about that later
'cause there's all these other layers to why,
and I didn't know that until later.
So I started thinking about all these links
that tied our story together.
So at McDonald's in particular, in kindergarten,
actually sorry third grade,
I remember going to McDonald's with a social worker,
and being the youngest and being the one who talks the most,
to this day out of all my siblings.
[audience laughing]
I told the social worker like, everything
that was happening in the the household.
And I only told her because she offered me french fries.
Extra fries! [audience laughing]
And I remember my sister and brother looking at me like,
"Don't say anything."
And I was like, "More french fries?"
[all laughing]
So I immediately just start singing like a bird.
And that day, that was the day we got moved from her home.
In trash bags.
And I was watching the news like a month ago,
and there was this organization that
when they transition kids from foster care,
they give them duffel bags.
Because they realize that trash bags were like a thing.
And so we would leave that day.
And I remember leaving and no one was home.
And it was usually people always there.
There was nine people, by the way, living with my aunt.
And we were four, and she already had five kids,
and one of her kids had a kid.
So I grew up in a house full of teenagers,
and it just so happened no one was home,
and my cousin was very upset.
He looked at me and was like,
"You just messed up the family."
And I remember thinking, "Well good.
"We should leave."
And I'm nine years old thinking this way.
And then moving forward, my thesis show at Madison,
I remember my colleagues were like,
"You always talk about this story,
"but I think it'd be great to kind of really see it.
"Just can we see it all out?"
And I was like, "Well yeah."
So I started with my grandmother,
who I never got to meet.
She died a year before I was born.
And so after she died, that's when the family
took to drugs and chaos and then we were split up.
And actually my mother took us to a friend's house,
and I thought we were there for one night.
And my older sister was like, "No."
She was the fact checker.
So my older sister's like, "Nuh-uh.
"We were there for a year."
I was like, "Really?"
[audience laughing]
I just remember watching Little Shop of Horrors .
That's all I remember.
And she was like [laughs].
So my thesis show was a culmination
of all those indicators, images.
I didn't have images of the house that we grew up in,
but I know one of the stories
that I thought was interesting
was that my family grew up pretty well-off.
My grandfather was in the army,
they were fine financially.
But then after the matriarch in the family dies,
my mother was like, "We just kind of,
"we didn't know what to do."
And that was her best friend.
And that kind of changed the story to where it,
so I had to think about that house that we grew up in,
which was burned down.
So when I went to Chicago to see where we lived,
it's the only house that's empty,
still to this day in that plot.
Everything else is still around,
but that one house that I grew up in is no longer there.
And I just Googled an image that made sense to that house,
and tried to recreate it.
Took the photo again,
and thought about McDonald's
and the Department of Children Family Services logo
that I got to see so much.
'Cause we would get direct mail,
and when I went to college
we were still considered foster children
even though I was in college,
so I would still get mail saying, "Dear Ward,"
or "Dear Ward of the State."
[audience gasps] Oh yeah, so.
And then also the Chicago police car,
which is interesting because we would get picked up
in a police car to take us to the station
to wait for an available home.
And so that connection between incarceration,
I have a lot of family members
that are incarcerated currently or just getting out.
And the ice cream truck.
So my father, I only met him a few times.
Last time I seen him I was in kindergarten.
But my memory of him is ice cream.
So he's-- food I have a issue, okay.
[all laughing]
So he would buy me ice cream.
So I would start thinking about these little moments
and how can I put that into the work?
And there's the image of me again,
and there's a close up.
And there's me taking McDonald's wrappers
and trying to think about how true
do I want to have this conversation?
And then the house that we grew up with my aunt
was South Side Chicago,
one of those you know two-flats.
And I found out literally like a year ago that,
and some people in my family,
they don't think it's important to tell it.
I think most families are like this.
They're like, "Who cares?
"That happened 20 years ago."
You're like, "I wanna know!"
And so I'm like, "I wanna know."
So my sister was like, "Well, you know
"the landlord's son lived downstairs.
"And she wasn't supposed to have nine people upstairs.
"It was a three bedroom home.
"So when we were being told to be quiet,
"and we kept getting in trouble,
"that's because the guy was home."
I was like, "Never knew that!
"I just thought she was mean."
I had no idea. [audience laughing]
And I think she was mean,
but, [audience laughing]
there was another layer.
And then the Christmas tree,
we had the best Christmases with my aunt.
And so I thought about those things.
And then my favorite toy was this doll called PJ Sparkle.
And I just took the dress.
And it was marketed as,
she was marketed originally as a orphan,
but then know I looked and it said she's a princess.
So they changed the story.
So I think that's a little interesting.
I did my research.
So I thought about the toys and all that.
So this is a thesis show.
And then moving forward I started getting more images.
So, this is a school in Chicago that is no longer,
there's a bunch of grass growing all over.
It went from this school to a charter school,
now it's just empty.
Every elementary school my siblings and I went to are,
and that's a very common story unfortunately
in the African American community,
especially in Detroit.
I see a lot of people that are like,
"Yo, none of my schools exist anymore,"
if you went to a public school.
But what's interesting is, there's no names.
So trying to like find these people.
[laughing]
So yeah, there's me.
So I got this image and I just immediately
started working with the reproduction of these images,
and what's the story.
And in here embedded is my report card
that I found from that time.
And my report card,
I remember getting in trouble a lot in school,
but once the teacher found out
that I was in foster care,
I remember being treated a certain way.
And it wasn't a good way and I remember acting out
because I didn't like how she treated me.
So I did do some weird stuff.
I stole some stuff off her desk,
buried it in the backyard.
[all laughing]
And I remember it said "most likely to steal."
