Tracey Snelling
Tracey Snelling uses sculpture, photography, video and installation to capture the essence of time and place. Her works invite us to examine the social and cultural conditions of the world extended beyond our own sphere. Snelling uses scale to aid her medium, often working in monumental size and engaging a cornucopia of sounds and sights, engaging her audience in a participatory experience.
Tracey Snelling has had solo exhibitions throughout the United States as well as in China, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, the UK, and Italy. She received the Joan Mitchell Painters and Sculptors Grant, was awarded a fellowship at the Institute for the Humanities at the University of Michigan, and completed permanent sculptural commissions at the Historisches Museum Frankfurt and Facebook offices in California. Her work is held in numerous public and private collections, including the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX; Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD; the Margulies Collection, Miami, FL; the West Collection, Oaks, PA; and 21c Museum, Louisville, KY. Snelling exhibited major installations at the Havana and Venice Biennales last year.
Portrait of the artist, 2019, Venice Biennale installation, Courtesy of the artist and Swatch Ltd.
LS: You’ve been in Paris for the past couple of months doing a residency at Cite Des Arts Paris. Can you tell me about that residency and what you’ve been working on?
TS: I was in the Cite space in Montmartre. The space is a beautiful wild garden with old buildings. While there, I was finishing work for a show with Cokkie Snoei in Rotterdam. My exhibition is called I can’t forget you and consists of sculptures based on films that I love. The films include Belle de Jour, Wild at Heart, Paris, Texas, Easy Rider, Don’t Look Now, and Urban Cowboy. Since the Paris lockdown began mid March, I decided to leave Cite a month early and returned to Berlin at the end of March. Plans to work on a lithograph with Jules Maeght had to be postponed, as well as having work in a show with Galerie Italienne in Paris.
LS: That is most unfortunate to hear that the pandemic had such a direct impact on your residency and new body of work. Can you tell me more about this series of sculptures, and how film has influenced your work in general?
TS: I’ve loved films since I was young. I grew up watching horror and sci-fi films with my dad. Another great childhood memory was going to drive-ins with my family. As a teen, I’d try to find and rent the strangest, most subversive films at the video store--all the John Waters films, Liquid Sky, Suburbia, Repo Man, Breaking Glass... But I also gravitated to the more quiet, well-crafted films such as Badlands and The Last Picture Show. For the exhibition with Cokkie Snoei, I chose some of the more well-known films that I enjoy. I’ve always been a huge fan of Buñuel, and though Exterminating Angel might be my favorite film of his, I chose Belle de Jour because I like the fantasy aspect, as well as Catherine Deneuve’s performance. Wild at Heart is one of my favorite David Lynch films. There are so many great lines in it, and visually it’s stunning. I admire how Lynch thinks, not only in relation to film but life in general. Wim Wender’s Paris, Texas hits the mark on multiple levels for me. The visuals, mood, slow timing and story all relate to my work, and his film has been a big influence on me. Because of my continued interest in films, I’ve made several short films, and plan to continue to explore this medium.
Tracey Snelling, Gilley's, 2020, Mixed media sculpture with video, 23 x 53 x 32 cm, Courtesy of the artist and Cokkie Snoei, Rotterdam
LS: You grew up in California and were based in Oakland for many years, though much of your time in the past few years has been spent in Shanghai, Berlin, Paris and beyond. How has that shaped your work and career?
TS: In 2015, I had meetings for a project with the Historisches Museum Frankfurt and visited Berlin for the first time. I was immediately taken with the city and its energy, and moved to Berlin for most of 2016 to check it out. After returning to California, I knew I needed to move back. So I’ve been back in Berlin since 2017. At the same time I’ve done residencies in Shanghai (6 months), Paris (2 months), and New Orleans (1 month). I love traveling and experiencing new places. I’m always excited to see how a different place functions--the culture, politics, people. And in each experience I meet a new group of people, expanding my network. The Swatch residency in Shanghai was by far the most beneficial and rewarding, as I was one of four artists chosen to show with Swatch in the Arsenale at the Venice Biennale 2019.
