Justin Chance

Justin Chance, a writer and artist, reflects on his journey into the world of art, recalling how his childhood experiences with reading and coloring laid the foundation for his creative pursuits. While the decision to pursue art as a career goal was gradual, a pivotal moment occurred during high school after visiting a Takashi Murakami retrospective at the Brooklyn Museum, where he realized the boundless possibilities of artistic expression.

Despite facing challenges and a lack of vocal encouragement, particularly from art education systems, Justin's passion for both art and writing persisted. Throughout his artistic journey, he draws inspiration from his upbringing in Valley Stream, New York, a melting pot of cultures and identities, where he developed a keen awareness of societal dynamics and the concept of cultural osmosis.

Justin's artistic process is characterized by pragmatism and a keen understanding of logistics, stemming from his upbringing in a scholarship-driven environment. He navigates the complexities of the art world with a critical eye, seeking to create works that are both conceptually dense yet accessible. His artistic influences range from Felix Gonzales-Torres to Damien Hirst, offering a nuanced perspective on the intersection of art and commerce. As Justin's works find a home in exhibitions worldwide, including at Naranjo 141 art gallery in Mexico City, his latest exhibition, "Archive," explores themes of time and language.

Through a diverse range of mediums, from sculptures to paintings, Justin invites viewers to contemplate the fluidity of memory and the passage of time. His residency in Mexico City has further enriched his artistic practice, providing him with new perspectives and opportunities for growth. In "Archive," Justin Chance offers a thought-provoking exploration of the human experience, inviting audiences to engage with the complexities of time and memory in an ever-changing world.

Justin Chance, you define yourself as a writer and artist: when did you say to yourself "from today I'll make art"?

I don’t really remember there being like some sort of exact moment.  Like most children I was always encouraged to read and color so the two have always gone hand in hand, especially with picture books so for me if I have to think that hard about it, they’ve always been pretty indivisible. If the question is about when I decided to be an artist, like as a career goal, that’s kind of tricky. It's kind of a few things but when I was in highschool I went to the Brooklyn Museum gift shop after they had a Takashi Murakami retrospective and realized that artists could do whatever they wanted to as long as it’s labeled within the context of art, and that stuck.

I don’t know, I never really had any solid vocal encouragement to be an artist, if anything it was kind of the opposite. Me and art education have a long and sordid history. Even though I was really excited about them, I was never good in art classes and I failed art in the 7th grade and in high school I had an art teacher who didn’t respect me or take me seriously at all, but then a cadre of English teachers who actually did, so art and writing have always been intertwined. Everyone was saying yes writing, no art. My parents even….the fights about art school….

Even at Purchase, the school I went to before transferring to SAIC…I took a printmaking class (one of the only ones offered to students who weren’t in their Visual Arts program) and the all the other “VA” students ceremoniously ripped me (and my prints of Fela Kuti) apart, it was so embarrassing. The professor (who I google maybe twice a year) gave me a C and wanted me to act grateful for her not failing me. To her credit, she is a very good printmaker but her CV leaves more to be desired…

No one wanted me to be an artist but in the opposition’s defense, I was probably very bad technically and am a very slow learner. All I mostly had were ideas and titles, it’s actually kind of sad to think about.  Even when I did apply to art school, it was a Dual Program that was also attached to some sort of writing, critical studies degree, so it's always been the two of them linked.

You are American, you studied at the School of Art Institute of Chicago but from what I can see your art travels around the world. How do you think your background and origins have influenced the way you make art and perceive beauty?

This is almost an impossible question, but I’ll try…

I grew up in a town on Long Island that directly borders these two towns in Queens, that in hindsight was very obsessed with itself in ways that maybe all places in New York are. In its own way the town (Valley Stream) was very preoccupied with what it used to be and because the demographics started changing people started calling it “Valley Queens”, pejoratively.  The way I understand it, it used to be very white and blue color/working-class and then in the nineties and oughts, vertically mobile immigrants with day jobs left the city and bought houses (like my parents), and the neighborhood and schools started changing. When I was growing up everyone’s parents were mostly from somewhere else but it didn’t really feel unnatural or tense, it just felt normal, and then there were kids (white) whose parents had been there for generations. I think the “Valley Queens” things and sentiments like that were kind of in the background but couldn’t really be taken that seriously, at least before Trump.  No one was that rich and no one (thinking naively) was that poor. Everything just felt normal and very American. I went to a public school (which is one of the reasons my family moved from Brooklyn) and the school would have assemblies and like performances where puppeteers and theater tropes would show up…..my parents took us to museums and like ice shows, and zoos etc. We went to the library a lot.  My parents bought me a ton of art and DIY kits for christmases and birthdays, ….we didn’t vacation a lot so after my brothers and I boycotted going to summer camp (the kids were mean and I was sensitive), we watched a lot of TV, especially cartoons, day in day out.

