INTERVIEW WITH KALIN THOMAS
S&A: Kalin Thomas, it is great to be able to discuss with you the ideas behind your paintings. You have a background in linguistics, how does your experience and knowledge in this field inform your art?
KT: Thank you Claudia for reaching out. Art is definitely a form of communication so it was not a difficult transition to make. In spoken language we communicate with words and gestures. With Art, we do essentially the same thing except with a much different “vocabulary.” It has a grammar, a syntax, a morphology. You would be surprised how nicely these things line up sometimes.
Once you see art as Language it can be analysed in the same way. We can look at patterns, organization, meaning, all kinds of stuff, and try to think about how and what it communicates to the viewer.
I think that because I am self taught, being able to break down the art into its essential elements was extremely helpful for structuring my approach to learning. And since it influenced my perspectives so heavily it undoubtedly had an effect on my approach to the work as well.
There is a great book by G.L. Hagberg called Art as Language. It is well worth reading if there is an interest in the subject.
S&A: What was the determining event that led you on the path to becoming an artist? Are there particular movements or artists that you look to for inspiration in your independent education?
KT: Good question.
I was always one of those kids who wanted to be good at something but was never really great at anything. I drew a lot but could never measure up against my peers. Eventually though, that competitive nature met with real masters and my own arrogance pushed me to take the extra step. Sometimes, I wish that I took a different route or became more serious about it earlier in life but, I am incredibly grateful for all the opportunities that I've had along the way. I am also thankful for a supportive family and friends to keep me going despite repeatedly choosing to better my work instead of making a living.
Surprisingly enough, I don't tend to focus on a single artist or movement very long. I have been quite taken with a great deal of classical Hindu sculpture recently. It reminds me of mannerism. Different artists, periods and locations will stand out for their particular qualities. It is difficult to find everything I'm looking for in a single spot and I end up jumping around.
S&A: In a separate correspondence you name Stoic philosophy as having a place within your personal philosophy. What elements of Stoic philosophy feature in the themes of your work?
KT: I was quite interested in it at the time when I was composing these pictures. After reading Marcus Aurelius, who wouldn't be? It's downright seductive! He uses simple, accessible language and eloquent reasoning. And I think when we look at our emotions, and look at our actions we see that we could easily be in control of our impulses. When I began taking art more seriously and required discipline in my studies this became very important.
In all these pictures I'm playing with the idea of this "dual nature" that I saw in myself, that humans aren't all impulse, nor are they all reason, but it ends up being some kind of struggle or balance between the two. These paintings focus on those moments of interaction as they progress within us, moving from Tension, to Conflict, to Harmony.
S&A: Would you be willing to expand on your concept of an “illusion of authenticity”?
KT: My initial idea was that if people thought my pictures looked like the paintings from a validated period in Art History maybe they would think I was quite a bit better than I am. Turns out it's more difficult than it looks. Or should I say, it's as difficult as it looks. So the whole thing kind of crumbled and morphed into something else.
Now, at least for me, by making a strong reference to a particular time period in art history I can juxtapose those values against our own contemporary ideas of conduct. Then, the content works to contextualize that interaction. As long as I'm considering how the pictures will be interpreted today, by a contemporary audience in a contemporary setting, I can stay relevant and restrain myself from becoming overly anachronistic. One easily gets swept up in the romance of dead civilizations. It’s not productive though, you just end up doing whatever you want, which is good for no one but yourself.
KT: Thank you Claudia for reaching out. Art is definitely a form of communication so it was not a difficult transition to make. In spoken language we communicate with words and gestures. With Art, we do essentially the same thing except with a much different “vocabulary.” It has a grammar, a syntax, a morphology. You would be surprised how nicely these things line up sometimes.
Once you see art as Language it can be analysed in the same way. We can look at patterns, organization, meaning, all kinds of stuff, and try to think about how and what it communicates to the viewer.
I think that because I am self taught, being able to break down the art into its essential elements was extremely helpful for structuring my approach to learning. And since it influenced my perspectives so heavily it undoubtedly had an effect on my approach to the work as well.
There is a great book by G.L. Hagberg called Art as Language. It is well worth reading if there is an interest in the subject.
S&A: What was the determining event that led you on the path to becoming an artist? Are there particular movements or artists that you look to for inspiration in your independent education?
KT: Good question.
I was always one of those kids who wanted to be good at something but was never really great at anything. I drew a lot but could never measure up against my peers. Eventually though, that competitive nature met with real masters and my own arrogance pushed me to take the extra step. Sometimes, I wish that I took a different route or became more serious about it earlier in life but, I am incredibly grateful for all the opportunities that I've had along the way. I am also thankful for a supportive family and friends to keep me going despite repeatedly choosing to better my work instead of making a living.