And I was like, "Well..." [all laughing]
So it was more like a behavior report card,
it wasn't even like a real academic report card.
So then I started thinking about my siblings,
and I remember,
and this was like one of the first portraits I did
where I kind of just isolated the face
and just focused on the hair,
and imposed this jewelry, because as three girls
and one boy in the family,
my brother's the oldest,
and as we try to have a relationship
with my mother, to this day it's very tricky
because she didn't raise us.
So trying to have like three girls on your dresser
digging for your stuff just freaks her out.
Because she like, "I don't, mm,
"I know y'all my kids, but."
So there's this weird separation.
There's me trying to tie that connection.
And I remember somebody saying,
"Well you guys never talk about your father."
I'm like, I guess fathers, I don't know,
we just obsessed over our mother
thinking that we put a lot on her.
We never even thought about, why wasn't our father around?
And also we have different dads, and that's tricky.
And so--
but we just something about,
we put a lot of burden on mothers, I decided.
'Cause we totally just,
even to this day my siblings are not so,
they're not always kind because they don't understand.
Especially when one of my siblings,
she's a mother now, she's like, "I would never do what-- "
I was like, "Well there's a whole story before her.
"You know before we were born."
So I did another portrait of me,
but just wanting to focus on maybe the hairstyle
and the dress, and maybe the jewelry,
thinking about my mom.
And I did another small series about the classmates,
and I called them Unknown Classmates .
So me trying to constantly go back in to find out,
who did I go to school with?
I don't have any friends from kindergarten.
And I always get like people,
"I have friends for 30 years."
And I'm like, "What?"
My friendships started, I still have friends from college,
not even high school.
So maybe on Facebook, I have to dig and find.
But some people have lifelong
because they stayed in maybe one house.
I moved so much, and when I had best friends,
we moved and didn't even get to tell them.
So I'm gonna to fast forward to my uncle who died in prison.
So in 2009 I was still in graduate school
at the University of Madison and my sister texted me
and was like, "Gregory died."
So this is my Uncle Gregory who, I remember him in 1995
when he stole my karaoke machine.
And I didn't know at the time,
'cause people didn't talk in the family,
I didn't know he was on drugs and he'd just got out.
He was in prison before that for about 20 years,
so he got out, and then he ended up going
right back to prison.
Not because he stole the karaoke machine.
[all chuckling]
For something else, and then he ended up,
so that was in 1995 he went back to prison.
I was in fifth grade, and then he died in 2009 in prison.
And under suspicious circumstances.
Still don't know to this day,
this is why I should be a detective,
'cause I'm like, "What happened when?"
And so what happened was he,
they spelled his last name wrong in the prison system,
and we couldn't find him for years.
And so when he died, they just cremated him
and shipped his ashes to my aunt.
And my aunt-- we gave her money for a urn,
don't know what she did with the money,
but there was no urn.
So I went to visit and I was like,
"Okay, I'm taking these ashes with me."
So I took the ashes in the box with me.
But before I did that, I actually,
so I was at the Women's Studio Workshop
in upstate New York doing a residency,
and I wanted to do a piece that talked about my uncle
and give him, 'cause when I found out he died,
I went online and found his rap sheet.
And it was pretty long and armed robbery, armed robbery.
He was a repeat offender,
and then I went back an hour later to grab his mug shots
and all the history was gone.
So apparently if you die in prison,
they'll totally delete.
But if you get a mugshot, it'll be up forever.
So at the time in 2009,
my mother was incarcerated in Milwaukee.
So I'm in grad school, my uncle just dies in prison,
my mother is incarcerated,
so I sent her, you know I tell her what happened.
And she goes, "Well can you send me everything you have?"
So I send her all the documents,
and then she sends me this letter saying,
"Can you do a art piece?
"Can you make a little pastel portrait?
"'Cause he looks pretty rough in the mug shots."
And so I decided to do an entire exhibition about him
and just thinking about giving him a story
that was unmarked by the prison system.
And I took my mother's letter and I embedded it in the piece
and it's basically her asking, his name is repeated,
and her asking can I enhance his photo.
And then I did some portraits of him,
and once again, not having a strong relationship with him
because I was young and he was in
and out of prison since he was 16,
and just trying to have a confrontation with someone
you don't know through images is kind of difficult.
I'm sitting in the studio with his mugshots all day.
These pieces were done in 2012,
which leads me to a show at Western Michigan University
that happened in the fall of 2018
where the Angela Davis from the Black Panther party,
which I didn't know at the time.
I got an invite saying we want you to be
a part of this panel, and it had all the panelists,
and I saw Angela Davis and I just thought,
it was a random Angela Davis.
I had no idea, and I called,
and then I was like, and the woman kept saying her name.
And I was like, "Are you talking about the Angela Davis?"
She was like, "Uh, yes." [audience laughing]
I was like, "What?"
So these pieces got in the show.
The show was about people who either directly dealt
with being in prison and incarcerated,
or people indirectly.
I was invited to be a part of this exhibition,
and this artist took his jumpsuit
and walked around the city once he got out.
So he got a jumpsuit and walked
and told people why he went to prison, when he went.
And then he made a tape,
I don't have a good picture of it,
but he taped the floor to show how large the cell was
that he spent 20 years in.
And then this is a carpet that a artist made.
"When I get out I not never coming back."
And so, and then Angela Davis.
So she comes into this space,
like they let me have one-on-one time with her.
This is the artist who was with me named Maria Gaspar.
She's a artist in the Chicago
and does a lot of work with prisons
and telling their stories
and helping them throughout the community.
The Cook County Jail, which is the jail
that my uncle went to,
but he didn't die at the Cook County Prison,
he was pushed way far out.
