Today we’d like to introduce you to Britt Spencer.
Every artist has a unique story. Can you briefly walk us through yours?
I’ve been working as a commercial illustrator since 2004 and in the gallery world since 2011. In illustration I’m primarily in the editorial market doing images for magazines and newspapers. But it’s the gallery work that really tickles my fancy. I share a studio with four other amazing artist in Savannah, GA where I’ve been residing for the last decade.
Please tell us about your art.
In short, my paintings are euphemisms; a generalized pathetic misery painted with bright child-like colors that belies their content. Sort of a nice packaging of insecurities, operating somewhere in the realm between humor and pity. I think the message that is conveyed is the message of the spineless storyteller; obscuring a direct message with an ambiguous one. Stories of nothing say a lot about everything… Just look at Seinfeld as evidence (yes, yes, I know, Seinfeld had plots and stories. but still I’m comfortable with the comparison… a show about nothing was not a show about nothing is the gist) … To me, the formal arrangement of the painting is more important than communicating anything specifically. I’m more interested in the tone of the work than I am with what the work says. This often results in a meandering process of playing around with the visuals until it ‘feels’ right and not being overly concerned with the coherence. Common themes that I have in my work: I seem to enjoy the non-heroic man; a figure in some hopeless struggle with something. I particularly like this man to be a soft-bodied man-child; you’ll see them a lot in my work. Very likely these characters have both a sinister perversion as well as a sympathetic hopelessness, or at least that’s what I’m going for… that constant balance of good and evil; pride and humility.
I’m largely a fan of /influenced by consumerism and simple media in general. In other words; Teen Mom is more stimulating than a tired performance of Don Giovanni. Also, I’m heavily influenced by the colors you see in fast-food and commercial packaging. I consider the McDonald’s fry box one of the most aesthetically pleasing things in existence. I like false nostalgia or the ease of adopting symbols and cultural cues into your own identity without actually experiencing culture in a genuine sense (most people would just shorten that and say I’m comfortable with cultural appropriation). As an example, I use the visual language of ‘comics;’ ben-day dots, halftone pattern, etc. People look at my paintings and say they look like comics. But not really, right? Certainly not any contemporary comics at least, and not comics from my generation. Instead it’s the cultural understanding of what a comic looks like and it has become a symbol of something, not exclusive or owned by anyone, but absorbed into the world of meaning-making through symbolism.
I guess that’s what I’m doing with my paintings. If I get a commission for illustration; I read the text, consider the audience and try to create an image that’s relevant, good-looking, and consistent with work that I’ve done in the past.
Given everything that is going on in the world today, do you think the role of artists has changed? How do local, national or international events and issues affect your art?
The role of the artist in society is grossly overestimated. Not that I don’t consider the artist important, but their role is no more valuable than any other vocation. I’ve grown tired of the rhetoric that places the artist on some mystic pedestal, responsible for delivering culture to society. I find this troubling and somewhat dismissive of the culture that is inherent in everything we engage in. Expecting culture to come from ‘artists’ relies on pilgrimages to museums, galleries, or theaters etc. This is nonsense. You can get just as much culture from sitting at McDonald’s as you could from visiting the Louvre.
How do events affect my work? Not sure, but I don’t live in a vacuum, and I fully acknowledge that the world I live in influences me and inspires the work I produce immeasurably.
How or where can people see your work? How can people support your work?
Online at www.brittspencer.com, in a number of editorial publications (Newsweek, Wired, Garden & Gun, Popular Science, among other), or locally, I’m showing with Spalding Nix Fine Art Gallery.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.brittspencer.com
- Email: britt@brittspencer.com
- Instagram: britt.spencer
Image Credit:
Acrylics on panel by Britt Spencer
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