Interview with Gerry Bergstein – Portray Perceptions
42 min read
Don’t Look Up, 2022, 58×81 inches, oil and collage on canvas
Gerry Bergstein is a widely known Boston painter and trainer who has massively influenced many artists for the reason that Nineteen Eighties. I lately was viewing his work on-line and have become re-enchanted by his astounding expertise and wide selection of artwork historic references, types, processes, and material. His morphing and juxtapositioning of visible and cultural opposites has made for a extremely ingenious and private artwork not like some other. I significantly love his resistance to doctrine and his contrarian takes on the chances for artwork. I made a decision to ask him for an interview and was extremely delighted and grateful when he agreed to speak with me on a Zoom name.
Ars Longa Vita Brevis, 2022, 67×101 inches, oil and collage on canvas
The late Francine Koslow Miller wrote in a 2002 Art Forum review of a Gerry Bergstein exhibition on the Howard Yezerski Gallery.
“Bergstein pursues darker issues in his vaguely architectural black-and-white work of mounds. An amalgam of decaying mountain, medieval constructing, and phallus, the mound at all times seems to be imploding or exploding in these works, which resemble pencil drawings on broken paper (right here the artist etched traces right into a ready floor of black paint overlaid with white). For Mount, 2002, Bergstein moved his stylus backwards and forwards throughout the extremely detailed central type in strokes imitating the rhythmic gestures of a cellist. Within the monumental Self-Portrait as Tower of Babel, 2002, the mound is underneath siege, pierced with luscious black holes; it begins to topple earlier than a romantic cloudy sky. References to Leonardo’s Deluge drawings, Brueghel’s Tower of Babel, and Piranesi’s ruins abound on this anthropomorphic citadel, whose stony pores and skin seems to be ripping aside. (It’s laborious not to consider the World Commerce Middle as properly.) Hidden among the many gaps within the tower are self-portraits and different small pictures: insect caricatures, a paint tube, a Guston “eye,” a thumb, a rocket ship.
In these works Bergstein equates nature and tradition with private ambition and beliefs. The mounds could posit civilization as a fantastic pile of rubbish, however additionally they recommend Bergstein as existentialist antihero on the foot of his personal mountain of ambition (his purpose being to attain international relevance whereas staying true to himself). As Albert Camus ends his Fantasy of Sisyphus: “This universe henceforth with out a grasp appears to him neither sterile nor futile. Every atom of that stone, every mineral flake of that night-filled mountain in itself kinds a world. The battle itself towards the heights is sufficient to fill a person’s coronary heart. One should think about Sisyphus pleased.” Bergstein likewise transforms the torment of his battle into victory.”
Idea and Apply, 2019, 22×30 inches, Oil on Paper
shut up element from Dithering Machine, 2022, 86×102 inches, oil and collage on canvas
Nicholas Capasso wrote in his essay Expressionism: Boston’s Claim to Fame
(Initially revealed in Painting in Boston: 1950-2000)
“…Bergstein distilled all these sources”(Max Ernst, Rene Magritte, de Kooning, Gorky, and Guston) “…into a private strategy during which Surrealist strategies of free affiliation and irrational juxtaposition have been delivered to bear on expressively distorted pictures created with an incredible facility of craft. This artist may draw and paint like an expressionist, an Summary Expressionist, a veristic Surrealist, and a trompe-l’oeil grasp—and convincingly mix these types on a single canvas. In the course of the eighties, this stylistic spectrum was matched by an equally various vary of images drawn from artwork historical past, self-portraiture, nature, in style tradition (particularly tv), and the suburban cultural panorama—once more, all on the identical floor. “
“…I continued to discover the spatial tensions obtained by juxtaposing thick and skinny paint. I had at all times been considering juxtaposition of pictures (Magritte). I used to be discovering that juxtapositioning of various surfaces may very well be simply as unusual and surreal.”The purpose of Bergstein’s method and strategy to imagery is essentially humanistic and expressionistic. He seeks to specific ineffable psychological states conditioned by his personal expertise of the world—an admittedly chaotic and complicated world—as a mannequin for emotionally apprehending bigger points in up to date society, psychology, epistemology, and ontology. These weighty themes, although, are at all times tempered by humor. Because the artist explains it, “My purpose is to do for portray what Groucho Marx and Alfred Hitchcock did for films and tv. My work is a illustration of the paradoxes, ironies, and absurdities of our media-bombarded tradition, translated by way of the language of paint.” Elsewhere he wrote, “I nonetheless surprise how the unexplainable creation of the universe, the light-speed motion of all these subatomic particles, and billions of years of evolution may have led to squeezing the Charmin, tax returns, life insurance coverage, the artwork world, and different unusual outcomes. If, as Einstein stated, ‘God doesn’t play cube with the universe,’ possibly he was enjoying bingo.”
Roadmap, 2021, 22×30 inches, oil on paper
From Gerry Bergstein’s website:
Bergstein’s work contrasts the superior and the trivial, the excessive and the low, the manic and the melancholic utilizing sources from Brueghel to “The Simpsons.” He’s the recipient of an Artadia grant (2007), a profession achievement award from the St. Botolph Membership (2007), and a four-week residency on the Liguria Research Middle in Genoa, Italy (2006). His solo reveals embrace Gallery NAGA and the Danforth Museum; Howard Yezerski Gallery, Boston (’04, ’02, ’99, ’97); Stephan Stux Gallery, NY (’99); Galerie Bonnier, Geneva, Switzerland; Zolla Lieberman Gallery, Chicago, IL; and the DeCordova Museum, Lincoln, MA. He’s represented within the collections of The Museum of High quality Arts, Boston; MIT; DeCordova Museum; Davis Museum at Wellesley School; IBM; and plenty of others. He has been reviewed broadly within the native press in addition to Tema Celeste, ARTnews, Artwork in America, and Artforum. He has been on the college on the Faculty of the Museum of High quality Arts, Boston for over 20 years.
Larry Groff:
What have been your early years rising up like? What was your loved ones like?
