Artist Curator Interview: Drew Young
Drew has been VMF’s Lead Art Curator for five years and has had an enormous impact on the murals seen scattered around Vancouver! This year was a special feat for Drew and his team of Guest Curators, so we thought we would sit down with him and pick his brain on what actually happened behind the scenes of 60+ murals across 9 neighbourhoods over 3 weeks!
Young is an internationally exhibited painter with shows and projects in LA (Thinkspace Gallery), HI (POW!WOW!), SF (Gauntlet Gallery), Denver (Abend Gallery), Tokyo (Amp), London (Rook and Raven), NYC (Re:Form Projects), Bogota (Come Together) and featured by Juxtapoz, Hi-Fructose, Booooooom.com, Supersonic Electronic and BlueCanvas.
His painting accolades have brought him many curatorial and creative director opportunities in recent years. He’s acted as the Visual Arts curator for TedX Vancouver 2014/2015, Skookum 2018 as well as the Founder of Snag — a weekly live-painting exhibition focused on illuminating Vancouver’s alternative arts culture. His consultation and curation efforts have led to thousands of artworks finding their way to collectors' walls and hundreds of public art projects coming to fruition across the Lower Mainland.
Who are the artists that you have curated for VMF 2020?
Strathcona: Mount Pleasant: Marpole:
Jnasty x Theme Cara Guri Vanessa Taylor
Rafael Miyani Animalitoland Jocelyn Wong
Annie Chen
Laura Kwok
South Granville: West End: Robson:
Nadine Nevitt Mandy Tsung Fiona Ackerman
Carrielynn Victor Katie So
Mega McGrath Chris Perez
River District: Gastown: Downtown:
Fernanda Ribeiro Priscilla Yu Co-Curated w/ David Vertesi
Ciele Beau Lauren Brevner
Extra Crunchy Sarah Delaney
Alex Fowkes Frazer Adams
Lukas Lundberg Kari Kristensen
Rory Doyle Luke Ramsey
Tell us about your curation process with VMF this year.
It’s safe to say it’s been dramatically different, at the very least. I became a huge fan of trashy reality tv, baking bread, and deep freezers. Also the pand-y happened.
On the VMF front, reimagining our tack altogether was exciting. 2020 pushed us towards a decentralized approach, offering opportunities in 9 neighbourhoods with 60 public art projects and the ability to work alongside a handful of fresh, brilliantly minded guest curators.
This year’s curatorial scope was our second largest to date, but geographically number one with a bullet (a 100-gallon hat’s off to Brit Lawrence and her incredible production squad for actualizing it). One of the aspects that made this year far different than previous years were our stakeholders. With so many neighbourhoods in the festival, it was natural to anticipate a wide spectrum of aesthetic preferences, creative inclinations and neighbourhood ethos to show up in the art. We ended up taking a sort of smorgasbord approach, however that wasn’t how we thought things would go when 2020 started.
Back in January of this year, I sat down with guest curators Krystal Paraboo and Sierra Tasi Baker to shortlist selections for the festival. We each chose 5 artists to paint in Mount Pleasant, with a theme surrounding climate urgency. Things flowed and we were jazzed about all the picks. Easy peasy. March: Oh wait? The globe is experiencing a metaphorical transient garbage fire? No street festival. Ok fair. Hmph.
April: #makeartwhileapart
As the plywood boards went up on all the downtown businesses, Director of Operations, Andrea Curtis saw a big, juicy opportunity. “Let’s take these walls by storm,” she said in a fierce tone… at least hypothetically in my mind. We saw the impact of the incredible work being done in Gastown, for the Murals of Gratitude initiated by Kim Briscoe. This made us think, we should go do what we do best: make art — big and fast.
Since the BIAs had such close relationships with the businesses being boarded up and are always looking for ways to illuminate their community, it was a no-brainer for VMF to engage with them to see how we could support. And this is how #Makeartwhileapart came to life, more or less. I’ll speak to this project more later, but in short, it served to empower the diverse communities the BIA’s serve. Wth the BIA’s support, each neighbourhood had its own temporary mini mural festival within a matter of weeks. And for us, it was a potent reminder of how impactful the work we do can be; for artists, for communities, and for ourselves.
Mural by: Benjamin T. Stone; Photo by: Gabriel Martins
June:
Even without an event amassing 150K attendees, everyone agreed that the show must go on. In true VMF spirit (white-knuckled ingenuity) the festival was reimagined with a far-sprawling and neighbourhood-focused approach.
What did this mean for the curation team?
Trembling bowels...Our project load increased three-fold. It also meant that the amount of subjectivity involved was increased exponentially. This is where my smorgasbord idea came into play. Given the rapid-fire rate we had to get artists placed, and volume of projects to fill, we dug deep. I reviewed every submission that came through VMF since 2016, including an additional open call for artist applications in July 2020 for the expanded festival. I combed through the 400+ artists I’ve had the pleasure of working with at Snag. I also combed through all submission packages I’ve reviewed when working on public art juries.
The result: A new-found level of disdain towards spreadsheets and lack/excessive use of capitalization in artwork titles.