And so I got to talk to her about my work,
which was, you know the day before I didn't know.
I was like, "Oh, the Angela Davis."
So I got to be on a panel discussion,
so I made her laugh, so that's good.
[audience laughing]
So we talked, basically we talked about
how she doesn't, she believes that these institutions
in general are oppressive
and we need to get rid of all of them.
And before we could start with the jail.
So it was a very amazing moment to have
where the work had this conversation
that was done in 2012 and I get to have a conversation
with the Angela Davis about imprisonment.
So then I began, so I'm thinking about these backdrops,
'cause the piece out there is a huge,
one of the largest wall pieces I've done to date.
But I started with this piece
and I was thinking about the story of everybody growing up,
of how my family grew up with money,
but then there's no evidence of that now.
And so I had to respond to a piece at the Haggerty Museum.
So I responded to these beautiful serving wares
that they were gonna put on Etsy
that was donated to them by the previous president,
who they're worth a lot of money.
And I was like, "I want to do something with these."
And also screen printing has a history
with elaborate, fancy wallpaper.
So I wanted to do that.
But then I thought about, my mother at the time
Googled herself and found her mugshot
and found her rap sheet online,
and was very upset about it.
And I said, "Well, I'm gonna to take those mugshots,
I'ma Google everybody in the family.
So then I start Googling everybody in the family
and found lots of mugshots.
And I decided to do something with them
to give them a space outside of the usual.
So I was like, "If you were to walk into a rich,
"fancy home in the 17th Century, what would you see?"
And if that was our story,
let me figure out a way to appreciate all of the story,
not just the good, let's appreciate the negative
connotations of this story.
So then I got this picture, this photograph,
this is my grandparents that I never got to meet.
My grandfather was, he died of alcohol poisoning,
or I mean, cirrhosis of the liver.
So he's a vet, he gets out, this is the '80s.
And my grandmother, and I remember seeing this photo
for the first time and she actually,
it was on her obituary.
So, that was interesting, and he was,
it was just his shoulder.
So I finally got this photograph,
I was like "That's who that was?" [laughing]
And so I reproduced this image
'cause I thought about them being the housekeepers,
and so I put them, or the homemakers.
So what I like is how this image translates
and it looks like a hat from the military,
and it's just the image translating.
And then I thought my grandmother looked like a queen
and I'm like, "I wish I woulda met her."
And so I just kind of imposed this piece on there
and wrapped her in fabric.
I photoshopped this in to think about
who were they and who they could have been?
Or maybe who they were,
but then there was all these other layers
to the family history.
Then I started thinking about public school systems,
'cause Detroit has a, I mean,
I'm watching the news one day and there's mushrooms
growing on the walls.
I'm like, "What?"
There's no heat, there's no--
And I remember having so much pride
going to a public school growing up,
and we all had to dress up for our photos.
We have a chant, we have to like,
it was just a really good moment.
So to see that public schools are being torn down
or not funded, so then I make this.
And then I took this piece,
I simplified it, but it looks like a tombstone.
So I also like when images do that.
When you play with them
and it's like the death of public schools.
And then in Michelle Obama's book,
Becoming: Michelle , I was turning and I was like,
"Wait a minute!
"This also says Francis Studio."
So apparently on the South Side of Chicago,
there was one studio that was taking all these photos
of these black families for about 50 years,
or black schools in particular, or schools.
So I was like, I have to look into this Francis Studio.
I got to find the archive,
'cause they don't exist anymore.
So I start thinking again of objects,
of the hot combs, and what other representations
that coming from childhood experiences
and how anyone from the African diaspora who has curly hair
and the history of straightening your hair
had nothing to do with straight hair,
but more about braiding your hair
so it looked like Egyptian.
So I was thinking about that
and how the hot comb is huge in a young black girl's life,
or a young black male who has hair when he was younger.
And so then I thought about the park
that was behind he house that was attached
to the public school that I went to,
and that the swings were never fixed
and we would play on them all the time.
And I took these pictures in Madison, actually.
I went to a bunch of areas to see
where I could see broken swings,
and then thinking about how my aunt favored
one of us over the others,
and how she'd dress us according to who she liked.
And so all these things would just come up
and I would have to kind of remember them,
and then I wanted to make work about them.
And then the backdrops are, I think, theatrical.
I'm thinking quilts,
I'm thinking what is something that I coulda had
that would have been passed down?
I don't have anything, so how can I try to make that image?
And so I started thinking about taking over space,
getting rid of the white wall space.
And talking to my mom, she said,
and my mom-- she doesn't admit she's a hoarder.
She thinks she's a collector.
[audience laughing]
But she was like, she walked into an apartment one day
and she was moving in and it was so empty,
she couldn't stay there.
She doesn't like the emptiness.
She has to fill the void as much as she can.
And I think about that,
wanting to create your space as much as you can,
even if it's tacky, even if it's not, you know?
But my mom's place to this day,
you can't walk anywhere.
There's stuff everywhere.
And it's all clean and it has a purpose,
these little knickknacks and all these things,
so I was thinking about that wanting to cover
and create a space.
And so I'm working on a flat surface for the most part,
you know screen printing, printmaking.
But how do I get the viewer engaged?
And also, my influence, I'm thinking Rauschenberg,
Andy Warhol, I'm thinking all these artists
who worked on paper in this way.
And so this was at the Dean Jensen Gallery,
and Dean Jensen retired, and so I'm with the new gallery,
the Alice Wilds in Milwaukee, which I'll talk about.
And so thinking about toys and marketing
and growing up with my aunt.