Gerry Bergstein:
I grew up within the Bronx and Queens in New York, the place I stayed until I went away to school and left New York. We lived in Bayside Queens, which was nothing like Manhattan. I’d be very stunned if anybody else on my block ever went to the MoMA, for example. Nevertheless, my father liked to attract and paint; my mom liked music and literature. I’ll not have develop into an artist if not for his or her assist. Like when my mom informed me to go to see that Max Ernst present. If my mom have been alive right this moment, she would have develop into a Music or an English professor, however she didn’t get to go to school, sadly. My father was an accountant. When he was youthful, he did lots of great life like drawings of his household; a lot of them are hanging in my residence. He may need made it as an artist, however his household discouraged it, and he wanted a job to assist the household. He continued to attract and play the piano like Mozart, and Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata was considered one of my favorites. So I grew up round classical music and older artwork.
My mother and father didn’t get up to date artwork. One time, after I was a lot older, I went with my mother to the Guggenheim, which had simply reopened with a Dan Flavin present after having been closed for a time, and the very first thing she stated, “Nicely, I suppose they don’t have the artwork right here but – they’ve simply put the lights. (laughs) And so, a part of my difficulty with excessive and low artwork is that I’ve that skepticism of my mother, however however, I additionally like lots of that stuff. Finally, I got here to love Dan Flavin. So I’ve blended emotions about excessive and low, and I like combining them. So I’m a contrarian I at all times see each side of every part, which is each enjoyable and wholesome.
as but untitled, 2022, 40×26 inches, oil and collage on paper
LG:
I learn that your mom inspired you to see a Max Ernst retrospective on the MoMA within the early 60s. I used to be curious so I regarded on-line to see if there was any details about that present and located the catalog for the present on the MoMA web site – I discovered a quote that appeared prefer it may have additionally been describing your work.
“From Ernst’s frottagee, decalcomanlas and flows of pigment emerge a procession of visions generally obsessive and infrequently prophetic: new landscapes inhabited by new phantoms and animals; new adventures and new terrors revealed by the rarest and most vital desires. The world of Ernst will be turbulent, eruptive and violent. It will probably additionally provide with irrational lucidity and calm, an evidence of the magic of objects, the black humor of human foibles and the apparition of unseen presences. Just like the wanting glass, the Imagined world of Ernst is a reverse picture. It is usually a universe.”
Are you able to say one thing about your curiosity in Ernst and some other influences which are most essential, particularly the surrealists?
Gerry Bergstein:
I used to do these little summary, very detailed ink drawings. They have been principally summary, however my mother should have acknowledged one thing about their complexity, so she despatched me to the Max Ernst present, which blew me away. I agree with the assertion you gave.
“new adventures and new terrors revealed by the rarest and most vital desires, the world of Ernst will be turbulent, eruptive and violent“, is one thing I’m very considering in addition to “The magic of objects”. Magritte put it in another way. Magritte did a portray of a marriage ring floating on high of a piano. He had this concept of secret and magical affinities between objects, you couldn’t put these affinities into phrases, however I really like that concept. I suppose that’s an entire Surrealist thought. And the final line that Max Ernst’s work as a universe additionally rings true to me. Though my work is a universe–it’s the universe inside my mind and my studio. Perhaps the universe is within the mind of the beholder.
I acknowledge stuff from engaged on an image. I’m not superb at observing actuality in nature. I’m type of dangerous at it, possibly, as a result of I’ve by no means carried out it that a lot. Nevertheless, what I’m good at is exploring my mind visually in response to the marks I make, I’ve this sgraffito course of, during which the paint stays moist for a month, and I can draw into and out of it. I mix various things. I’ll go away the studio after which come again the following day, and it’s telling me one thing, to boost this or to deemphasize that. I’m fairly good at that. It’s simply who I’m, which entails free affiliation and rorschaching. Gregory Gillespie talked about rorschaching rather a lot and is just like what I do – however completely different.
Hamburger Categorical, 1979, 24X50 inches, Oil
Larry:
I’m questioning if the painter Ivan Albright has some affinities with you? It’s not surrealism or rorshaching, however the depth and drive of his imaginative and prescient maybe are associated to you and Gillespie’s work.
Gerry Bergstein:
Completely, I feel the ironic factor is about these polarity issues I went to Chicago and noticed Albright’s portray, That Which I Should Have Done I Did Not Do (The Door), a few years in the past. I noticed an image of it in a e book after I was an adolescent, and it completely blew me away, however if you rise up near the precise portray and take a look at one sq. inch of that door, it seems to be like a microscopic Jackson Pollock. So many little fascinating marks. I like artwork that refers, deliberately or not, to the entire of Artwork in an authentic method.
Gerry Bergstein:
Another factor about surrealism, are you aware the portray Hide and Seek by Pavel Tchelitchew?
LG: Positive.
Gerry Bergstein:
I liked it as an adolescent, after which in 2017, I retired from instructing, however in 2019 I used to be persuaded to show a grad seminar, however I used to be shy and nervous about my listening to and was afraid I wasn’t updated sufficient. So to assuage myself, I visited MOMA simply two days earlier than that class began in 2019. And I walked as much as the third ground and there was Disguise and Search hanging once more after it had been in storage for like 30 years. The wall textual content stated that in 1961, which was the yr I first noticed it, was voted by the general public to be the preferred portray in our assortment. Nicely, I believed that was such an affirmation. I don’t like it as a lot as I used to, however I believed, ‘what goes round, comes round’. It suffered from acclaim, rejection, and re-acclaim. I feel that’s so nice.
Prefer it or not, the politics of artwork aesthetics within the artwork world come into my work, in a really ambivalent method.
Reconstructive Surgical procedure, 2022, 44x33x10 inches, oil and collage
LG:
You studied on the Artwork College students League?
Gerry Bergstein: I studied on the artwork college students league for a yr with Harry Sternberg. Who was an excellent trainer. He taught me what freedom was. Harry Sternberg was associates with Jack Levine. And his work, at occasions, was somewhat bit like Jack Levine. Edwin Dickinson was proper subsequent door. And Lennart Anderson was there on the time. I moved to Boston by chance. I had no clue in regards to the Boston expressionist college, however I believed it was ironic that I moved to Boston and have become considerably concerned with that custom and Boston somewhat than New York.
LG:
Why did you progress to Boston?
Gerry Bergstein:
I needed to go to a spot that was affiliated with the faculty. In any other case, I’d have been drafted.
LG:
What was your expertise going to the museum college (Faculty of the Museum of High quality Arts at Tufts College) again then? You studied with Henry Schwartz, Barney Rubenstein and Jan Cox, a Belgian Surrealist painter. Was Barney the primary trainer that can assist you study realist and trompe l’oeil portray?