The Practical Result: A 70+ page document showcasing incredible artists, most of which are fresh faces that have yet to step into the VMF limelight.
With this in hand, and the support of our Executive Director, David Vertesi along with the guest curators (who had their own additional selections), we were able to curate ‘platters’ of potential artist/neighbourhood pairings to BIAs based on their artistic preferences. This allowed us to move as fast as possible, meeting both our deadlines and individual BIA’s specific needs.
David Vertesi, you are the nucleus to my electron.
“When March hit, no one knew what was going to happen to their careers and livelihood. Artists especially, becoming unplugged from their seats in studios, sets or contracts, were — and still are — in a precarious situation financially and psychologically.”
Tell us about how you have worked with the guest curators on the team.
This is our third year bringing guest curators into the festival – it’s a really fascinating dynamic for us. With the highest artist per capita ratio in the country, it’s important to bring in new perspectives each year to avoid creating a monoculture from a single curator. While it is common to have a solo curator in a commercial gallery or project context, we have seen how the more diverse the voices are during the curation of the festival, the more the festival can represent the communities and cultures within our city.
I had the pleasure of meeting Sierra Tasi Baker last year where we were jurors for the CoV Utility box program; a city initiative to beautify utility boxes all over GVA with local artists’ work. Her vast wealth of knowledge as an Indigenous curator is truly astounding which made me quick to put her forward as a potential curator for 2020.
Our second curator for this year, Krystal Paraboo whose extensive academic achievements in curation and art history, alongside her animated energy made for the perfect ingredients for a 2020 Guest Curator. With a heavy focus on Black Vancouver-based artists, Krystal unearthed some extraordinary talents — notably, Anthony Joseph. His Hogan’s Alley mural depicts many of Vancouver’s leaders in the black community. This is one of the most intricate and comprehensive pieces I’ve seen since the festival’s inception.
A major component of curating and curating alongside others is our implementation of one-on-one artist consultations. A large portion of our artists and curators haven’t worked on projects at this scale or even in the public domain. These sessions are an effective learning opportunity for featured artists and curators. We’ll be reviewing designs and creating plans to scale them up exponentially. Here, we identify mark vocabularies and pair them with the right tools and equipment to go big. Often, things that seem inconsequential like a simple gradient can quickly be identified as a major challenge.
Some examples of things that can alter the approach of a design:
- Texture of wall can determine what medium to use
- Complexity of design/experience of artist/production timeline
- ‘Strange shapes’ in negative spaces
- Copywriting issues
- Painting in real life vs in photoshop I personally have been overwhelmed in a project with no end in sight. The last thing I’d want is for an artist to feel the same during our festival. This is why these one-on-ones educate and empower artists to not just finish, but finish strong. I make it clear I’m always available for a call anytime to workshop ideas or approaches — I’m here as a sounding board, a cheerleader, and a friend to help facilitate their best work as they see fit. The Drew Hotline can be a little too active at times, with my girlfriend unable to get a full sentence in at home as I’m constantly answering S.O.S calls.
Tell us about #makeartwhileapart - Is it true you curated over 60 projects in 3 weeks? What was the impact of that work on Artists, the community and yourself? Do you see your role differently now?
Roll Call!
Aimee Young Carson Ting Jenn Brisson Olivia Di Liberto
Alex Fowkes Chris Perez Jerome Berthier Oxana Gaidasheva
Ali Bruce Ciele Beau JNasty Paige Bowman
Alison Woodward Cody Swinkels Karen Yukovich Phresha
Andrew Tavukciyan Drew Young Kari Kristensen Portia Pascuzzo
Animalitoland Erica Phillips Katie So Priscilla Yu
Atheana Picha Frazer Adams KC Hall Sage Lim
Ben Knight Graeme Zirk Lukas Lundberg Sandeep Johal
Benjamin Stone Hanna Lee Joshi Marion Landry Siloh
Brett Mason Robinson iHeart Mark Illing Shannon Elliott
Bronwyn Schuster Ilya Viryachev Mega McGrath Taka Sudo
Brother Jopa James Knight Michael Rozen Tierney Milne
Carmen Chan Jamie Bizness Myles Marwood Tristesse Seeliger
Carrielynn Victor Victoria Siezcka Nick Gregson Will Phillips
Mural by Tierney Milne; Photo by Gabriel Martins
Making this heap of calls was arguably one of the most touching experiences I’ve had as a curator. Just about every artist I’ve worked with in the past has shown an immense amount of gratitude towards projects I’ve brought them on for. But in this case, their responses were beautiful, profound, and in some cases, stippled with tears.
When March hit, no one knew what was going to happen to their careers and livelihood. Artists especially, becoming unplugged from their seats in studios, sets or contracts, were — and still are — in a precarious situation financially and psychologically. I’m no stranger to mental health challenges and this experience brought those difficulties front and center. I personally had lost an immense amount of income from dropped projects, leaving me spending time staring at the wall and navel-gazing. This period did, however, offer me lots of time to catch up on my drinking-white-wine-and-yelling-at-the-screen, watching 90 Day Fiance sessions — the worst (Best. Shut up brain). I don’t think my partner, Colleen and I have ever gotten into weirder fights than then…
#Makeartwhileapart was a huge opportunity and a much-needed personal win for me. It gave me purpose by filling the looming void in my schedule (or lack thereof).
