Your Full Name
Adam Guinness Kissel
Tell us about you
I am a New Zealander by birth of English, Irish & German heritage. I live in Queensland, Australia with my wife and five children. I have a neo-classical photo-manipulative and collage aesthetic but also work on paper, acrylic /mixed media painting, lino print and graphic design in my artwork.
The essence or purpose of it all is to move people and myself… onwards … emotionally. My internet moniker is– ‘fleet of gypsies’ which serves as a de facto focus for the ‘artist-as-mirror’ theme I have chosen.
Thus my studio practice oscillates between traditional work and digital art, sometimes getting stuck halfway between the two in the trad-digital hybridism of post-modern experimentational poetry.
In your opinion, what would be the secret ingredients to become a great digital artist?
- Being able to conceive spatial depth (a 3D look) for your elements /shapes in a flat 2D format. Knowing basic artistic perspective.
- Using layering and the graphic aesthetic well.
- Using the very broad digital colour palette liberally in innovative combinations.
- Having an idea of design principles but being able to experiment in an appealing way – i.e. producing imaginative, surreal, beautiful, quirky, harmonious compositions.
- Ability to formulate finished artwork having first seen the potential of raw materials and making something look like something else.
- Being able to voice a ‘concept’ or ‘meaning’ and being able to use visual symbols and significators to enhance the works’ voice.
- Ability to use decorative elements judiciously.
- A feedback system and your own sustainable areas of personal inspiration.
Where are you located?
Brisbane, Australia in the State of Queensland.
What is the most fascinating part of being a digital artist?
I would have to say two things … 1) the varied responses to my work and 2) the self-transformative process of creative inspiration.
Where do you get inspirations from?
Spiritually…my faith community, but stylistically speaking, it can be anything from installations, dvd, music, Art Deco & Vogue Magazine to Pop Art and Comic books. Being open-minded and taking in visual imagery can help you sort out what you will do next.
Do you promote/ sell/ showcase your work? If so, how?
Exhibiting on the web is essentially a kind of showcasing. Having said that, I’m generally a poor promoter of my own talents. Some sites sell prints of your work. Some of my sales go to charities. .I exhibit paintings occasionally and sell stuff on Fine Art America website, Red Bubble and Deviant Art. I often thought If I was just about selling, selling, selling I would be inspired for shorter bursts and be a bit compromised.
If you have a long range goals in your life. What is it?
As an artist, the long term goal is always the development of higher tunings or developed aesthetics so to speak. The main tension of the internet art community is concerning integrity and many people will sell out to trends of success. Instant media itself can produce in people short term driven goals. Where artistic objectivity and self criticism is submerged by financial goals alone, long term artistic goals can be jettisoned.
Luckily I don’t have to paint just to survive. I also work in the medical field. I’m hoping to go beyond being 50%-there and 50% in art. Art is my passion. In my country artists are the new working poor, unless you have a great grant or support structure behind you. On a personal level my long range goals are connected with other people i.e. my family. Most medium term projects I embark on come either as a whim or out of a sense of challenge somehow. I’ve always been like that. I would certainly love to travel and research deeper into art or be in a more dynamic artistic community. The internet is a surrogate for these desires at times.
What types of assignment/ project are you attracted the most? Why so?
Painting… strangely… derived from figurative illustration with sculptural feeling. This is where I feel there is more of me to be personally invested. Throw in collage / mixed media series with painting and I’m happy to work long hours and get more creatively expressive.. Advertising / commission work is interesting… brainstorming is a creative process.
Who is a digital artist that you look up to? Why so?
There are so many I get a sore neck. Those who consistently, innovatively tap new vistas of feeling are always popular. I’m sorry there are too many artists who have a swansong or a style that captures attention for a while.. If you go to http://fleetofgypsies.deviantart.com/ and look at my ‘Favourites’ Gallery, you might get an idea.
Describe a difficult work/ project situation and how would you overcome it?
Producing advertising material for some odd commercial thing at times can be difficult… Decision-making over what happens after the process of brainstorming is the key. Artistic synthesis needs to be matched by sustainable vision. The problem is that deadlines are not always so kind. Time, past work and prayerful meditation has given me answers in the past.