LS: In this difficult time, we are seeing clearly the importance of community in the art world. Traveling to new cities and countries, how do you integrate and adapt to new art communities?
TS: Throughout my travels and my time in the art world, I’ve seen my network of friends and fellow artists grow. This is one of the best byproducts of traveling for art. There are always those special people you connect with on a deeper level. To know that everywhere I go, I have these close, authentic relationships, is a comforting thought. In many ways, the world seems so connected.
Tracey Snelling, One Thousand Shacks, 2016, mixed media installation with video, 5 x 3.1 x 1 m, courtesy of the artist
LS: Two of your monumental works - One Thousand Shacks (2016) and Tenement Rising (2016) concern the often abysmal state of global housing conditions, and the people living within them. You write: There is both a vulnerability and strength found within the poverty-stricken slums throughout the world. In the midst of heavy burdens that these communities deal with on a daily basis, such as lack of food, poor sanitation, polluted water, and exposure to hazardous waste, many individuals facing these challenges are strong-willed and resourceful. They are a celebration of humanity in the middle of tragedy. What do you believe is the role and power of art in facing these seemingly insurmountable global issues?
TS: Art can bring an awareness to a topic, and hopefully cause someone to see it in a different light or to feel emotions about it that they hadn’t previously felt. With One Thousand Shacks, the work, when shown in its original configuration that is roughly 16 feet tall, literally overpowers the viewer. To be faced with an insurmountable wall of poverty, with accompanying videos and sounds, brings another layer of understanding and awareness. With this awareness, possibly more can be done for the issue. At least, that’s my hope.
Tracey Snelling, Tenement Rising, 2016, Mixed media installation with video, 325 x 240 x 135 cm, courtesy of the artist and Studio la Citta, Verona. Photo credit: Swen Rudolph.
LS: These works seem especially relevant currently, at a time when social distancing is critical yet impossible for many. Do you foresee continuing this series in consideration of Covid-19?
TS: Yes. I’m actually working on a proposal right now for a project dealing with the subject of home. This project would look at the many ideas of home, as well as touch on the immense homeless issue in the US. The issue of homelessness has been continually growing as social services disappear and wages don’t keep up with the cost of living. In addition, the current political power in the US seems to want to take medical care and any kind of aid away from people that need it most. And now, with the coronavirus and the way that the potus is dealing with it, unfortunately this problem will grow exponentially.
LS: That proposal sounds like a fantastic idea that I look forward to see come to fruition. I found when people were confronted by One Thousand Shacks they were often very struck. I think the way you play with scale has a powerful effect on viewers - the physical mass engulfs them while tiny video screens reinforce that human suffering within these situations. I think these sculptures are a great way for people to understand not only the enormity and complexity of these problems, but the human side of them too.
TS: Thank you for that. That’s my intention with my works that are based around social issues. I think the combination of small scale elements combined to form a large scale, overwhelming work, along with the video elements, can reach the viewer on several different levels. Most importantly, if I can help the viewer have an emotional or visceral reaction to the issue, then maybe it inspires further action or involvement in the issue.
LS: The last time we worked together was your solo exhibition at Jules Maeght Gallery in 2018. Visitors were greeted by your latest Clusterfuck installation, a tumultuous assemblage of movie posters, old tvs and records, fake money, bullet shaped lights and more. In these installations, our cultural curiosities and consumerist consumptions seem to compete for each attention and swallow each other. Where did these works emanate from ?
TS: My first Clusterfuck installation was at City Hall in Oakland, California. It was a combination of sculptures, tchotchkes, lights, posters, etc. Since then they have mutated, grown, been made in miniature, and taken on different subject matters. The idea is to overwhelm the viewer with a multitude of stimuli. It’s a very free, satisfying way for me to work. My sculptures are so detailed and time consuming. The Clusterfucks feel like free association. Even though a lot of thought goes into them, they feel loose and untamed, and I have somewhat immediate gratification from the installation process. It’s also a fast, effective way to get my thoughts out to the world.
