RAW: Sacramento “Unearthed”
Coldie — first interview (2011)
Coldie's first interview, at the RAW Sacramento "Unearthed" showcase in April 2011: Coachella 3D photography, his anaglyph Music Apocalypse series on canvas, and why imperfection makes the art better.
Chapters
In his words
“My biggest goal with art is to get out of my own head a little bit and kind of let the art speak for itself.”
“Being crisp and clean is not the goal.”
“It's kind of painting a vision of something that might happen.”
Full transcript
Lightly edited from the video’s captions for readability. A dash (—) marks a word the captions muted; [inaudible] marks a word they couldn’t make out.
0:00 COLDIE: I started creating art about 5 years ago. I started with 3D photography. I was shooting the Coachella Music Festival, and after shooting that for a couple years, I kind of stepped out and started doing fine art, which led to these works on canvas. And it’s all 3D.
0:24 The inspiration for the art comes from a mix of love for music and apocalyptic landscapes, where UFOs take over, and they’re really upset about how digital music has taken over, so they’re back to take vengeance. My biggest goal with art is to get out of my own head a little bit and kind of let the art speak for itself.
0:47 And for a lot of these pieces, I learned that the imperfection of the art really makes it better than how I started it. So a lot of these have tears and rips and imperfections that I didn’t think about when I was making the art, but as the process went along, I learned to kind of use those to my advantage, and it kind of shows throughout. So, you know, being crisp and clean is not the goal.
1:12 My art means to me kind of the future, things that are untold. Dreaming up any type of reality that could come true or could not come true, because nothing’s happened yet. So it’s kind of painting a vision of something that might happen.
1:12 I’d like to start working with bands, music industry people who are kind of going for more surreal, cutting-edge, different artwork, things that are using the new technology like 3D, and kind of going a little bit more grungy than people are used to.
1:35 Tonight at the RAW showcase, I’m presenting a collection of my first series, called the Music Apocalypse. And it’s a collection of surreal scenes that mix music and art and urban landscapes together, as well as some of my photography from Coachella. And it’s all taken up in the front row with the biggest bands around, and kind of sharing that with people so that they can see what it’s like to be in front of the big stage.
2:20 I really like RAW because they give me a blank canvas. I can do whatever I want, and they just kind of set the level at a stage where I can meet people and have a good time and share what I have. My name is [inaudible], and I’m a RAW artist.