The non-creative solution is to become equipped with a wider range of visual materials (cost!!) . The creative solution is wrought by inspiration and self belief in the choice-making using what you know and have. Other people have different problems. Generally you can do much more with a fully equipped studio. You can always do more.. betterer. and provide what people really crave… their own choice!.
What do you think about the Internet and how it is affecting our lifestyle?
My last comment was made tongue-in-cheek knowing that this was going to be the next question. It certainly is loaded isn’t it. The web, I mean! In my field – visual art..anyone now can upload virtually anything, but usually it is the same stuff made from a slightly different perspective. If I told jokes about manga vampires with enhanced breasts, you’d know instantly what I mean.
I originally liked the information sharing idea of the internet, but overwhelming social problems such as pornography, youth alienation, political censorship, spamming, viruses, social engineering and mind control makes me think our wondrous fascination with evolving technology isn’t such a ‘good thing’ that the Baby Boomers thought it would be. Sometimes I remember a dream with the odd sense of dread I had as a child being lost in a library when I was small… the books would come clattering down upon me, open-mouthed and heavy … just like the deck of cards in Alice in Wonderland.
If you could turn back time, how would you do things differently?
Get more arts education. I was a late bloomer (but an early starter). I think I would have liked to have grasped more in the area of poetic text and how this can help inform visual art.
How do you keep your work fresh? Do you need to consciously adapt your style or does it progress naturally?
I believe one’s style progresses naturally as one experiments and learns… that is.. if you desire to learn and retain the changes. That is why journalling is so important. Seeing natural beauty, the victories of other artists, found objects, textured colour play, romanticism, figuration, geopolitics and surreal /retro empathies all feed into my own ‘creations’.
As a re-modernist, sourcing visual culture is about sifting media with integrity and what I call ‘discernment of voice’. The post-modern surreal is an interesting place to play, although there is very little ‘new under the sun’. Striking work does not need to be shocking or stereotypically gothic-dark to be effective in voice.. open minded refusal to play safe when embracing visual ideas has been a key for me to unlock new areas to experiment. I have a triple random polymerge machine that throws random combinations of random numbers of random digital photos (jpegs) together (up to 24).
You can get some amazing visual effects like this. But it all gets back to choices.. of images . The 1900’s Dadaists utilised non-art random ‘bytes’ (sound, text, shape, texture) to get out of the traditional Art world’s “expression rut”. It is still a good practice today. My kids often say ‘that’s random!’ , but I think they mean ‘that’s unaccounted for in my current conversation’…..
I don’t think their phrase ‘random’ credits the dramatic shock value that Neo-dada randomness truly evokes. Sometimes life overwhelms us and our limited understanding.. then you can talk about prejudices, racial stereotypes, internal iconography &c usurping the random .. mundane and surreal…. the place of true spiritual and sensory-tactile feeling that is dished out by daily reality.
Name 3 of your favorite (art) books/ magazines.
I found Juxtapoz, (a low-brow modern art magazine) an interesting one… Design magazines, and visiting the art section of a library for journals and coffee-table things is always rewarding and full of interesting surprises. My favourite art book is a big visual book on Robert Rauschenberg’s ‘combines’. I need to check out more on-line art magazines too… or become a fat fossil who doesn’t know what he is talking about.
What is your life motto?
How does “Take responsibility… you are only here once” sound?
In what kind of a work environment do you do your best work?
To be honest I’ve not been in many varied ones. I hate fussing over interruptions from lack of resources, I would have to say … quiet… intense …homely.. and well-stocked. I have a studio under my house and I mainly ignore it like a bad attitude to a friend or a.jilted lover.. but when I get in there … Bellissimo!!
What do you like the sound of?, i.e. wind blowing, bird in the morning, etc. Why so?
Ah… I want to hear the ocean…All New Zealanders have salt water in their blood..
If you have online portfolio (website/awards/credits/client’s showcase), what is the URL?
http://fleetofgypsies.deviantart.com/. I’m currently working on building a website at Fine Art America.
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