Manufacturing unit, 1973, 5×5 ft., oil
Gerry Bergstein:
Henry Schwartz taught me extra; he had these weird setups that have been surreal, they usually jogged my memory somewhat little bit of a few of Bruce Connors’s early work. Surreal setups with musical scores and portraits and various things pasted it collectively, they usually have been pleasant and hilarious. I discovered rather a lot from that undertaking and I suppose that’s what bought me considering trompe l’oeil. Barney was extra of a good friend. I adored Barney and discovered rather a lot from him, however it wasn’t a teacher-student factor; it was extra lengthy conversations. Plus, I liked his work. Jan Cox woke up sure issues in my creativeness. I took a design class with him, and he was candy and accepting of surprising concepts.
I skilled the museum college in numerous methods. I used to be a pupil there within the final two years of the extremely educational curriculum to the scholar revolution in 1970, which modified that fully. Quickly after that, Clement Greenberg started to carry sway in Boston with new college at college and Kenworth Moffett, a Greenburg acolyte, being employed because the M.F.A.s first up to date curator. Clement Greenberg was seen by some as being on the apex of modernism in Boston; though his affect was already in decline in New York. I appreciated modernists like Morris Louis and Jules Olitski however I believed that the concept you couldn’t present realism or surrealism on account of some second-rate philosophy was simply infuriating.
Regardless that the museum college was actually educational for the primary three years I went there, I managed to search out my method by way of that, and I’m glad I had some publicity to, you recognize, actual educational drawing and that type of factor. Regardless that I wasn’t that nice at it,
Gorky’s Room 1976, 84×84 inches, oil on canvas
LG:
Do you assume painters want that type of educational coaching?
Gerry Bergstein:
That’s an excellent query. The museum college modified radically in 1969. The coed strike through the anti-war motion. The top of the college was fired, and a brand new head of the college changed him, and insurance policies have been modified so college students may make their very own curriculum; you didn’t must take any course you didn’t wish to. For the primary few years, the outcomes have been disastrous. However finally, it form of labored itself out. Do all artists want that educational construction? I’m undecided, I feel I wanted it, however I don’t know. What do you assume?
LG:
After I was in class, I sought out conventional realist coaching. A number of the summary painters whom I love probably the most additionally went by way of that educational rigor. However then there are different summary painters who have been self-taught or didn’t get a lot educational coaching, who I additionally like. So I don’t assume there’s any proper solution to study artwork, though I do assume it’s important to study artwork historical past properly. I don’t imagine in only one proper reply and check out to withstand artwork doctrine.
Gerry Bergstein:
There’s nobody reply; I completely agree. Yeah. I imply, I feel de Kooning was an excellent draftsman and I am keen on his early work; I don’t assume Pollock was such an excellent draftsman.
LG:
Nevertheless, Pollock did examine with Thomas Hart Benton, who helped give him an understanding of construction.
Gerry Bergstein:
That’s precisely proper. I feel his compositions have one thing somewhat bit in frequent with Benton’s compositions.
Pollock knew what he was; he knew the terrain. Youngsters going to artwork college right this moment get little or no of that, though possibly that’s a gross generalization, I don’t know. I feel it might probably nonetheless be potential to get it in order for you it sufficient. Gregory Gillespie as soon as stated to me that regardless of going to the San Francisco Artwork Institute, he thought-about himself self-taught as a result of it was strict summary expressionism when he was there and didn’t provide a lot in the way in which of studying the right way to be a realist painter.
LG:
Perhaps that’s not at all times such a nasty factor generally. Gillespie could have taught himself the way in which he wished to color realistically, however his time at San Francisco Artwork Institute finally helped him develop into such an incredible painter; he should have gotten one thing out of it, simply not realist portray chops. Gregory Gillespie is amongst my favourite painters.
I Love Portray, 2019, 4x2x4 inches, blended media
Gerry Bergstein:
I bear in mind a narrative about Chuck Shut, whom I feel went to Yale. He was a reasonably good summary painter again then. I heard him communicate as soon as at Harvard, and he stated, The issue with summary portray was that he would depart his studio pondering, ‘that is the most effective factor that’s ever been carried out on this planet’. Then he would come again the following day, and it regarded like full crap; he wished to do one thing that he may very well be verifiable that he was doing it proper. He additionally wished to get as far-off from de Kooning as potential. So if de Kooning used lots of coloration, he used black and white. If de Kooning was completely into the act of portray, he was watching TV whereas he was portray. His transfer to be self-consciously away from that’s fascinating to me as properly. In a while, he joked that he had made extra de Kooning’s than de Kooning himself with all his little “coloured pixels” in grids that you simply see in his later work.
So we’re on this form of lineage. Most likely if I hadn’t taught, I don’t assume I’d be fascinated about the stuff a lot in any respect, however since I taught, it’s a vital factor to me.
LG:
It’s in all probability not useful to at all times be reacting in opposition to one thing or rebelling. Sooner or later, you must resolve what you wish to be.
Gerry Bergstein:
The act of insurrection in itself doesn’t assure good artwork. There must be some form of aspect of affection and discovery within the work, not simply insurrection. I want each love and rage.
The Gleaners, 2016, 13.5×12.5×8 inches,blended media on panel
LG:
How did your profession as a painter evolve after ending college? What was life like for you again then? Had been you in a position to paint full-time? Did you begin instructing instantly?
Gerry Bergstein:
after I first bought out of college. I bought a touring fellowship and spent 4 months in Europe, which was life-changing. After I bought again, for round 5 or 6 years, I labored full-time as an image framer. I didn’t get a lot time to color then. I needed to make a dwelling, however I made it a degree by no means to surrender.
In 1973 I bought a grant to go to an artist in residency in Roswell, New Mexico, for six months. They gave you a stipend, home, and studio. I went there and bought to know some critical artists. We grew to become pleasant. I bought to know their work habits and know what it was prefer to have time to work, which was terrific.
After I returned in about 1977, I bought a job instructing on the night time college within the Museum Faculty. However it paid 5 {dollars} an hour, my mother and father would ship me cash every so often, however I used to be dwelling hand-to-mouth. I made associates with some artists; Miroslav Antic was one. He was a trainer on the Museum Faculty. He was a lot pushier than me and had a good friend who opened a gallery. He introduced this good friend to my studio, who then supplied me a present. I additionally bought a job instructing at Harmony Academy, which was somewhat higher than being an image framer because it was part-time however somewhat bit more cash. I used to be struggling alongside. After which, I had a present at Lopoukhine/Nayduch Gallery in 1979; nothing offered, however there was lots of curiosity from artists, and it was very encouraging.
