LIESL PFEFFER - JULY 2020
Can you tell us a little about yourself?
I’m an Australian artist working with photography, collage, drawing and textiles. I am interested in transforming materials, the photograph as both object and image, and exploring the relationship between time, memory and reality in photography. Through my work, I try to make sense of my place in the world and the universe. I grew up in Brisbane and studied photographic art practice at the Queensland College of Art. I left Australia in 2012, lived in Brooklyn for five years, and moved to Berlin two years ago.
I’m an Australian artist working with photography, collage, drawing and textiles. I am interested in transforming materials, the photograph as both object and image, and exploring the relationship between time, memory and reality in photography. Through my work, I try to make sense of my place in the world and the universe. I grew up in Brisbane and studied photographic art practice at the Queensland College of Art. I left Australia in 2012, lived in Brooklyn for five years, and moved to Berlin two years ago.
Where are you and what are you currently working on?
I’m at my studio in Pankow, in a big concrete building in the eastern side of Berlin which was formerly part of the G.D.R.. It was built to be a diplomat hotel in the 80s and was later used as an Academy of Sciences. Now the building has about 90 artists using the rooms as studios. My 20 sqm (215 sq ft) studio has big windows, white walls and a brown vinyl floor.
This year I am focusing on a single research project. I’m teaching myself patchwork sewing and I’m making studies and larger quilted works out of fabric that extend my previous work with collage. I’m thinking of the patchwork as a way to collage using fabric.
I’m at my studio in Pankow, in a big concrete building in the eastern side of Berlin which was formerly part of the G.D.R.. It was built to be a diplomat hotel in the 80s and was later used as an Academy of Sciences. Now the building has about 90 artists using the rooms as studios. My 20 sqm (215 sq ft) studio has big windows, white walls and a brown vinyl floor.
This year I am focusing on a single research project. I’m teaching myself patchwork sewing and I’m making studies and larger quilted works out of fabric that extend my previous work with collage. I’m thinking of the patchwork as a way to collage using fabric.
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What’s your studio routine like? Any zany habits?
I’m in the studio four or five days a week, from about 10am to 4pm or thereabouts. I used to do much longer days but I’m in a bit of a ‘less is more’ routine at the moment, partially because of covid-19 but also because it’s summer. I wish I had some zany habits to share. Sometimes I listen to podcasts, otherwise I work in silence so I can concentrate. In the afternoons I make coffee and look out the window while trying to think how to solve problems in the work. My BAD studio routine which I know I should try to break, is that once I get really into making something, especially if it’s repetitive and meditative, I will do it for eight or ten hours at a time, five days a week, even though it becomes physically painful. It’s really stupid.
I’m in the studio four or five days a week, from about 10am to 4pm or thereabouts. I used to do much longer days but I’m in a bit of a ‘less is more’ routine at the moment, partially because of covid-19 but also because it’s summer. I wish I had some zany habits to share. Sometimes I listen to podcasts, otherwise I work in silence so I can concentrate. In the afternoons I make coffee and look out the window while trying to think how to solve problems in the work. My BAD studio routine which I know I should try to break, is that once I get really into making something, especially if it’s repetitive and meditative, I will do it for eight or ten hours at a time, five days a week, even though it becomes physically painful. It’s really stupid.
What are your favorite materials to work with?
Photographs to cut up for collages on paper, watercolour paints on grid paper to make studies for things I will sew, cotton uni-colour fabric from the Turkish market in Kreuzberg for my fabric works, pre-coated cyanotype paper for making sun prints.
Photographs to cut up for collages on paper, watercolour paints on grid paper to make studies for things I will sew, cotton uni-colour fabric from the Turkish market in Kreuzberg for my fabric works, pre-coated cyanotype paper for making sun prints.
How has your work changed over the years?
My work has changed in terms of materials and process, often depending on whether or not I have darkroom access. It’s not really a change so much as a back and forth. If I have access to a darkroom or photo studio, I will work on photographic printmaking projects. If I don’t have darkroom access I’ll do a lot of painting and collaging and weaving, and now this year, sewing. Over the years the research side of my work has become more important, for example for my printmaking project To See The Moon Fall From The Sky, first I spent six months reading popular-science books on astronomy and cosmology while recuperating from a wrist injury. Nothing I learned in those books is tangibly represented in the work, but I don’t think I would have made the work without first falling in love with thinking about the origin of the universe.
My work has changed in terms of materials and process, often depending on whether or not I have darkroom access. It’s not really a change so much as a back and forth. If I have access to a darkroom or photo studio, I will work on photographic printmaking projects. If I don’t have darkroom access I’ll do a lot of painting and collaging and weaving, and now this year, sewing. Over the years the research side of my work has become more important, for example for my printmaking project To See The Moon Fall From The Sky, first I spent six months reading popular-science books on astronomy and cosmology while recuperating from a wrist injury. Nothing I learned in those books is tangibly represented in the work, but I don’t think I would have made the work without first falling in love with thinking about the origin of the universe.
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Who else do you recommend we look at / read / listen to / cook with?
All Berlin related, because I can. My favourite contemporary Berlin-based artists are Alicja Kwade and Sol Calero. Some Berlin bands to listen to while you cook: Chuckamuck, Highest Sea, Voodoo Beach, Malaria!. And you should watch Berlin gallerist Johann König’s daily covid-19-lockdown virtual studio visits with artists such as Helen Marten, Elmgreen & Dragset and Erwin Wurm (on the IGTV channel of his gallery, König Galerie).
All Berlin related, because I can. My favourite contemporary Berlin-based artists are Alicja Kwade and Sol Calero. Some Berlin bands to listen to while you cook: Chuckamuck, Highest Sea, Voodoo Beach, Malaria!. And you should watch Berlin gallerist Johann König’s daily covid-19-lockdown virtual studio visits with artists such as Helen Marten, Elmgreen & Dragset and Erwin Wurm (on the IGTV channel of his gallery, König Galerie).
Any exciting projects on the horizon?
I’m making a small book of film photographs with my partner, who is a designer and photographer. We were in Palermo in Italy in February and March of this year. The covid-19 nationwide lockdown happened three weeks into our month-long visit, so the direction of the book was impacted in a way that is visible in the content of the photographs. The look of the city changed so much—rolled-down shutters and closed doors and empty streets.
But I’m mostly working on figuring out where I’m going with these sewn collage pieces in the studio.
I’m making a small book of film photographs with my partner, who is a designer and photographer. We were in Palermo in Italy in February and March of this year. The covid-19 nationwide lockdown happened three weeks into our month-long visit, so the direction of the book was impacted in a way that is visible in the content of the photographs. The look of the city changed so much—rolled-down shutters and closed doors and empty streets.
But I’m mostly working on figuring out where I’m going with these sewn collage pieces in the studio.
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website: http://www.lieslpfeffer.com/