And I did this piece about the See 'n Say toy
'cause it was one of my favorite toys,
but I think the irony was growing up in this house
with my aunt and we couldn't say anything.
We would be seen and not heard,
and so I thought of the idea of these toys
trying to get kids to be more open
and be seen and how that was kind of irony,
but not knowing why she didn't want us to be seen and heard,
because she technically shouldn't have had
us in the house in the first place.
And so I reproduced the See 'n Say toy
in a print a few times.
And I do like to repeat images
and try to juice them for all they're worth,
and then I'm like, "Okay, never again, I'm done."
And so then I decided to just get these See 'n Say toys,
and not the new ones.
'Cause the new ones have a handle.
That's not what I grew up with.
[laughing]
So the ones with the string.
And I went on Etsy and I bought them from people,
and people would be like,
"Oh, enjoy this with your child."
I'm gonna put a hole through it.
[all laughing]
And people sold them at different rates.
So there was this woman my age who sold it at like $12
and this one woman sold it at like 50
because her grandkids played with it.
So I thought that was interesting to see how people--
So this was at the Museum of Wisconsin Art.
And so I had this, once again, long backdrop
thinking of it as a big painting.
And so there's this object
and people can actually play with it.
And these are vinyl.
So I learned the difference between the new toys,
are USB, and this is vinyl.
So these toys are 30 years old and they still work,
but the new toys don't last.
And I drilled a hole through the back of this thing
and it still worked.
I was like, "I don't know what."
[all laughing]
And so then moving to my grandmother.
So this is, my grandmother died of cancer.
So she died of cancer before I was born,
and I saw this photo and I was like,
"Wow," totally stark image from the first image
I showed you guys
where she looked like a queen, to here.
Brady Roberts, who was the curator at
the Milwaukee Art Museum reached out to me
and was like, "I want a piece of yours.
"It has to do with your uncle, so go."
And I was like, "Okay?"
He's like, "We don't know if we're gonna buy it, we'll see."
[laughing]
So I was like, "Okay, I'ma think about a piece
"that intertwines my uncle with my grandmother."
And so, when I took the ashes,
I sat on 'em for a minute
because I was looking for the perfect,
I wanted to get the family together.
It didn't work out like that.
So then I decided to put the ashes in the piece.
So, that's tricky and I didn't know that was illegal.
So. [all laughing]
So I totally took the ashes, screen printed them
onto this urn.
So one Christmas I bought everybody urns.
Which, when I tell people that,
they kinda look at me weird.
I was like, "It's just what I had to do."
So I had the ashes, so I did buy little urns
and give, and like disseminate my uncle.
But then I still had half the ashes left.
I was like, "This is a lotta ashes."
[all laughing]
So I was like, "What else can I do with these ashes?"
So I still have some of 'em.
I screen printed on this piece.
I put gel medium over it and then I had to shake it
to make sure nothing came out,
and then this is me working.
So and I know that the curator,
he was like, "I want the piece to be big."
'Cause they did it, they redid their wing
at the Milwaukee Art Museum
and it was gonna go up for the new wing.
And I was like, "Okay."
So he was like, "As big as you can get it."
I was like, "Oh." [laughing]
So this is me working, I thought I imagined,
this is my mom's jewelry
that I'm always kind of playing with
that she's like, "Don't touch."
But I have to sneak and take it,
that I put in my grandmother's hand.
And then this is the piece.
And so this is like cut out, placed on the backdrop.
This is my uncle, the ashes with the urn.
And then his image is placed in here very transparent,
his mug shots throughout the entire piece.
And so that was when they were putting it up
in the new space. [audience murmuring]
And so this is Milwaukee Art Museum.
It's theirs forever.
It was up for two years,
and the people were very upset when they took it down.
But you know, artists sometimes,
we're not very good at archiving things,
so I did something weird.
And he's like, "We're taking this down.
"We got to fix it."
But it was up for two years.
They took it down.
They were like, "Works on paper has to rest.
"We'll put it back out eventually."
So then moving forward,
I did another piece of my grandmother.
That piece, that table, that lamp,
that plant, that candle, that's all in that show
and I was thinking about, "Why is the lampshade missing?"
So I immediately was like, "Huh, okay."
And then that's when I found out
a lot of the domestic violence in my grandparents' marriage,
and so that made sense.
They dressed really well.
I talked to a cousin that I never talk to
who's a older cousin, and she was like,
"We just loved going over to your grandparents house
"because she had a garden
"and she was always dressed to the nines."
And but there was a lot of violence,
and so I'm thinking about that lampshade.
And this is an object that my mother has,
the only thing that she has of my mother's, it's a lighter.
I thought it was worth something,
but it's worth like $10.
And it's just a limited edition UFO lighter.
[all laughing]
From the '50s, and I was like, "Okay."
[laughing]
All right, I'll just reprint that image.
And then I did a show thinking about the hot combs.
I did a piece at Florida Gulf Coast University
where I took actual hot combs and patinaed them
and painted them, but I wanted to do something
with them in ceramics.
And that's where the pieces out there are actually porcelain
and I had molds made.
I collaborated with an artist in Detroit,
Chrys Lewis, who's a really amazing porcelain genius.
And she helped me out with those pieces
and the lamps, as well.
So this is the porcelain hot combs.
And me painting them and thinking about them
and trying to get the teeth to look like actual teeth.
And then these photographs.
So my aunt, you know after I got the Joan Mitchell,
I was like I wanted to see what photos I could get access to
and my aunt was not happy about giving up the photographs.
So my sister, was like, "You know your auntie's a hustler.
"You're gonna have to pay her."
I was like, "Okay."
So I offered money.
