January 2022 Featured Artist
Exploring Womanhood:
Where Personal & Universal Aspects of the Female Experience Intersect
An Interview with Fine Artist
Viky Garden
A Viky Garden "Selfie"
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New Zealand-based artist Viky Garden was born in Wellington, Aotearoa and currently lives in Tāmaki Makaurau, Auckland with her husband Steve Garden, co-founder of Rattle Records, a contemporary music label in New Zealand.
Since the age of 15, she has predominantly used herself as the model for her work. Through this singular practice, Viky primarily explores the nature of impermanence and similar themes that reflect personal and universal aspects of the female experience. Unable to attend art school, she began painting in earnest at the age of 27. Since then, she has had 26 solo exhibitions and has participated in numerous group shows, both in her homeland and internationally. A multi-disciplined socio-political artist, Viky works as a painter, pinhole photographer and sculptor who has – from the very beginning – engaged in a self-reflective study of the political sphere of womanhood. She uses her own body as a form of language and credits her tutor, New Zealand artist Vivian Lynn, for instilling an awareness of feminist perspectives during her formative years in the late 1970s. Viky’s work is held in private collections in New Zealand, Australia, UK, Canada, U.S. and Europe. She is represented by Fe29 Gallery in Dunedin, New Zealand. |
Woman and Cat
Acrylic on Linen: 80 x 60 cm © Viky Garden |
Untitled
Acrylic on Canvas: 120 x 90 cm © Viky Garden |
Pahiatua 1966
Acrylic on Linen: 80 X 60 cm © Viky Garden |
Viky discusses her work, her influences, and how her diverse series coincide with her life journey, ultimately representing the experience of women worldwide.
What does “self-portrait” mean to you?
Self-portraiture is central to my artistic practice. I primarily use self-referencing and metaphor to examine personal and universal aspects of the female experience. I focus on the complex and often elusive links and juxtapositions between physical, intellectual, emotional, philosophical and socio-political transitions.
What does “self-portrait” mean to you?
Self-portraiture is central to my artistic practice. I primarily use self-referencing and metaphor to examine personal and universal aspects of the female experience. I focus on the complex and often elusive links and juxtapositions between physical, intellectual, emotional, philosophical and socio-political transitions.
Edith's Turban
Oil on Canvas: 40 x 30 cm © Viky Garden |
Strange Little Fruit
Oil on Board: 60 x 40 cm © Viky Garden |
Are your influences more external or internal?
I try not to think about this. It’s too hard. As a woman with a strong feminist overview, I see and process things in a very particular way. As an artist, I’m always in a state of flux – always moving forward and developing, responding to what I do and how I do it. I'm challenging, examining, and recontextualizing. I'm open to the world but always protective of the delicate voice that serves my creativity.
I try not to think about this. It’s too hard. As a woman with a strong feminist overview, I see and process things in a very particular way. As an artist, I’m always in a state of flux – always moving forward and developing, responding to what I do and how I do it. I'm challenging, examining, and recontextualizing. I'm open to the world but always protective of the delicate voice that serves my creativity.
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Please explain the inspiration behind your series Grit. Many of our readers are transitioning through menopause and the many challenges this brings.
Though I wasn’t fully aware of it, Grit slowly took shape over the many years during which I experienced a long, tough perimenopause. Many of my previous works preempt Grit, (Slow Moon and Self Portrait at 57 are good examples). Gradually, I came to concentrate these insights into a coherent reflection on the stages and changes that profoundly impact many women. My intention was to present these ideas in a direct and powerful way, eschewing self-evident titles and lazy sentiments. Apart from the small Ikon paintings, which were painted on found frames, the works in Grit were all painted on unstretched canvas. There were a few reasons for this. First as a metaphor for skin – unstretched canvas has numerous imperfections (unlike canvases pulled tight over stretchers) that implied age-related irregularities. I could also fray the fabric and use this as part of the composition, a sort of gentle undoing that mirrored frayed emotional and psychological states. I also knew that when mounted on the gallery wall, they would cast a unique shadow when a viewer walked past them, a slight hover that might allude to shifts in time. |
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With respect to 'I’m smoking, I’m drinking, I’m dancing, I’m flying' … I might be called a 'ceremonial' smoker and drinker – someone who, on those extremely rare occasions when I feel invincible, will pour a tot of something and smoke a vanilla cheroot. It’s hardly decadent, but it is a self-celebration of those rare and precious feelings of exuberance, a kind of 'rite of passage.'
I'm Smoking, I'm Drinking, I'm Dancing, I'm Flying
Acrylic on Frayed Canvas: 91 x 64.5 cm © Viky Garden |
Happenstance played a part here, too. The abstract glass in the painting is sitting on her abdomen, forming a double halo and suggesting a note of quiet but glorious elevation (see photo).
"I’m in my room, I’m creating. I’m not caring, I have no expectations. It’s so elusive, but when I feel invincible, I grab that feeling with both hands, turn up the music, and I’m free. This painting is not me at 30, 40 or even 50. Here I am, at 60, and for this small moment in time, I’m owning it. What appears to be cigarette smoke is a sea of daffodils, signifying renewal. I'm Smoking, I'm Drinking, I'm Dancing, I'm Flying" ~ Viky Garden |
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Another frayed work, 528 Months, represents the total number of my menstrual cycles. It’s a smaller painting, but a potent one. Forming an irregular halo are puffy, imperfect, organic blooms, which on closer inspection reveal delicate daffodils drawn within, a symbol of hope and renewal. One shape, however, close to the subject’s head, has evidence of an overflow, a black drip of paint, signifying a period of mental-emotional instability. These blooms act as a personal metaphor.
