#will hutnick

[ladyburde]

WILL HUTNICK , If I Could Just Be Honest acrylic, mica and screen print on paper 30 x 22"

[ladyburde]

WILL HUTNICK,  YOU’RE A GHOST, 2015, acrylic, paint marker, paper, spray paint, tape and Tyvek, at The Java Project, Brooklyn, NY

[lizpurr]

Will Hutnick, Nome King, 2013

[volumequestions]

Will Hutnick

Volume:  Where do you live / where do you work?

Will Hutnick:  I currently live in Wassaic, NY, in Dutchess County, about two hours north of NYC.  I’m working as the Residency Director at The Wassaic Project, an arts non-profit organization that exists to provide a genuine and intimate context for art making and strengthening local community by increasing social and cultural capital through inspiration, promotion and creation of contemporary visual and performing art.  We have year-round programming including a huge summer exhibition, as well as 10 artists in residence per month.

Can you give a quick description of your work space?

My studio is located in an old livestock barn in Wassaic, so I have a relatively large and funky space where I can spread out and work on (and see) multiple projects at once.  The space is really raw and open, and is surrounded by the Wassaic Project’s artists in residence’s summer studios, so there’s a communal “grad school we’re all in this together” vibe happening, which is really inspiring.  I usually have all of my materials laid out (on the floor and scattered around tables) at all times, that way I can move quickly between works and materials and get out of my head a little bit.  So it’s definitely a little chaotic and disheveled, but I’m organized in my own way. A friend came into my studio the other day and said that my desk looked like I was a “maniac”, which was nice and weird.

What's your day to day studio schedule like?

I devote Mondays to my studio practice and really try to shut out emails and social media that day.  My work schedule with The Wassaic Project is flexible, so I’m also able to get into the studio some afternoons and evenings during the week as well, and because I tend to work rather quickly, even an hour in the studio can be very productive.  I gravitate towards laying down a lot of information on several works at a time, and then at some point carve out those areas to edit down the information and see what is really needed, what the work is trying to say/be.  It’s a constant dialogue between the work - I really value that exchange.  I love going back into works from a few years ago and “collaborate” with my past self - most of the time, if not always, I see that the things I was thinking about then are still very much relevant.

Whose work have you been looking at lately?

I’ve been looking at/thinking about lately: Devin Balara, Leslie Baum, Mark Joshua Epstein, Joanne Greenbaum, Angela Heisch, Shara Hughes, Meg Lipke, Kelly McCafferty and Ben Pederson, just to name a few.

What was the last show you saw in person that impacted your work?

I was blown away by the Stuart Davis retrospective at the Whitney a few months back, In Full Swing.  Davis has always been an influence on me, but I hadn’t seen his work in person in a while, so it was great to see so many different works across so many years.  His interest in repetition and time and how that manifests itself in the work is remarkable; I was obsessed with some of his earlier more-representational-like images/still-life compositions as well.  Also, Caroline Larsen’s show Kabloom! at The Hole this summer was really great: her surfaces are so seductive and mesmerizing, how they are constructed and physically interwoven.  Her color is everything too.

What influences your practice outside of the studio?

Outside of the studio, I read a lot of novels.  I think a lot about time travel and interconnecting narratives and interstitial and inter-dimensional spaces, and I think a lot of those queries are further manifested through novels by David Mitchell, Murakami, Jennifer Egan, Ishiguro, etc.  Jenny Offill’s “Dept. of Speculation” was the last book that I read that really got under my skin and is something that I think about constantly.  It’s such a beautiful and heart-breaking work.  I also play the cello, something that I’ve done since I was a kid, so music is a huge influence on my work and practice.  I recently participated in the pit orchestra for a local production of “Dogfight”, which I’ve had stuck in my head for the past month or two.

Any upcoming projects or residencies in the near future?

I have a few upcoming group exhibitions, including at Automat in Philly (an Ortega y Gasset Projects exchange), Trestle Contemporary Art Gallery in Brooklyn (Trestle Gallery’s new space) and Tiger Strikes Asteroid in Brooklyn (for their 2017 Flat File Program).  I also applied to this year’s SPRING/BREAK Art Show, so fingers crossed that that plays out.

Volume:

Big thanks to Will for taking the time to talk with us.  You can see more of will’s work and learn more about upcoming projects / exhibitions at his website:  www.willhutnick.com

[willhutnick]

Will Hutnick, Don’t Know / Can’t Know Where the Sun Beams End, 2016

acrylic, paint marker and spray paint on panel

80 x 83 inches

[willhutnick]

Adam Ekberg, Transferring a gallon of milk from one container to another, 2014, archival pigment print, 50 x 40 inches, Courtesy of the artist and ClampArt, New York City

on view in PASS / FAIL, curated by Will Hutnick, at Ortega y Gasset Projects in Brooklyn, opening Friday, April 15, 6 - 10pm

http://oygprojects.com/pass-fail/

[willhutnick]

Will Hutnick, But We’re Getting Off The Subject, 2016, acrylic, paint marker and spray paint on canvas, 30 x 30″

[willhutnick]

Will Hutnick

Cracks In The Ceiling, 2016

acrylic, paint marker and spray paint on canvas

40 x 30″