M.P. Landis: Thelonious Monk was the first jazz guy I discovered.
Monk Work
Fred Schmalz
Fred Schmalz: Your most recent show presented paintings and drawings channeling the music of Thelonious Monk. Can you describe the seed of this interest?
M.P. Landis: Thelonious Monk was the first jazz guy I discovered. I bought a record of his when I was around 18–I thought I was buying a blues record. Even after listening to it I figured it was some kind of strange blues music, which actually is accurate in a very elemental way. At that time I had no knowledge of jazz other than pre-war blues which I had become immersed in–buying all those great Yazzoo Records compiled from scratchy 78’s from the 1920s and 30s.
At some time, years later, I had a vague idea of doing a Monk series. Last year, as I was approaching my 40th birthday–an age I never expected to reach–this idea formed as a way of celebrating my life and giving respect to his life and music. There was no real plan other than to listen to Monk’s music and see what and how that affected my work for a year.
FS: Where did the collision of art and music first produce something tangible?
MPL: I was living in Provincetown, Massachusetts, in the late 80s, when I really started digging into jazz and improvisational music. At that time, I was making angry political work that was primitive and figurative–I remember a roommate called it "German Expressionist." But within all that, this little series of jazz paintings came out–almost from nowhere–these abstract paintings on wood cabinet doors. It was like this very unconscious oasis of work in the midst of all this turmoil and struggle of the other work. At the time, it really felt like this fluke or one off series–I called it "A Little Series of Jazz"–I believe it was in 1991 or 92.
FS: And did you think you were onto something? Did you continue to work in abstract forms after this series?
MPL: After moving to New York, I had pretty much worked my way right out of using the structure of the figure, so that by 1998 I was working abstractly or in ways exploring materials and process. Since I moved to New York, I have often used music–mostly jazz–very directly as inspiration in my work… as a jumping off point to get beyond my ideas and find a way of working that transcends technique and becomes more emotional and dance-like.
FS: Tell me about how this has led to collaborations… I know you used to paint "live."
MPL: Painting live onstage with musicians really pushed me into opening up into the energy of the moment; surrendering to the sounds and how my body movements reacted. I did that a lot for a few years and eventually burnt out on it; all the lugging dripping heavy gear around it made me envious of the drummers…
FS: Discuss your attempts to "transcend technique" in relation to Monk’s once saying, "I play the wrong wrong notes."
MPL: What I think that means, or how it applies to me, is that, in following his own vision those wrong notes sounded right to him, made sense to his inner logic regardless of what was acceptable. And for me, I like to push what I make ‘til it feels right, in some inner logic kind of way, even when that leads me to something that might look off or clumsy, but in a way that attracts me. Listening to Monk a lot has helped give me more permission to allow that to be, to not look for the aesthetic fix…
FS: …sounds like the inner logic is that aesthetic fix, for you, so permission is so much listening.
MPL: Yeah. And feeling and living and walking through the city and the park.
FS: Talk about how you "use" music, practically, in your painting process…
MPL: Well, in my studio I play music most of the time and though last year a very large percentage of what I was listening to was Thelonious Monk, I listen to a huge variety of music and sounds. I have a voracious appetite for things I have not heard before. It is funny but I stumble on the word "use." I feel almost like the music uses me or, I guess I use the music to use me. There is a certain surrendering to what I am listening to which helps me jump right into physically moving; making marks, grabbing paint, etc. It overcomes the endless problems of decision and throws me right into the act of creating. I guess it has an energizing influence, it is a type of fuel that helps push me into making something I haven’t made before.
FS: In what way is this process synesthetic for you?
MPL: I believe it works in many different, changing ways. Sometimes it may work in a literal way, like a certain music energy may, on a given day, make me reach for yellow. But there’s also things going on like the energy of the music will push me to do something with whatever is in my hand; to not stop and search for the "right color" or brush or whatever medium "out there" but to go somewhere inside to find a way to express what the music is making me feel. I work by layering and sometimes the layers are connected and sometimes not. Music helps break down my holding on to what I may have done before, not that there isn’t often some reaction to what has been already done, but listening to music helps keep me from being too careful of obliterating the past work or in simply trying to fix what is there… but I am straying from the question.
FS: How do you feel the overt expression of music’s influence in your work (titles, etc.) acts as a guide to the viewer?
MPL: Well I never really thought about it in that way. I name the influence of the music often by titling the work by musician or piece of music as a way of dedicating and acknowledging something that has moved me in some way. Throughout the last 10 years, I have usually dealt with each painting individually in terms of what I was listening to; if I was listening to Cecil Taylor when a painting came together, I would name it after Cecil Taylor and maybe the piece of his music.
I guess I do hope that that may work as a guide to help viewers into their own reaction and relationship to the work. I don’t mean for it to define the work because I’m not interested in making visual representations of music, or anything for that matter. These paintings and drawings are artifacts of a creative process; a recording of my reactions to not just music, but to life and my living it.
FS: Many of your paintings and drawings use text, clusters of letters, lists. Discuss this use as a form of musical notation, specifically in the "WD" series. Also as a form of habit.
MPL: The "WD" series is the lifeblood of all my work for over 10 years. It is also the lifeblood that connects my everyday activity with my studio work. The letters, lists, etc., that you refer to begin with a piece of paper that I use–one new one per day–that I fold and keep in my back pocket and use throughout each day for memos, phone numbers, whatever comes up. I then obsessively keep them in chronological order and staple them to boards in the studio and draw, paint and work on them until they feel finished. Then they get replaced by the next one in line. I usually have 30 – 40 in process at any one time. So, as far as a form of habit, yes definitely and although I never really thought of them as musical notation, I like that idea.
M. P. Landis’ Monk Work was exhibited in January 2006 at 55 Mercer Gallery, where he regularly shows. He also exhibits at the Schoolhouse Center for the Arts in Provincetown, MA and is a member of the international artists’ group VERN. His work is included in many public and private collections. He lives and works in Brooklyn. www.mplandis.com
Fred Schmalz is a poet and publisher of the literature and art journal swerve. His chapbook Ticket was published by Fuori Editions in 2002. His poems have appeared in Jubilat, Divide, and other magazines. He lives in Brooklyn.
www.swervemag.com
