I grew up in a small and somewhat isolated and curiously English town outside of Montréal, Canada. I was impatient, so left there as a teenager. The question of where home is for me has always been a bit tricky and even trickier over the last few years. In 2018, I left Montréal for an almost year-long stay with my wife in NYC which ultimately led me to my current home in South Texas - a place that I have been made to feel very much “at home” in and very quickly, too. NYC has also always been a place I’ve felt at home (my first visit was in 1987 and I returned as often as I could ever since) but to me, the idea of “home” is really a space-time feeling and exists with friendships and memories.
How would you describe your creative process? Do you have any studio rituals?
So much of my current process needs to happen in my mind before I even touch a surface. Often, I let hypnagogic images show me what I need to work on next. These are usually a kind of rapid-fire, slide-show of “images” that flash in my mind’s eye (or eyes, as sometimes there’s one image per side) as I’m ready for sleep - something that has been happening to me since I was at least 3 or 4 years old. To me, these are wordless thoughts but not purely visual as there are often accompanied by textural sensations. As for rituals, the studio for me has only recently become a place to actually go to and close the door behind me. Prior to the last few months, the studio has been whatever small surface I could use that didn’t disrupt the everyday goings-ons too much (in NYC, it was a small desk inside a retrofitted closet. Whereas in Montréal, Ontario and Alberta, the studio was no larger than a card table). So (and perhaps because of this) the rituals have naturally revolved around performing the necessary chores and daily business before committing to time in front of the work. For me, this is also “mulling time” where I can begin the process of what is probably over-thinking the work itself.
I love that term, hypnagogic! And that you see and feel these images and textures in the moments before falling asleep. It sounds like that psychedelic dream sequence in Dumbo! With these fleeting images, is what you see always a landscape or a still life?
Yeah, it can get pretty out there for sure and very difficult to describe (which I can do aloud as they happen). To be honest, it’s only fairly recently that I realized that not everyone gets these and that there’s even a name for it. When they happen, they tend to arrive in almost “stylistic” episodes, so one night (usually nighttime) there will be dozens of images that will be related by say, colour and they could all be various landscape-y type things, but another episode may be wonderfully abstract or kaleidoscopic. Sometimes its a slide-show and other times, the images seem to blend or morph into one another. I have absolutely no control over when or how it will happen nor do I wish to have this control.
Are there any common themes in your work?
I do consider consciously incorporating a theme (or themes) in my work but for now, I think that the place my work seems to want to live in is sensation, experience and memory. If there is a theme of any kind it is about the interaction between the immediacy of our sensory experience and how we organize those experiences in memory.
As a musician, do you find that your love of music impacts your work? If so, what music do you listen to in the studio? Anything on repeat?
I have never felt that playing and improvising or composing music to be a separate thing from working visually. The disciplines are very different for sure but so many of the issues to consider at the level of composition and story-telling are the same. As for what’s being heard in the studio, it’s a pretty varied situation that can range from science podcasts to Miles Davis. There’s nothing really on repeat but there are musicians/composers who are frequented. I do love to listen to entire albums as I feel that the great ones are like suites and are meant to be heard in their entirety.
You started painting more seriously during the pandemic while quarantining in Canada. Did your move to south Texas impact your work? If so, how?
I have always painted whenever possible while earning a living mostly freelancing in various design domains but yeah, certainly during the lockdowns (and being in a sort of domestic limbo while waiting for a visa to process) has really been an opportunity for me to feel “right” about staying in and getting to work on what I have felt I should have been doing for years. I don’t think I’m alone in feeling as though these lockdowns have given some of us a kind of “permission” to block the world out to some extent so that we can concentrate on other things, wether that be home, family or the work we really want to do. I was incredibly lucky to have been “stuck” in lockdown with my brother’s family for an entire year during the pandemic. Obviously it wasn’t planned, but getting that time with them while also taking the time to begin to push my work where it needed to go all within previously unexperienced landscapes was life-altering. I have only been in South Texas now for less than a year and as much I am just starting to feel like it’s affecting my work, I can’t tell exactly in what ways yet. But there’s definitely an effect.
At times, your work appears multi-dimensional. Are you intrigued by or have you explored other mediums? Where do you draw inspiration?
Well firstly, thank you. I think if that’s something perceived in my work, it might actually come from how I think about music as well. I play guitar but when I think of a musical idea, I might think of it in an orchestral sense or something else not necessarily guitar-related. So I think that when I’m painting, the ideas may be say, sculptural or architectural but what I’m actually doing is painting, so they get processed in paint (and other stuff) and on the surface. For me, inspiration comes in tiny glimpses. I don’t feel that there is an over-arching or “chronic” inspiration. It’s more like quick and sharp pains that come and go.
Aside from making art, do you have any other passions? How do you fill your days?
These days it’s been all about putting a home together and getting a “real” studio going for the first time in decades but I’m still able to play music even though that is for now, a solitary endeavor. I’m actually hoping to get into gardening in a small way since where I’m at now, lots of stuff grows. I do like to stay pretty active and I get to swim here and I’ve also just got myself a bike to get around on and explore (before I admit to not being a car owner in Texas, I should verify if that’s not a punishable offense).
How has instagram and technology impacted your work?
I’m pretty ashamed to say it now, but it took some coaxing from certain friends to start taking IG seriously. I’m not usually a Luddite, but when I first opened an IG account, I really wasn’t seeing much I was interested in but suddenly, I started to find some artists who I admired that actually had accounts and from there I began to really watch with great interest what was going on through IG. It was a great educator for me even if I felt that I was only auditing and sitting at the back of the class. It still took me a while to begin to post my own work with any seriousness. Then one day, I logged in to find a few messages from and art critic who I admire and had taken the time to provide me some very constructive criticism - that’s when I realized that I was using the technology in ways that I hadn’t even fully grasped yet.
What work do you admire these days? Has this evolved?
I have loved Paul Klee’s work since I was a kid and that hasn’t changed at all. The work that I admire tends to be stuff that is very different from the way I work in either process or concept. If there’s an artist who can make a mark or a gesture and walk away knowing that was enough, I admire that. It’s aspirational for me. I think that what has evolved in my appreciation has absolutely come from what the internet has been able to provide which is the opportunity to see works individually rather than as part of a compendium or curated/ordained collection of an artist’s work. Not to knock curation by any means, but personally, I have found that seeing some works “out of context” has heightened my experience of the piece - so it’s great to discover works in this relatively new way and to be knocked out by just one or two works of ANY artist.
What would you say has been the most impactful moment (or moments!) in your creative career?
Definitely the time spent with my wife in NYC. It was for me, an education (and re-education) on every level that continued through the pandemic and to today.
Katherine Reid, formerly Vice President of the Art & Objects division at Sotheby's, has been a part of the art world ecosystem for over a decade. From an internship at the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, to launching her New York career with the Chairman of Post-War & Contemporary Art at Christies, to taking part in the founding of Art Agency, Partners, one of the most innovative advisory businesses in the art world, Reid's depth of experiences in the art world have only fueled her desire to collect across categories.