Hollow / Shallow

Interviews with Joseph Kohnke and Karen Kazmer

by Lester Alfonso

Joseph Kohnke is a kinetic sculptor who lives in southern California and is actively producing and exhibiting art there and until Feb. 26, 2009, here in Peterborough, Ontario in a joint show with Karen Kazmer, a medical pratictioner and artist currently living in Vancouver.  What brings it all together is two-sided exhibit called Hollow/Shallow both an exploration "of respiration in two diverse pneumatic installations."  I got a chance to talk a little bit with Joseph and Karen separately at Artspace on opening night Jan 16, 2009.

Hollow by Joseph Kohnke

LESTER: How does this work - Hollow/Shallow?

JOSEPH: Shallow is Karen's piece - which is in the back room.  Hollow is my piece and we collaborated in another show previously in Portland (Oregon) where she had more pieces in the space.  And I had another piece as well and we called it Hollow/Shallow as well but here at Artspace it worked well just to have a piece in here [main gallery] and a piece in the back [Mudroom.]  I was in Chicago and she was in Vancouver.  [We communicated] through emails, talking on the phone...

LESTER: So how did you get together? Was there a curator?  A matchmaker?

JOSEPH:  We met in Chicago.  She was showing a piece right after me in this gallery and I was taking my piece down and she was bringing hers in.  We met.  We talked about Canada - which I never really thought about as a place to be showing.. So she told me a few places to apply to.  And I applied to Grunt in Vancouver where she lives.  We met there when I got accepted there.  And we just kept in contact.  And eventually we did the Portland show together called Hollow/Shallow about 3 or 4 years after we met.

LESTER: Was it like smashing together artistic sensibilities or is it a personality thing or pure politics?

JOSEPH: It was more how we both deal with the issue of asthma.  She grew up with asthma and I have asthma - how we deal with the body, medicine and how that works...how she dealt with asthma in the body being that she's in the medical field.  She deals with patient's breathing... So it was basically bringing our ideas together and we worked with Hollow/Shallow as a concept of using air and the body.  We made separate pieces under that concept to create a large show.  Portland Arts was a large space...

LESTER: Can you tell me a bit about your background?  What do you bring into it?

JOSEPH: I basically make kinetic sculpture...  But I got into it as a kind of therapy for myself, just to get through.  My father died [when I was] in high school so it became a therapeutic thing to do art even though I never thought about becoming an artist - here I am now.  Still doing it.  And my father, he collected a lot of antiques and mechanical devices.  So I saw that as a kid and...I'm still going through that kind of stuff...

LESTER: If someone was to ask you the question "What is art?" would you then include self-healing in your answer?

JOSEPH: Yeah, I think so.  I think some of my favorite artists have their own issues involved in the work.  And I think it takes it to a different level than just craftsmanship.  Some people could say that I'm a good craftsman and not deal with content.  But for myself, I have my own issues involved in it.  It think it's richer content if you have your own issues in there.

LESTER: So when did you officially start calling yourself an artist?  Was that hard or easy?

JOSEPH: I think it's harder as I get older. (laughs) When you're young, in your 20s, [you say] I'm gonna be an artist!  Now, I'm realizing my stuff doesn't sell very easily...it takes a lot of time.  It's harder and harder to rationalize what I'm doing.

LESTER: Is there a big difference between the art scene in the U.S. and Canada?

JOSEPH: Well yeah, there's so much more funding here!  There, in the States, your gonna pay fees just to apply...and there's so much competition and even if you do get the show, you have to ship everything yourself.  There's no stipend.  There's nothing to support you once you have the show.  So you end up taking time off work and buying materials and doing the show and not selling and you're just throwing money out...  Here, there's a lot more funding.

LESTER: Your piece here specifically, Hollow, can you tell me what feeling it comes from?

JOSEPH: It's basically the beginning and end of an asthma attack.  The sound within the body...the heartbeat pounding, the ringing in your ears from the heartbeat pounding.  You don't hear the pounding here but the ringing in your ears and the blood going to your head and the wheeze of your lungs.  You can hear it all within your body and the sound of that.  And how it easily creeps up and then as the attack happens it's very high and then it creeps down towards the end.  So at the end of its cycle..it drifts off.  That's what I was going for.  Not that people see it. (smiles)

LESTER: It's almost like turning something ugly (so to speak) - beautiful by slowing it down...

JOSEPH: Yeah...people find it very peaceful to listen to this.  I find that interesting.  There's no doubt that it's kind of a soothing sound...

LESTER: What do you think of Karen's piece?

JOSEPH: I think what she was going for - this kind of amoeba cell - it's really funny how it's popping out and jumping out at you... It's hokey but it's great at the same time.  I really like it.  

