This is the twenty-eighth in a series of interviews with each of the Sondheim Award Semifinalists. Finalists have been announced, and will be on exhibit at the Walters Art Museum June 21 to August 17; those not selected as finalists with be exhibited at the Decker, Meyerhoff and Pinkard Galleries at MICA  July 17 to August 3, 2014.

Name: Aharon Bumi
Current Location: Baltimore
Hometown: Montreal, Quebec
Previous Education: University of King’s College; Cambridge University

How would you describe your work, and your studio practice? Over the last several years, my interests have been oriented around questions of making, working, and building. For me, this has been a way of acknowledging, or perhaps simply imagining, the various codes in which an artistic practice is implicated. What is the space of our working and thinking? And how is it constructed, reconstructed, deconstructed over and over again? In the studio, I tend to pursue these kinds of questions at multiple levels –with larger projects offset by small material experiments.

What part of artmaking to you like or enjoy the most? The least? I like the moments of drawing with purpose – when an idea (a motif etc.) starts to take shape on a page. I dislike the moments associated with “wrapping up” the work – the showing and the telling, the web-life of the thing, the repeated and perhaps unavoidable return to professional practices.

What research do you do for your art practice? Very often, the research consists of holding onto a particular moment in somebody else’s work – a motif, an image, an aspect or particular part of an image, etc. – and keeping it close by. I’ve met writers who say that they sometimes walk around with a specific book in their pocket – not so much to read it as to re-imagine its contents. . . I think my research operates similarly.

Do you ever get in creative dry spells, and if so, how do you get out of them? Yes, for sure, always and repeatedly. By now, it seems like a cycle of necessary contractions. When it happens, I tend to pack up my things, and move for a while into other ways of working and thinking. That time, however long, allows me to come back into a new set of working conditions.

How do you challenge yourself in your work? For a long time, I have been interested in the way that artists consciously restrict themselves to various sets of working parameters. Most recently, these include people like Lygia Clark, Dorothea Rockburne, Al Taylor and Roni Horn. For all of these people, the serial nature of their work represents a kind of repeated investigation into a particular set of materials. At the moment, I think I tend to challenge myself in a similar way. One part of me proposes a field of limitations. And the other part tries to extend these limitations through various experiments.

What is your dream project? I recently met someone who was working in an aeronautical lab with a 40 foot simulated wind-tunnel. After we met, I fantasized about making a work in the wind-tunnel.  Undoubtedly, I am misunderstanding what the space looks like.

This is the twenty-seventh in a series of interviews with each of the Sondheim Award Semifinalists. Finalists have been announced, and will be on exhibit at the Walters Art Museum June 21 to August 17; those not selected as finalists with be exhibited at the Decker, Meyerhoff and Pinkard Galleries at MICA  July 17 to August 3, 2014.

Name: Martine Alicia Workman
Age: 34
Website: www.martinealicia.com
Current Location:  SW Waterfront, DC
Hometown: Lake Bluff, IL (born in Cumberland, MD)
School: California College of the Arts

Current favorite artworks & other things: Christian and Islamic illuminated manuscripts, Japanese woodcuts and Ehon books, ephemera, early American newspapers, Agnes Martin, Albrecht Dürer & Amy Gerstler

What is your day job? How do you manage balancing work with studio time with your life? I do graphic design and illustration, but right now I’m taking care of my newborn son full time. I’ve also worked in a bakery, and worked as a caretaker for the elderly. If I can’t make it to the studio, I’ll draw in my sketchbook and think about new projects. All of my work first takes shape in my sketchbook.

How would you describe your work, and your studio practice? I make works on paper and artist’s books/zines rooted in drawing. My practice is project based and changes depending on what idea I’m pursuing, although every project begins in my sketchbook.

What part of artmaking to you like or enjoy the most? The least? I love the process of making art, and I’ve always loved to draw. I love making messes and I hate cleaning up. I’m trying to get better at the administrative side of being an artist.

What research do you do for your art practice? I enjoy research and am always trying to learn something new; sometimes it makes it into my work and sometimes it doesn’t. I ask my artist and librarian friends for opinions/help and use the internet. I have collected a bunch of books for my own library I refer to often.

What books have you read lately you would recommend? Movies? Television? Music?TV: I love murder mystery shows and will play them while I’m assembling books or doing production work. Murder, She Wrote and Moonlighting are my favorites but I will watch any mystery show! Music: I’m a huge Prince fan and enjoy soul music. Movies: Pedro Almodovar is my favorite director. Books: I have a newborn son, so I’ve only been reading baby books for a while… Happiest Baby on the Block is pretty great!

