Dance of the Cranes

We continue our Nuit Blanche interviews with contemporary artist, Brandon Vickerd.  You can visit his website here.

SHARP OBJEX: What influenced you to become an artist?

Brandon Vickerd: Being an artist has always been the only option for me – there has not been much else I have considered doing.

BV: Certainly, there are a few former teachers who served as mentors (John Greer and Daniel Laskarin), but now I would consider them peers. It’s essential to have a group of peers to bounce ideas off of, and to measure your work against. Even if it is just from a competitive standpoint - when I see an amazing exhibition, it pushes me to renew my efforts in the studio. It drives me to expect more from my own practice as an artist.

BV: It will be my first time exhibiting at Nuit Blanche.

Dead AstronautSO: Can you tell us about your featured exhibition, Dance of the Cranes, at Nuit Blanche?

Conceptually the work is celebration of the urban landscape, not necessarily as a constructed habitat, but as a quasi-living organism that physically rejuvenates itself through the act of building. I am trying to think of the city not as a static entity, but as a system that constantly goes through a cultural growth, being affected by the inhabitants and culture at large. I see the movements of the cranes as a meditation on how these machines and the individuals operating them are agents of social change - constructing the world around us and therefore our sense of place..

On a non-cerebral level, I want to create a beautiful 14 minutes of epic spectacle that will remind everyone watching that the city can be a beautiful place. Most people living in Toronto cannot escape being bombarded by bad news about their town - gun violence, garbage strikes, urban decay, poverty - I want to remind people that there is also something really complex and beautiful about where they live.

Chrome GhostSO: One of the most interesting aspects of your works is how you take otherwise simple objects and give them life.  What have been your biggest challenges in terms of constructing/directing these pieces? 

BV: I have no shortage of ideas and the production side of things comes pretty easy to me, so I would have to say my biggest challenge is connecting with an audience by finding appropriate venues. I am beginning to realize that the gallery system is really confining, and provides a limited audience. Artist have know this for decades, but it's one thing to read Robert Smithson talk about it, and another to experience the frustration of  only having other artists and arts professionals view your work. In the last year I have consciously made a decision to produce public work that is ephemeral, monumental and accessible. Operating in the public sphere like this presents a whole new challenge, no amount of academic art speak is going to convince a crane operator that a work of art is good. It comes down to whether what you are doing is enriching their experience of public space or not.

The idea for Satellite and Northern Satellite came about in the same way – I saw a newspaper headline that read “GPS Satellites Crash”, I spent the rest of the day expecting satellites to be falling from the sky. It turns out it was the computer that operated their navigation systems that crashed, but I liked my idea better, so I decided to start making satellites crash.

Once I get an idea, I let it percolate for sometime, usually a year or two - if it sticks with me, I get down to producing it.

BV: I am working on a touring show called Tales to Astonish – the exhibition is an attempt to create a series of figurative monumental works to fictional low-brow cultural icons. There will be a monument to Ironman, the Human Torch, and others. It will be a two person exhibition with Kevin Yates and the first venue will be the Cambridge Galleries in 2010.

I am also building a scale replica of an ’87 Monte Carlo sedan from wood – it will be sitting on car jacks with parts missing as if they have been used for salvage. It will be shown at the Art Gallery of Windsor in 2010.

BV: There are three pieces of advice I drill into my students: Always be making - always be working in the studio – it is the people who are always producing who stumble across ideas of importance. Ninety percent of being an artist is perseverance, refusing to give up when all your peers are calling it quits. Also, surround yourself with successful people, spend your time with individuals who are doing what you want to do - it’s the best way to learn.

BV: I am becoming really interested in creating public art on the scale of public infrastructure. Dance of the Cranes is a first attempt to construct a public work that operates on a massive scale, and yet remains ephemeral. I see a lot of potential for working in this way – utilizing massive existing structures or networks to create something new and spectacular.