WEBVTT 00:00:01.100 --> 00:00:02.940 [Ridgewood--Queens] 00:00:07.040 --> 00:00:08.720 ["New York Close Up"] 00:00:11.680 --> 00:00:14.880 ["Jamian Juliano-Villani Gets to Work"] 00:00:17.160 --> 00:00:18.600 It's a very simple routine: 00:00:18.600 --> 00:00:19.580 I come in, 00:00:19.920 --> 00:00:21.100 reheat my coffee, 00:00:21.109 --> 00:00:23.369 go on the computer, look at stuff, 00:00:23.369 --> 00:00:24.580 clean my brushes, 00:00:26.080 --> 00:00:28.000 and then I get to work. 00:00:35.880 --> 00:00:40.320 I've not had time off since I started, which is crazy. 00:00:50.320 --> 00:00:53.180 Once you have a deadline it's like impending doom. 00:00:53.180 --> 00:00:54.300 It's like a pimp! 00:00:54.690 --> 00:00:56.960 Constantly, like you owe someone something. 00:00:56.960 --> 00:00:59.180 Stress assassinates creativity. 00:01:04.640 --> 00:01:07.740 If you make a bad painting in your job as an artist, 00:01:07.750 --> 00:01:09.500 it's like the worst. 00:01:09.500 --> 00:01:10.500 It's mortifying. 00:01:10.500 --> 00:01:13.560 It's like having chocolate all over your face or something-- 00:01:13.560 --> 00:01:15.740 and you're going to some gala. 00:01:17.340 --> 00:01:19.580 You're only as good as your last painting-- 00:01:20.200 --> 00:01:21.200 which sucks-- 00:01:21.660 --> 00:01:23.800 but, you know, it's kind of the truth. 00:01:32.320 --> 00:01:34.320 I was growing up in the middle of nowhere, New Jersey, 00:01:34.320 --> 00:01:38.120 and I just wanted to get out of New Jersey and get to New York immediately. 00:01:40.140 --> 00:01:44.540 New York is where it seemed like all the artists went to be artists. 00:01:44.549 --> 00:01:45.549 ["Painters Painting"] 00:01:45.549 --> 00:01:47.090 I was watching "Painters Painting"-- 00:01:47.090 --> 00:01:49.649 Stella and Rauschenberg and blah blah blah, 00:01:49.649 --> 00:01:51.329 and they're all in New York, you know-- 00:01:51.329 --> 00:01:53.020 sitting on ladders, covered in paint. 00:01:53.020 --> 00:01:55.340 For me, as a teenager, it was amazing. 00:01:55.860 --> 00:01:56.780 "That's..." 00:01:57.360 --> 00:01:58.720 "That's it!" You know? 00:01:59.140 --> 00:02:00.460 Now, I romanticize it less 00:02:00.460 --> 00:02:05.250 because coming to New York and starting to be in the art world thing-- 00:02:05.250 --> 00:02:06.240 it's insane! 00:02:07.200 --> 00:02:10.259 I've had a million shitty jobs. 00:02:10.259 --> 00:02:12.020 Overnight shift diner waitress. 00:02:12.020 --> 00:02:13.380 I worked at a group home. 00:02:13.380 --> 00:02:14.580 Taught gymnastics. 00:02:14.580 --> 00:02:15.810 Kindergarten teacher. 00:02:15.810 --> 00:02:20.900 I organized books for a marine who was obsessed with ships. 00:02:21.660 --> 00:02:24.790 I was commuting back and forth from working at a restaurant in New Jersey 00:02:24.790 --> 00:02:27.200 so I could get my first apartment in New York. 00:02:27.690 --> 00:02:29.440 I was basically painting on top of my bed, 00:02:29.450 --> 00:02:31.460 staying up every other night to paint. 00:02:31.460 --> 00:02:33.660 Slowly, I got a slightly bigger room-- 00:02:34.100 --> 00:02:35.520 and then I got a slightly bigger room. 00:02:36.860 --> 00:02:39.630 Three years ago, I actually got my first real studio ever. 00:02:39.630 --> 00:02:42.000 That was like Christmas, every day. 00:02:48.000 --> 00:02:48.760 --Terrible. 00:02:54.340 --> 00:02:55.640 The paintings, I think, are... 00:02:56.180 --> 00:02:57.060 They're tricky. 00:02:59.600 --> 00:03:02.300 You need to make them better, make them weirder, 00:03:02.300 --> 00:03:04.240 make them smarter, make them dumber. 00:03:12.160 --> 00:03:15.280 You just paint a snowman in the desert... 00:03:16.380 --> 00:03:17.740 That's it? Really? 00:03:17.740 --> 00:03:19.380 Like, there's no other step, you know? 00:03:19.380 --> 00:03:21.020 It's like some stupid one-liner? 00:03:23.000 --> 00:03:26.900 I have a sense of humor and a really light way to approach something. 