Jackie Meier

Where are you from and where do you reside?

I am from Andover, MA and I reside in Mamaroneck, NY.

What necessities do you require when making your art?

My necessities are coffee, my materials, and to be alone.

What is the most difficult part of the artistic process for you?

I think staying focused and sticking with the slow process of day to day painting. I have come to realize that I need to turn my phone off and really concentrate on doing the work without taking little breaks to check email or the news or social media.

Describe a typical day in the studio for you.

Before the shelter in place and the move of my studio to my home, I would take the train to the ferry to the studio in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. The process of getting there was important to transition from homefrom mother, suburbs to artist, city. Once in my studio I make coffee, sit, and write about the paintings in progress or what I am feeling or going through, I get things out so I can get settled and get ready to work. I usually end up giving myself a pep talk and making a list of things I want to accomplish that day, stretching canvas, drawing, painting, or reading.

What are some themes you find recurring in your pieces, intentional or not?

I am constantly drawn to where the pattern goes off, or where a small corner doesn’t quite match up, I think it is a result of how hard we try to get it just so, but we are human and imperfections are the beauty of life. If it was perfect or machine-made it would feel dead or too sterile for life.

What are you most interested in representing through your works?

I am most interested in expressing an energy of spiritual/emotional type. I think art has the ability to transcend or highlight the everyday. I feel this current shelter in place is something that all of us needed, to reassess our lives, goals, and priorities. I am finding by being unable to meet with others how much I miss and love them. The sense of time has warped, and days are so fast perhaps because I am slowing down to watch things grow and spring arrive. I am not sure how long this will go on so I am focusing on one day at a time and staying present and positive. I am appreciative of all the small wonderful things this world has in store for us. I am actively trying to go with the flow of life right now.

Why do you make paintings?

I make paintings because it is who I am. If I don’t paint for a while, I start to feel agitated and anxious. I make paintings to feel whole. I love color and shapes, how they are mysterious and beautiful, how often the things that work don’t make sense. I am trying to make paintings that haven’t been made before showing my own particular way of seeing and being in the world. I feel alive and free when I am painting.

Are there any aspects of your process that are left to chance?

While my work might look very structured and planned the whole color selection process is very much based on intuition and often chance. When I am stuck to choose colors I close my eyes and reach into my box of tubes of paint and choose a few. This is sometimes the whole color scheme. I also use chance in not entirely washing my brushes between paint applications, I let the residue color the new color. Spontaneity is extremely important. I choose color based on my gut. I choose where to put them based on what the shape calls out for. When I draw and try to come up with new compositions it's often the drawings that break the pattern or where I lose track of my place that become the best paintings.

How do you choose your materials?

I am a traditional oil painter. I choose them because they are luscious, luminous and create the best color I can make. I have tried acrylic, egg tempera, I use watercolor and gouache on paper. I always come back to the feeling or working with and look of oil paint on canvas. I recently made my own oil paint and found the color to be even richer than commercially-made paint.

How does your choice of color inform the final piece?

I try to have a certain light in each painting. This comes from a color scheme or certain choices. I try to keep the color surprising and unusual. It happens by the choices of pigment and the layering of the colors.

Where do you find your day-to-day inspiration?

Everywhere. I am so visual, I tend to notice everything and keep my eyes open to color, nature, looking at great paintings in books, the way other people see things, or approach painting keeps me active. I am visually, emotionally, and thoughtfully curious.

Do you find that your location strongly influences the direction of your work?

I am unsure how location affects my work. I do know I was making good work in the residency I was just in in Virginia. The studio was large and had windows on three sides. There was a slider to access the outdoors. It was also out in the country, I felt peaceful and at home. Now I am in my family home basement, small, half windows, lots of concrete, but I am happy. I feel comfortable and working, though a bit cramped, I love the pace of slowness and ability to just get to work by walking to my paintings. I am realizing it is more about where I am in my internal world that dictates what affects my painting.

How has your work developed in the past few years, and how do you see it evolving in the future?

My work is continually evolving. In the last few years I have been painting with less worry about getting each section of paint perfectly smooth. I have never used tape, and now I question even the use of a ruler as a tool. I want the paintings to be entirely of my hand. I would have never guessed this is where I would be a few years ago.

Is there something people would be surprised to learn about you?

I think people might be surprised to learn that I have two children, I live in the suburbs and came late to painting. I am surprised that I actually can say I had a dream, it took a while to follow it, but I did it!

Are you formally trained?

Yes, I took all my electives as painting classes in undergrad at Boston College while I earned a degree in Economics. I started to get serious with art by taking more classes at the California College of the Arts in San Francisco. I moved to New York and got my MFA from Pratt Institute in Brooklyn. Some of my favorite teachers were Roy Tomlinson, Mary Snowden, Linda Francis, and Kit White. I did not have a mentor but was on the lookout for women artists who had families and a strong art career.

Do you admire or draw inspiration from any of your peers who are also working now?

I do draw inspiration from so much of the art I see out in the world today. I am constantly looking for moves, or ideas that others are playing with to see how I can incorporate into my work. My own work is quite solitary. I have tried to collaborate but found it very difficult, I would love to try that again. There is something magical about two or more people who can let go of their own egos and work together on one piece.

What’s one of your favorite objects you own?

I own a ceramic sculpture by an older artist that I saw in her studio and I had to have it. It looks like a snail, but also an S, it's blue and iridescent. I fell in love with the oddness of it.

What’s next for you?

Teaching art online! I am going to offer classes and project ideas to whoever wants something to make or do.