Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Alex Vlasov. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Alex, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today We’d love to hear the backstory behind a risk you’ve taken – whether big or small, walk us through what it was like and how it ultimately turned out.

I ruminate quite a lot on this. I think taking a risk means going against culture and the established norms. The moment you decided to become an artist is your first risk. Because for a lot of people, it is not a very normal path. So, since the first day of being an artist, you are dealing with risk. It is almost like playing video poker at the airport in Las Vegas, who knows what’s going to happen next?

Then, you decide to get your degree in Studio Art and everyone says, “You are out of your mind.” But still, you’re willing to take such a wager. Isn’t that romantic?

Christian Wulffen would come to my studio in undergrad, and frequently pose the question – “How can you make a painting without making a painting?” Thinking outside the box also means taking a risk.

One of my favorite artists of all time Michael Asher would do such crazy things but with his work there is nothing to own, which I admire. Asher was willing to take the risk of not living off his work, but rather challenging the boundaries of art his entire life.

You go to your studio and ask yourself frequently how to keep the work vital as well as challenging for yourself and the viewer. Your studio is not really a store in Disneyland, it is where you take many risks.

I think overall taking a risk means when everyone goes one way, you have to follow the opposite path. And at some point, you are hooked on risk. It’s like gambling. Everything you do as a visual artist poses very long odds, but still, nothing can stop you. In relation to art specifically, it is quite an extraordinary thing because you put your entire life on the card table.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I am a visual artist who holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting from the Cleveland Institute of Art.

How I got into art is not a very traditional way. Lots of people want to be an artist from a very young age. But in my case, I realized that when I was twenty-four.

My early art education comes from going to art museums in New York and staring for hours at paintings of Philip Guston, Agnes Martin, Jackson Pollock, et al. That’s when I probably learned how to look. When you stand in front of a painting for forty minutes, crazy stuff happens.

Later, I went to a small community college in Maine because I had to stay away from New York in order to get myself together. I took a course called “Intro to Visual Arts” with Michael Branca and had a blast. In Maine, I came across the work of Brice Marden and realized that the scribbles I’ve been doing up to that point have some potential. I also read the journals of Keith Haring for the first time. You know, Maine was really a transformative place for me. There is nothing to do besides nature, books, and art. That’s where I finally found myself in life.

After Maine, I transferred my credits to the Cleveland Institute of Art. When I arrived in Cleveland, I thought – “Well, if paradise exists, this is it.” I studied there with incredible artists and teachers who influenced me in many ways. I think Cleveland is a perfect town to go to art school. It has a very robust art community. Plus, you can make work without too many distractions.

In terms of what kind of work I create… Lately, I’ve been making paintings out of construction materials that I compose and recompose in a different manner. The work functions on the slippage between image and abstraction. While the formal elements are abstract, the paintings still hold representational qualities and associations. But, of course, in the end, what you are looking at are just cement boards with swaths of paint on top of it. So, in that sense, I am really interested in how painting operates. As a painter who deals with the language of abstraction, it is clear to me now that the form cannot be reinvented. But what you can do is you can develop your own visual vocabulary that is based on the aspects of painting language. I believe that’s the only way to reinvestigate the history of abstraction, what is at stake, and what can be constructed as reality. That is when the existential question comes in because people have constantly been thinking about the meaning of it all. My paintings are about questioning everything instead of providing some resolution.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

Well, I think being an artist means dealing with resilience almost every day. Because if you made a decision to be an artist, you set yourself up for failure and difficulties. You know that you will fail and most likely for a long time, but still, you persist to go no matter what. And looking back at my journey so far, it is a story of resilience.

Specifically, when you have a disagreement with the direction of contemporary painting like I do. You know, at this point, I could probably collage at least a gigantic painting out of all the rejection letters that I got. But it’s alright because it doesn’t work with me that way. I do not care. I don’t have self-doubt. To give you a concrete example. For instance, three or four months ago, I got a rejection letter from Yale. I looked at it and said to myself, “Wonderful. When in fifteen years they will ask me to give their students a lecture, I am going to start my lecture by showing them this letter.”

The trends come and go. It is all temporary. But if you still resiliently move forward and make work, eventually success will come. It’s all in art history books.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

I think success in painting is how you inspire others. Obviously, I am not making paintings for myself. I don’t think about myself at all. Genuinely, I am not the happiest person in this world, but it doesn’t matter what troubles me or whatever gloomy mood I might be in. When I paint – I paint, and I do it with an abundance of optimism, playfulness, and gush of joy. Because I have a responsibility that I carry as an artist. I cannot make people sad or heartbroken when they look at my work. It is not about me when people look at my paintings. It is about them and what they take away from it.

But it is also crucial to understand that I am not trying to put a pair of pink sunglasses over people’s eyes. While being optimistic, my paintings are very much realistic. Because where the optimism exists, there is also hope. And if there is hope that means a realistic acknowledgement of the present is there.

So, hope is important. While my paintings don’t go out there to make friends, like it or hate it, those paintings stand for what they are. They are paintings full of playfulness, optimism, and hope. You take it all and go forward.

I am a humanist. I believe in humans. But I think there is a lack of optimism and hope in this world. And feasibly, I can contribute in this regard with my work.    

Contact Info:

• Website: avlasov.com
• Instagram: alexey_esenin

Image Credits
Adrian Holt, Jordi Rowe