She was like, "Oh, you can have the photos."
I was like, "No one else wants these photos!"
So I got the photos and the very next day,
she's like, "I need 'em back." [laughing]
So I had to hurry up and scan 'em in
and send 'em back to her.
And so that's where these photos come out,
and I think it's interesting
because she chose, she has over a thousand photos.
She took so many images of us growing up,
but she is, and I have talked to a lot of people
that was like, "Yep, I have an aunt
"who is the keeper of the photographs."
There's always one person in the family who's the keeper.
And so she picked and chose what ones she wanted to give me.
And it's funny, 'cause when you make work about family
or people's portraits, I think no matter what the story is,
everybody wants to be represented.
So she was like, "I've never been in your work," like upset.
[laughing]
I was like, "Well, okay."
So she sent me these images, and that's my uncle.
You know with the abs back in the day.
That's the one that passed away, that died in prison.
That's my sister's birthday,
but I thought that couch with the plastic,
I remember that plastic just being stuck to the thigh.
[audience laughing] On a hot summer day.
And I went to a university and was doing a talk,
and these students were like,
"Why is there plastic on the furniture?"
[audience laughing]
I said, "So I see how you grew up.
"I see how you grew up." [audience laughing]
"You didn't grow up like I grew up.
"You don't know about that plastic."
I was like, "You don't know about runners, do you?"
They're like, "What's a runner?"
I'm like "Uh-huh.
"You don't know about that life."
[laughing]
And so me reproducing these images,
pretty large scale, and doing it with Caran d'Ache.
And so screen printing, doing a reduction process,
which is a very typical screen printing process
that you learn in any program.
And also, like bringing in the Caran d'Ache.
'Cause I went from avoiding the faces,
because I'm like these are people I don't know very well.
They're my family,
but we don't have a relationship like that.
But then also not wanting
to talk about them at the same time.
And my older sister was like,
"If you're gonna tell this story,
"you should just be honest about it
"and just be 100% real about it.
"There's no point if you can't go in there."
And so then the Caran d'Ache kind of
read a little bit more painterly
and it's like one and done.
So it's a monotype, so when I make them on the screen,
whatever I get, I get.
I can't go back really.
And so you get to have this distorted.
And I am thinking about the fact that
most of our photographs and objects
were burned down in that house
that my grandmother and my grandfather had.
After they died, it was actually drugs
that brought the house down.
Somebody was doing drugs in the house.
And so luckily we weren't there,
but that's how we ended up on the streets with my mom,
and then, but yes.
This is very, to this day,
I just remember being in this position a lot.
[audience laughing] Just a lot.
[laughing]
But also I think it's interesting how we read images.
Because I was doing this piece in a classroom,
and one of the students was like,
"Is she reaching for a gun?"
I was like, "Why you think she reaching for a gun?"
So I'm like, [laughing]
and just thinking about like,
you know we also, as far as representation goes
with the black image and black families,
there's so much that we haven't seen historically,
in the museums and in general.
So I think, I see that African American portraiture
is really popular today.
I'm seeing a lot, my ear is to the ground on Instagram.
But also it's a lot about that's happening in the art world.
And I think it's because people just haven't seen
and also, me having to get these photographs,
I also haven't seen a lot of our own history.
So we're trying to get this narrative out there.
There's other stories in the black community.
And so that's me isolated.
Also, graphic tee, Batman shirt, I mean I just.
So when Leah and I was working together,
we was trying to get the dates of the photos.
And I was like, "Okay so Batman came out."
[audience laughing]
1992, I was in second grade.
And she was cracking up on the phone.
That's only how I know.
I have to look at the image and go,
"Okay so, that image, that shirt, those graphic tees."
And then I started, this was a show,
this piece was installed prior to another space
at Lawrence University,
and I actually brought in these extension cords.
And so the thing about this aunt,
this is the aunt that was physically abusive.
She also took in four kids and she had five.
And I thought about the extension cords,
'cause that was one of the devices used.
And I called my sister and I was like,
"How do you feel about me talking about that
"and bringing that in?"
And she was like, "Well just make sure you get
"the really orange cord." (audience laughing)
'Cause there's a red cord and there's an orange-orange cord.
And I was like, "Okay."
So she was like, "No."
And so I kind of brought that in
and just to think about those,
when I look at the image of my aunt,
it is definitely a trigger of that time.
And we'll be on the phone talking
and then eventually somebody will be like,
"I don't wanna talk about that no more."
And we're like, "Okay."
But we talk about it still to this day,
and then we immediately move on.
So we kind of, and I think that's interesting.
To be able to heal from quick conversations
and micro-conversations, but then like, okay.
So then just to talk about community,
this is the YWCA right around the corner.
I did a public piece for them.
There's the Children's Museum.
The Children's Museum got a grant.
They brought me in, said
"Could you work with these families?
"They're interested in you doing
"something in the stairwell."
So I ended up getting a bunch of volunteers and we,
they wanted their portraits painted.
They looked at my website and was like, "Okay."
And I remember growing up in a halfway house.
I remember growing up with my mom
in these in-between shelters.
And so it wasn't unlike,
I think they brought me on 'cause they're like,
"I feel like you could have a conversation with the group,"
and they wanted, they felt comfortable with me
because of my background.
So I ended up doing portraits of 12 families.
It was supposed to been two,
and it turned out everybody wanted a portrait.
[laughing]
So representation is important.
This was interesting, because I totally painted her
with her bonnet on her head,
and it's been a thing right now
where they're stopping black moms
from coming to schools with bonnets on.
So that conversation is very, another layer of interesting.
