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The first time I saw a HUMAN FIVE show was last winter at Antisocial - a Vancouver art gallery/skateshop. That show was a rare experience, somehow it made me feel art can be accessible not only to typical art collectors, but to pretty much anyone. Their work is unpretencious, eclectic and very real, it radiates a fun positivity that seems warm and is easy to relate to. On a rare sunny spring day in Vancouver, Mike Swaney, one third of HUMAN FIVE, invited me to his home studio where we talked about art, life and HUMAN FIVE. EM: Who's Human Five? MIKE: Simon Redekop, Jaret Penner, and me EM: How did you guys meet? MIKE: Simon and I went to school together. We started to be influenced by the same artists, and started working together at school. In the beginning, we were influenced by a lot of illustrators, but basically we graduated and started HUMAN FIVE in order to promote our illustrations in the beginning; and Jaret graduated a year after us. Simon and I knew him from school, but just as an acquaintance. After he graduated, he started working with us, We asked him to join HUMAN FIVE with us, and promote HUMAN FIVE all together. After he joined us, I guess you can say we began our infatuation with fine art. We realized that illustration is not what cracks up to be. Not enough personal satisfaction and point blank, people telling you what to do. Every artist goes thru that. EM: What was your first project together? MIKE: First project I remember doing was Bubble Gallery at Blinding Light Cinema. They have this bubble gum dispenser that Jason McLean curates. We painted 50 fabric swatches each, just like faces of people, and their favorite food written on them underneath them, so there were 150 fabric swatches, and they were 3 inches by 3 inches square, and we just folded them up and put them in bubbles. And they were a dollar each. EM: How was the response from that show? MIKE: It was good. It was pretty much the first introduction of HUMAN FIVE as a collective into the art world, and after that people started to click and see our stuff on the streets little more, and realizing where we were coming from. EM: Who are your biggest supporters in your art? MIKE: Supporters? I guess my friends, besides Simon and Jaret. That's definitely my main drive to do something in this city, so my friends can see it, and they can say I saw that piece you put up or whatever. EM: You guys are getting lot of recognition in Vancouver and in the States as well, how do you feel about that? MIKE: I guess more people know about us now. But in a way, when you become known, faster you become forgotten. 'Cause this age is such a gluttonous fickle age as far as media and pop culture goes. People just wait for the next new thing. They want to know it or they can say they know it and are aware of it. They interview you, and tell people all about you. Once everyone knows about you and summarizes you, that's the time for the next person, the next new thing. So in a way I don't care much about being known to lot of people. So, Hello evilmonito! (laughs) EM: Yeah, it's like break dance phenomenon in the early 80's. Lots of b-boys got exploited the shit out of it when it was hot, and they were quickly forgotten, and I see Graffiti is heading towards that direction. MIKE: Yeah, people riding the wave, and getting on the bandwagon. Like 80's music right now. People who never grew up listening to it, now do because it is supposed to be the in thing to do. |
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EM: How do you decided to display your art in a show/gallery? I sense that the display is as important as your art itself? MIKE: First, we look at the space and compare to the art we prepared for the show. Then we kinda find the pieces that go well beside each other, and then we paint the walls. Paint the compositional shapes onto the wall to break up the space, and then that acts as a backdrop for a piece to go on. Most of time, we don't like putting pieces on a blank white wall, because we see so much potentials of what you can with a wall. But I like the white space in galleries as well, but we are just fascinated with flattening angular space, like making a round curve go across the corner, so it messes up your eyes, and it flattens that corner. Another thing is that we are really fascinated with outdoor environmental placement, Almost in a way we are creating that indoor. EM: Yeah, that relates to the next question. Do you think your indoor art, as in gallery exhibitions, is an extension of your street/outdoor art? MIKE: We take materials, found objects and bring them inside, nostalgic to outdoor art, I guess. There is a whole bunch of people doing that. It's not like we are doing any next shit, but there is a way we do our indoor art by incorporating the outdoor looking stuff, but not sacrificing integrity of outdoor stuff, so we let it be known that it is in a gallery, and it is in a totally different