15 Questions About Art :: Minty Lewis
Minty Lewis has been creating comics since 2003. Her characters are mostly fruit, yorkies, jerks, and nerds. A collection of her work, titled PS Comics, was published by Secret Acres in June of 2009.
She lives in Berkeley, California with her husband and an army of small pets.
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What is your earliest art-related memory?
I drew a picture of a sleeping lady and slipped it under my mom’s pillow when she was taking a nap. I think I was bored and sort of hoping the pillow jostling would wake her up so she could entertain me. She told me later that she did wake up but chose not to open her eyes so that I could carry out my plan uninterrupted. She still has that lady somewhere, or at least she did for a long time.
Who has had the greatest influence on your work?
I don’t know if there’s anyone from whom I’ve directly derived my sensibilities, but there are so many artists and works that have been important to me. I’ve spent a lot of time absorbing Devo, Roald Dahl, Pee-Wee Herman, Michael Kupperman, Gary Larson, Lynda Barry, Jack Handey, Chris Elliott, and David Shrigley (among others), but there must be something in my raw material that drew me to them in the first place. I guess everything I create is a byproduct of the interaction between those influences and the gray matter I was born with.
What are the main tools of your craft?
Pencils, erasers, Bristol board, India ink, pen/nib, Photoshop. Plus regular old notebooks for working out ideas.
Is a formal education important?
I guess it depends on what you want to do. You can still make beautiful art without a formal education, and I don’t necessarily think an art-specific education is so useful, but I’ve observed that most of the smarter, more dedicated, and well-rounded artists I know have a formal education of some sort.
What is the biggest misconception about art?
That it has to be serious to be sophisticated. Humor is very underrated in the art world, even though it can communicate so much.
Which is more important in art - concept or execution?
Concept holds more weight. I can still enjoy impeccably executed art even if there’s a weak concept, but I won’t think about later if the concept is weak. I think the important art is the stuff I think about even when I’m not directly experiencing it.
What theme or aesthetic are you most drawn too?
I like clean lines, bright color, bold shapes, modernist design, animals, and things that don’t take themselves too seriously.
What is your favorite piece of art in your home?
It’s this weird papier-mâché/rope relief painting thing that my dad bought at a community college art sale in Delaware (see photo below).
I wish I knew who the artist was and how this piece compared to the rest of his/her oeuvre. I like how they avoided having to render hands and also maximized the number of patterns and colors. I also like the big fish lips. Also I like making up stories about this scenario. Where are they—a candy store, a bar, a library, a ship? Is the person in the back jealous of the two people in the front? Is the person in the back a woman? This painting really gives me a lot to think about.
If you could collaborate with anyone, living or dead, who would it be?
I fantasize about making a live-action movie with my fruit characters, but I am not interested in directing. Maybe Tim Burton is the man for the job?
Which emerging artist do you think more people should know about?
Damien Jay, of course!
What has been your greatest achievement to date?
This little book of mine.
What has been your biggest roadblock?
My biggest challenge is maintaining focus on my art. Between work and a social life and the internet, it is really easy to find other things to do, and putting art ahead of any of them takes serious effort. I have to keep reminding myself that making art is more personally enriching than most of those distractors.
How do you define success?
As far as art is concerned, I am always raising the bar a little higher. I don’t think there will ever be a point where I can wipe my hands on my pants and be like, “Voilà! I’ve done it, time to relax!” I used to think finishing a minicomic was “success,” but now I have finished a handful of minicomics and published a book and I just feel like I have a lot more ahead of me.
What will be the name of your autobiography?
Put a Milk Crate over It. It doesn’t necessarily closely represent my life, but I decided a long time ago that this would be the name of my autobiography. It has to do with an incident that took place at Blockbuster in Charlottesville, Virginia, around 1998: there was an upside-down milk crate in the middle of one of the aisles and, upon investigation, I realized it was covering a turd (human? canine? I don’t know, I didn’t take it to the lab or anything!). I guess they don’t pay Blockbuster employees enough to pick up turds.
Anyway, I think Put a Milk Crate over It works for anyone’s autobiography—it’s kind of an alternative to “when life gives you lemons, make lemonade” or “doing the best you can with the tools you have.”
What is the best piece of (art-related) advice you’ve ever been given?
Don’t wait for inspiration.
I’ve heard this advice echoed in a number of books on writing (Bird by Bird by Annie Lamott and Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg are two I can think of), and it’s really so true for all art. I always have to get started by telling myself, “OK, I don’t have any ideas, but I am just going to fill up a page with writing (or sketches) and see what happens.” Amazingly, ideas and inspiration always develop when I just commit to taking that first clumsy step.
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15 Questions about Art is an ongoing series in which we ask our collective favorite artists, writers, musicians, sleepy dreamers and object makers from across the creative spectrum to give us a glimpse into how they perceive art through a standard set of questions.
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