Surprisingly enough, I don't tend to focus on a single artist or movement very long. I have been quite taken with a great deal of classical Hindu sculpture recently. It reminds me of mannerism. Different artists, periods and locations will stand out for their particular qualities. It is difficult to find everything I'm looking for in a single spot and I end up jumping around.
S&A: In a separate correspondence you name Stoic philosophy as having a place within your personal philosophy. What elements of Stoic philosophy feature in the themes of your work?
KT: I was quite interested in it at the time when I was composing these pictures. After reading Marcus Aurelius, who wouldn't be? It's downright seductive! He uses simple, accessible language and eloquent reasoning. And I think when we look at our emotions, and look at our actions we see that we could easily be in control of our impulses. When I began taking art more seriously and required discipline in my studies this became very important.
In all these pictures I'm playing with the idea of this "dual nature" that I saw in myself, that humans aren't all impulse, nor are they all reason, but it ends up being some kind of struggle or balance between the two. These paintings focus on those moments of interaction as they progress within us, moving from Tension, to Conflict, to Harmony.
S&A: Would you be willing to expand on your concept of an “illusion of authenticity”?
KT: My initial idea was that if people thought my pictures looked like the paintings from a validated period in Art History maybe they would think I was quite a bit better than I am. Turns out it's more difficult than it looks. Or should I say, it's as difficult as it looks. So the whole thing kind of crumbled and morphed into something else.
Now, at least for me, by making a strong reference to a particular time period in art history I can juxtapose those values against our own contemporary ideas of conduct. Then, the content works to contextualize that interaction. As long as I'm considering how the pictures will be interpreted today, by a contemporary audience in a contemporary setting, I can stay relevant and restrain myself from becoming overly anachronistic. One easily gets swept up in the romance of dead civilizations. It’s not productive though, you just end up doing whatever you want, which is good for no one but yourself.
Untitled No.2 diptych.
S&A: You indicate that human duality is something you explore in your work. With this in mind, Untitled No.2 diptych of Vitium and Virtus, or Vice and Virtue, is a contemporary rendition of traditional ethical questions. What can the symbolic structure of Untitled No.2 diptych reveal about your thoughts on the dualism that Vitium and Virtus represent?
KT: I wanted to emphasize that even though we think of Virtue as being "good" and Vice as "bad," they rely on one another for those definitions. That was why I wanted to place them in diptych format, so that the structure would express this dependency.
How the pictures came about reflects this idea, although unintentionally. The old man biting the snake was a strong image I had in my head. The meaning wasn't contrived. It was some monstrous hybrid between Adam and Eve and Chronos Devouring his Children. It was never meant to be "Vice" at all but only became that after I started painting it. About midway through it changed for me and I had to compose the other picture to contextualize it. Paintings are so greedy. They take and take and take, only at the end do they give anything back.
Anyways, this ended up being really interesting because where Vice is a veritable spitoon of allusions, Virtue is a carefully arranged bouquet. Each cardinal virtue is represented in the hand and has a corresponding putto to solidify the meaning. I’ll give an example. For Prudence she holds a mulberry wreath, which is a late bloomer and thus considered "prude" as it avoids the early spring frosts. The corresponding putto wears a mask on the back of the head to indicate that Prudence "reflects" on past outcomes before moving cautiously forward. Many of the symbols in Virtue came from books of Emblems that I was reading at the time.
The imagery in Vice was mostly from other paintings or of my own invention. I still enjoy this central moment when I look back at it. He just gnaws at the snake while the fruit lies rotting on the ground. There is a lot of ambiguity in this picture but I think it successfully communicates the ideas, particularly when it's next to Virtue. You don't need to read the symbols if you can read the painting as a whole. You just feel it. This is part of the reason why I left them untitled. I want to encourage this kind of viewing experience.
S&A: Untitled No.1 is reminiscent of Baroque dynamism with its wide range of expressive bodies and intertwining narratives that unfold in both the distance and foreground. Looking at the main narrative, the straining bodies and taut ropes create strong diagonals in the composition and express the physical strain as well as the psychological disposition of the central figures. Could you tell us about the conception of this painting?
KT: This was really the main picture of the three. I used a mythological structure for this, The Assassination of Dirce. I say “structure” because I had my own agenda. I wanted to convey this idea of tension between the human, reasonable nature, and the passionate, animalistic nature symbolized by the bull. This narrative offered the perfect elements for this expression. The primary mechanism of this picture takes that central metaphor and flips it onto the woman in the shadows, Antiope (the cave being a reference to her subconscious). I wanted to capture the moment when the external arrangement of symbols reflects her inner conflict.
You will see this metaphor echoed again and again throughout the picture in different ways: the boy and the dog, Silenus on the ass, the Maenads tearing apart animals, Herakles fighting the Nemean lion (the base of the statue), Dionysus turns away from his panther. This repetition brings harmony to the content but also begins to blossom out into the greater duality of the picture. Things like the ominous clouds, the meeting of light and dark in the eclipse, or the small, bifurcated branches on the ground.
