We recently connected with Jennifer Printz and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Jennifer thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.

Like a lot of others I learned my creative craft through a combination of former education and then figuring things out on my own. I had great professors at both the undergraduate and graduate level and learned a lot from them about drawing and printmaking from them. Early on my education, I was surrounded by upper level students who took their work seriously and I drew a lot of inspiration from them and starting spending lots of time in the studio.

Although it takes time to learn the technical aspect of any art form, I think it takes more time for most of us to learn to listen to ourselves. We start by creating for others and make work that is more about the expectations of a teacher, partner, or peer than following our own voice or creative desires. I wish I had started doing that sooner, but I am not sure I could have. Once I was able to trust myself, my work became much stronger because it became mine.

Even when my work takes different forms, as it has in recent years, there are the threads of what I want my practice to be about that connect each and every piece. They are made with a specific care and concern for the time and energy of the work which comes from a decision I made years ago to work from a hopeful meditative place in order to give that back to my viewers.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

I am visual artist and the work that I am making now began in 2014. I was completing a large scale mural and had a few weeks to prepare for an artist residency in Malta. In the process of working outside, I found myself asking questions. Like stars at noon, what else is there that I cannot see in the world around me? What holds up the clouds and organizes the universe at large?

I printed out photographs I had been taking for years of the sky overhead and packed them in my suitcase and portfolio for the trip to Malta. Once there inspired by the unfamiliar environment where I could almost constantly see the sky meet the sea and Baroque architecture, I began drawing obsessive patterns on top of inkjets of photographs I had taken of the sky over my home in Virginia. I began exploring the questions I had asked myself back in the states and answered them via the drawing process.

That summer I made tiny delicate graphite marks with a .05mm mechanical pencil. When I returned I continued this investigation going deeper and researching science, through an historic and contemporary lens to see how it explains the world around us. As a university professor, I also started team teaching a class with a physicist that explored how art and physics can be intermixed and from there I have never looked back. I continue to make works that combine photography with drawing and printmaking and in the past two years, I have started to also incorporate textiles into my work.

The prolonged touch of my hand then and now establishes an intrinsic presence in each piece reflective of the movements of my body and visceral energies. Ultimately these pieces are meditations that reflect past moments of the photographic documentation and the deliberate drawing or printing process. These pieces then are like the sky: still filled with mysteries and a vast sense of history.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

First and foremost, I feel we need to support art educator at all levels. A population who has never learned about art or who has never gone to a museum or gallery will not support artists. When art educator is not within our elementary, middle and high schools, our general population will see it as unimportant and an unnecessary element rather than something that enriches life and supports our society at large.

Beyond that it would be ideal, if every municipal government had a percent for the arts program that was used to place art within public and private buildings and to support public art of all types.

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

Like many of my age, I had to unlearn the lesson of working too much. Early on in my career, I would work all the type and I barely slept. It was like a badge of honor to stay up until 2 or 3Am working. I ate terribly, and did not take care of my physical health. I felt I always had to do more and be more. Ultimately I burnt out. The breaking point came when I was in bed listening to my now ex-husband and dog snore. I started yelling at them both – how could they sleep? It is funny to think about now (well for me, I am not sure if he finds it funny even now) but it is a reminder of all that I was doing wrong. And the poor dog definitely didn’t deserve to be yelled at!

Change started for me with going to the gym. The regular discipline of exercise can transform one’s body, energy levels and then suddenly everything else. I also started using a planner – I mean religiously using a planner – to schedule time to workout, relax, as well as work. All of this has made a massive change in my life quality. I know see I am more creative and productive when I take care of my body and spirit.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.jenniferprintz.com
• Instagram: @jenniferdprintz
• Linkedin: Jennifer Printz

Image Credits
Mateo Serna Zapata