Grants, so I used to be starting to do okay. I’m a really shy individual. For a time, I’d escape in a sweat simply strolling right into a gallery, not to mention asking them to have a look at my work.
I went to New York and fell in love with artists like Susan Rothenberg, Robert Colescott, The dangerous portray present on the new Museum, and Philip Guston, Oh my God. I believed this was the final word negation of the Greenbergian tyranny.
Self Portrait, 1979, 60X72 inches, Oil
Components Of Fashion, 22X30 inches, Oil/Paper
LG:
Has Philip Guston’s work influenced you indirectly? Are you able to speak about this somewhat?
Gerry Bergstein:
After I first noticed Philip Guston in 1975 at BU when he first began doing the Klan heads and I loathed it, however then in 1979, I used to be doing this self-portrait of me lined with a blanket in mattress, and the form of the blanket was rather a lot like a kind of Klan hoods. There was a cigarette with actually thick smoke popping out of it; then I remembered that present, and prefer it was love. I nonetheless love Guston. I grew to become very enthusiastic about this new path in portray. My good friend Miroslav was type of a mentor then. Henry Schwartz, whom I adored, rejected that work fully, however I didn’t thoughts as a result of I knew Henry liked me.
I bought right into a present in 1981, Boston Now, on the Institute of Up to date Artwork, the place yearly they might placed on a present with about eight Boston artists; it was actually thrilling, after which I bought into one other Boston Now present the following yr after which bought picked up by Stux Gallery. After that, I began promoting each single factor I made. From about 1981 to about 1995. I offered every part. On account of this, I used to be in a position to educate full-time on the Museum college as a result of I used to be displaying. Instructing at first was only a day job, however then I discovered rather a lot from it, and it was actually enjoyable.
Effort At Speech, 1981, 60X90 inches, Oil
LG:
Do you see your self as a part of a continuum of the custom of Boston Expressionist portray, comparable to Hyman Bloom, Jack Levine, David Aronson, Karl Zerbe, Henry Schwartz, and others after them?
Gerry Bergstein:
I’ve considerably blended emotions in regards to the Boston expressionists. I really like Hyman Bloom. You realize, folks like Arthur Polonsky and David Aaronson, I believed they have been somewhat too slick, too crowd-pleasing, virtually too romantic, however I suppose they’ve all had a giant affect on me. Unusually sufficient, the yr I stop instructing, nobody had checked out these guys for many years, I made a decision to do a slide present of all of them for my class. The scholars got here as much as me and stated that is the most effective artwork we’ve seen in years; we like it!
LG:
Would you name your self a Neo-Expressionist, or do you reject being labeled as a part of any specific college?
Gerry Bergstein:
Would I name myself a neo-expressionist? I did after I was within the 80s. Together with Francesco Clemente, Jorg Immendorf, David Salle, and Julian Schnabel. I used to be considering a few of their work; I positioned myself in that spectrum. However there was lots of dangerous Neo-Expressionism too. Is Philip Gustin a Neo-Expressionist? I don’t know
The Irascibles (3D), 2013, 6x12x10 inches, blended media
LG:
I feel his late work may slot in with that on some degree. I anticipated that you simply may react in opposition to being labeled as a Neo-Expressionist; I believed possibly you’d resent being labeled, That you just’re in a faculty of 1.
Gerry Bergstein:
I’m extra into my ancestral lineage. Perhaps starting with Bruegel and Hieronymus Bosch, happening to Piranesi, Velasquez, and Goya, after which up by way of Ensor, Rousseau, the Surrealists, the German expressionists, and the Summary Expressionists like de Kooning. Arshile Gorky, Gorky was a giant affect, after which the Neo-expressionists are additionally my forebearers. 
However what you wish to do is so as to add your individual take to no matter you’re doing–you wish to make it your individual. You’re advancing the custom somewhat step at a time. it’s a really broad custom. I imply consists of near-total abstraction and likewise artists like Bouguereau and Fragonard. Late in life, I out of the blue fell in love with Fragonard, who is nearly my exact opposite. His sentimentality is so blatant that I simply can’t assist however like it. Nevertheless, Boucher, I don’t like as a lot.
A Transient Historical past of the twentieth Century, 2015, 67×21 inches, blended media
LG:
I don’t know for those who’ve seen the brand new Synthetic Intelligence picture software program the place you give textual content prompts to mix imagery gleaned from tens of millions of pictures on the internet. I noticed lately the place somebody mixed a Bouguereau nude and a few type of blue monster.
This form of AI surrealism is, most of the time, fairly dreadful, however I nonetheless assume it may very well be helpful for producing concepts visually. Form of like drawing thumbnail sketches. I attempted this some time in the past, writing within the immediate, Picasso portray of the Tower of Babel, to see what may come up. It was fascinating what it selected to do.
Gerry Bergstein:
It’s fascinating and terrifying on the identical time. Is the painter going to be just like the chess grasp, who can now not beat the pc anymore? I don’t know. However what terrifies me one yr, I can fall in love with the following.
LG:
I suppose the purpose I’m fascinated about is that a lot of our lineage is open for reinterpretation and making it new. Like possibly making hybrids like medieval-neo-expressionism or cubist-photorealism. Know-how, in addition to our up to date mindset, permits the previous to proceed in new, thrilling methods. Portray is way from being lifeless.
Gerry Bergstein:
Portray has been declared lifeless for properly over 100 years. (laughs)
Previous and future generations study the identical points by way of the lens of their tradition and thru their expertise. Some issues could evolve technically and culturally, however the large points like life and loss of life, love and intercourse, energy and rage all keep the identical.
as but untitled, 2022, 40×26 inches, oil and collage on paper
LG:
That’s an excellent level.
You’ve talked up to now about your fascination with juxtaposing contrasting imagery and methods of making use of the paint. You typically paint trompe l’oeil parts, particularly flat issues like tape, over or alongside expressionistic parts. You may also incorporate flat, cartoon, or child-like drawings, collage, and sculptural items subsequent to realistically painted fruits. You appear to experience combining the excessive and low-brow, sacred and profane, and the banal with the extraordinary. You as soon as said that your “work distinction the superior and the trivial, the historic and the non-public, the manic and the melancholic.” Are you able to say extra about why this has engaged you for thus lengthy?
