DAVID AMICO
Part One: Uncalibrated
David Amico was one of the artists who, in the late 1970's early 80's, helped put Downtown Los Angeles on the map. Loft space was abundant and cheap. David had a 3000 square foot space on Broadway, which he made available for artist's shows and performances. Among these were early exhibitions by Los Angeles and New York artists who became more widely known later. There were performances by the Kipper Kids, T-Bone Burnett, and an exhibit of David's own work with a sixty four piece orchestra. Another highlight was an exhibition in February of 1980 by a collaborative group called "Pleasure/Function" that included Peter Fend, Colen Fitzgibbon, Jenny Holzer, Peter Nadin, Richard Prince and Robin Winters. Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE) had just opened down the street, and downtown was rapidly becoming the focus of the Los Angeles art scene. A number of downtown painters were gaining visibility. Andy Wilf and David Amico were preeminant among them. These artists combined pop imagery culled from spanish-language "novelas", scenes from the over-the-top chaos of the street and the tradegy of skid-row, with the then emerging neo-expressionist movement.
David first showed at P.S. 1 in New York in 1976. After returning to Los Angeles, David was one of the first of this new generation to show in the Newport Harbor Art Museum's first Biennial, curated by Paul Shimmel in 1984. He showed with the popular Ulrika Kantor Gallery and the Jancar-Kuhlenschmidt Gallery that opened in a tiny basement room and also showed some of the artists he helped promote, including Kim Hubbard and Jane Reynold's (although in Jane's case it may have been the other way around ). Later with galleries including Newspace and Irit Krygier. David was included in the the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art's first show in 1983 and . As the 1980's wore on, however, a growing preference for conceptual work eroded the critical support for painting, and the downtown scene became less attractive.
David has been represented by ACE Contemporary Exhibitions since 1987 and has taught at the Claremont graduate School, Art Center, and UCLA. In addition he has been teaching for a number of years at Idyllwild Arts.
He was interviewed for STRIKING DISTANCE by Nancy Evans on Saturday, February 15, 1997 at his studio in downtown Los Angeles. The conversation was recorded and occassionally interupted by Mitchell Syrop.
Nancy Evans is a Los Angeles based painter who has shown at Sue Spaid Fine Art and Marc Foxx Gallery in Los Angeles, Fawbush Gallery in New York, and the Gasworks Studios in London. Her work was recently exhibited at the Otis College of Art in Los Angeles. Evans moved to Los Angeles in the summer of1980 and the first person she met was David Amico.
Nancy Evans: When I think of your work, one of the characteristics of your work is that you didn't settle into one clear cut style. That's been true in the past. Do you still feel that's true?
David Amico: I think it wasn't so much not falling into a clear cut style. I think I have a style. What I've tried to do is not fall into a clear cut method of working. And I think that's what differentiates the 80s/90s artists, if you will, from some earlier artists. Not all earlier artists, but some earlier artists. You didn't have to make stripes all your life, now. And some people refuse to do that. And I sort of respect that we brought that kind of ideology into the mix. You can pursue that if you want, but you don't have to. And I think that's a legitimate position.
N. Well, I know that people told me that you have to choose this or that. And what you're saying is that you don't have to choose.
Or, your choices can be whatever they need to be in order to distinguish yourself. They don't necessarily have to rely on some sort of hard cast image. I've always painted and I've always painted somewhat the same way. I tend to overwork things at times and that's part of that painting over. So if you look at the work you can really sort of figure out that it all looks like it comes from me. I still try to mess around with some industrial sort of architectural elements. It's always been part of what fascinated me about living downtown. We're not living in a rural area. We're living in the middle of the city.
N. So it's not like it's nature that we're looking at. It's machines, or buildings, or ...
... Or trucks. All the paraphernalia, clothes being hauled out onto the docks, goods and services, all of that stuff. So the work has always sort of stayed within that realm. There's an industrial edge, patterns off of material and stuff. It's an urban industrial edge that's been in the work. The C series that I've been doing for the last three or four years, is the closest thing to just settling into one kind of style, if you will, or one kind of imagery. Those are structures. They're actually gaskets, they're not even letters, but turned vertically they become letters. So I'm talking about structures, computerized images that come down from a number of different sources.
