This year, the Eastside Culture Crawl will be celebrating its 20th anniversary from November 17th until November 20th. The crawl is taking place in 78 buildings where Vancouverites and art-lovers alike are invited to visit artists in their studios. I had the privilege of speaking with two artists, Tristesse Seeliger and Judson Beaumont, about their work and thoughts on the culture crawl this coming weekend.
Tristesse Seeliger is a mixed media artist who combines paintings and collage. Recently, her work has taken a focus on geometry and cartography. She has collaborated with Lululemon and has been featured in many magazines and blogs. She uses the mathematical principles of tiling and patterning to reassemble maps and create new territories. She is an Emily Carr graduate and this is her second year at the Eastside Culture Crawl. This weekend you can find her at the Arts Factory at 281 Industrial Ave.
Judson Beaumont is an uncommon furniture creator. Ranging from whimsical to absolutely comical, his furniture could be straight out of a cartoon. Beaumont’s work has been featured in Elle magazine as well as countless other magazines and blogs. He is an Emily Carr graduate, is the founder of Straight Line Designs Inc., and is the recent author of a children’s book that will be released at the culture crawl this weekend. This weekend you can find him at Parker Street Studios at 1000 Parker Street.
Here is my interview with both Tristesse Seeliger and Judson Beaumont!
HCUBC: How long have you been part of the Eastside Art Crawl and why did you choose to participate?
TS: This is my second year and my husband and I share a studio at the Arts Factory. Being in the art crawl is a great opportunity for artists to have a community in Vancouver as well as to have locals come and see their work. It’s a big event that brings people out. It can be overwhelming, but it’s definitely creative and cool.
JB: I’ve never been in charge, but I have the glorious bragging rights to say that I was one of the very first people in this building at 1000 Parker Street. I’ve been here over 30 years. The building is very, very old. When you look at it you think there’s nobody inside, but once you walk in it’s full of artists and designers and painters. Back when I came here in ’85, we were just young artists out of Emily Carr and it was the perfect venue. I mean, there were no windows. It was basically completely boarded up. It had very little heat, very little light. It was derelict, there were pigeons running around here. But we brought it back to life. Over 103 artists are here now.
HCUBC: Can you describe a time when you first realized creating was something that you had to do?
TS: I’ve said this before, but art has always been the thing that I’ve gravitated towards to solve the challenges that I face in the world. I always go to music or performance or visual art whenever I’m faced with a challenge that seems quite complicated because it seems to offer answers to questions that I have about my life and the world. When I was a teenager I was a dancer and then I started to make films and photography. The thread of creativity has always been there and I come from a very creative family.
JB: My father made me go to art school when I was nineteen years old. I always loved woodworking as a kid, although I didn’t consider myself a good builder. I was very self-conscious about making things, but my instructor told me: Well, just do it anyway. Just tell people that you want it to look bad or unfinished or old. That really dulled the pressure on being a builder or a sculptor. My sculptures turned into furniture and my furniture eventually turned into art.
HCUBC: Do you have any creative rituals?
TS: Absolutely, I like to get up, go to my studio, and if I’m searching for a thread to get going on a piece of work, I’ll start to make things. I may not even know where I’m going with it but I’ll push myself into using materials that I haven’t used before or I’ll take an idea that I have in one medium and try it in another medium. I think you just need to start working. Get up and go. Even if I don’t have a specific idea of what I want to make, I push through, and something comes always.
JB: Well, I’m the first one in here everyday. I get in everyday anywhere between 6am and 7am. I get up and I probably sketch for a good hour and a half before my staff come in at 7:30am. I’ll plan my day but I’ll also plan new ideas, new furniture ideas, new sculptures. We have a lot of school groups that come through and we take them on tours and I’ll show them my studio and the first thing I ask them is: How many of you have a sketch book? Very few kids nowadays own a sketchbook, they go right to the computer. There’s something lost in that. An artist comes up with an idea, and once they’ve got it resolved on paper, then they go to the computer to do all of the extra work. So I’m trying to get kids to draw and sketch and work that way. But that’s my ritual. Drawing, I think, is the key to everything. It’s a passion, I love it. I do it on airplanes when I travel, I doodle on pieces of paper wherever I am. If you can draw it, you can build it.