LS: it must be comforting to work free and loose, almost gesturally since so much of your work requires so much planning and patience and details.
TS: Yes! It feels great to have that fast, free exercise in expression. It’s funny, I’ve tried to capture that same free and loose gesture in my sculpture work, and at times I can manage it. But soon again, I return to my “regular pace” of work with sculpture. Now that I’m starting to draw more, I notice that has its own pace too.
Tracey Snelling, Clusterfuck 9, 2019, large-scale mixed media installation with projections and performance, dimensions variable: large room size, courtesy of the artist and the San Jose Institute of Contemporary Art. Photo credit: David Pace
LS: Since then you’ve completed a few more large-scale Clusterfuck installations, including at the San Jose Institute for Contemporary Art and at the Venice Biennale in the Swatch Pavilion at Arsenal. Does the venue or audience influence the installations, or are they more related to your own current interests and investigations?
TS: They are usually more related to my own current interests and investigations. The Clusterfuck for the San Jose Institute for Contemporary Art was the largest one I have done so far. It had four large projections, referencing the US gun issue and gun violence, the US issue of women's rights (both in history and happening at this moment), the new age movement, and popular culture and news. In the middle of the installation is a living room set, where I staged a performance representing the problems with and the breakdown of “traditional family roles”. I was influenced by the insanity going on in the world, especially in the US--mostly male conservative Republican politicians trying to take away abortion rights and women’s control of their bodies and their rights in general, along with the US obsession on guns and the amount of violence and death that comes from it.
For the Venice Biennale, I had started working on sculptures and a Clusterfuck about my experiences in China as soon as I arrived at the residency in Shanghai. It’s nice to work on a sculpture of a building that is located down the street. I can continue to photograph and visit it for reference. It’s much easier to work this way, than to document in a foreign place, then try to build everything back in my studio back at my homebase.
Tracey Snelling, Shanghai/Chongqing Hot Pot/Mixtape, 2019, Mixed media installation with video, Dimensions variable: large room size. Courtesy of the artist and Swatch Ltd.
LS: The Clusterfucks become a form of interactive performance. The deeper the viewer engages, the more they learn.
TS: Yes, and with the addition of performance to the last Clusterfuck at the SJICA, interactive performance is further embedded. The viewer, if there, could see the performance. But after, the set remained in place with the video of the performance playing on the tv. A viewer can sit on the couch in the middle of the Clusterfuck, and watch the tv performance, the large videos, and interact with the props surrounding them. This addition of mediums and combining different forms of art excites me. I am curious where I can take it next...
LS: Pandemic aside, what’s coming up next for you?
TS: I was supposed to have my first solo show with Galleria Giampaolo Abbondio in Milan April 15, during MIART, but of course both were postponed. That will happen sometime in the future. Also delayed but in the future, a lithograph with Jules Maeght, a group exhibition with Galerie Italienne in Paris, and my residency with TOKAS in Tokyo, originally scheduled for May 2020, is now May 2021. Everything is really up in the air. Instead of a constant flow of production, I’m using this time to try to relax, plan new projects, draw, run, and meditate. I think the downtime is good. But it’s also hard to concentrate at this time.
LS: I believe that a lot of people have come home to empty walls and are beginning to realize that they may like to live with art. Where can interested collectors inquire about your work?
TS: They can see my present exhibition at http://www.cokkiesnoei.com/ Cokkie Snoei, Rotterdam. They can also contact Aeroplastics Contemporary, Brussels; Studio la Citta, Verona; Pan American Art Projects, Miami, and Galleria Giampaolo Abbondio, Milan.
Tracey Snelling, 2019, Courtesy of the artist and Swatch Ltd.