Interview with TLR Cover Artist: Krista Steinke; Part 2

Who/what have been the biggest influences on you as an artist?

I grew up in a creative household environment. All three of my siblings are very talented; my sister is a writer, my younger brother is an artist/musician, and my older brother designs video games. It was through my mother, also a professional artist, that I acquired a love for the “visual” and the desire to work with my hands and make objects. My father is a Lutheran pastor and a writer. I think listening to his sermons as a child influenced my interest in storytelling and its use in explaining the more complicated, mysterious curiosities of life.

Beyond my personal upbringing, I draw inspiration from a variety of sources including literature, film, music, psychology, and the history of art. These often shift and change according to my interests. My work always seems to somehow parallel the events, questions, and issues that infiltrate my everyday life. For example, I have reached that age where my eyesight is beginning to degenerate, and I now have to wear reading glasses. Because of this, lately I have been fascinated with vision and the act of seeing or not being able to see. Consequently, in my current work, I am experimenting with alternative photographic optics and exploring the poetry behind visual perception.

calico blue, 2011 (from "Pom-Pom Pink/Duct Tape Silver) archival pigment print

Your series Backyards BB Guns and Nursery Rhymes evokes the disquieting oddness of traditional fairytales. I’m also reminded of the work of outsider artist Henry Darger, specifically his sometimes-hermaphrodite heroines, the Vivian Girls, inhabitants of Darger’s vast fictional universe. Can you speak to the importance of the uncanny in your work?

The uncanny has always been present in my work as a way to investigate deep-rooted, and sometimes uncomfortable truths about the human psyche or experience. The world I represent is not perfect, stable, or clear. Time and place are not located in reality, but rather, highlight a moment that exists in memories, fantasies, and ideals. The places captured often reveal a landscape in which perceptions are blurry. Inaccurate perspectives, distorted proportions, and flawed details decontextualize the familiar and emphasize the imperfect, fragmented nature of contemporary life, but also in how things appear, disappear, circulate, and change.

"the apple grew ripe and fell far from the tree", 2006 (from "Backyards, BB Guns, and Nursery Rhymes"), archival pigment print

You’ve worked in photography, video, and mixed media. Is there any medium you haven’t yet tried that you’d like to explore?

I have dabbled to some degree with most art-making mediums, but I have not had the chance to work extensively with many. I would love to experiment with more 3-D materials such as fiber, bronze, or wood. I have always felt that photography and sculpture were closely related. Before I shoot, I am first thinking and working in the physical realm of form and space in order to set up my subject and compose my shots. Sculpture feels as though it would be a natural progression for me. In the end, however, I would probably go back to making photographs of my sculptures. Photography is a language that has always best articulated my ideas and the process that I love.

The photograph TLR used as the cover for its Lives of the Saints issue is surprising, lovely, and whimsical. Was this the image you imagined when you set to work on it?

I often go into a shoot with a loose idea of how I want an image to come out. This usually changes once I start photographing, especially when I work with children, who are wonderfully unpredictable and bring their own imagination and personality to the work. For this particular image, I wanted my model to appear as if she were falling into a massive white void. The composition, the gesture, and even the lighting all came together during the shoot. In general, I am at my best when I work intuitively, and my most successful images are the ones that take a completely different turn from my original plan.

white, 2011 (from "Pom-Pom Pink/Duct Tape Silver), archival pigment print

What are you working on now? What do you see yourself doing in ten years?

Right now, I am on sabbatical so I am able to work on my art full time. I have three shows coming up in March, and I am currently focused on my series “Purgatory Road”. This project, like my previous work, hinges on my interest in narrative, but marks a move towards a more abstract direction, both conceptually and formally. On the back burner, I plan to return to the series “Pom-Pom Pink and Duct Tape Silver” (i.e.: cover image for TLR) and I have a few other projects in the works, including a video piece. In ten years, I predict that I will still be working in photography and video but branching out into a progressively more experimental way of producing work, continuing to incorporate mixed media, and perhaps taking on some ambitious projects such as site-specific installation in a public space. I also have an idea brewing for a feature length film project but that is in the twenty-year plan.

Read Part 1 of this interview here.

Krista Steinke is a Philadelphia-based artist working in photography, video, and mixed media. She was born in Richmond, Virginia but spent most of her childhood in Texas. She received a BA in the Advanced Humanities from Valparaiso University, a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and her MFA in Photography and Digital Imaging from The Maryland Institute, College of Art.

Her work has been included in exhibitions from New York to LA and her time-based work has been featured in film and video festivals around the globe. She is the recipient of many awards and fellowships including the 2009 Pennsylvania Foundation for the Arts Fellowship in Photography, 2008 Finalist for the Photolucida Book Award, and 2008 Artist Residency at Light Work. Her work is in numerous collections, including the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Woodmere Museum in Philadelphia, Brauer Museum of Art, Johnson & Johnson Collection, and Fidelity Investments. Her photographs have been published in The Photo Review, SPOT Magazine, SHOTS Magazine, Contact Sheet, EXIT (Madrid Spain), and Monthly Photography (South Korea).

Krista’s work is represented by the Schmidt Dean Gallery in Philadelphia. She is an Associate Professor and Chair of the Art Department at Moravian College. Recently, Krista’s work was exhibited at the Atlanta Jackson-Hartsfield International Airport and she is looking forward to a solo exhibition this coming spring in Houston, Texas during the 2012 Fotofest Biennial of Photography.