http://www.thebubbleblower.com

Hi Carol, thanks for taking the time out of your busy schedule for chatting with us today.

It is my pleasure. This is my first interview via internet. Thank you for inviting me.

Over 30 years ago you embarked on a journey into a set of pieces called The Bubble Blower. It was radical and refreshing for its time. Why bubbles and breasts?

In 1975, I was painting large photorealistic paintings in acrylic, using hard edge shapes to create “reality,” when it occurred to me that this 2-dimensional realism was not why I had wanted to be an artist. Reading Lillian Hellman’s Pentimento, the honesty in her personal narratives, was very inspirational. Southern writers, especially Flannery O’Connor and Tennessee Williams, were also influential. I wanted to use art to conceptualize what I was feeling inside, both the psychological and the emotional. In a manner related to surrealism, I started doodling negative spaces and allowing positive images to emerge. Then I shaded them to give them dimension. These drawings looked similar to Jean Arp’s sculptures, a sculptor I admired. But one form suggested a breast with an inverted nipple. (At this time, finding recognizable forms in abstraction was scorned. Surrealism was passé.)

In 1976, I attended a workshop with Judy Chicago in Denver and she suggested we “draw ourselves as we see ourselves, as the world sees us, and as we would like to be seen.” At the time, I was 33 and the mother of everybody, nurturing and taking care of my now ex-husband and two sons. I had given up myself to them. The breast with the inverted nipple became the symbol for me, as I saw myself, with bubbles inside wanting to get out. Then I drew a breast with fig leaves falling off, mother going public, as my world or family saw me. The third drawing was the breast blowing bubbles, or allowing the inside emotions to come out, as I would like to be seen. I went back home and drew 36 of these drawings, which were very autobiographical and narrative, like a writer, and I named each series of 7 after a writer. The 36th drawing, “The Temple of the Holy Ghost” was the finale, named after my favorite short story by Flannery O’Connor. It represented “the happy ending,” but also our sacred humanism, all of us created in the image of God, but certainly capable of behaving like the devil.

What would you say to those people who have trouble in accepting your message?

Art making is something very personal for me. Of course, communication is important, but not necessarily to please. The breast has always been a controversial image, representing the nurture that so many of us did not get growing up, and may never get enough. Psychoanalysts have claimed that males even substituted other images for it in their dreams. I want to honor nurturing, the people who care for others, the breasts in our communities and in our homes. They can be males, too. But I am also very aware of the dark side of nurture…enabling and suffocating, attracting parasites.

Your Resurrection of the Bubble Blower forces the viewer to reexamine how they look at breasts and more importantly, the owner of the breast role in society. What has been your greatest challenge in bringing to the mainstream these iconic sculptures and statements?

A gallery owner asked me, “Do you have to say they are breasts?” My response was, “No, but I won’t say they are not.” Well meaning curators have advised to refer to them more formally as half spheres, or domes. Architecturally, if skyscrapers are phallic symbols, what are domes? Formal values are important in art, but it’s like learning scales in music. An artist learns techniques to be able to express themselves. Art about art bores me. If there are no layers of meaning, it is shallow, often referred to as a “one liner.” And humor has nothing to do with being shallow… just read Flannery O’Connor. Humor is our means of salvation and very healing.

Your work is very playful and strong, but at the heart of it all what is the idea behind Resurrection of the Bubble Blower?

It became necessary to give up my art during the 80’s to make a living for myself and my sons. I put away my bubble blower drawings, including other drawings dealing with fears and nothingness, and worked as a computer programmer, later owning my own software company. I remarried in 1988, sold the business in 1990, and went to back to that earlier work, picking up where I had left off. The fears drawings became mixed media sculptures, then wall pieces from the ANI (Anti-Nothingness Image), and then more sculptures. Then the bubble blower came back. I found four framed wooden panels from an old movie theater in an antique shop and started drawing them. They were large, so I scrolled oversized drawing paper on the wall with dowels (like paper scrolls) and the bubble blower was now framed, with very important boundaries. Then I started painting on the wooden panels. On the last panel, the nipple came out again. It was the year I became involved in supporting contemporary art in my community as president of a contemporary art museum board. This painting (along with beads and mixed media) I called “The Saint Goes Marching In.” Then I started making the breasts as sculptures. The first one was with the nipple inverted, but the second was “extraverted.” It took a while before I realized the bubble blower had resurrected, with new meaning. It had survived and had much to say about nurturing, including nurturing oneself. The nipple could now go both ways.

In February of 2007 you gathered together 34 female artists and put on an exhibit called “What F Word?” (Cynthia Broan Gallery in Chelsea NYC). How has the feminist movement progressed and/or changed with the help of artists such as these and yourself?

