Vesper Stamper - The Resilient Illustrator

[danielerossi]

This episode got intense for me during the second part where Vesper started talking about her books about the holocaust. Of course it would be intense. It’s the holocaust. A very dark and disturbing history in human kind.

It made me realize how few really serious topics I come across in podcasts, conversations, interviews, etc. about illustration with the exception of Maus (but I’m not heavy into graphic novels in the first place so chances are this is new to me).

It really speaks to how effective and powerful storytelling is to place the reader/listener into many different situations they’d otherwise not or never get into.

[LauraA]

@asyas_illos I've got to stay that I loved the one they eliminated!

[demotlj]

I loved this interview and it is my favorite of all of the artist interviews so far because instead of the more typical -- "this is how I got to where I am etc." it got into deeper issues of art and the artist's place in society, how art plays out in the artist's own family, art and the educational process, etc. etc. I found it very thought provoking and honest, and it made me want to sit down and have coffee with Vesper to continue the conversation.

[Asyas_illos]

@lauraa I was wondering what my fate would have been had they been switched! They were my two favorites anyway. Oh well…

[Charlotte Glaze]

I love all the podcasts... this one was extra special though. I loved what Vesper had to say about the why behind creating art and I had to stop the podcast and write down her quote. SO GOOD.

Thanks for having guests that are so interesting and cool on the podcast!

“The artist’s calling is to stand outside. The reason we all feel like misfits, and the reason we all feel we never fit in anywhere… It’s because we’re meant to occupy that space. We’re meant to stand outside of things and to be translators. That’s why visual things are so powerful. We are translating an unseen reality into a seen reality for people, and they need that. But do we want that to become commodified or do we want that to be sanctified? There’s a lot more meaning behind having your work be a sanctifying presence in the world.”

• Vesper Stamper

[LauraA]

@charlotte-glaze You will love her podcast "On Being Fire-born," then!

[Jeremiahbrown]

@charlotte-glaze That quote was actually one of the things I respectively disagreed with, and think can easily turn malignant. The reason we artists feel like misfits is because most people feel like a misfit, not just artists. I know many people who aren't artists who felt and feel just like that.

I guess my question to her would be do the benefits of that, in my opinion, flawed mentality outweigh its negatives? I can see how it can be empowering, the lonely one oppressed by "they" but who has a secret weapon, but it also pushes others away and can easily wall of that individual's world. I'm a little jade because for many years I managed a retail store right next to an Art college so naturally I hired over a dozen of its students during that time and this mentality was prevalent and crippling to many of them.

From that experience my take, as an artist, has been to drop the misfit focus and instead funnel that energy into adding to the world/telling a story as an integration tool...something to make you closer to the world and others, not to isolate and separate.

I almost deleted this because I'm not too sure if this is the platform for a topic like this, haha, but I figured why not and I would love to hear other opinions if they feel like it.

[Lee White]

@jeremiahbrown Love the conversation happening here. I think this is exactly why we want to have these interviews on our podcast. We hear something and have to figure out how that fits into our world. We can accept it, reject it, or modify it to fit.

My thoughts on what she is saying is a bit different. You are saying that she is implying that artists strive to be on the outside fringe. I think her point is that is where many of us land naturally. And if so, embrace it. My kid always says "Dad, you are so weird!" and I always respond with "You got that right!". Gotta own it! BUT, I don't think she is implying that if someone does fit in, they should strive to be an outcast. That would be sort of weird. She is saying "Embrace who you are!". Like I said, you gotta own it and be proud of it. Turn the negative into a positive. : ).

At least that is my take. Love to hear what others think! : )

[Lee White]

@charlotte-glaze agree, that quote is powerful!

[Jeremiahbrown]

@lee-white Love your response! My only pushback would be that it's not just artists who feel like this (outsiders, weirdos, etc.), but it seems like we artists are one of the only employment groups that make it our platform... and that is where I think the danger lies. It's not entirely different from the victim mentality and when embraced too much it becomes a hinderance.

In my retail experience I witnessed many situations where extremely capable people were unable to do a straightforward job because they were unique/different and weren't being understood. The most successful students I hired would, to modify your words (option number 3 ) "Embrace who they were!"...but also embrace everyone else's weirdness and not use it as an excuse for abandonment. "I'm weird but you know what? So are you, and you, and you so let's combine/accept our weirdnesses and do some amazing stuff Captain Planet style!"

...and scene.

[LauraA]

@jeremiahbrown I hear you on the victim mentality. But what I hear her saying is, "If everyone calls you weird, celebrate it!" In fact, it's an artist's job to see the world in a fresh way.

An anecdote: Years ago, when I was a portraitist, I went to an exhibit opening. At some point a circle of us artists were gathered around talking very intently. We didn't think anything of it or think we were special at all--we were just bouncing things off of each other and having fun.

But when I got into the car afterwards with my husband, he declared, "Now I get it! They're all like you! It must be an artist thing!" And I smiled and said, "Yes, I guess it is!"

[Jeremiahbrown]

@lauraa I like your story, thanks for sharing! I'm probably going too far the other way. Maybe artists do have some right to feel special and my stance is throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

[demotlj]

@jeremiahbrown I listened today to Stamper's podcast episode "Fireborn" based on the suggestion of @LauraA and in that podcast episode she says that artists should stand between the two worlds of rules and institutional order, and the world of flame and chaotic --often destructive -- energy. She says that we all tend to lean toward one side or the other but by remaining in the middle as an incomplete fit for either, we as artists can interpret and critique one world to the other. She talks about the danger of becoming too enmeshed in one or the other way of being, and, if I'm understanding her right, isn't advocating an artistic alienation from the world but is advocating the artist's calling to be neither completely "order" nor completely "chaos." In that podcast, she also says that it isn't only artists that have that calling and that others also stand in that in-between place, mentioning for example, the biblical prophets.

All of that is to say that I think her comments in this podcast were reflective of a much more complex world view than she had time to really explain and I suspect she would agree with some of your concerns. And my apologies to Vesper Stamper for probably murdering her philosophy in my attempt to summarize it! It was, however, a really thought provoking podcast.

[LauraA]

@demotlj said in Vesper Stamper - The Resilient Illustrator:

if I'm understanding her right, isn't advocating an artistic alienation from the world but is advocating the artist's calling to be neither completely "order" nor completely "chaos.

Yes! I was being too lazy in my replies instead of going back to the source. She does address the stereotype of the artist being a "hot mess," and says that's not what she's advocating. I think that by definition, an artist has to make order out of chaos. Not rigid order, but organic, thriving order.

And in fact, sometimes the Biblical prophets did feel a bit sorry for themselves, because they really did suffer persecution, but God always reminded them to have compassion for the people they were prophesying to.

[Jeremiahbrown]

@lauraa , @demotlj That's reassuring and great insight! I should go listen to that podcast.