Interview with Artist Kit King

AHC: Can you tell us a bit about your process, themes & inspirations?

Kit: My process is the antithesis to my work, and sort of chaotic. I'm really all over the place; constantly changing up my approach, methods, and techniques. 

The themes in my art- for the most part- seem to gather around space/dimension and the psyche. I tend to lean towards intimate crops and forms that give way to something beyond the surface. I find inspiration absolutely everywhere, but it seems my need to understand and decode my emotional state, and my personal struggles seem to inspire the work I produce. I find the ability to articulate this metaphysical world through paint just utterly fascinating and inspiring. I'm captivated and moved by artists who can so genuinely and wonderfully express the visceral and rawness to the nature of the mind, through their work. 
​

AHC: What first drew you to art? Was there a specific moment in your life or turning point where it became clear to you that you were being called to create?

Kit: Creating has always been something I've just done. Like filling my lungs with air, art has always been my breath. It has always been without thought. I was born of two artist parents, and so it has naturally been a predominate part of my life from day one. (I didn't choose the art life, the art life chose me. hah)
​

AHC: Who are some of your artistic influences? Is there anyone outside of the art world who has had a huge impact on your work or who just generally inspires you, writers, filmmakers, musicians, philosophers etc? 

​Kit: I feel like any artistic influence is mostly subconsciously so. No one person (aside from my parents as a child) has stood out to create any significant impact on my work. I imagine it more collectively and inadvertently.

My work is not only a result of my emotional state, or my circumstance, but cumulatively incorporates bits of information I plug into my mind every day from everything that surrounds me. Songs I've heard, art I've seen, films I've watched, letters I've read, and of course the people I've met. All this information affects us and plays a role in how we think, and act, and so it would make sense to assume it would then affect how and what we create. My paintings are just the sum of how I process all the information from the world around me. 
​

AHC: You write that the goal of your work is "to provide an entrance for the audience to one transient moment of connection" and to "breathe a vital life force into transformed renditions of the world." Could you talk more about this? I think that your piece "Pa" is one of the best examples of this, there is so much intimate energy coming from this piece, you can feel it, palpably, the moment that your eyes encounter it. It must take a lot of mental and emotional energy to create work that is so alive and intimate in this way, do you feel slightly drained after completing a piece?

​Kit: oh no, on the contrary, I feel very much alive and more full of energy than when I start a piece like that. I find my more intense works come from an emotionally strained place. I find myself creating them b/c I need to. I need what it gives me. When I finish a work, I'm replenished. I somehow feel more full for having created it, and at the same time I feel this weightlessness, like a burden has been lifted. I often paint out of a place of pain, where art is my escape- my medicine, and when I complete a painting, I am healed... at least until the weight of life floods in again, and then it's onto the next piece. With my work, I want the viewer to feel that weight. I want them to feel the pain- only to find a resolve the longer they look at it. I have a great difficulty forming interpersonal relationships, and so I wish to connect to people through my art. Bare my soul in paint, and have the viewer be able to feel me through that caught point in time. I want people to experience life when they see my art, and not just see paint on a canvas.
​

AHC: What is the first work of art you encountered that took your breath away?

Kit: I'm honestly not really sure. I've been around art my whole life and remember being filled with such awe and wonderment as a child when I seen what people were capable of ( I still feel this). 

​Now this isn't one particular piece, but I do remember stumbling upon my parents portfolio as a child though, and just being completely struck. I had no idea what they could do... They sort of became superheros in my eyes after that. 
​

AHC: Do you have any upcoming exhibits or new projects you'd like to tell people about?

​Kit: Ahh I'm always busy with new shows. I'm not sure what I'm allowed to divulge at the moment, so the best way to keep up to date is to visit my website and click the EXHIBITS tab.

For more information visit www.kitkingart.com/