The feminist movement in the late 60’s and 70’s brought much change to art, from medium to subject matter, including the psychological and coining the phrase “the personal is political.” Consciousness raising groups were in vogue. It challenged what was derogatively referred to as “feminine,” be it emotional or sexual. There remains disagreement about the definition of feminist art. My impression is that the way our society goes has a way of determining where art goes, or at least what is accepted as art. Renewed threats against the control of our bodies by the court and the bullying attitude of male chauvinism has made many of us, artists and non-artists, male and female, think about why this is happening. Artists often get complacent, making work they can sell. The artists I selected have remained true to their convictions in creating art for a more humane society, respectful of its complexity. The younger artists in the exhibition expressed great admiration for their brave predecessors, proud to be in their company. The artists made it very rewarding for me and I loved the work.

How has growing up in the south prepared you for the artists that you are today?

Southern writers were an influence on me. Their dark (and sometimes dumb) humor enlightened me. Religion had such a powerful influence, as well as football and beauty queens. I knew the worst of male chauvinism and the fear of the feminine. I lived there during the civil rights era of the 50’s and 60’s, when blacks bravely protested in order to be treated equally and with dignity. We all want to be treated with respect. One thing I learned was that I had to first respect and love myself before I could reach out in a healthy way to others. And this means loving who we are as human beings with all our faults, but embracing our virtues and understanding our differences. We are insecure beings, often feeling discomfort and fear, trying to live together on sacred soil.

What is one piece of art that everyone should see?

There is a painting by Norman Rockwell of the three civil rights workers murdered in Philadelphia, Mississippi in 1964. It is hanging in the Rockwell Museum in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. I was stunned when I saw it. A powerful illustrator, who used humor to convey strong messages, made a very serious painting… a masterpiece. Those murders and the other forms of terrorism used by the Ku Klux Klan, were never a source for humor, only deep sadness.

Can you tell us a little about what kind of preparation it takes to have a successful gallery showing? What are the most critical things we need to have figured out?

I either make a scale model of the gallery space and reduce the work to proportion or draw an architectural floor plan with the pieces arranged according to scale to make sure the gallery is not over crowded. (Artists have a tendency to want to include too much work.) Another very important issue is how well the works relate to each other. Freshly painted clean walls are a must and using a lot of lights that are able to be dimmed and not too close to the work. I insist on good craftsmanship in installing, professional handling of the work, and good documentation.

Tell us one thing we may not know about you?

My studio and desk are usually disaster areas. I seldom put anything back where it belongs. Order out of chaos, maybe? I am not seeking serenity. That will come when I die.

How have you handled the business side of being an artist?

When I divorced in 1979, I decided not to use my art to make a living. (Until that time, I had been financially supported by my husband, but I had supported him while he pursued a medical degree.) All my photorealism paintings sold, but it was not what I wanted to do. After I started the bubble blowers, it was very difficult to show the work and nothing sold. The long range plan for my computer software business was to be able to sell my business to someone I could work for on a part time basis after my sons were educated, and take off half the year to do my art. It would have worked, but I married a “male breast” who enables me to pursue my passion full time.

Any advice for those aspiring to be a true artist? (What kind of tips do you have for those dealing with exhibits and staying inspired and fresh?)

Know yourself. Don’t block out things that you find disturbing. Examine them. Use your work to analyze yourself and the world you are in. Authenticity is essential for the artist and the work. I also suggest finding a means of financial support outside of the art that requires creative skill and keeps the brain working. I made a conscious decision not to make work for the market or to please others.

To stay inspired and fresh can be a challenge, especially when your work does not get the recognition you think it deserves. More recognition seems to go to derivative work than to authentic expression. Some curators select works for exhibitions that are safe and won’t get them in trouble with their institutions. Often they aren’t willing to consider new aesthetics, under recognized artists, or something beyond their own interests. Artists don’t seem to be determining what art is or where it’s going.

But how good ones art is remains a delicate issue. An artist must believe in what they do, but they also have to be honest with themselves. Many good artists experience deep doubt about their work and why they do it. My screen saver on my computer says “GO GIRL, GO” and I hope it means it.

20 years from now, where do you see yourself and your work?

If I am alive, I will be 84 years old. To be physically able to continue to make work, I exercise almost daily in the water… water aerobics, water Pilates, or water yoga. I also exercise my mind and keep challenging myself to do things I have never done, like an internet interview. It is important as an artist to support other artists, to mentor younger artists, to nurture, and to expound on the importance of creativity in our daily lives. It would be gratifying to see my work receive more recognition, but I would also like to see a more humane world.

I find the current administration’s fiscally irresponsible greediness a disaster for our future. I abhor terrorism in any form, especially in the name of God. I cherish education. We can only change the world by first changing ourselves, from the inside out. The personal is political.

Thanks again Carol. All the best with your work!

Kevin

Posted: April 24th, 2008 under Carol Cole.
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