N. It seemed, like for myself at the C series show, I thought this is really interesting because you've made these structures – and I saw them as structures – that allow you to apply paint in ways, like thick or thin or mixed strokes. And it wasn't about standing way far back from an image. It was almost about standing close and seeing the paint.
The whole idea of those was to make mirrors without making mirrors. I chose those two letters, C and U, mainly because they appealed to me. Because they were industrial shapes that weren't letters originally. They read as letters. But if you just sit there and look at "C - U" and "U - C" and "I - C - U", you're talking to yourself. You're questioning yourself. It's like you're talking out your mirror image. What you're talking out is this industrial life or image of yourself in an urban environment. It made sense to me. It was sort of a conceptualized mirror. This was a mental connection as well as a physical connection, to have this shape repeat, to sound that out, word that out, to make it into poetry. And also to have it function as this kind of industrial tarnished object that you have this visceral connection to as well. So it served multiple purposes.
N. The last time I was in New York, I was struck that it is an industrial city and I think of L.A. as a post industrial city. You don't see oil and stuff, the way you're using colors and stuff are more post-industrial, really.
I think, that confuses people, that industrial / post-industrial. There's no gears anymore. Even New York is getting away from that. The whole world is. It's all satellites and communication disks, and computers and what not. But it's still industrialized material. It's like post or modern, it's still dealing with that mass market, mass communication, satellites going around the world in straight lines. It's interesting, when I'm up in the mountains, there's this one place where you go and watch the sky at night and you can stare up at the heavens and you can see the stars crystal clear and you can also see these trackings of satellites. And it's like there's a grid that's going on over our heads. We've moved away from the industrial world with the gears and stuff, but we've entered into this other, this communication thing that has hardware floating around us all over the place.
N. So you like to think of yourself as an artist, or as an individual within this - the way you visualize the world - structure that's making you fairly small.
I'm fairly small but I also think of myself as fairly organic (laughs). We get the impression with these devices that everything is sort of ... It's plastic, is what it is.
N. I think that some people are very attracted to logic systems and other people are not. And I get the impression that you are attracted to logic.
Yeah. I'm attracted to what our organic system puts out. I mean this is an amazing time. Philosophically, I guess, coming off of this century and moving into the next. It's been very painful. But it looks promising.
N. So in some sense society is really decayed but you see optimistic elements as well.
Yeah. I see ... being on the Pacific Rim here, having students in the school that are from all over the world, having Japanese and Korean students along with American students all in the same classroom studying art. That's a different pattern than thirty years ago. And if this is an indication of where we're going, I think it is somewhat promising.
N. Do you feel there is a lot of intercommunication, that there's a cultural openness?
Art brings it out. You put them all in the same classroom, the language skills can vary, but in the end we're all drawing, we're painting an assignment or doing something together or working on their own work and they gravitate to each other's ideas. There's an exchange that takes place. Someone's doing something with a certain kind of method or color and the other person picks up on it. They talk. The power of art, the creative process in that rudimentary sense, is really still evident. And it's wonderful that we have these configurations. It's wonderful that we're doing this school, that there's this interest coming from these people across the Pacific Ocean, that they still regard art as an integral part of their children's heritage and they want them to continue it. It's wonderful. It's still very viable.
N. Do you think that Americans consider art an integral part of their heritage?
Oh sure. Sure. I mean we're very much involved with style because of our product orientation and consumer orientation. Kids buy stuff because it looks good. There's all kinds of stuff going on with communication. We are an eclectic society in regards to style. We may not teach formal ... We go up and down about what we teach or what we're going to fund but by and large everything that we do is visually, artistically oriented. The television and movie industry have grown to be a major contributing factor to the economy.
N. But do you think I mean how do you think painting fits into that larger view of art?
I feel that all that stuff is art. Film is art. Television is art. Painting and drawing is just, we do the R&D.
N. So you think in some sense that fine art by the fact that the individual is doing it, can be more progressive, can be quicker ...
I think the fine artist still represents the individual trying to operate within all of this. And it's a very romantic concept. And they're still being looked at. I think the fine art position is as viable as the poet. The poet is also very viable. The individual willing to give that individualized voice is a very integral part to all of us. It helps us make art in our own culture, distinct and different.
N. Because I've worked in the film industry a lot myself, I feel like the world views are really different between those two groups of people and that fine artists tend to be marginalized. But it sounds to me like you're having a broader view of the culture.
