Gary Setzer is a local artist who is an Assistant Art Professor at the University of Arizona. He kindly gave his time to sit down with us to answer some questions about interpretation, art, and the successes he has had in teaching this complicated subject.
We would highly suggest the readers of this blog to look up information about Gary Setzer. Due to copyright issues, we are not able to put his work directly onto this website. But Setzer displayed his show entitled Gary Setzer: Homonymous Confusion of Planes, 2007 last autumn at the University of Arizona museum. The artist is on YouTube under this title, discussing this performance art, and everything this artist has to say in this video is worth listening to. He is currently in London showing his artwork.
In your years of teaching, how do you think the majority of your students feel about interpretation?
-I teach mostly freshmen, and they tend to view art as subjective. They seem to embrace the idea of interpretation and the idea of leaving it open. Though, going through art school makes the artist more specific with content. They will limit interpretation to a degree, I mean the further along they are as an artist the better they will be at conveying the point.
What, if anything, do you intend when you make your art?
-Actually, a lot of my work deals with interpretation. I suppose my main themes have dealt with Semiotics, Phenomenology, and Hermeneutics.
How do you feel about interpretation (both in general and of your own work)?
-Well, it's something I can't really control, especially as a younger artists, I would embrace and enjoy it. There is an art for everyone. Whether it is the Mona Lisa or something less traditional, people will come to it and put their own experience on it. History can change the way we see art, but there is no right way. I think there is art that is made just for artists, and there is art made for the public.
If someone interpreted your work the wrong way, how would you feel?
-If can inform me of something that I was not conscious of before. It would make me rethink the way I'm trying to convey my art, but I wouldn't take it personally.
When you give an Abstract Art assignment to your class, what do you expect from your students? What if they gave you the assignment for the grade, and you could not see their intention? How does the grading work with this?
-I expect my students to take risks. Each project is graded with a rubric, so the students should be attempting to manage those specific point. I can't grade to my taste; there have been some pieces that I personally did not like very much but still received an A, while there have been some pieces which I like a lot but received a D. I grade on overall affect given the success the artist had conveying their intention.
Do you think interpretation has a negative or a positive affect on art?
-It can do both. I like analysis, and I don't like analysis. I don't like when certain trends bend towards a "yes" or a "no." Art is more organic than that.
When does art become less personal and more commercial?
-I think that's a blurry line today. Art in galleries is somewhat a part of the commercial world. And art on TV is all commercial. Any walk of art will have a commercial value on it, and I don't see anything totally evil about it.
What is art?
-I still don't have an answer for that, and I never will. Art is a continuous investigation . Once we define it, art will try to escape that definition.
Miscellaneous Conversation with Gary Setzer:
-The lower level arrt classes are more steeped and grounded; it is art in the making and the context for the making. In lower levels we teach skill points that are necessary for a career. Not because that's what "good" art is, we just try to give a good vocabulary. The learning of art is a creative challenge, kind of like an obstacle course (though a little less "military"). A lot of the schooling is showing the students the standard, which they can work past in their careers, or they may not.
We also got the chance to talk with some of Setzer's lower-level students (this is presented later in the website). Through this conversation we can see that interpretation plays a huge part in art, especially for the artist. If you thought there was a great deal to be considered when merely viewing a work of art, imagine being the person who created it. An idea is born, and the true artist is able to put that idea into some sort of visual presentation. But what happens to the artist when that idea is misinterpreted, and we are left with a refreshing idea: that which Sontag would call art that has been "left alone...and untamed."