So I did all these portraits,
then we had like a revealing,
and then I took the kids' drawings, the babies,
and just blew it up and projected it.
I made like an I-Spy game.
And so they were very happy to see their,
and this will be up forever apparently.
But I think that's interesting.
I was like, "Well, it sucks for the kids
"that you're gonna have in the future."
They're like, "I wasn't in this mural."
[laughing] But just kinda spending,
I spent a month with them, seeing what they wanted,
talking to them, and they were very excited
to see their images reflected.
Especially in a community in Madison,
and so that was fun to do.
And it's open, you can totally go in
just to the stairwell and look at the,
they made it open for people.
But I brought in like the kids' hands.
'Cause it was like, how are the kids gonna be involved?
So I just made them scribble on some paper
and just brought their hand in.
And did all these portraits for them,
all painted on the wall.
So, in the middle of me doing this project,
this was in 2017, I did it for two weeks,
went to go to Paris to teach a course
at Paris College of Art,
and then came back and finished.
So I went to Paris, I'm just gonna bring out some,
'cause I did a show about it.
So one thing about Paris that I loved
is they don't like things to not look pretty,
so I learned that.
They really, this is a lot of money to spend on,
'cause they are restoring a building.
So, "Oh, let's just put up this facade of an image
"so you don't see what's really happening."
So I thought that was interesting.
And then Versailles was amazing.
So my first time there, first time to Europe,
took students with me from Detroit
and met other students from all over
was in the printmaking class I did there.
And I bring this up because this is the class I had,
I did some printmaking.
Also, look how cheap the wine was, amazing.
[audience laughing]
I mean, never drunk so much wine in my life.
[all laughing]
And then went to Berlin,
'cause Tara Bogart, she's a friend of mine,
she was doing something there.
And she was obsessed with Paris.
I liked Paris, but when I went to Berlin I was like,
"Berlin reminds me of Detroit."
[laughing]
There was, and also, I thought it was great
having all this history about the Holocaust
and all those, all outside.
Like everywhere you walk there's a reminder,
"We'll never do this again.
"We'll never do this again."
I thought that was pretty awesome.
But also, we stayed in a building.
This is the building we stayed in.
The apartment was great.
So she didn't like all this graffiti.
I was like, "This is normal."
So this is a real shop that's open,
and I didn't know that Berlin was gonna be full of graffiti
and very like, lived-in.
I loved it, also there's like these random pipes everywhere.
And I was like, "What the?"
And I have friends who live in Berlin,
never mentioned I'm gonna see a bunch
of blue and pink pipes.
No one said that.
So when I went back,
so I ended up doing an exhibition on campus
in The College for Creative Studies,
and this was about my time in,
I totally took out the photos from New Orleans.
But I went to New Orleans, Paris, and Berlin.
And I wanted to, I was looking for my identity
when I went to New Orleans.
'Cause my last name is Buie
and I wanted to see if there was, I didn't find much,
and then I was like. "Okay, in Paris?"
And so I learned more about like slavery in New Orleans
than I did in Paris.
Nobody wanted to talk about that.
So and then, so I was kind of thinking about
how to bridge these connections together,
so I had this exhibition where I brought the pink piping
and I made a area for New Orleans,
I made a area for, I mixed the media.
So that's a door in New Orleans.
I went to the Museum of Free People of Color in New Orleans
where they talked about all the iron work being signifiers
and actually being, meaning the S that's in all the ironwork
means Sankofa, means "come back to."
So all these secret things that we see in New Orleans.
And I kind of wanted to bring that back,
and then I took the entryway to Versailles,
and I went to New Orleans and took pictures
of all the black hair products in the stores.
'Cause whenever I go to any city,
I got to the local CVS or Walgreens,
and that's how I know where I am.
I go, "How many black hair products in this store?
"Okay, I know where I am based on you have nothing."
[laughing]
And there was so much in New Orleans.
I was like, "Oh my god, they're still doing perms?
"So, we're still doing relaxers?"
And so I just took so many pictures
and bridged that kind of conversation
between New Orleans and Paris and thinking about that,
and the door that I saw in New Orleans with the lock on it.
And then thinking about if New Orleans
would have pipes like Berlin?
'Cause Berlin is also made on swampland,
that maybe that can also help filter out
some of the floods and thinking about that.
And I learned a lot about the tignons
that African American women,
or a lot of the free slaves,
or actually slaves were forced to wear, it was the law.
So I took some traditional paintings
and paired 'em with my mom,
when she was actually pregnant with me,
which I didn't know until she goes,
"Oh, I was pregnant with you in that image."
I'm like, "Wow, good to know."
And just put a tignon on her head.
And this is very interesting 'cause going back
to the bonnets being banned and thinking about
the trying to police black hair constantly
and what that's like.
So that was that piece.
I'm gonna move forward, I'm gonna go quickly.
Thinking about how I reuse images,
this piece was down in Madison in 2012.
Karin Wolf actually helped me make this piece happen.
And I reproduced it, but on a larger scale
with the Urban Institute of Contemporary Art
in Grand Rapids, so Feather hand cut
all these for me, thank you.
But it all out of paper,
it's the swings, I'm thinking about that.
Simplifying the image, these are some pieces
I just kind of took images from
or photographs of,
this is me once again trying to dissect the image
as much as I can.
And then this is a show I had
at the Lynden Sculpture Garden.
I found all the images of everybody
having a full body pose.
Most of them are, everybody's cut off,
but there's not that many,
and that's my uncle's picture from prison.
And there was a show at one point
of people categorized or taking images
from people's Polaroids they took in prison.
It was a very common stance that you would do.
And then they're embroidered on the outside,
then I screen printed a large curtain.
