I conducted an interview with one of my friends, who creates a bodies of work under the alias, S.Q.R.L. He is a phenomenal artist who has a lot to communicate through his work. You can view his work here. Please enjoy this Q&A and get to know him and understand his work better!
CBP: Summarize why you choose the subject matter you do.
SR: I started with a lot more political and religious work – my own beliefs about the Irish Catholic life i was raised in. As I got older, I started to incorporate portraiture and touch base on my own thoughts and pay homage to those of the past like Rothko or Caravaggio, Bernini, so on. I decided to start doing more classical work and poses while putting my own spin on it. I choose women [subjects] mostly as a way for me to therapy myself… to deal with the unrequited love, betrayal, rejection, true love, and heart break. Plus women are more aesthetically pleasing than men are. Klimt said it and only painted women. From traditional portraiture i moved to making moments happen: that moment you catch an eye with a love across the room, the moment before an orgasm, that awkward silence between two people, and narrative scenarios that start to tell more of a story.
CBP: After the heartbreak you’ve endured, what way do the female figures in your work become therapeutic to you?
SR: I’d say that it all is dependent on the piece and the place I am in my life, what I feel like making. The piece named “Iris of My Eye” that is of a former love has religious overtones but is essentially nude which subverts the meaning. I have gotten the most response from that painting because of the energy it projects. One of love and light. That is partly my playing into my Irish Catholic upbringing and the dogma of the church, how i was brought up to feel about sex and love – it was strict.
CBP: Do you create your idea of a perfect woman when you paint them – one that would diminish the pain of past loves? Or do you consider the inner hurts of the subject as you paint her, breaking past the outer wall she put up around herself that could make her seem bitter and cruel? Or maybe even to remove her from a pedestal she’s been placed on and instead reveal her flaws making her awkward and human? Or something far different?
SR: I try not to elevate or put women on pedestals; I try to get to the truth in their own person/personality while at the same time conveying an idea or concept I have. There’s a part that is purely aesthetic, conveying my concept, idea, composition, and form.
There is a second piece I did of her, “A Rose and My Thorn”. It was finished after the breakup and has an energy and feel that people do not respond well to. I was heartbroken and in pain and the energy of that is clearly present in the piece. It gets a lot of negative response… interesting how that works.
Each piece has an aura, an energy, a piece of me inside it. With my newest piece, “Store My Heart Safely”, I am trying to project the idea of pure love while instilling my own hope to find true love with a beautiful woman.
CBP: Are the stories you tell stories from your memories or narratives that you are creating?
SR: It really is all dependent on what I am feeling at the time. They are both things and people I’ve known or done, while blurring that line of reality. Some is legit truth and actually happened, some are projections of the future, and some are narratives I create.
CBP: What did you want to communicate about your beliefs about the Irish Catholic life you were raised in? Why did you decide to move on from political and religious subject matter? Did the art you created allow you to release whatever burden these subjects had on your psyche and cause you to move on to your newer work?
SR: At first as a young, punk-hardcore kid, I was just pissed off at the world. I hadn’t been to church since CCD was shoved down my throat and I got confirmed. I had lost my faith in everything… the government, religion. I always believed in a higher power or interconnectivity of life… more of an agnostic Buddhist view. Then, as I went through college and life, I had a few instances that restored my faith through hardship, love, and betrayal. A few freaky things that I would consider signs from something higher or omnipotent reminded me [of my faith] and filled me with light and love. I am not a strict, Irish Catholic, but I am intrigued by the ritual aspects of Catholicism and the symbolism presented through the Catholic church. My personal beliefs lie somewhere like they did [when I was younger]. I believe we are all interconnected and there is an afterlife. Whether or not there is a heaven and hell thats one thing. I think if you were bad in life, you will get bad in afterlife. I believe in reincarnation. Like I said, now my beliefs are in a higher power, but it’s an amalgamation of a lot of religions. We should stop fighting over who the messiah is and just feel the love. During college, I tended to work through all these issues/ideas and so it advanced me to more ambiguous concepts that can be interpreted by a wider audience. I can release my own personal burdens and explore my psyche. I find figures are the easiest way for the viewer to relate to the piece – humans observing humans.
CBP: Humans observing humans, yeah you’re definitely right about that helping the viewer. It feels like you really want to invite the average person into your pieces, not just the art enthusiast or the intellectual. You use your knowledge of art-human interaction to help facilitate the viewer’s understanding, so that they can appreciate what you’ve created, whether or not it’s at your own level of understanding.
I’ve noticed you also choose fun, bright colors in most of your work, do you have a specific reason or do you just enjoy them?
SR: The colors I use come directly from our ever-growing monster-of-a-techniculture that we live in. We are flashed by thousands of images and colors each day. I went to school for new media so that I could study media and video. That directly affects my work. Also, say you go to time square… you are bombarded by an almost strobe light-like scenario – bright flashing colors: hot pinks, greens, blues and yellows. I use that in a way while combining my backgrounds with abstract expressionism. The subconscious, automatic writing and painting.
CBP: I have to say you definitely captured the advert affect you mentioned concerning your color choices. They draw me in like a teeny-bopper to a rack of Jo-Bro merchandise (Jonas Brothers… yep, I went there). Do you use that effect to draw the viewer to your work or is there more to it than that?
SR: Hahaha, I’m a victim too. I observed the affect it had on the viewers and the response it gets. From that point, I decided to stay with an assortment of colors that have that affect. Its a good way to draw the viewer in and please them aesthetically, simultaneously. To me, it became a more subconscious and subtle comment on the techniculture so I could keep my media and political views on a different level without being completely overt. Also, I spend my time trying to explore the possibilities inside the [color] tones and effects through different combination.
CBP: Tell me about your integration of writing into your art?
SR: The writings in my paintings are almost like haiku. One or two-line poems or sayings that I come up with or the way I’m feeling. I hide it sometimes, sometimes not. The title, as well, plays a role into the overall meaning of the piece, pushing the concept or creating one. Sometimes it’s anger coming out, sometimes pure love, sometimes hopes and dreams. It’s all different with each piece. At the beginning, it was a lot more random. A whole poem that no one would ever see. Then, as I progressed, it became one or two-line poems that would be accompanied by the title, which would enhance the work. I have always been interested in the power of juxtaposition of image and text, like Barbara Kruger or Jenny Holder. They use it to make a statement and present a concept. That’s also why I brought the text in.
CBP: Well thank you so much for the interview! It’s really interesting to get in your head and have a better understanding of your artwork.
SR: No problem. I love talking about art, I’ll do it all day!