Zip, 1997, 96X69 inches, Oil
I’m Portray as Quick as I Can, 2019, 16 × 12 1/2 inches, Blended media on paper
Gerry Bergstein:
I grew up with studying comedian books, Mad Journal, Twilight Zone, and science fiction magazines, and considered one of my favourite reveals that I noticed extra lately as a present of Pulp Fiction covers on the Brooklyn Museum. I feel they’re so nice.
My mother and father have been very cultured, however they have been very shy and remoted virtually, so I had lots of conflicting influences. I prefer to joke that I used to be the rebellious son of accountants and dentists. I’ve all that obsessiveness in me, however I typically explode. It’s constructed into my psychology; even within the 60s, through the top of the scholar strike, after all, I used to be completely in favor of peace and civil rights, however there was additionally what I referred to as psychedelic fascism. It was just like the left telling you what to do as like the best was telling you what to do–‘meet the brand new boss, identical because the previous boss’–or one thing like that, proper?
I’ve at all times been a skeptic, and I’m undecided why, however I feel it’s an fascinating place to be. I’ve two quotes on my web site, one from John Lennon and the opposite from Groucho Marx. Lennon says all you want is love and Marx says no matter it’s, I’m in opposition to it! (laughs)
Guide I, Handbook, 2015, 20.5×34 inches, blended media on paper
LG:
That’s so humorous. Nice.
Gerry Bergstein:
I additionally assume I can study stuff like what Ivan Albright has in frequent with Jackson Pollock, possibly not the deepest connection, however it’s there. What does Chuck Shut have in frequent with the de Kooning, and what makes them completely different? I feel the factor about Chuck Shut was that he was temperamentally unsuited to be an summary painter as a result of he was due to the emotional curler coaster of summary expressionist portray– I do that as properly; if I make one good mark, I out of the blue assume that is the best factor that’s ever occurred in artwork. The emotional; ups and downs have been an excessive amount of for him. He additionally stated that he thought abstraction was not an area for main breakthroughs at the moment.
Probability Conferences 2002, collage and set up ground to ceiling set up
Probability Conferences 2002, collage and set up ground to ceiling set up
I even have this concept referred to as likelihood conferences. I did some collages within the early 2000s; a few of them have been installations hanging in my studio, with every part hooked up to string and clothesline. And there have been all these picture reproductions of work speaking to one another. Like possibly The Flintstones and late Leonardo speaking to one another. And I discover that conglomeration satisfying. And, you recognize, folks criticize it as a result of it was like an excessive amount of of an artwork historic joke, and maybe it was, however possibly it wasn’t fully an artwork historic joke as a result of for me, it was one thing actual.
LG:
William T Wiley stated in an interview speaking about considered one of his reveals,
“It’s like Sir Francis Bacon’s assertion, “There’s no factor of wonderful magnificence that doesn’t have inside itself some proportion of strangeness.” So, you recognize, excessive and low meet at that time the place authenticate expression emerges, I feel, and a few impressed expression emerges, whether or not it’s with a razor blade or an previous sock, it’s no matter that specific factor. So you would have one thing there that, the latest post-modern time period is, “Seems like artwork, so it should be artwork.”
How do you resolve the stability between the disparate parts and the proportion of strangeness?
Gerry Bergstein:
I like that William Wiley assertion very a lot. I feel that type of sums it up for me.
LG:
We talked somewhat about Greenbergian Modernism artwork dogma and such, together with the inflexible doctrine of each the best and left and different related closed ideologies which have influenced your artwork and life. Is there something extra to say about this?
Gerry Bergstein:
The issue with ideologies is that they should be put into apply by folks. All of them have a level of reality, however I feel that non-public ambition is just like the “uncertainty” precept” of the artwork world and most different human worlds. It’s by no means talked about in ideologies however is a hidden a part of their creation. I really feel strongly about that, possibly as a result of I used to be so shy for thus lengthy and other people round me have been expressing themselves with nice authority–I used to be fearful of them. However that’s not true anymore. Now I received’t shut up. (laughs)
LG:
Did underground cartoonists like Robert Crumb or earlier cartoonists like George Herriman ever have a lot affect in your work?
Gerry Bergstein:
I like R. Crumb. I really like that documentary about him. I’m uncomfortable when he beheads ladies in his work. Nonetheless, I feel he’s a superb draftsman and a kinky man in an fascinating method. George Herriman, I like simply because Philip Guston appreciated him, however I don’t know him very properly. I by no means learn psychedelic comics. As an alternative, I learn stuff like Archie and Superman after I was very younger. The Hardy Boys, the American dream, Father Is aware of Greatest, the American Dream–you’re a very good boy. You solved the crime–you’re a very good boy. That was a complete lie, and that compels me, figuring out how we delude ourselves.
Gerry Bergstein’s Palette gurney
LG:
Are you able to say one thing about your portray course of? I’m curious how a lot you consciously plan out your work or do they tackle a lifetime of their very own with out a lot planning beforehand?
Gerry Bergstein:
I’ve had many alternative processes, however I can provide you a number of of them.
After I was nonetheless in class, I used to be in love with Arshile Gorky, and I liked the form of eroticism and delicacy of his line and form. I liked his rigorous compositions, however I couldn’t get it in my very own work. And in the future, I had this coloration canvas, and in a match of pique, I simply painted the entire thing black and scraped into it with the again of my paintbrush. I believed, Oh, there’s Gorky’s line. So I fell in love with it. I believed it was the most effective portray of the twentieth century, and I confirmed it to BarneyRubenstein, and he stated, properly, it’s very good, however it seems to be like Gorky. So I discovered that you must add one thing. The method that I’ve in all probability used probably the most, and what I’m engaged on proper now, are these black and white items the place I begin out utilizing black gesso and two or three layers of ivory black with somewhat wax medium. So there’s somewhat little bit of tooth to it; I blot it and let it dry. I then apply zinc white blended with somewhat clove oil which retains it moist for a month. I then use these completely different instruments that I scrape into the image. I often have a construction in thoughts.