The dynamism you mentioned was employed to capture this idea of Tension in the structure. I used an armature based on a volumetric ratio of 3/4th that I borrowed from Palladio. It's kind of arbitrary where it came from I guess but it does the job. That is one of several arrangement structures that I overlayed in this picture, each one reflects different aspects of the meaning.
I also tried to work contradictions into the subject matter so as to leave the interpretation open for the viewer. This is important to me. Some examples of this would be like weighing emotive passions against appetitive ones by bringing in the bacchanals, or compositionally playing the viewer’s sympathies towards Dirce but scattering poisonous or harmful flowers at her feet to hint at the malice she held for Antiope. I really enjoy exploring these moral ambiguities.
In the end though, these pictures reflect my own personal struggles and observations. If they are helpful or intriguing to others, all the better.
Visit Kalin Thomas Art to view more of his paintings and take a virtual tour of his studio.
KT: I wanted to emphasize that even though we think of Virtue as being "good" and Vice as "bad," they rely on one another for those definitions. That was why I wanted to place them in diptych format, so that the structure would express this dependency.
How the pictures came about reflects this idea, although unintentionally. The old man biting the snake was a strong image I had in my head. The meaning wasn't contrived. It was some monstrous hybrid between Adam and Eve and Chronos Devouring his Children. It was never meant to be "Vice" at all but only became that after I started painting it. About midway through it changed for me and I had to compose the other picture to contextualize it. Paintings are so greedy. They take and take and take, only at the end do they give anything back.
Anyways, this ended up being really interesting because where Vice is a veritable spitoon of allusions, Virtue is a carefully arranged bouquet. Each cardinal virtue is represented in the hand and has a corresponding putto to solidify the meaning. I’ll give an example. For Prudence she holds a mulberry wreath, which is a late bloomer and thus considered "prude" as it avoids the early spring frosts. The corresponding putto wears a mask on the back of the head to indicate that Prudence "reflects" on past outcomes before moving cautiously forward. Many of the symbols in Virtue came from books of Emblems that I was reading at the time.
The imagery in Vice was mostly from other paintings or of my own invention. I still enjoy this central moment when I look back at it. He just gnaws at the snake while the fruit lies rotting on the ground. There is a lot of ambiguity in this picture but I think it successfully communicates the ideas, particularly when it's next to Virtue. You don't need to read the symbols if you can read the painting as a whole. You just feel it. This is part of the reason why I left them untitled. I want to encourage this kind of viewing experience.
S&A: Untitled No.1 is reminiscent of Baroque dynamism with its wide range of expressive bodies and intertwining narratives that unfold in both the distance and foreground. Looking at the main narrative, the straining bodies and taut ropes create strong diagonals in the composition and express the physical strain as well as the psychological disposition of the central figures. Could you tell us about the conception of this painting?
KT: This was really the main picture of the three. I used a mythological structure for this, The Assassination of Dirce. I say “structure” because I had my own agenda. I wanted to convey this idea of tension between the human, reasonable nature, and the passionate, animalistic nature symbolized by the bull. This narrative offered the perfect elements for this expression. The primary mechanism of this picture takes that central metaphor and flips it onto the woman in the shadows, Antiope (the cave being a reference to her subconscious). I wanted to capture the moment when the external arrangement of symbols reflects her inner conflict.
You will see this metaphor echoed again and again throughout the picture in different ways: the boy and the dog, Silenus on the ass, the Maenads tearing apart animals, Herakles fighting the Nemean lion (the base of the statue), Dionysus turns away from his panther. This repetition brings harmony to the content but also begins to blossom out into the greater duality of the picture. Things like the ominous clouds, the meeting of light and dark in the eclipse, or the small, bifurcated branches on the ground.
The dynamism you mentioned was employed to capture this idea of Tension in the structure. I used an armature based on a volumetric ratio of 3/4th that I borrowed from Palladio. It's kind of arbitrary where it came from I guess but it does the job. That is one of several arrangement structures that I overlayed in this picture, each one reflects different aspects of the meaning.
I also tried to work contradictions into the subject matter so as to leave the interpretation open for the viewer. This is important to me. Some examples of this would be like weighing emotive passions against appetitive ones by bringing in the bacchanals, or compositionally playing the viewer’s sympathies towards Dirce but scattering poisonous or harmful flowers at her feet to hint at the malice she held for Antiope. I really enjoy exploring these moral ambiguities.
In the end though, these pictures reflect my own personal struggles and observations. If they are helpful or intriguing to others, all the better.
Visit Kalin Thomas Art to view more of his paintings and take a virtual tour of his studio.