A Creative Excuse

Esther Elia joins us while her show is on view through November 29. We talk about growing up in an Assyrian farming family in Turlock, California, the wrist injury that ended her violin plans as a teenager, and the moment her older brother pointed out that she had been drawing through their entire conversation and suggested art school. Esther tells us why the open-ended painting classes at CCA made her feel like “the god of my own painting,” how she loves strict rules and still does her best work when someone else lets her set them, and how ISIS destroying artifacts in Mosul and a women’s gym in Turlock led to her portraits of Assyrian bodybuilders as contemporary deities. She also walks us through the late-night Depop and Facebook Marketplace scrolling, done with a newborn and a toddler, that fed her newest work, and makes the bold claim that Persians are the most fashionable people in the world.

In this episode with Matt, we talk about his solo exhibition, Penti Menti.
We also talk about his path from a childhood of doodles and a high school art teacher to the landscape paintings overlaid with geometric patterns.  Matt also goes into how plein air work and his newest wave paintings have made his mark-making looser, more physical, and more integrated with the land.

In this episode with Thais, we talk about their solo exhibition, Miss Universe.
Chopped up, mismatched, and set loose in a cosmic bloom of florals, the women in Miss Universe are equal parts beautiful and creepy, carrying Thais Mather's long look at femininity and creation from ancient myths of cosmic mothers to the pageant stage, from the void of space to the planet we keep trying to escape.
Thais’ exhibition opens at Hecho Friday October 2, and is on view through November 1.

In this episode with Eliza Lutz, we talk about their solo exhibition, All the Lives Alive Inside Me and both the metaphorical and literal meanings of that title. 
Merging embroidered prints on paper with quilted portraits assembled from loved ones' clothes, the works in this exhibition chronicle the giving and receiving of care in all its forms, from child rearing to elder care, from domestic arts to community organizing.
Eliza’s exhibition opens at Hecho Saturday September 5 and is on view through September 27.

For years Daniel McCoy's work ran toward the surreal and humorous, full of recurring characters like Hot Sauce Man, a stand-in for the late-night regulars he remembers from New Mexico's Allsup's gas stations. More recently he has turned to the landscapes of Northern New Mexico, rendering the light, rock formations, and cloudscapes around his home with a slower, more observational eye while keeping a bit of cartooning alive in the line. Daniel returns to the podcast to talk about family, life in the high desert, and his newest exhibition, We Can Only Go Up From Here.

Zahra grew up in two deserts which vary drastically and have many similarities in culture. One close to the sea in Kuwait, the other close to the mountains in New Mexico. Working in watercolor and ink, her dreamlike paintings often begin with a sparse line of text, drawing on Arab poetry, family folklore, and the magic woven through everyday life to reflect both her cultural roots in Kuwait and her current life in New Mexico. In this episode we talk about pomegranates, cats in bags, hawk fledglings, and we go into the realities of how to navigate dark times with creativity. 

Annalise Gratovich creates her finely crafted prints by hand from start to finish, carving wood, etching metal, dyeing paper, and using manual printing presses to create multiple originals. Each piece is printed on the finest archival papers using oil based inks and hand dyed papers she produces in her studio. Annalise operates as a self publisher out of Austin, Texas and travels frequently across the country as a visiting artist and speaker and to publish prints with esteemed print shops.  In this episode we talk about Annalise’s newest body of work, Carrying Things From Home, a series of 8 monumental woodcuts that are 13 years in the making. On view at Hecho now for the first time in their entirety.

Jaydan Moore grew up in the Bay Area inside a family that has sold tombstones for four generations, an early apprenticeship in how objects hold a whole life. He went to CCA at eighteen, found metals, and never really left. Fifteen years ago he picked up a silver-plated platter at a junk shop and has been working in that single material ever since. We talk nostalgia, tragedy versus comedy, and how he got to metal.

Kat Kinnick is back on A Creative Excuse for her third solo appearance, and we get into it. We talk process over product, how the animals in her paintings sit at the edge of cuteness and brutality, and how the desire to connect, to nature, to people, to the things we don't say, runs underneath all of it.

Haley Greenfeather English is an artist and educator born and raised in Tiwa territory. Their paternal family is from Red Lake Nation and Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians and their maternal family is of European/Irish descent. Their art is an extension of their love of storytelling. It is something that deeply connects them to being and understanding what it means to be human. Through collections of loose drawings, written journals, and sentimental random objects, English visually brings pieces of stories together. English incorporates portraits of their family, warped perspectives, historical narratives, Indigenous and medicinal plants, cigarette smoking spirits, insects and animals.