[NOTE: Here's an idea: play both embedded movies at once and you'll get better sense of what it sounds like in the gallery.]

Artspace Interview
 
Shallow by Karen Kazmer
 
LESTER: How did you collaborate [with Joseph Kohnke] - how is this a collaboration?  How did that come about?
 
KAREN: Well, Joseph and I met in Chicago. His work was still up when I went in to check the gallery that I was showing in -I was really intrigued and enthralled with his work.  The notions of poetic memory in the work that I saw had a direct line to emotions in a very gentle, beautiful way.
 

As he was packing his work up, I encouraged him to apply at some of the local galleries in Vancouver which I'm very familiar with. Sure enough, he showed up for an exhibition there.  We were able to engage a bit more and realized that we had some commonalities in our work.  The main element is the idea of breathing and using air to make sounds and movement.
 
In this exhibition air-driven units operate the harmonicas and I use air-driven things to inflate and deflate - to make movement.  So his piece is more about the sound - using the air to create the sound - and I'm using air to create movement in the airbag that coordinates with the robotic elements in the work.
 
His piece is called Hollow and it is about a particular type of breathing that occurs when you're having an asthma attack.  You can't respire fully.  So you have a kind of hollow respiration. Joseph does a much better job of explaining this.
 
This work is about oxygen and breathing also, but in a shallow pond.  There are the organic elements: the amoebas and microorganisms that exist in a small pond. I just went from there.
 
I started thinking about the future, specifically that of algae. They are using it for things we never dreamed of.  We will have hybrids of the mechanical and the biological systems, so to speak, in the near future. They're going to start colliding.  I started thinking about surveillance mirrors becoming a cellular organism.
 
The other elements reference the nervous system: the way the mirrors twitch - the idea of the synapse.  You have your autonomic nervous system and then you have the other nervous system that's more responsive.  The autonomic one is the one that keeps you breathing all the time...  So there are two nervous systems in this work called Shallow.
 
LESTER: You've got a video projection coming from the ceiling and then the hole in the ceiling is jagged - is that part of the piece?
 
KAREN: The hole in the ceiling was created in a jagged way so there wouldn't be any straight edges on the projection. I wanted the projection to be like an amoeba itself.  So you have this sort of amoeba blob shape projecting onto another blob.
 
LESTER: It's got a sci-fi, almost a campy sci-fi feel to it, like Little Shop of Horrors...
 
KAREN:  It does.  It's a little bit into...the idea of a carnival.
 

LESTER: Look!  A caged giant amoeba!
 
KAREN: Right!  Come into my little peep show and I'll show this amoeba that I found!  So it has a different personality than Joseph's - which is obviously more poetic.  And then you come into this mudroom in the back - they call it the Mudroom here, which I found to be very appropriate.
 
LESTER: Perfect!
 
KAREN: This "scumbag" thing that has surveillance mirrors - depending on where you are – will twitch.  One might turn slightly.  One might twitch.  One may completely disregard you and one would be very afraid of you.
 
LESTER: I think it's very interesting to have a collaboration. I'm assuming that you were both autonomous - or did you have influence over each other's pieces?
 
KAREN: In terms of influence, I would say I was influenced a bit by Joseph's piece in the way that it would - not exactly contradict what I'm doing - but it would set the tone.
 
So you walk through Joseph's work with these amazing harmonicas calming you down.  Then you walk through the hallway here and you have a five second delay... by the time you get up to the stairs surveillance mirrors are checking you out.
 
His work sets the tone and I turn it back.  You can walk all the way through his but you can't walk through mine.  You can only circle around it.  Or just be totally revolted and turn around and leave and then go back through Joseph's installation.
 
The thing that I find really interesting about Joseph's work - he's very precise and really knowledgeable about how things should interface.  He just takes [it] up a notch to a level that is very thoughtful. 
 
My work is more, I would say, of the moment. You're greeted by this blob and its twitch... you leave. And the blob just stays there.
 
Joseph's is more about the sound and memory and mine is more about the experience. I watched a lot of people interact with this particular work in Portland.  One viewer came into [the gallery] and started to play his harmonica with the piece.  He was the only person in this huge space with these other harmonicas and I was one of the few people who got a chance to see this.  It was an amazing experience to see a work that could really get to people. I'm really pleased to be able to show alongside his work.
 
LESTER: What is your definition of art?
 
KAREN:  My definition of art   extends beyond what is presented in a gallery.  It goes out into the street and into homes and workplaces of people who don't even consider themselves to be artists. Even the small creative moments a non-artist would have are important. They suddenly have this amazing idea - they might not follow through with it, but they have this idea. It's not always the thing that you make or the event that you produce; the creative process in itself is art to me.