Yeah, that's because I don't work in that field. (laughs) So I have this idealistic thing that...They do marginalize what we do and they probably don't even consider what we do. But I think that they probably do [consider it] and are curious.
N. It does seem to me that you can do things as an artist that you can't do as a group of people.
Exactly. You watch those film credits at the end of any production, that's a lot of people to make choices. And the wonderful thing about artists ... I think everybody dreams about being able to do something without having to run it through those kinds of committees. And I know that what individuals do still matters. What one artist does can help change the consciousness of other people.
N. Even if that artist isn't famous?
I'm not Pollyanna about what this is about. 'This' being what the art business is about. But I do think it has a place. And I still see young individuals coming, growing up and wanting to be a part of it. However long they last or what they do with it is totally up to them. But there is this desire still, and I think that the desire is real. ... It effects style. It's not effected by style. It is effecting the way people communicate.
N. When I think of Bill Gates saying he can have a computer screen with the Mona Lisa on it, I think "So what?" It's not the same as the tactileness of paint.
But that's perfect for him because he's talking about power. So an artist isn't going to be talking about that kind of power. That kind of statement makes sense for him. It doesn't make sense for you or I. We're more interested in why she's smiling the way she's smiling. (laughs)
N. Or what they're hanging next to it.
Or the frame. (laughs) I think that stereotypically people say "Oh, look at that!" and we're usually the ones going "What?...What are we supposed to be looking at?" Not always. Some artists are real quick. But I've always considered myself sort of slow. I drive down the freeway, see those license plates that are sort of made into messages. I'll see one and I'll be trying to figure it out thirty miles down the highway. (laughs) I just don't get these things that quick. It's like we're supposed to be looking in this frame but we're checking out the color of the wall or the plug or the nice border or the painting next to it.
N. Do you think that you've trained yourself to become a lot more visually sensitive than the average person? Or do you think you're innately that way or do you think you're not that way at all?
No, I think that I've trained myself to be tolerant of this ...(laughs) ...I think that I've trained myself to say that this is okay and that you too can live in a world where everyone is going where they want to go as fast as they can ... accept myself for who I am.
M. Is that hard?
Well, I think ... No. Yes. Depends on who you ask. (laughs) For me, it was easy, just maybe a couple of friends might not agree with me.
N. Well, for instance, maybe when you say "What am I supposed to look at?" maybe it's because you're looking at a lot of things. When they say "Look at that!" you wouldn't know what 'that' was, in a sense, because you've already identified four or five things that you might begin to be looking at?
Sure. (laughs)
N. Is that a rationalization that says that artists feel really superior.
I don't think that we say that we're superior. I think other people do. People think that artists live this very quasi-glamorous life. And I think we allow them to play that game because ...What else is there to do? But you know, it's not very glamorous. It just means being sensitive. 'Being sensitive' is the best way to describe it.
N. Being sensitive to what?
All that we're talking about. That when someone looks at something they see multiple kinds of things or multiple layers or different things. What is an artist? What are these young people that I'm working with? They are young people like other young people, but they're sensitive to this desire to try to create something. They're sensitive to things around them. Sometimes they see. Sometimes they don't. Sometimes they miss the obvious too. It doesn't mean that just these people can do it. Other kids can do it. Other people can be a part of this. But there are not very many volunteers.
N. Why do you think that is?
The rewards are not as ... the rewards are unmeasurable. There's not a clear way to measure this kind of information. We're not providing ... there's not tangible kinds of things with the exchange of this kind of service, if you will. An artist is a complex individual and so are other people. No more and no less. But the areas that we work in are areas that can't be calibrated. It's hard to calibrate the success of something. Or the failure.
N. Speaking for myself I'd say that I can be interested in things for a long time that other people wouldn't be interested in, like mixing a color or something ... And you can't justify that type of interest, so people think it's a non interest ...
It can be clear headed or it can be foggy. It's the unmeasurable aspect of it that frustrates most people. But not artists. And we feel sometimes, rightfully or wrongfully, superior because we have this ability to stay with something like this, or to be sensitive to something, or to be interested in something that's unmeasurable. But I don't know if it really matters one way or the other.