00:03:26.900 --> 00:03:28.030 Just come up with a joke, 00:03:28.030 --> 00:03:30.480 and then from there, how can you offset that 00:03:30.480 --> 00:03:32.380 so it's like psychological or personal? 00:03:33.020 --> 00:03:35.700 It's like ping pong, back and forth, back and forth, 00:03:35.710 --> 00:03:38.630 until it's just all these things going like this, 00:03:38.630 --> 00:03:39.880 negating itself. 00:03:41.280 --> 00:03:43.560 A lot of weird decisions just happen here by myself 00:03:43.560 --> 00:03:44.901 in the middle of the night. 00:03:44.901 --> 00:03:47.120 But also a lot of it is talking to other people. 00:03:47.700 --> 00:03:50.060 If you have all these different voices coming in, 00:03:50.060 --> 00:03:52.720 it's less of a one-person lecture. 00:03:54.100 --> 00:03:56.520 [Ajay Kurian, Artist] 00:03:58.760 --> 00:04:00.880 Across the hall is Ajay, 00:04:03.120 --> 00:04:04.440 who is an amazing artist. 00:04:04.440 --> 00:04:08.200 Man, he saved my ass so many times with so many shows. 00:04:08.580 --> 00:04:10.780 "Uh, can you give me a minute and we could like, um..." 00:04:10.780 --> 00:04:12.800 "You could just give me moral support please? Thanks." 00:04:12.800 --> 00:04:18.340 --I'm thinking like a very very, super light, pale teal kind of colors. 00:04:18.340 --> 00:04:20.600 --Blue, or very very pale purple. 00:04:21.580 --> 00:04:23.020 --Purple is probably better? 00:04:24.600 --> 00:04:25.660 --Like cool purple. 00:04:25.660 --> 00:04:26.720 [KURIAN] --Like lavender, or? 00:04:26.800 --> 00:04:27.960 [JULIANO-VILLANI] --Cool ass purple. 00:04:28.940 --> 00:04:29.720 [KURIAN] --I could see that. 00:04:29.780 --> 00:04:30.360 [JULIANO-VILLANI] --Right. 00:04:31.620 --> 00:04:32.620 --Or like a... 00:04:32.620 --> 00:04:34.100 [KURIAN] --Is that a vase or a mirror? 00:04:34.100 --> 00:04:35.830 [JULIANO-VILLANI] --Who the fuck knows? 00:04:35.830 --> 00:04:37.180 --It will be a mirror. 00:04:37.180 --> 00:04:37.940 [KURIAN] --Okay. 00:04:37.940 --> 00:04:38.720 [JULIANO-VILLANI] --Hmm... 00:04:42.020 --> 00:04:42.760 --Fuck. 00:04:44.520 --> 00:04:45.920 One of my friends was telling me, 00:04:45.920 --> 00:04:47.840 "Just put some crap in there, no one can tell." 00:04:47.840 --> 00:04:49.120 I was like, "Thanks, jerk!" 00:04:49.120 --> 00:04:50.120 [Inhales sharply] 00:04:50.840 --> 00:04:53.360 But I can definitely tell. 00:04:53.360 --> 00:04:55.220 Because these are supposed to be confident. 00:05:01.280 --> 00:05:02.310 I just turned 30. 00:05:03.080 --> 00:05:05.693 I mean, I chainsmoke-- like, you know, a pack and a half a day. 00:05:05.700 --> 00:05:06.920 I drink a lot. 00:05:07.350 --> 00:05:09.000 My sleeping habits are terrible. 00:05:09.010 --> 00:05:10.290 I eat garbage. 00:05:10.290 --> 00:05:12.540 This is just a vessel, you know what I mean? 00:05:16.080 --> 00:05:18.900 Past couple of years, I had so much stamina 00:05:18.900 --> 00:05:20.700 and just kept on working and pumping. 00:05:20.700 --> 00:05:22.160 And now, it's like, when it actually matters, 00:05:22.160 --> 00:05:23.800 I got to make sure I still have it. 00:05:23.800 --> 00:05:27.030 I think the main pressure is maintaining integrity 00:05:27.030 --> 00:05:28.930 and making work that you feel good about-- 00:05:28.930 --> 00:05:31.440 even under pressure, which is really difficult. 00:05:33.040 --> 00:05:34.580 I really want to push the paintings-- 00:05:34.580 --> 00:05:38.320 and I don't know how yet, but hopefully I'll figure it out 00:05:38.320 --> 00:05:40.780 and make them something that they aren't yet. 00:05:43.220 --> 00:05:44.640 I know I'm going to make some, like, 00:05:44.650 --> 00:05:46.760 embarrassing, bad sculptures or videos or something. 00:05:46.760 --> 00:05:48.260 But, like, fuck it, I got to do it, 00:05:48.260 --> 00:05:49.380 now is the time-- 00:05:50.260 --> 00:05:51.760 while I have the energy.