Do you ever get in creative dry spells, and if so, how do you get out of them? During dry spells, I’ll do production work, make lists of practical things to do(application deadlines, research/order new materials, etc) and I’ll read a lot and do research on a new topic of interest. I don’t actively try to get out of them, since my work has ebbs and flows that are equally important to me.

How do you challenge yourself in your work? I push myself to learn something new with every project. This is easy to do in the research phase of a project, but can get frustrating when materials or techniques aren’t working out the way you hope they will.

What is your dream project? An artist book with an unlimited budget and large staff at my disposal is a total dream!

This is the twenty-sixth in a series of interviews with each of the Sondheim Award Semifinalists. Kyle is one of seven finalists, whose work will be on exhibit at the Walters Art Museum June 21 to August 17; remaining semifinalists with be exhibited at the Decker, Meyerhoff and Pinkard Galleries at MICA  July 17 to August 3, 2014.

Name: Kyle Tata
Age: 24
Website: www.kyletata.us
Current Location: Charles Village
Hometown: Baltimore,MD
School: Maryland Institute College of Art, BFA

Current favorite artists or artwork: Too many to list… Constant all time favorites:Christopher Williams, Paul Sietsema, Joachim Koester, Jill Magid, Michael Asher, Allen Sekula, Dan Graham, Tom Burr, Lewis Baltz, James Welling. Artists I am currently really into: Carl Gunhouse, Daniel Shea, Christopher Rodriguez, Sam Falls, Alex De Corte. Some of my awesome friends from Baltimore that inspire me every day: James Bouché, John Bohl, Andrew Liang, Ryan Syrell, Ginevra Shay, Elle Perez, Val Karuskevich.

What is your day job? How do you manage balancing work with studio time with your life? I currently work part time as the photography instructor at Baltimore School for the Arts teaching high school classes in darkroom and digital photography, as well as a few other part time jobs. I am lucky to have a job that allows me to constantly think about art and photography. It is also great to be able to teach analog darkroom photography on a high school level to students who have never had the experience before of printing their own work in a darkroom. Film photography is such a great medium and I’m so thankful that Baltimore School for the Arts continues to have a functioning darkroom.

How would you describe your work, and your studio practice? My work is often conceptually based projects that result in a photographic series, sometimes the end product of that series will be a book, a photographic installation, or both. As of late I have been trying to create work that does not have a true end product but instead can simultaneously exist in many different formats. My photography recently has becoming more abstract but is based on specific materials that relate to 20th century Modernism and its relation to architecture. I am very interested in the role that abstraction plays in everyday domestic life.

What part of artmaking to you like or enjoy the most? The least? I often get too caught up in theory and concept before I even start a piece and sometimes that hinders me from actually creating a physical object. The part I enjoy the most has to be the grey area after the series of work has transitioned from simply being an idea in my sketchbook to something that occupies real space but before the series is complete. I have a hard time finishing a series completely, I am constantly going back into past work and revising it.

What research do you do for your art practice? A lot of my projects deal with some sort of cultural history, so I do tend to do lot of time looking up specific historical events and topics in libraries and online before I actually start making a work. I consider artistic research to be a very important aspect of my practice.

What books have you read lately you would recommend? Movies? Television? Music? I’ve recently read “Draw it with your Eyes Closed: The Art of the Art Assignment” and it definitely has made me think more critically about my approach as an art teacher. As for music, I’ve had the new St. Vincent and Future Islands albums in heavy rotation lately. I have an addiction to buying artist books and exhibition catalogues, I recently got Sara Cwynar’s Encyclopedia of Kitsch which is a fantastic photography/artist’s book with a completely unique design.

Do you ever get in creative dry spells, and if so, how do you get out of them? I feel that I constantly shift between phases of complete stagnation to periods of intense work and production. When I get in a dry spell I try to force myself simply work on anything to keep my hands busy even if that work doesn’t actually lead to a complete finish project, it helps me to start something new.

How do you challenge yourself in your work? Lately I’ve been trying to force myself to incorporate new media in my artwork and not simply continue a formula. My newest work is probably the least traditional photographic work that I’ve done in a long time and visually is much more aligned with abstract painting than straight forward photography. One of the hardest things to do as an artist is to constantly push your practice and not get not let the work become too predictable .

What is your dream project? I know this isn’t what is meant by this question, but lately I have been having dreams about making artwork that doesn’t actually exist in real life. It has been weird to visualize what artwork my subconscious wants to make compared to my actual work. Sometimes the work in the dreams is pretty close to real life but other times it has been really strange and unlike anything I’ve done before.