N. Yeah, I don't know if it matters. I just think that it's interesting that the things that artists are interested in, how many other people are interested in those things? People tend to put more narrative meaning in work than a lot of artists would tend to want to put into it. Do you feel that? Like someone coming to look at it wants to know what that has to do with them. It doesn't have anything to do with them. They just happen to be in the same place with it.
I never know how to answer people who come to me and ask me what the work's about. It's about ... I don't know. I mean it's about a lot of things. But mainly it's about keeping this kind of expression alive in these times. It's attempting to be dynamic and exciting at times, or quiet and personal at other times. But it's designed to arrest the viewer and make them stop and look at something.
N. So it's more emotional? I mean you tend to...how do you conceptualize pieces? Do you preconceptualize them? Like cues or mood that you would want to go for?
Just a little bit. Whatever leads me. I don't really know. It's not like I sit down and calculate these things out. I don't. And sometimes I think that the whole activity is not very interesting.
N. It's not? Even to you?
Right. I don't like to make a big deal out of it. I like to see situations to have it, people that are interested in it. I was recently in another city doing a show, and after the show I sat down with some friends of this gallerist. And these people were involved in advertising and working with computers and doing all kinds of things. And I was talking about painting a little bit and they were asking me questions about art and one young man turned to me and said "You know, it's interesting to hear you talk about painting because I haven't thought about painting at all in years." And at first I thought, "Wow." I wasn't offended or anything. I thought that was a really legitimate statement.
I think art can be that way and I think that's fair right now. We're in a transition. I think that everything is going to change. I think that we're in a hopeful position on a lot of global issues, a lot of philosophical issues. I think we're heading in a very different direction from where we've been. The entertainment aspect is a big thing right now but that could become very small in the future and more quality interests could be involved, with more quality subjects. I don't know how to explain this but it's just a belief that I have that we're moving, growing. Instead of one finger becoming so small and falling off – we can accept that kind of Darwinism – but we should also be able to accept the same kind of Darwinism about our minds. So maybe it will take four or five of our lifetimes, but I don't think people are going to be doing the kinds of silly things they are doing now. At least I hope they don't.
N. I think there is an element of desire there. When you were saying that, I'm thinking, "Yeah, that's what I want too." I want there to be more depth and more intimacy. And I can accept a more compartmentalized existence as a result. I don't have to know about everything. I just want to know about some things with more depth. But what I'm asking is "Why do you think that society is going that way? Just because you want it to?"
I mean how many times did people bathe in the fifteenth century? ...Once every six months? Maybe once a day. I don't know. I guess the Romans did every ten minutes. Maybe these things don't matter. And maybe that's the folly of being an artist, is you speculate on stuff like this and you don't really know 'if' or 'what'. But that's the kind of folly I enjoy, this kind of folly, this kind of speculation, 'what if?' and 'what happens if?' And it doesn't make sense. And you can't calibrate it. It's not as calibratible as science or mathematics or farming. And so we are constantly clowning, but we're playing in areas, and playing with thoughts, and playing with ideas, and playing with paint, and playing with pencil, and playing with film, and playing with dance. And somebody has to do this.
N. Do you think that as an artist you are by default an intellectual, then?
No. I don't think that! (laughs)
N. I mean what you're describing is, I think, kind of intellectual ...Do you think that it's by default a branch of philosophy?
You've always been more supportive. (laughs). It's a branch of something – respectable. And that's why it's lasted. That's why it's important. And that's why it will be interesting. We make connections real quick, scurry over subjects, take ideas without the background, put them with other things, spill the applecart. We're accident prone in regards to intellectual dialogue. And whether we discover anything or not is not important, but others get inspired by our inquisitive nature, if you will. And I think that's why a painting still looks good today, that walking into a building to see an expression that's viable for these times can still be exciting, that museum shows still are important. And they can be intellectual, visceral, physical, visual. It's all very important. The ideas and stuff that artists are working with is evolving. It's just an evolving process.
N. Do you get involved with ideas of quality? Like this is a good play, this is a bad play. This is a good art piece, this is a bad art piece.
I think that you see things that you'd like to see. I think as artists, the older we get the more we want to see different things, more interesting things, more exciting things. And we recognize certain patterns and we've seen them before and they become not as interesting to us. And I think that's a legitimate criticism that we've earned. We've spent a lot of time doing things. We've watched a lot of things. And to go somewhere or do something and see something that is not so exciting, we should say something about it.