By Roxanne Phillips
We
are pleased to present our second set of interviews with artists
whose works are featured in Art Saint Louis' new in-Gallery
and virtual gallery exhibit, "Varsity Art XXV" (March 5-April 1,
2021). This year's 25th annual exhibit features works by 44 undergrad
and grad level art students representing 22 STL regional colleges and
universities from Missouri and Illinois.
We invite you to view the virtual exhibit and all of the featured artworks in the exhibit on our website here and you can also view all of the works in our Facebook album here. We also invite you to view HEC-TV's video piece on this exhibit here.
We proudly introduce you to featured artists Summer Brooks and Erin Dellasega.
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SUMMER BROOKS
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| Featured in “Varsity Art XXV” at Art Saint Louis: Summer Brooks, O’Fallon, IL. “Crown.” 2021. Spray Foam on Ceramic, Resin, Paper, Mica, Gold Leaf, 21”x21”x5”. $500. McKendree University. Professors: Kevin Kao, Amy MacLennan. Artist’s statement: “As a Black artist, my work is highly sensitive to my experiences not fitting into the western beauty standards. The western standard of beauty are ideals that deem what is attractive. Natural hair and African features were not desired by western society. Black women constantly are forced to conform to western ideals. I capture this tense relationship that Black women have with beauty by rejecting these “standard” ideals. My figures embrace their beauty.” |
Roxanne Phillips: What was it that first inspired you to be an artist?
Summer Brooks: As a kid, I would always be drawing or experimenting with different media. The whole creative process inspired me to continue my career as an artist. There’s nothing like creating a piece of art.
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| McKendree University art student Summer Brooks. |
RP: What concepts do you explore in your art?
SB: My art deals with black women and beauty standards that are placed onto us. I am interested in creating work that starts a conversation about how harmful those standards are to Black women.
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| Summer Brooks. “Jam.” 2021. Spray Foam, Terracotta, India Ink, Gold Leaf, 10.5”x6”x3” $75. |
RP: Best time of day or night to create and why?
SB: I find that I create more during the night. The night is quiet and has far less distractions. I am quite the night owl so I have no trouble staying up till dawn finishing a piece. Inspiration also likes to spark in the dead of night for me.
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| Summer Brooks. “BLM.” 2021. Ceramic, India Ink, Gold Leaf, 7”x7”x4”. NFS. |
RP: What do you hope viewers will take away from your pieces?
SB: I want to show the viewer that Black women are beautiful regardless of western beauty standards say. Black hair and skin are magical and beautiful and I hope that my viewers are able to see that throughout my work.
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| Summer Brooks. “Grease.” 2021. Spray Foam, Terracotta, India Ink, Gold Leaf, 13”x13”x8” $100. |
RP: How important is the size/scale of your art and why?
SB: Size is important in my work since it can impact how the message comes across to the viewer. Sometimes a piece has to be substantial in size in order for it to be impactful. My work is not all too big, but each piece is scaled to a size that is still strong conceptually.
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| Summer Brooks. “Black Buttercream.” 2021. Ceramic, India Ink, Gold Leaf, 7”x7”x5”. |
RP: How have you overcome pandemic challenges in your creative process / education?
SB: The pandemic has brought on a lot of challenges. I have dealt with a lot of artist block because the state of the world is not ideal currently. In order for me to move past this artist block, I had to realize that creating work based off of the current happenings in the world was okay. After that realization, I was able to create and move past the artist block while also creating work that was more meaningful to me.
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| Summer Brooks. “Pomade.” 2021. Spray Foam, Terracotta, India Ink, Gold Leaf, 18”x17”x4”. $200. |
RP: What is your future creative life?
SB: I would love to start my own studio so that I can continue exhibiting my work. Creating a sustainable practice by selling pottery is also another goal for me. Eventually, I hope to get an MFA so that I can teach at a university level.
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| Illinois-based art student Summer Brooks. |
Learn more about Summer Brooks: www.instagram.com/summer_.jpeg
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ERIN DELLASEGA
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| Featured in Art Saint Louis' "Varsity Art XXV": Erin Dellasega, Charleston, IL. “Chosen Spot.” 2020. Acrylic, Collage on Canvas, 47”x35”. $1,000. Eastern Illinois Unversity. Professors: Christopher Kahler, Ann Coddington. Artist’s statement: “In my paintings, I depict contemplative interior settings that are disrupted through the use of bright and unnatural colors. I take what might normally be considered a mundane setting and I fracture the space through the use of collage and spatial ambiguity. By utilizing reference imagery of spaces that are very personal to me, I strive to allow viewers into an introspective space and time in which they would otherwise not have access.“ |
About the artist: Erin Dellasega is a mixed-media artist from Kansas who currently splits her time between Kansas and Illinois. Her work combines the media of acrylic painting, physical collage, drawing, and digital collage. Dellasega graduated with her BFA in visual art with honors from the University of Kansas in May 2020 and is currently working towards her MA in studio art at Eastern Illinois University.
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| Erin Dellasega. “Sometimes/Fractured.” 2020. Acrylic and Collage on Canvas, 3.5’x5’. NFS. |
Roxanne Phillips: What inspires you to make art?
Erin Dellasega: Listening to my favorite music and watching my favorite films and the spaces in which I enjoy these experiences is what inspires me to make art. I am interested in the atmosphere of these spaces during these times, and the way that I associate each different feeling with the space. My paintings tend to reflect these experiences through the layering of interior spaces in the same way that the memories become layered and overlapped within my mind over time.