arena, but we like to have it rough just like the outdoor. I don't think it's right to take exactly what you do in public/outdoor forum and put it into a gallery, like doing a graffiti piece on canvas and putting in a gallery. Because it is like allowing the gallery to make money off an art work that they would consider trash or shun if it was on the side of their building, and it is ok now because it is in a gallery and on a pretty canvas. EM: Are your parents artists? MIKE: My mom is. She makes clay dolls. She always drew since I can remember. She was definitely a inspiration to me when I was younger. EM: What do you think about commercialization of Graffiti and street art in general? MIKE: In certain areas, it can be good because I'd rather see that if it's done properly than some cheesy stale design. I think a lot of graffiti influenced art has a nice design aesthetic that other people can't achieve. So certain companies that are somewhat affiliated with or come from that area(graffiti) can profit off of it, but not exploit it. EM: What aspects of street art that interests you? MIKE: Just the fact that you can interupt someone's life with an accent on the street, and that they won't know anything about it when they see it, but they might reflect on their own lives or even learn little about the artist who've created it. It might shock some sense into people, and it might get them out of their daily monotonous routine. Graffiti was what started me to be interested in the streets. EM: Is it excited for you to create it(in the street)? Is that part of why you do it? MIKE: Yeah, I mean it's somehow addictive. You just keep going back even if the piece gets painted over it. You don't let it get you bummed out. Maybe you get disturbed for a sec, but then you do it again, and put up more stuff. EM: Street art could be transient, as in it could be gone the next day. MIKE: Yeah, it's temporary, and that's probably what I like about it. EM: Yeah, I think that's why it's problematic when you put a graffti piece in a gallery because that transient quality is gone once it's in that space. MIKE: Yeah, you've taken away that temporary aspect of street art. If you see it on the street, then you take a photo of it because that's what all you gonna have, and that's why it's so valuable. I want people to understand what we(HUMAN FIVE) do is not graffti. Graffti started as one thing, and we are motivated by the act of putting art in the street. |
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EM: What are you working on right now? MIKE: We are painting some skateboard decks for Skull Skates, for their anniversary party. We also do graphics for Capita Snowboard. I'm painting everyday for a landscape show, coming up this summer EM: Many artists and designers are coming up with limited edition pieces. What do you think about the limited craziness? MIKE: It's saturated and boring. I told my friend about our 100 limited posters for our last show, and she was like, "You call that limited? Limited means less than five." I think It's an easy way to get people to scoop up the product, so people can say they have one out of how many there are. It's like filling up their cool quota. There were actually many cool things before everyone started doing it. Like when I first saw people doing limited stuff, it made really curious, but now everyone's doing it, and I think it discredits people from the beginning who did it for the right reason. EM: What kind of materials do you use to create your pieces? MIKE: Right now, we've been painting on woods like doorskin, with acrylics, and wallpaper, creating a texture surface, and using sewing as well. EM: Having original art on the wall is so much better than having a replica or posters on the wall. MIKE: Toughest dilemma is just that people who wanna buy our art are our friends who are young and don't have deposable income . I've give up tons of my works, but there comes a point when you have to value what you do. You have to make a decision that this is what I do for a living, and I just can't give the out for free. I think my friends understand that. EM: How about your involvement with Capita Snowboard? MIKE: I do graphics for Capita once a year. Probably the best snowboard company that I could work for. They let me do whatever I want creative wise. They just let us do whatever we want. They are one of the reasons why we started to emerge as HUMAN FIVE. Basically Jason Brown, who started Capita, was following our street art, and he met us when we were taking down one of our shows. He wanted us to be part of Capita team. He told us that he wanted to incorporate our street painting into their work, and it was on. I think it's a revolutionary company in a sense that they let us have full creative control. They try to challenge people with different graphics that don't cater to average joe. More of HUMAN FIVE at www.humanfive.com and www.capitasnowboarding.com
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