1 00:00:04,220 --> 00:00:06,620 [SUBWAY TRACKS RUMBLING OVERHEAD] 2 00:00:08,420 --> 00:00:09,680 ["New York Close Up"] 3 00:00:14,080 --> 00:00:15,340 There’s some expression: 4 00:00:15,920 --> 00:00:18,600 "Your best ideas come to you in the shower," 5 00:00:19,160 --> 00:00:22,340 "in transit, and as you're about to go to sleep." 6 00:00:23,960 --> 00:00:28,980 I haven’t stopped thinking about what the next painting is. 7 00:00:32,580 --> 00:00:35,540 I feel incredibly free when I have an art idea. 8 00:00:39,460 --> 00:00:41,040 Being an artist is almost like 9 00:00:41,050 --> 00:00:43,329 a pursuit of this feeling of freedom. 10 00:00:43,329 --> 00:00:44,900 [Avery Singer, Artist] 11 00:00:44,900 --> 00:00:46,260 I love that feeling. 12 00:00:46,260 --> 00:00:47,320 I live for that. 13 00:00:58,100 --> 00:01:03,500 ["Avery Singer's Next Painting"] 14 00:01:17,140 --> 00:01:22,780 I’ve been predominantly making these SketchUp models 15 00:01:22,780 --> 00:01:27,570 on the computer, as a way of producing a sketch for a painting. 16 00:01:27,570 --> 00:01:29,720 These sort of bad architectural models 17 00:01:29,720 --> 00:01:33,740 that are these semi-figurative scenarios. 18 00:01:34,000 --> 00:01:37,840 I just get basic line and detail information from that 19 00:01:37,840 --> 00:01:39,700 and project it large scale, 20 00:01:40,060 --> 00:01:42,120 sketch it out on the canvas, 21 00:01:42,120 --> 00:01:46,100 and then realize the painting using airbrush. 22 00:01:57,020 --> 00:01:59,030 The way that paintings are made 23 00:01:59,030 --> 00:02:01,530 is almost the content, you know? 24 00:02:01,530 --> 00:02:03,840 I would like to keep it a bit more vague 25 00:02:03,840 --> 00:02:06,619 and explore things with the technique. 26 00:02:06,619 --> 00:02:09,000 Because the technique tells its own story. 27 00:02:15,860 --> 00:02:22,330 You can take traditional tools and employ them 28 00:02:22,330 --> 00:02:27,230 in the way that they’ve been intended to be employed for 500 years. 29 00:02:27,230 --> 00:02:30,150 And then, in the next hour, you know, 30 00:02:30,150 --> 00:02:33,590 incorporate some kind of new technology 31 00:02:33,590 --> 00:02:37,790 that bears no relationship upon the gesso that is, you know, 32 00:02:37,790 --> 00:02:39,880 something that's been used for however long 33 00:02:39,880 --> 00:02:42,980 and comes out of a recipe that was invented in Italy 34 00:02:42,980 --> 00:02:44,560 who knows how long ago. 35 00:02:45,240 --> 00:02:49,420 The juxtaposition of all these things produces meaning. 36 00:02:50,000 --> 00:02:52,940 I try to kind of put things side by side that... 37 00:02:53,960 --> 00:02:56,140 may have never been seen together before 38 00:02:56,150 --> 00:02:57,890 to produce a new relationship 39 00:02:57,900 --> 00:03:02,020 or just to produce a new visual reality. 40 00:03:16,160 --> 00:03:20,160 I think by 11 or 12, I was already in love with art. 41 00:03:22,380 --> 00:03:25,700 And then by the time I was 16, it was just, like, unequivocal. 42 00:03:25,720 --> 00:03:28,599 I was like, "I know that this is what I have to do." 43 00:03:28,599 --> 00:03:30,500 "I have to go to Cooper Union." 44 00:03:32,920 --> 00:03:35,680 I grew up here in New York. 45 00:03:35,680 --> 00:03:38,580 And my parents are artists as well. 46 00:03:38,580 --> 00:03:42,879 So I grew up in a loft where half of it is their art studio-- 47 00:03:42,879 --> 00:03:46,160 the other half is, kind of, open-plan apartment. 48 00:03:46,160 --> 00:03:47,280 So growing up, 49 00:03:47,780 --> 00:03:51,400 my room was basically a loft bed above my Mom's studio. 50 00:03:51,410 --> 00:03:53,580 So that was how I was used to living. 51 00:03:53,580 --> 00:03:55,739 My parents use Golden paint. 52 00:03:55,740 --> 00:03:59,940 And so I only use Golden paint. 53 00:04:00,720 --> 00:04:01,920 This company. 54 00:04:04,200 --> 00:04:05,160 You know. 55 00:04:06,080 --> 00:04:10,800 So I’m like a second generation Golden paints painter. 56 00:04:11,260 --> 00:04:12,120 [LAUGHS] 57 00:04:13,060 --> 00:04:16,280 The joke is: everyday of my childhood, 58 00:04:16,280 --> 00:04:18,989 my dad would just stand in front of me 59 00:04:18,989 --> 00:04:21,500 and intimidatingly, kind of, 60 00:04:21,500 --> 00:04:24,039 do this, like, finger-wagging thing. 61 00:04:24,039 --> 00:04:25,039 [LAUGHS] 62 00:04:25,039 --> 00:04:26,599 And say, “Never become an artist. 63 00:04:26,599 --> 00:04:27,970 "Don’t become an artist." 64 00:04:27,970 --> 00:04:28,980 "Marry a millionaire." 65 00:04:31,600 --> 00:04:32,700 [INTERVIEWER, OFF SCREEN] How’s that working out? 66 00:04:32,740 --> 00:04:33,740 [LAUGHS] 67 00:04:34,160 --> 00:04:36,500 "No" on both counts! 68 00:04:43,120 --> 00:04:44,120 I don’t know what it is, 69 00:04:44,120 --> 00:04:45,710 but I just love solitude. 70 00:04:45,710 --> 00:04:48,000 And I love working alone, 71 00:04:48,000 --> 00:04:50,580 and defining my own time, 72 00:04:50,580 --> 00:04:53,000 and my own life, and my own space. 73 00:04:53,640 --> 00:04:55,200 You don’t look at the clock anymore 74 00:04:55,210 --> 00:04:57,360 and then all of a sudden the sun is down 75 00:04:57,360 --> 00:04:59,660 and you realize you've been painting for fourteen hours 76 00:04:59,660 --> 00:05:02,580 and you have this progress in front of you. 77 00:05:05,160 --> 00:05:06,740 This is your task-- 78 00:05:06,740 --> 00:05:10,760 this what makes being an artist so hard. 79 00:05:12,000 --> 00:05:15,740 Because I don’t want to reproduce other people's paintings. 80 00:05:15,740 --> 00:05:17,500 I want to make my own.