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| Erin Dellasega. “April at Home.” 2020. Acrylic and Collage on Panel, 14”x14”. NFS. |
RP: Who inspires you and why?
ED: I find myself being mostly inspired by musical artists and my favorite bands that I grew up with. I tend to listen to music all day long, whether I am in the studio or at home. All of my family members and I share this same passion, so it was something really solidified within my mind from a young age. In the same context, I am inspired by my family and my home life, which is very evident in my work. On the other hand, I am currently interested in Philosophy, more specifically metaphysics, which I am hoping to continue to develop within the conceptual area of my work as I continue my practice.
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| Erin Dellasega. “At Night/In My Room.” 2020. Acrylic and Collage on Canvas, 3.5’x5’. NFS. |
RP: What media do you use and why?
ED: I use an array of media. I start my ideas with a digital collage in Photoshop and then I create the physical work with acrylic paint, physical collage materials, and drawing materials. When I paint, I don’t limit myself to just using paint; rather, I like to utilize textiles remnants, old drawings, pieces of old paintings that I have scraped away, pastels, markers, and even crayons to build up the layers in my work. I have an accumulation of remnants from ongoing textiles projects and old paintings and drawings that I always keep in case I want to use them later. I find that these objects hold a lot of memories for me that allow me to enhance the tactility of my work while also layering the experiences that are held within each piece.
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| Erin Dellasega. “Shower Curtain #2.” 2020. Acrylic and Collage on Panel, 18”x24”. NFS. |
RP: What concepts do you explore in your art?
ED: I tend to touch on the ideas of the digital realm of my life in conjunction with the real, tactile interior spaces in which I live. I find that there is a lot of overlap between the aesthetics and tendencies that develop from utilizing social media for so many years within the way that I remember different experiences and seasons of my life. Specifically, there is some kind of imprint left over from the music I listen to or a television show that I watched, which allows me to access very intense memories of my life just from the sensorial experience. And, for me, this always comes back to the visualization of the spaces in which I experienced those times. So, the overlapping and pastiche of each memory occurs over time in the layers of each of my paintings.
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| Erin Dellasega. “New Home #1.” 2020. Acrylic and Collage on Panel, 9”x12”. NFS. |
RP: How important is color or lack of color and why?
ED: Color is incredibly important to my work. I utilize mostly high key color, lots of neon pink and yellow and purple, in combination with darker grays and browns. I have come to realize over the last couple of years that my inherent affectation for these types of unnatural colors comes from my experience with social media, namely Twitter and Tumblr, since a very young age. My teenage years were spent keeping track of my favorite fashion trends, albums, and film stills on my Tumblr page, and these digital years really allowed for the distortion and highly saturated aesthetic to develop. During those years I was bombarded by the ever-growing interest in digital distortion and the rise of micro movements like vapor wave and witch house and so many other so-called “aesthetics” that later on would really affect my color choices without much realization.
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| Erin Dellasega's Illinois-based studio. |
RP: Best time of day or night to create and why?
ED: For me, the best time of day to be in my studio is from noon until 5/6pm. This is when I have the most energy and largest chunk of time on a normal day. A precise schedule and agenda for each day is actually really important for me to sustain my practice. I like the afternoon because I can utilize natural light in my studio without it being too dark and affecting how I see my work as it hangs on the wall; especially since I utilize a lot of gloss medium in my paint and only having artificial lighting is sometimes too harsh. I like to reserve my mornings for writing and journaling and exercise, and then once I am finished doing that, I am ready to get to work.
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| Erin Dellasega. “Late Night, New Home.” 2020. Acrylic and Collage on Paper, 3.5’x4.5’. NFS. |
RP: What do you find most challenging/rewarding about the creative process?
ED: The most challenging part of my process in particular is the act of creation and then destruction; what I mean is that when I am not happy with a piece, I always keep it and I will either scrape the paint off to utilize as collage material, or cut it up, or paint on top of it. The decision to destroy something is really difficult, especially if I have spent hours or even weeks on it. But once I decide to do this, and start something new or different, that is the most rewarding – because I trusted my intuition in knowing that that wasn’t really meant to be the final piece. When I create a piece that I am really proud of on the foundation of something distressed or unsuccessful, it becomes really powerful for me.
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| Eastern Illinois University art student Erin Dellasega. |
Learn more about Erin Dellasega: https://erindellasega.myportfolio.com/ and www.instagram.com/erindellasega
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Roxanne Phillips
is an artist and art educator based in St. Louis since 2001. She earned
a MFA in Printmaking & Drawing from Washington University in St.
Louis and BFA in Painting & Drawing from University of North Texas.
Roxanne is an adjunct art instructor at Washington University in
St. Louis and has worked with Art Saint Louis
since 2017 as Administrative Assistant and Installer. From 2018-2020
she was Master Printer for Pele Prints. Her works have been featured in
numerous exhibitions
throughout the St. Louis region including at Art Saint Louis, COCA, Crossroads
Art Studio & Gallery, and St. Louis Artists’ Guild. Her work is
currently available at Union Studio in St. Louis. She has served as
exhibit Juror for several regional exhibits & art fairs. Roxanne is
past Board member of St. Louis Women’s Caucus for Art.
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