Maybe it's an osmosis thing? Maybe it’s an audacity thing? I didn’t grow up feeling (emphasis on feeling) less than middle class and I didn’t grow up thinking I was dumb or incapable (this came later with Math)...I didn’t grow up being the only Black person in advanced classes, and I didn’t grow up the only one with parents with accents.  I didn’t grow up thinking about New York as a place that will solve all my problems and I didn’t grow up thinking that there was limitless time, resources and opportunities for me to be whimsical. So I feel pretty comfortable decentering myself and zooming out.  I was very bad in math and most science lab work stuff but also very good in the humanities so sometimes I felt genius and other times very, very humbled… it all balanced out.  I am one of six and was raised with my older and younger brother so I think there is also something about developing an awareness that attention is not really a currency and it’s not really personal, people are busy.  Anytime I feel like there is an art work or text obsessed with itself, or something that assumes its own importance, I am out.

My parents aren’t art people and they also aren’t book people, my parents were just parent people and I think that really informs how I think about art and writing and cultural studies. I think that is the core actually.  I’m rambling at this point but for better or worse I grew up in a scholarship/application economy and I think the trickle down of that ethos was: no one is going to give you the chance to do anything if you are not exceptional or convincing. If you keep faking it eventually, you’ll make it or make something. And in its own way I think that all of this has influenced the way I make art and perceive beauty. I like ideas that are dense and also very simple, things that provide a lot of different ways to engage. It’s a contradictory thing: on the one hand, I love ideas and colors and playing around with forms, etc. etc., but on the other hand: poetry (and theory) makes me very impatient, chop, chop.

It's interesting how you experiment with different artistic techniques while maintaining a strong identity expression: would you like to tell us how you have developed your personal aesthetic sense over the years and if you have any reference in particular that follows you along your artistic journey?

When I have an idea, I think about it from a few different angles. The titles often come first and then almost immediately after I think about the viewer/reader encountering it, online or in person.  I also like to think what sense it would make with the other work I’ve made in the past or would like to make in the future. What is the thing and also, what is the cliff notes version of the thing? What’s the pitch? How much would it cost to make it? How much time? Where could I show it? Could it possibly sell, would it matter if it doesn’t?

When it comes down to it, most of it probably comes from not coming from money or art and having to be very pragmatic. Not just with materials and cost but also with language and other people’s time. I like to know how things (especially institutions) work.  People, including myself, have finite amounts of attention and resources, so how can you use it? Also, in an art world where you can get to a point where eventually everything could be made, does that mean it should? I like to think about the lifespan of a project and the logistics of storing and shipping…. When I make this, where will it go? How would it get installed without me? I am very bad at hands-on tasks like measuring and cutting straight lines so I also have kind of built that into the work. Also, ideas change. So, it’s like what is the acceptable margin (on all fronts) of error?

Maybe above all, I really like to think of portability, formally and conceptually. What is the take away? What am I okay with an exhibition or text being reduced to?  Where else could it go?

In terms of references, there are certain artists that I look towards: Felix Gonzales-Torres and Damien Hirst, but as two different almost cautionary tales. On the one hand you have Damien, who overproduced and has almost made a conceptual caricature of himself, even though a lot of that work at its core (especially in the nineties and ought’s) is really genius and on the other is Felix…who, tone wise I respect, but sometimes, could be so needy (which I know, is part of the point) and requires so much explaining and context and institutional support and rules that it almost negates what attracts me to art in the first place, immediacy.

I don’t really invest that much into “lineage” but since the art world can be so murky it’s really helpful to look at other artists and gallery programs to get an idea of precedence. What exactly are the rules here?  What have other people gotten away with? What exactly would people buy? What happens to work like that after the show? Things like that.

You say you want to go beyond the limits of language through your art. What is the limit you have had to overcome as an artist?

Hmmm ....not to make everything about money but…..money and also time and also people’s expectations ... .and complacency. I’m not going to get into the whole identity thing but…

I think there is something there that sometimes still feels very frustrating. People may be getting dumber or maybe dumb people are getting more vocal?  There is also something there about artists being rewarded for being a brand and this fear of saying or making the wrong thing and this asinine pressure (put on by people who aren’t actually artists outside of Twitter or an Instagram Bio) to be an expert on everything.