How did the COVID pandemic influence this series? I work in a small studio in the backyard of my home. My work is such that there is often no differentiation between weekdays and weekends. When COVID first reached our shores in 2020, I was busy working on my pinhole images. (The pinhole photograph, Covid, won a photographic award in Barcelona, Spain). By the time I was working on Grit, we were well into our first lockdown, but it had no significant impact on my lifestyle or working methods. |
528 Months
Acrylic on Frayed Canvas: 47.5 x 37.5cm © Viky Garden |
Shelter
Oil on Hessian Board: 60 x 80 cm © Viky Garden |
Please comment on your piece “Shelter.” Shelter was painted at the beginning of 2001 for an exhibition called Auckland, A Work of Fiction (2002). This series of paintings reflected the social impact of topographical changes to the city at that time – an emergence of vast, cheap, and often flawed tracts of new housing, the loss of landmarks, and the faceless, ambiguous nature of urban developmental sprawl and its associated greed, callousness, and political indifference. A review at the time said: ‘This is not the single most powerful work in the show. It is a calmer, more tender work called Shelter, where three trees which, like the crosses on Calvary, cast long shadows. The woman in this painting has a complex expression of acceptance and holds a tiny, leafless sapling which might be bare but hints at possibilities of growth.’ |
The Pink Tree
Oil on Hessian Board: 100 X 80 cm © Viky Garden |
New World Virtues, 1
Oil & Acrylic on Jute: 83.5 x 63.5cm © Viky Garden |
Your work exudes a love of experimentation. You have distinct stylistic changes over time. Do these changes parallel personal life changes in any way?
I’ve been exhibiting regularly since 1994, so changes in my practice over that time would be inevitable to at least some extent. I’m aware the changes have been prompted by personal issues, but this only becomes clear in hindsight.
In 2015, I took a hiatus from painting for some months, feeling I had come to a dead end in terms of how I approached my work to that point in time. It coincided with and in some ways mirrored changes I was going through personally and felt very keenly.
I’ve been exhibiting regularly since 1994, so changes in my practice over that time would be inevitable to at least some extent. I’m aware the changes have been prompted by personal issues, but this only becomes clear in hindsight.
In 2015, I took a hiatus from painting for some months, feeling I had come to a dead end in terms of how I approached my work to that point in time. It coincided with and in some ways mirrored changes I was going through personally and felt very keenly.
Girlhood
Oil & Acrylic on Canvas: 80 X 60 cm © Viky Garden |
Artistically, I changed everything. There were no preparatory drawings, not even on the canvas. I switched from oils to liquid acrylics – preferring their immediacy – but it meant having to get over the baseless prejudice that acrylic paint isn’t a serious choice for a 'real' artist. I also stopped using brushes, swapping them for bits of card and sticks. I had to learn about a new medium, but in the process, I discovered an extraordinary and liberating freedom.
Passengers #14
Oil & Acrylic on Linen: 40 X 70 cm © Viky Garden |
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Having never had the opportunity to go to art school, I’ve had to push myself into new artistic directions, such as pinhole photography,* sculpture, and monotypes. Each new path I took felt like stepping out into complete darkness, like being a tightrope walker without a net.
But as a fulltime artist I still need to pay my way, so experimenting is both risky and freeing. With painting, it’s often about reclamation – reconfiguring what I do, stripping it back, but relying on the fact that creating art is in my marrow and that I’ll get there if I just trust myself. *Pinhole photography: Pinhole photography uses the most basic concepts of a camera. A lightproof box, an aperture, and light-sensitive material. Light is passed through the pinhole to project an inverted image onto the paper or film on the opposite end of the camera. With Pinhole Photography the distance between the pinhole and film determines the angle of view. The more shallow the depth, the wider the angle. (Parallax Photographic Coop) |
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What do you hope the viewer takes away from your work? I suppose the bottom line is that I hope they think or feel something; although I don’t set out to tell the viewer what they should think or feel. I’m not responsible for how they respond, I only hope they do. I’m always pleasantly surprised when I hear that my work has meaning for someone. I remember the time when a woman at one of my exhibitions burst into tears because a painting resonated deeply with her. Prior to social media, most artists rarely had any idea how their work was perceived. It was something that the dealer galleries enjoyed and experienced. Do you believe your work is universal – a global female experience? Yes, I do. I’ve predominantly used myself as the model for my work for the past 40 years, exploring the nature of impermanence and similar themes that reflect both personal and universal aspects of the female experience. If I’m ever asked, 'Do you still paint yourself?' I smile and think to myself, no, I’m actually painting something about you. |
Begging the Tree
Oil on Hessian Board: 92 x 120 cm © Viky Garden |
Where do you find sanctuary?
Given the looming threat of COVID and climate change, I find sanctuary where my feelings are safe, which is often in the minutiae of everyday life, such as in my garden, which is an endless source of surprise and comfort. When I need to feel that I have wings, I have to be near the sea, the timeless expanse of the ocean that both connects and separates us.
Given the looming threat of COVID and climate change, I find sanctuary where my feelings are safe, which is often in the minutiae of everyday life, such as in my garden, which is an endless source of surprise and comfort. When I need to feel that I have wings, I have to be near the sea, the timeless expanse of the ocean that both connects and separates us.
The Wilding
Acrylic on Linen: 90 x 70 cm © Viky Garden |
Email FE29 Gallery
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Portrait September 2021
Acrylic on Canvas: 70 x 50 cm © Viky Garden |