I was thinking of it being a stage.
And moving forward, I did some work in Erie, Pennsylvania.
So these kind of go back to the objects
that are in this show a little bit.
There's the, this my aunt's.
She would buy things out of a,
I don't know if you guys know
Spiegel Magazine and Fingerhut?
Okay, Fingerhut.
So she would buy a lot of objects
out of Fingerhut magazines,
and everything was cheap,
but she was trying to reproduce all the stuff
she grew up with, and I thought that was interesting.
And I remember having to polish this thing every week.
And I was like, "It's not real.
"It's not real." [laughing]
And I had to make it look real.
So my job was to make it shiny all the time,
and thinking about that.
And then that lamp, so in one of the photographs,
this lamp is when my aunt was like a tiny baby,
that image is in the show in the back,
and I was like, "That lamp is so beautiful,
"I wish I would've had that lamp."
So I showed this work and these,
a lot of, I would say 60-year-old women came
and was like, "Oh, I had that lamp.
"I gave it away."
So people would be able to look at the images,
so then this is me trying to
reproduce the lamp a couple times.
So I had to get this shade custom made in LA.
Because you can't find those shades anymore
unless you go to a garage sale.
And then this is Chrys, my collaborator who,
she threw this and she was like,
"I can't throw it as tall as I want."
I was like, "That's funny, I'll take it."
So just trying our best to reproduce
this lamp from the photo.
And this is a show I had at the Alice Wilds Gallery
in Milwaukee, and so this kind of goes back.
This is me trying to think about these things,
but expanding them out.
This is some later work I'm getting into,
that's my sister in a Jheri curl, I think.
It's funny 'cause my family are not,
they're not like, "Oh, use our images."
They're like, "Which image are you using now?"
[all laughing]
And then my sister's like, "The one with the Jheri curl?"
[laughing]
So there is like, in one of the pictures,
in the back is very fuzzy, I see a Jheri curl bottle
and a plant inside of it like a flower.
I'm like, "Were you using that as a vase?
"That's funny." [all laughing]
That's me bringing that conversation into that.
So that's a close up.
So I took actual pearl earrings and put them into the print
and fabric, and then so this is Easter,
us getting ready for Easter Sunday.
And there is a picture out there
and me and my sister was looking at each other,
but then this sister was looking towards us,
but I took the peace lily
and just kind of photoshopped it in,
took it out the background of the photo,
put it in the foreground.
And was thinking about all these memories we've had,
but also how I can subvert the images.
Like, what am I doing?
What do I want to say and how do I talk about our past
in a way that I think is, I don't know,
engaging for us to have a conversation?
Because it is some really disheartening things in a family
and they don't wanna talk about 'em,
but the art kinda allows us to talk.
And so when they come to shows,
they're like so-- they'll talk about it.
But they won't, I can't get 'em to talk about it
outside of me having shows.
But that's the last image.
Does anybody have any questions?
Yeah?
- Woman: Just out of curiosity,
and this is really good work that you display here,
so what made you decide to do this?
- Tyanna: Do like art in general?
- Woman: Yeah.
- I remember just always doing it,
and I remember I had a story about me being in kindergarten
and the first time I was praised outside of the house
was in art class. [audience murmurs]
So it was like that moment and a teacher,
and I remember being in kindergarten,
I felt so proud that the teacher was proud
that I made something.
And that feeling stuck with me.
'Cause I know how, and that's probably why I teach,
and I'm very encouraging,
even to the student who's a problem.
Because I know what it's like
to say one negative thing and you would disrupt their life.
I know what that's like,
so I stay on the other.
'Cause I'm like, I know what it's like
to feel constantly encouraged
and having to go with that energy, so yeah.
- Woman: So, follow up question.
- Yeah?
- Would you think of this
as a form of therapy for you?
- I think artists in general,
my mother was like, "I'm happy you're doing this
"'cause it's your outlet."
Like everybody needs a positive outlet.
So does this make me feel better about everything?
I sometimes think art doesn't change anything,
but it can start the conversation to change.
It just opens up that space.
So it's not like our family got closer
because I'm making art about it.
I wish, oh.
I was like, "We not close yet?
"Okay." [audience laughing]
But no, it's also just like,
but my brother for the first time admitted
that he has a fear of abandonment.
He's 40, he's just now realizing that.
So, but he's like, "I'll still come to your show,
"but I know it's gonna be sad."
I was like, "It's not gonna be sad."
But that's the way he,
he's got to deal with those,
I said, "You gotta deal with the past."
So I think it is a form of therapy by accident.
I didn't try to go out and set out for therapy, but yes.
Yep?
- Woman: What do you want people to get out of it?
- What do I hope that people get out of these images
or what story?
I love reality TV. [audience laughing]
And I think, also, I'm nosy.
I like everybody else's business.
[audience laughing]
And I think the best part about other people's business
is it makes you feel human.
You go, "Okay, well if you going through that,
"then I'm good."
And I think it's a way to like compare.
[audience applauding]
I think we get, when people get depressed,
they think it's their story is just so unique.
I'm like, "You're not special."
And my story is not that unique.
I talk to people like, "Girl, I grew up in foster care, too.
"And?" [laughing]
And I'm like, "You right."
And so, it was my friends that were like,
"It's not that big of a deal."
And I was like, "That's a good, I needed to know that."
so I'm not like, "Oh, my story's so horrible,"
and there's worse.
And so I definitely want people to be able
to relate to some parts of the story
and then you leave feeling like, "Okay,
"I feel better about myself.
"I'm not fighting people on television."
[all laughing]
- Woman: I think a lot of us relate to,
who grew up, so a lot of things
that you hit in your story.