Dithering Machine, 2022, 86×102 inches, oil and collage on canvas
Dithering Machine, 2022, oil and collage Element
Till about three months in the past, for a few yr, I used to be doing these orb-like shapes; generally, they jogged my memory virtually like a flying saucer, or Earth, or possibly my mind. I’d draw within the construction after which randomly, with lots of agitation, transfer my arm round inside the construction. I’d attempt perspectival and different methods of constructing issues look spherical. Steadily biomorphic shapes or ruined landscapes components of it will emerge, and every single day I come into the studio and do it some extra, after which when that each one dried, I’d take these little tiny brushes and improve a number of the shapes that I noticed. They grew to become fairly completely different.
And in my newer ones, I’ve collaged pictures of various components of various work, and I print them in barely completely different colours from black and white. So the latest ones have somewhat little bit of coloration in them once more. In order that’ sgraffito method affords me the chance to rorschach and free-associate and make errors.
Shard, 2016, 46×30 inches, blended media
I attempted one other factor a number of years earlier for my present “Theory and Practice” at the Naga Gallery I grew to become seduced by digital images, for higher or worse. It took me about 10 years to do something I form of appreciated. My studio ground is a multitude, it’s a portray in itself, and each time I reduce out somewhat determine or historic picture that I’d wish to check out in a portray. it falls on the ground together with the drips on the ground, after which I made a decision to pour white home paint on high of all this and canopy up a few of it, however not all of it. I then would stroll round it till I’d discover a composition I appreciated. I then had a good friend are available with a 200-megapixel Hasselblad, and he took an image of it for me. I photographed it and printed it out giant, very giant on canvas, like 5 by six toes.
Hap, (after Poem by Thomas Hardy) 2017, 48×74 inches, blended media
LG:
Did you print that your self or did you may have another person?
Gerry Bergstein:
Fortunately I had entry to the Museum Faculty’s printers and their Tech Assistants.
LG:
Wow, that’s nice.
Babel, 2015, 18.5×90 inches, blended media on canvas
Gerry Bergstein:
So I’d do this, after which I’d take detailed photographs of little components of the ground. So the massive shot was the ground assembly the wall. There was graffiti on the wall, and there was stuff on the ground. However then I’d take these drips of white home paint that will crack after some time. They’d additionally get distressed after I walked on them after they have been dry. They’d start to appear like fossilized de Kooning pours. So we take photos of them after which reduce them out and collage them into the portray. Certainly one of my favorites form of regarded like a fossilized de Kooning. There too, I’d paint into them and see issues within the summary shapes that appear like pictures, however then in the event that they grew to become an excessive amount of like images-that, they bought corny, I’d must scale it again. It was a type of a juggling act.
Particular Supply, 2016, 19x13x5 inches, blended media on panel
Valentine 2003, 24x24x3 inches, bas aid collage
I additionally had a nonetheless life interval after I met Gail, who’s the exact opposite of me. I used to be deeply in love together with her, and he or she grew to become my muse and led me to make these stunning nonetheless lives of flowers and fruit for 3 or 4 years (within the 90s. – I wished to be very stunning but additionally take care of vanitas, the evanescence of all magnificence in artwork and life.
LG:
These fruit and flower have been virtually little sculptures produced from thick paint, proper?
Gerry Bergstein:
Sure, a few of them used toy mannequin railroad staff who have been setting up fruit out of very thick paint. I really like the thought of one thing being pure paint and picture concurrently. Like the way you may see in Thiebaud’s thickly painted image of Ketchup, Mustard, and Mayonaise.
Typically what occurs is that I’m doing one thing for 3 to 5 years and I start to get bored. First, it’s a studying curve, after which after I discovered the right way to do it and do some actually good work, It begins to be somewhat too simple, and I get bored. And so I feel the rationale I finished doing this sgraffito for a few years was that I bought sick of it. Nevertheless, now, I’m into it once more.
In a nonetheless earlier part, I’d paint fruit on a canvas, after which I’d drip white paint on high of it, then I’d paint into the white paint, and regularly, there have been so many drips on high of it that they grew to become completely summary. Finally, I misplaced my method, and I went into one thing else.
I developed a few strategies for a collection of determine self-portraits the place the pinnacle seems to be like a drawing, however it’s really a portray. I’d take {a photograph} after which have this white paint on high of black paint after which hint a top level view from the {photograph}; I’d then very rigorously render the pinnacle on the canvas with a pencil. So it regarded like a reasonably good realist depiction. However then, on the our bodies, I’d have picture illusions of little scraps of paper with all my favourite artists listed or pictures from artists like Gorky or Vija Celmins to my father’s head, to an anatomical chart half. And so my physique grew to become artwork historical past or one thing private as an artist factor. Randall Diehl, a good friend of Gregory Gillespie’s did this nice self-portrait with tattoos of various artists throughout his physique. I like artwork about artwork.
Backyard of Delights, 2016, 64×32 inches, blended media on canvas
LG:
That’s so fascinating. I observed that in a number of of your work the place you embrace some sort of self-portrait, You’re carrying this paint-dripped shirt and pants that look somewhat like a mix of a de Kooning and a Hubble picture of the celebs, making you appear like a cosmic home painter. Is that one thing you made?
Gerry Bergstein:
I made that myself; it’s a t-shirt with black Denims with acrylic poured on high of it. I wore that outfit of the day opening of that present.
LG:
That’s so humorous.
Gerry Bergstein:
Truly, I simply wore the shirt I didn’t put on the pants; that will have been an excessive amount of.
LG:
I’m undecided if Cosmos is the best phrase, however there gave the impression to be a motif of the cosmo operating by way of various your works. I’ve learn that electron microscope imagery of the construction of neural networks within the mind look remarkably just like astronomical photographs that present the bigger patterns of tens of millions of galaxies. Your work generally appeared to talk to this fascinating comparability on some degree.
Gerry Bergstein:
The macro and the micro Sure. Completely. Subatomic and deep house. Sure.
LG:
An awesome thought for a t-shirt!
Gerry Bergstein:
I’m within the cosmos as a result of it’s so superior, mysterious, and non secular. I’m form of an agnostic, however I imagine there’s one thing that I’ll by no means perceive or also have a clue about; it’s so splendidly mysterious. And then you definately take a look at the Earth, and we’ve got Donald Trump. Definitely not great and mysterious, he’s the exact opposite of that, from the chic to the ridiculous. I’m considering that difficulty too.
LG:
Ugh, please don’t get me began about Trump! I really like these new photographs coming from the brand new James Webb House Telescope. Simply so astounding that we now get this new appreciation of the place we’re within the bigger scheme of issues and the way small and insignificant we’re however on the identical time so uncommon and valuable.
