Studio Visit - Gabrielle Teschner
Studio Visit - Gabrielle Teschner
Studio Visit with Gabrielle Teschner
Welcome to the studio of Gabrielle Teschner. Employing architectural components into her carefully crafted works, Teschner questions and explores the edifice of accumulated knowledge, incorporating architectural icons that become themes for an examination of structural authority in both building construction and rigid ideologies.
Q.
Tell us about this body of work launching on Tappan?
A.
These pieces are made of cotton muslin and many depict stones. A lot of them are traveling works, and have crossed as many borders as I have in the past few years. I carried them everywhere. I was thinking about essential building blocks--elements of architecture that a whole structure would depend on. A keystone, or a column. Something that supports weight. We rely on the fact that these foundations exist in order to dwell. Some of them I made after I spent time in Berlin, and I was thinking about the remnants of the wall underfoot. Those stones had been significant dividers, but were scaled down to paving stones.
Q.
When do you make your best work?
A.
Before a good meal.
Q.
Regarding your method of making, is it a case of the material or method dictating the idea of the other way around?
A.
I start with an idea, but it works the other way too. Fabric talks about flexibility, portability, and information-loss in a way that more rigid sculptural materials don't. I sew this work. So much of the composition ends up behind the work, folded into the seams. With wood, it gets sanded off, it ends up on the floor, you never think about it again.
Q.
Artist whose career you covet?
A.
If I'm going to break a commandment and a noble truth, can I go big? Picasso. I wanted to be him when I was five. I thought I could pick up where he left off.
Q.
What are you most proud of?
A.
My reflexes.
Q.
What do you see yourself doing in 5 years?
A.
Tending a prolific orchard.
Q.
If you could travel anywhere to create for a while, where would you go?
A.
I just traveled to Siracusa Ortigia in Sicily and I would go back there. It's a bright island with washed, white stone an hour from a dark city built of black lava stone. The columns of an old Greek Temple were used to build the newer cathedral that stands there today, which was built on top of an even older foundation, and you can see all the layers, all the stages of degradation in the stone, from the outside. I would like to take some more time thinking about that.
Gabrielle Teschner says
"Fabric talks about flexibility, portability, and information-loss in a way that more rigid sculptural materials don't. I sew this work. So much of the composition ends up behind the work, folded into the seams."
Q.
What are your other hobbies?
A.
Spending time on the water, running stairs, looking up the uses of plants, going to the movies, talking with people who don't speak English
Q.
If you could have a drink with one artist, who would it be?
A.
Richard Serra
Q.
What influences you?
A.
Architects. Hindu Time. The history of math. Couture. Koans.
Q.
What motivates you?
A.
My big family on the East Coast, and the morning
Q.
How many hours do you try and work in the studio per week?
A.
I try and create part of something every day. That could take me five minutes, or 5 hours, and not always in a studio. I spent half this year without one. There's a great picture of Rothko sitting back and staring at one of his pieces. I think that's one of the best uses of studio time. You're the first person to see this thing, ever.
Q.
Silence or sound while creating? If sound, what?
A.
I'm in Key West at the moment, and I was told a tropical storm comes through tomorrow. I would love to be working in a good thunderstorm with the window open. That's the right amount of drama. That or hip-hop, or Lionel Hampton.
Q.
Artist whose career you both covet?
A.
We do not covet other careers. We hope that our career will grow. Offering us the privilege of continuing to do what we love and to have the freedom to make our choices.
Q.
Tools or mediums you’re dying to experiment with?
A.
Animation
Q.
What’s the first thing you do when you begin formulating an idea for a piece?
A.
Go for a walk. I do my best thinking when I'm moving or watching things move. I've been making a lot of small paper works on ferry-rides and flights. The scene is changing out of the window, and there's nothing to get done but this.
Q.
What work took you the longest to complete?
A.
The Path, it was 14 feet wide and 8 feet tall. It took about 5 weeks but I used every hour I had. I couldn't wait to see what it would become. I used my full armspan, my full height, to put it together.
Q.
Best gift you’ve ever received?
A.
A painting of a scarlet-sailed shipwreck by Ryan Pierce.
Q.
Describe your work in 3 words.
A.
In the beginning.
Q.
What's one thing you still have from your childhood?
A.
A fat little bronze Buddha that my Dad got in India. It's an inch tall and it's far heavier than it should be, like a piece of black matter. It used to sit in my windowsill.
Q.
Do you have a favorite quote, or a phrase you think about often?
A.
"Five colors blind the eye, from the Tao te Ching." It points to how the finite divisions we create between things make it harder for us to sense the infinite.
Q.
What country do you wish to visit?
A.
Iran
Q.
What makes you nervous?
A.
Over-population.
Q.
What makes you laugh no matter what?
A.
Slapstick kills me. And that scene in the Big Lebowski when Walter throws the ashes over a cliff and they fly into The Dude's face. There's something about halted motion...