HCUBC: Is there something that you’re trying to communicate with your art?
TS: I like to make things that are beautiful. I like to make objects of beauty. In my artwork, I like to use geometry and collages. All of those patterns are made up of maps of Canada. I use tessellation patterns. That’s why they look like quilts. Quilts use those basic patterns as well. Some of my work uses big tessellations and some of my work uses more complicated tessellations, like Roger Penrose’s tessellations [Penrose Tiling].
JB: I guess I want it to have a sense of humour. I’m trying to make people smile. When people come into the culture crawl and they see my future they go: Oh! You’re the guy that does that crazy stuff! Or: I’ve seen your stuff at airports! I do play areas. I want art to be fun. I was labelled a children’s furniture designer. I never wanted that, but it was sort of given to me by my peers. I don’t consider what I do for children, I consider it for the young at heart, for people who like something different. I’ve been compared to Beauty and the Beast, Alice in Wonderland, and Tim Burton. All of those things have influenced me. It’s the way I was raised, you know, on Bugs Bunny Cartoons. But really, I was just trying to find my own look, and I try to encourage other people to do that, too. Everyone’s signature is different. Artists, we’re all trying to come up with our own language, our own mark or brand. If you hang in there long enough, you tend to find your mark.
HCUBC: Do you have any advice on living a creative life?
TS: Surround yourself with a good tribe of people that you trust and are supportive and get to work. I don’t believe that any artist or genius comes into this world making work that is incredible. Everyone I know sits there and they work and they make a lot of crappy things and then all of a sudden they get onto something. You have to trust yourself.
JB: Oh God! Just be prepared to work hard! It’s not a nine-to-five, it’s a way of living. I put in 10-12 hours a day, and I put in more even more hours when I was younger. The hours meant nothing. It’s just what you do. You come in on the weekends and you surround yourself with it. It really becomes part of your DNA. It’s what you do. And if it’s not doing that, then you need to take a look at what you’re doing and try something a little bit different. I don’t think I would’ve survived all these years if I didn’t have that community spirit. If you have a bad day, you can walk down the hall and have a cup of coffee with a buddy, or have a beer and work things out. It’s like a support group, if that sounds silly. I’m so inspired by all the new young artists that come in here now. I just love it. Artists are better in groups.
HCUBC: What are you looking forward to this coming weekend at the Eastside Culture Crawl?
TS: I share my studio with my husband, David Crompton, he’s also an artist, a beautiful artist, and we get to spend the weekend together. It’s great meeting people. It’s really a very quiet existence in a studio, and then having people come through… it’s all about making connections and building relationships. I guess that’s what it’s all about. It’s intimidating but exciting!
JB: I’m launching a children’s book that I’ve just published! That’s a big deal. We’re going to have a book signing on Saturday. In regards to the rest of my art – I don’t come to sell stuff. I mean, I have For Sale signs on all of my stuff in the studio, but it’s really more like spring cleaning. It’s the time of the year where we stop working, we vacuum the floors, we clean up the shop, we throw out things that have been sitting around for a while. If something is half done, well, we’re going to show you a half done piece. There’s no pressure to sell anything. We want you to check out the studio, meet the staff, look around at all the little knick-knacky prototypes and just get inspired! If you want to buy something or commission a piece, of course we’ll do that, too!
HCUBC: Is there anything we haven’t touched on that you’d like to share with your audience?
TS: As a teacher of art as well as being an artist, I think that it’s very important that people ask themselves and are conscious of how they view art. That’s something that’s been in my teaching for a while. As you go through your day, where are you consuming art? In video games, you consume art, when you’re listening to music you’re consuming art. I think it’s super important that people are comfortable around art but also that they’re conscious that art makes their lives better.
JB: Be prepared, [the Eastside Art Crawl] gets pretty crowded. Come a little early and start on the fourth floor and work your way down. The culture crawl is a whole bunch of buildings. People will open their doors and there’s a big map that they’re giving everybody. I don’t think you could see everything in four days. That would be very aggressive, you’d have to walk very quickly. Get the map out, check out whatever you want to see. Plan out where you want to go. Wear comfy shoes. There will be food trucks outside.
Seeliger’s Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.
Beaumont does not have any social media apart from the website linked above.