Gerry Bergstein:
I do know, they’re going to have the ability to possibly get clues of the place there could be life. It’s completely wonderful.
LG:
I learn a quote from John Walker saying one thing alongside the traces of ‘…his kinds must have the amount in order that they may indicate different issues, that his work should be imbued with feeling. In any other case, it’s simply design or ornament.’ Would you agree with this and care to remark additional? Have you learnt him?
Gerry Bergstein:
I don’t know him however I love his work. It’s a fantastic line. As somebody who loves Bouguereau and Fragonard – I may not be the most effective one to reply about sentimentality.(laughs)` I feel there’s a distinction between emotion and sentimentality. There’s lots of feeling in Max Beckmann; There’s lots of feeling in de Kooning. There’s lots of feeling in Vija Celmins. Unusually sufficient. It’s inclusive of feeling, mind, and course of in various proportions or roughly essential to completely different artists. At occasions an artist like Hyman Bloom will get somewhat sentimental however it’s a chic sentimentality. So you recognize, I feel it’s borderline, however artwork could be nothing with out feeling, and artwork could be nothing with out any individual’s thoughts and creativeness. Artwork may also be nothing with out particular person strategies of individuals develop. So I feel they’re all essential.
Whirl, 2019, 30 × 22 inches, Blended media on paper
LG:
I perceive you’re married to the painter Gail Boyajian who paints unimaginable panoramic landscapes with birds. I observed that considered one of her work ( Vanitas, 2015 ) consists of the Tower of Babel. And a few of your fruit and flower work present some affinities together with her work. Regardless of your topics and types being so completely different, there appear to be a number of factors the place they intersect. I’m curious to listen to something you may say about having a painter as a associate.
Gerry Bergstein:
I made these Fruit and Flower work for her; We had one within the background within the place the place we bought married. I first noticed Bruegel’s Tower of Babel portray in 1971 on my first journey to Europe, however I liked it a lot that I went again later with Gail; there’s a entire room of Bruegel’s work. We each love Bruegel.
Tower, 2019, 44×34 inches, Oil on canvas
LG:
I discover each the story of the Tower of Babel and Bruegel’s portray so compelling – just like the bible saying people want to remain of their lane – don’t evolve with better ambitions like advances in civilization. To not construct our information, medication, science, and humanity any larger. It reveals how insecure this God should be to fret about people rising above their station.
Gerry Bergstein:
I see it as human ambition taking up from God, and That’s why he destroyed it, and it’s hubris, and it’s the type of like power-seeking or figuring out every part or which we by no means can do as a result of (goddamn) God made us so we couldn’t do it. (laughs) However I can see your level; I feel it’s the other facet of the identical coin. It’s in regards to the folly of ambition and energy. However however, that’s all we’ve got, and I really like ambition and energy. It’s a double-edged sword.
LG:
Sorry, I interrupted you, please proceed speaking about your spouse.
Gerry Bergstein:
It’s a extremely fascinating relationship. She not often watches tv. She doesn’t know what Mad Journal was. She doesn’t know the New Wave music I used to hearken to. However she’s a complete skilled on Henry James and George Eliot. So once we first bought collectively, we vowed that I’d learn Portrait of a Girl, and he or she was going to observe LA Regulation. (laughs) So she watched one episode of LA Regulation, and I learn one chapter of Portrait of a Girl, and we’ve been arguing about it ever since. However now we’re beginning to come collectively within the heart. I learn an excellent biography of Henry James lately; I used to be fascinated by it as a result of he was an bold insecure man, identical to the remainder of us. (laughs) So we’ve got nice discussions, and he or she’s a very good critic of sure issues in my work, like the place one thing is spatially. So we’re encouraging and serving to one another in our work. Since our work is so completely different, we’re not aggressive with one another. She has a special form of ambition than I do. My ambition is altering as I become older, somewhat extra contemplative. I’m not so anxious.
Guide II, Fragile Sky, 2016, 21×32.5 inches, blended media on paper
LG:
As you become older, are you engaged on a smaller scale?
Gerry Bergstein:
Truly, it’s getting greater; it’s getting each greater and smaller.
LG:
The size of so a lot of your works is large. I’m curious; some painters I’ve talked to begin to work smaller as a result of they don’t have the space for storing or different causes, however you promote most of your work, in order that’s in all probability not a difficulty, proper?
Physique Politic, 2019, 88×102 inches, oil on canvas
Gerry Bergstein:
I don’t promote an enormous quantity of labor. I just like the folks on the Naga Gallery–they’re actually sincere and useful. However I feel a few of my newer work is just too fragile and huge, I don’t know why I like to maintain doing it. I suppose I’m an fool. (laughs) Perhaps working bigger is a response to mortality. I’ve had a number of well being issues; nothing will kill me imminently. However I notice, in a method, I by no means have earlier than, that that is going to finish, and I wish to get my final shot in or one thing. Final yr I labored on three tremendous giant work, the biggest of which was 90 by 112 inches. That took over a yr, and now I’m returning to considerably smaller work.
LG:
The inhabitants explosion of painters over the previous a number of a long time has made the competitors to indicate and promote work impossibly stiff, particularly in a higher-end market the place somebody may make sufficient to reside on. Work are sometimes valued much less for creative advantage and extra for saleability or advertising and marketing. What opinion are you able to share about this dynamic?
Gerry Bergstein:
That’s an fascinating query as a result of I like to promote work, and I’m at all times fantasizing about promoting work, but when I have been extra considering promoting, I’d make very completely different work. So it’s a blended bag. I do work that’s tough after which complain if nobody needs it. (laughs) I do give it some thought, actually, however I don’t let it intervene with decision-making within the precise act of portray. It’s a balancing act.
Idea and Apply, 2019, 22×30 inches, Oil on Paper
LG:
It appears to me that for some artists, the extra they attempt to make it sellable, the more serious it will get. The essential factor is to concentrate on the integrity of the work, which you do.
Gerry Bergstein:
It’s actually laborious. Placing your self out on this planet. It’s crucial. I do it reluctantly, however I do it. Nevertheless, I do it much less as I’m getting older. I’m displaying much less and getting out on this planet. Covid, after all, was little bit of a damper. (laughs)
LG:
How a lot ought to younger painters care in regards to the business potential of their art work? What recommendation may you provide the youthful technology of painters arising?