The straightening comb, girl, you know--
- Yes, yes, yeah. [audience laughing]
- Extension cord, we know about.
- Extension cord, yep, yep.
- But what is your relationship like
with your aunt now?
Is she still living?
- She's still living.
My relationship with my aunt now,
we definitely, we didn't have a relationship after we left.
I felt like she was always mad that we left,
and that was in 1993.
And, I would talk to her on the phone,
it'd be very quick and short.
But we don't have a relationship.
But it's lingering, it's out there.
My mom have gotten close to my aunt,
and she'll tell me, like but we don't.
It didn't seem necessary 'cause it would be forced.
So it's tricky because I couldn't bring it up to her,
but I brought it up to her kids how we felt growing up.
And they were like, "Oh yeah, she beat us too.
"She hit us, too."
And I was like, "Oh."
They was like, "Y'all thought you was special?"
[all laughing]
So I felt better a little bit.
I was like, "Well can we get--
"What happened to her?"
And they were like, "Eh, it's too long of a story."
You know, like so.
Yeah.
- Woman: So through these images, you've done
a lot of self-discovery and reliving,
learning about yourself as a child.
- Yeah.
- Is there anything
for future works that you want to learn about yourself more?
- That's a hard question.
So what is something I want to learn further about?
I'm not sure yet.
I just I feel, I do like the idea of dissecting things.
I'm interested in finding out more
about what happened to my uncle.
And I also feel like not everything needs to be art.
Some things just need to be done.
And I can, and then whatever happens, happens.
But there's things that I think about
that I want to like just make right.
And if no one else in the family is thinking about it,
I feel like it's my job.
Because I was thinking about and they weren't.
So I'm not mad at them for not--
like I'm not mad at the aunties and all them
for not going out of their way to take care of their brother
who died in prison.
Like, well I'm here, I'll be the niece that does it.
So yeah, I think about the non-art, actually.
Yeah.
- Yep?
- Man: Now when you're
putting an image together, or you're working on an image,
and the image relates to an experience you had,
how important is it that the image reflect historically
what actually happened or how you feel emotionally about it
through the fog of time?
You know because it's not then, it's now.
- Yeah, so how do I feel about the,
how do I work with the images to reflect the story?
Well, a couple things, composition are important to me.
So I am looking at that.
I'm going right back to basics as a artist.
What composition looks good, what works?
And then I'm not necessarily concerned
with the actual facts of the stories,
I'm just thinking about what stands out to me in the image.
So as I was looking at all the photographs,
there was some that just didn't make the cut.
I was like, "Yeah, but these ring true."
And I would call my sister and FaceTime the images to her
or send them to her, she just had her first,
well she's having her second child.
And she was like, "We all look like my son."
You know just having that conversation,
and so I was like, "Well that one has to go in."
Thinking about, how I guess my family relates to the images.
And how they feel about it does play more into the story
versus how accurate.
Because we all have different accounts of what happened,
and I think that's also interesting.
And my sister is like, "I wasn't favored."
And then my older sister is like, "We know,
"but she was." [all laughing]
But she would never admit it.
Yeah?
- Man: I'm really interested in,
you went from earlier you were doing no faces
to now they are kind of, they look almost
like reflections in water.
- Right.
- And that's partially because
you're using the crayons, the water-based crayons.
- Correct.
- And I'm just interested
in that you chose that
because it's a medium that's difficult.
- Yeah, so the work is, I'm dealing with old photographs,
and all the Polaroids were all,
that toxic stuff in there was all seeping out, so.
And it was hard to see the image,
even when I scanned it in at the highest DPI.
So I am thinking about this history of photography
and also developing the film.
And so you don't see it until you have to wait for it
and be patient, so I was trying to be patient
with myself as a artist and saying,
"What if I don't do anything with this?
"Let me see what happens over time?"
Thinking about the history of photography,
but also with the Caran d'Ache,
I'm like using that as a way to work kind of back
and back to the photo that is distorted.
So I am being sometimes direct,
like sometimes there's no mystery.
It's like, "I just want to reproduce this
"as janky as I can." [laughing]
To the best of my knowledge,
and then try to see what clarity can come from it later.
You know?
Yeah, last one?
So one more.
- Man: Do you ever combine the different types
of methods, like that's freehand then you used,
like photo silkscreen, and there were two sort of glued
when you do the prints?
- I think, so do I use mixed media processes?
It's weird because I was like,
well with reductions, you're using the stuff
called Red Blockout or screen filler and you're painting,
so you have to paint on the screen,
you have to draw on the screen,
you have to do all these things.
And then a lot of times I will collage, I'll cut.
But I would say that it kinda employs those things
without me having to think about it.
And then I'll throw in fabrics when I need to
or actual objects.
I did see a hand back there.
I know you said last one, but I'll feel bad.
[audience laughing]
Okay.
- Woman: You used the term
dedicated studio artist?
- Oh yes, I don't know what that means.
[audience laughing]
What do I mean by dedicated studio artist?
I think there's a difference between a research-based,
I guess there's a research-based artist,
where maybe you research a topic.
I guess you're all dedicated,
but you research a topic, you focus on that topic,
and you have a show based on that topic.
But then I have a friend, Claire Stigliani,
that girl gets up every day at 9:00 am
and paints and draws.
I do not do that.
I'll do it, I'll do something for exhibition,
have a show, and then I'll go into like a whole do nothing,
just binge-watching Netflix. [audience laughing]
So I'm either the laziest person in the world,
or the most productive.
It depends on when you see me. [audience laughing]
[audience applauding]
[Tyanna laughing]
Thank you guys so much.
[audience applauding]