Over the course of three weeks, artists were reminded of their incredible intrinsic ability to move the communities around them. 65 bright messages of joy, hope, love, friendship or celebrations of frontline workers, popped up in what felt like an overnight affair. I got to see excitement and encouragement from communities in an indescribable and penetrating way. We served something that I didn’t realize everyone needed so badly.
Those messages of gratitude and support have not left me. They have helped redefine what I see as ‘important’ when approaching curation in public space. Despite it not being an easy task, I feel very fortunate to have had this experience and lesson in personal and professional growth.
Was #MakeArtWhileApart challenging to execute?
It was a huge challenge, to say the least. Our production infrastructure and budget were limited. Even paint was difficult to get a hold of as Dulux Paints had reduced their staff. This left us to think creatively about artist support. Our Production Manager, Brit Lawrence did amazing work making sure everyone had what they needed like water, storage, washrooms, and COVID safety guidelines and sanitization goods. With over 60 projects, this was absolutely no small feat, especially with just about every nearby business boarded up and the usual artist S.O.S. signals going off all the time. You never cease to amaze me, Brit.
Mural by Ali Bruce; Photo by Gabriel Martins
Anything you’re particularly excited about? (an artist story, wall location, neighbourhood, specific mural, etc)
I guess I’m supposed to say something diplomatic here like they’re all special in their own way. Which is a true but a very boring answer.On the design front, I’m really excited to have Fiona Ackerman on board with us again over at Arc’teryx on Burrard. Her ability to create naturalist forms with experimental textures and layer-building then paired with naive mark-making and textile design is really quite something. She’s managed to meld a collage of disparate aesthetics into a visual dialogue that clamours its way to resolve. What’s really exciting to see with this work is how she’s managing to authentically scale up. Many artists’ studio practices call for very specific materials and environments. When scaling up these requirements are replaced with a very different set of resources. This in turn often creates work that may be close to a facsimile of studio work but certain textures, marks, and blends may not be as genuine. Ackerman is an exception to this circumstance.
On the technical front, I’ve been waiting to engage with Animalitoland for over a year now. Graciela is a travelling artist, originally from Buenos Aires, who landed here in 2019 and will hopefully stick around for a while longer. She’s produced many walls internationally and has become a rockstar with her level of finish, complexity of designs, and technical ability with air-born paint. Artists who know how to work with a sprayer or aerosols have a special place in our curation brains. Every year there’s always a wall that is either big, high visibility, or both with a challenging texture. It’s artists with these skill sets that we hold close to our chest for these scenarios. So when her 3000sqft wood-slatted wall at 7 West 7th Ave came online, we knew just who to put on it.
Mural by Animalitoland; Photo by Gabriel Martins
After five years of curating for VMF is there anything that continues to surprise you each year?
Honestly on a macro level not really, aside from our decentralized 2020 direction. With 300+ projects under our belts, we’ve seen the spectrum of wins and losses. Does that mean I’m not shocked when a design is declined, paint is spilled, or an artist is being harassed? Of course I am. But managing these types of situations is something our organization does a stand-out job with.
I suppose as I’m writing this, I’m realizing that I am surprised and filled with pride by how our organization has built such a powerful support system internally. Because when there is a situation where I’m overwhelmed by something, there’s always someone there who can either coach me through it, or take it off my plate. We’ve gotten really good at understanding everyone’s role, workflow, superpowers and threshold. Sometimes someone can red-line and someone else with somewhat overlapping responsibilities can step in and support.
Do you have any advice for someone who would want to get into your line of work?
My super power as a curator and artistic director is that I speak multiple languages; artist and business. I’ve worked as a freelance creative for 10 years — I’m very familiar with translating the ethereal into ‘client speak’ and vice versa. Without concise mediation, either side can get carried away on creative, which could create instability on a project. Things to remember:Keep a written list. I write everything I need to do in one place, even the small stuff, ie. emails to respond to, meetings to make, things to calculate. You’ll experience an onslaught or requests and the small stuff can slip through the cracks. Then, you'll end up with a major root problem requiring you to rip up the floorboards and redo the plumbing or foundation. There are rats and spiders down here too. Exercise patience. During mural season, I’m met on the daily with a whole new set of extreme challenges, physical, emotional, and interpersonal.
When working on a southern facade, drink more water than you deem necessary and wear an obnoxious amount of sunscreen. The more insane you look, the better.
If you need something done, give it to a busy person.
You are the curator, not the artist. You are here to amplify and build an artist’s creative force.
Trust your client’s instincts. But not always. Trust your artist’s instincts. But not always.
Be prepared to go to battle for an idea without pronged words.
You are not god. Trust people sometimes. Be comfortable asking for help.
Be comfortable with saying ‘I don’t know’.
Listen.
But trust me on the sunscreen.