Gerry Bergstein:
They need to be fascinated about making associates with different artists. That’s good for dialogue of the work and likewise good for introductions. I bought my begin from a good friend who launched me to a vendor and bought a present. I in all probability would have by no means carried out that alone. However you possibly can go too far in both path. I agree with you. College students want some form of dialogue of what occurs proper after college and the right way to survive, the right way to survive with a day job, and have a purpose to work themselves as much as. As shy as I used to be, when my work began getting good, about 1980, and I started to face behind my work, I didn’t have any downside displaying it to folks, however earlier than that, I used to be at all times somewhat shaky, and possibly for a very good motive. Even now, I don’t typically ship my work out to sellers very a lot in different cities. I used to try this. I confirmed in locations apart from Boston.
I feel younger artists must know that it’s a tough enterprise. They must be very persistent in order that they could luck out and have a present and promote once they’re very younger, which comes with its personal difficulties. Or they could must work for a number of years. I had I’ve had college students for whom I write letters of advice to get into graduate college yearly for ten years, after which lastly, they get accepted. I feel it takes a very long time to discover ways to paint. There’s one girl I taught; not solely did she get into grad college, however now she’s getting these instructing jobs. She’s an excellent panorama painter, and if she hadn’t labored for eight or 9 years with out a lot recognition, It might have been unhappy as a result of she’s doing terrific work.
In the event you get discouraged and wish to stop, that’s your enterprise. I’ve additionally had painters who bought out of grad college and began displaying in galleries a yr later and offered their work for some huge cash, after which–identical to that–it ends. They’ll’t determine what else to do. No matter you’re doing, you must be in it for the lengthy haul, be sincere with your self and let the chips fall the place they might. The entire thing in regards to the overblown artwork market, work promoting for tons of of tens of millions of {dollars}, is obscene. However the different query is that if I may promote a portray for 100 million {dollars}, I guess I’d! (laughs) I nonetheless assume it’s obscene. Artists should make a dwelling, possibly even a snug dwelling, however this commodification stuff, with folks, are shopping for artwork for the improper causes, is terrible. The younger artist has to navigate commodification in addition to having the ability to navigate socializing and friendships. They must be assertive and get their work on the market and don’t count on it at all times to work out, to have a thick pores and skin. Making use of for grants and the like, it’s a crapshoot. And you recognize, Perhaps for those who’re fortunate, you’ll get one in 20 tries, so simply maintain doing it.
Treehouse, 2019, 36 × 30 inches, Oil on canvas
LG:
Do you may have a present arising sooner or later within the close to future?
Gerry Bergstein:
Sure, in September 2023 on the Naga Gallery.
LG:
You’ll be displaying these new giant work you talked about there?
Gerry Bergstein:
I’ve some small ones to indicate too. The Gallery Naga is so nice; they encourage you to take extra dangers and never be anxious about what folks assume; they’re very supportive. I’m pleased about that.
LG:
From what I do know, it’s a superb gallery with a splendidly various vary of painters.
Gerry Bergstein:
Sure, they do.
LG:
Many galleries are having a tough time on this financial system and all. Are they doing okay?
Gerry Bergstein:
Sure, the Naga is wholesome as a result of they’re good enterprise folks. Since covid, it has sophisticated issues for all of the galleries.
LG:
is Arthur Dion nonetheless the director?
Gerry Bergstein:
No, Arthur retired. Meg White changed him. Arthur has develop into a really critical Buddhist.
LG:
Is Buddhism one thing that pursuits you as properly? It’s been essential for a lot of painters, like Gregory Gillespie
Gerry Bergstein:
Solely peripherally. I’ve tried meditation, however I’m so dangerous at it. David Sipress had an excellent cartoon, of a person elevating his hand in a meditation class saying, “I’m fascinated about not pondering, is that appropriate?” (laughs) And that’s what occurs to me after I meditate. I do it every so often, and it’s useful if I’m anxious about one thing. How about you, do you meditate?
LG:
No, nevertheless, after lunch, I prefer to hearken to classical music in an virtually asleep, dreamlike state for 20 minutes or so. It’s rejuvenating. I don’t assume it’s meditating, although, however it works for me.
Do you paint whereas listening to music?
Gerry Bergstein:
Classical music, sure! I really like chamber music. After I began this new collection of work, I listened completely to the chamber music of Beethoven, Brahms, Schubert, and Mendelssohn, whereas I used to be portray and it was so inspiring. I additionally love rock music.
Whitewash, 2019, 30X70 inches, Oil on canvas
LG:
Do you ever fear in regards to the music influencing the portray an excessive amount of on some degree?
Gerry Bergstein:
Sure, I’ve heard that; possibly that’s true. And I used to at all times till I used to be till about 1990 I listened to music continually within the studio. Both classical or new wave, Punk or no matter. After which out of the blue I began listening to the information…
LG:
Oh no, that’s fairly unhappy nowadays. (laughs)
Gerry Bergstein:
After which now I’m again listening to music. However not fairly as a lot, I’ve to remind myself. However after I’m doing it, I like it.
LG:
I really feel that I wish to paint as a lot as I can. If I spent all my time portray with no music, then I’d by no means get to hearken to music. Life’s laborious sufficient; you may as properly take pleasure in it wherever you possibly can!
Gerry Bergstein:
Precisely. I agree; I really like music; I feel it’s the best artwork type.
LG:
Typically I think about what musician could be most like a sure painter, what musician would I equate them with? Perhaps your musical doppelgänger could be Frank Zappa, would that be honest?
Gerry Bergstein:
Completely!, We’re in it Just for the Cash is considered one of my all-time favourite albums.
LG:
A humorous factor – that album I heard was a part of a undertaking that Zappa referred to as No Commerical Potential – but it was such an enormous success. One other instance of the significance of being true to your inventive self.
Gerry Bergstein:
I additionally hearken to John Coltrane and Charlie Mingus. Typically I think about the blacks in my portray remind me of somebody enjoying the cello, like a Bach Cello Suite or one thing. So it’s a variety.
However then, I’ll hearken to Little Richard the following day. I wish to have Beethoven’s Grosse Fugue, adopted by Chuck Berry’s Roll Over Beethoven, performed at my funeral.
LG:
That sounds excellent. Let’s hope that received’t be for a lot of, a few years sooner or later.
Fortress, 2022, 26X40 inches, oil on paper