Another limit is having to understand that online isn’t real life. Likes and followers don’t equal sales and like…art historical relevance or anything. Sales equal sales.  I think that’s the limit as an artist, all of this extra homework to deal with, particularly about “perception”. It’s all fake math based on algorithms that allow for particular situations of digital engagement, it’s not an actual report on value.  I am pretty good at  zooming out but even for me these were very tricky thoughts to navigate, especially when I was younger.  Is there a good artist who is “also good at TikTok”, I’m sure that’s possible but I feel so dismissive of that thing it feels almost like a paradox? Also, I am almost immediately suspicious of this whole “radical vulnerability, tell all, the personal is political thing..” some things are better told to a friend in real life. Log off.

I think we may be at a point of rewarding (professionally and academically) bad intellectual habits, lazy thinking and kind of outright narcissism.  I could say more but…it’s kind of…I think….people have forgotten that it is okay to shut up and listen and be unsure. Not everything is about you and not every single thing going on in the world requires your own personal spin. Sometimes there feels like this cultural gravity pulling you in, requiring that you to respond and join in, but I think the challenge of the artist, especially now, is to be really aware of where those forces are coming from and what the actual stakes are.

In terms of more direct limits, like on the day to day, right now I feel more limits as a writer than an artist. The gallery system I mostly understand, museums, auction houses, etc. The publishing world is a whole other deal. I want to be a writer-writer, like Helen Dewitt The Last Samurai era. I don’t want to be an influencer writer. I don’t want to have to write long-winded think pieces on the cultural significance of Cowboy Carter or crochet in menswear, just to finally get an email to produce a collection of short stories. I don’t want to apply to another literary magazine I would never read. I don’t want to have to be hot or professionally witty on Twitter either, or God forbid host a podcast.

Your works are currently on display at NARANJO 141 art gallery in Mexico City, MX. Could you tell us the plot of your exhibition?

The exhibition is called Archive and when it really comes down to it is mostly an exhibition exploring time, and of course, language. The word archive has this connotation of being dry and administrative but in reality, archives are often where all the action is.  I wanted to explore that kind of discrepancy and tension. This idea that time is one of those big weighty truths and is both very general and extremely sensational, personal and simultaneously extremely generic (which I like to think is an overarching interest throughout my work). Time is quantitative and experiential and is one of the universal contexts, for example: 1995 genuinely means very little to me personally but for someone else that could’ve been a massive life changing year; births, deaths, weddings, etc.

The exhibition is comprised of a few bodies of work, some that were planned before I got down to Mexico for the residency and others that came up as a response to the space. At the core of the exhibition are a group of sculptures called Exes. They’re pinatas of years between 1993 (the year I was born) and 2023 that were fabricated in Mexico City and painted an office, clerical gray. We then had a party where guests were blindfolded and invited to attack the pinatas. The pinatas were then brought back to the studio and mended with book conservation materials and then eventually sent off to another studio to be fiberglassed and professionally sealed. In Archive they’re exhibited alongside photographs from the pinata smashing event.

Another body of work in the exhibition is a series of checkerboard paintings each titled Year. Each painting is 12 by 12 inches and features 12 squares, corresponding to the months in a calendar and numbers on a clock. Even though they look similar and consist of the same format, like in life, each year has its own differences and nuances. There are two quilts both titled Guest, that are mostly cloudscapes with fragmented timestamps. Moments are guests and so are memories and I liked the idea of thinking about them as clouds passing.

One work in the show that I think I’m the proudest of is a framed embroidery on silk of DNA strains that shares the title of the show. I’d been working on it for a while even before I had the idea of the piñatas and decided to put it in as a way to double down on unique/banal qualities of time. On the one hand: DNA is personal and affects every living thing so much but on the other hand it is a system of information and a record in itself. Therein adding a more biological implication to the show that hopefully echoes some of the marks on the smashed piñatas.

How has the residency at Naranjo art gallery in Mexico City influenced your artistic practice and the themes explored in your current exhibition?

There is a body of work that came directly in response to my time in residence. It’s an installation called Dating that’s made of nineteen colored pencil drawings mounted on canvas. Each drawing was outlined and then throughout the course of my time during the residency colored in and dated, an inch a day. Gradually the image becomes full and exists as an archive of itself. The drawings were usually colored in at the beginning of each day in the studio, as a bit of a warm up.

Since the other ideas of the show were pretty set in the beginning, these works gave me an opportunity to respond in real time to some of the challenges and ideas I was having being in Mexico City as I was there. Also, they’re installed in the gallery’s side room so I think it helps give them their own space to breathe.

I think if anything Archive feels like a really exciting shift….I feel like it’s maybe my less manic show and that I’m starting to get the hang of condensing multiple different ideas and bodies of work into a format that could possibly be more digestible? It was also my first time working with a fabricator and having a body of work that required so much participation.  Now that some time has passed, I think the residency was really helpful in putting me in like studio survivalist mode. Forcing me to really think and work outside of the way I usually do at home.

JUSTIN CHANCE

@_justin_chance