We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Summer Tomes a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Summer, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. What were some of the most unexpected problems you’ve faced in your career and how did you resolve those issues?

I think one of the biggest shocks coming out of art school and into the art world is the lack of time you once had. For me, I have several jobs. I work as a curator at a gallery in downtown Chattanooga and a preschool teacher at a Montessori school so between all of these other obligations making time for my practice became more and more difficult. It weighed heavily on my confidence as an artist and made me begin to question if I was even able to call myself an artist. However, in order to make art about activities you’re passionate about you must partake in those activities and actually live your life. When I took a step back and started evaluating how these other jobs and responsibilities have impacted my career as an artist I felt myself enjoying my time in the studio more and feeling less pressure to make forced work.

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

My name is Summer Tomes and I am an interdisciplinary artist indulging in painting, drawing, ceramics, and fiber art. I grew up in Memphis, Tennessee in a family that valued art and the creative process. My mother put me and my three sisters in classes such as soap making classes, ceramic classes, and even a few painting classes. My father is a pianist so music also had a great influence on me as I grew up and still acts as a huge inspiration for me when I enter my studio. I became passionate about making work in high school and started visiting galleries in Memphis. I took a drawing class at The Memphis College of Art my senior year of high school. I received my BFA in Painting and Drawing at The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga and I still live in Chattanooga today. In college I experimented with materials and was particularly interested in imaginary worlds and creatures and how this imagery could relate to my own journey in creating a healthy mental space. My studio time became ritualistic and was important to use when processing information I had learned in therapy and support groups. After college I became fascinated with ceramics and the natural feel that came with working with clay. It takes a lot of patience and physical strength to work with clay so I once again found it therapeutic but in a more tactical and hands on sense. I am still working in many mediums and I’m not sure that that will ever change as I am and constantly curious about how something is made. I often, ignorantly, believe I can master a craft once I’ve watched a ten minute youtube video on it. Obviously, that’s not true, but this curiosity is so powerful for my practice as I never get bored learning new crafts and the history behind them. This is what I am most proud of within my practice. I sometimes feel insecure that I don’t have one medium to call my own, but through the repetition of imagery I can make my work feel cohesive even as I bounce from medium to medium.

What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?

I feel like being an artist or just generally a creative person is incredibly rewarding n so many ways. It’s also interesting because I feel as though there are people who I have met who believe that they do not possess a creative bone in their body but they engage in activities such as scrap booking or sewing/ knitting and I wish they’d give themself more credit. I think that is what is so rewarding about being a creative; the ability to take something that is seen as a craft or a domestic practice and altering the perception of that into what I would consider art. A lot of my practice is based in craft practices. I make fiber art which has a long history of domesticity and I see that as a huge strength of the medium. I love being able to re-appropriate a practice that has long been seen as a hobby or something to not take seriously and putting it on this pedestal, literally, to evoke its value. I think a lot about my grandmother passed away recently at eighty-two years old. I was never that close with her, but my dad showed me her scrap books and I was enamored with them. She never considered herself an artist as far as I know, but her dedication to her archival practice would prove otherwise in my opinion. She saved the “To:” and “From:” stickers from every gift she received and meticulously pasted them into these hand bound journals. She began this practice when she was probably eight or nine and continued it for decades. It was so rewarding to see her in this new light. It makes me thankful to see the value she put on her objects and inspired me to see something mundane as a work of art if contextualized. So, I would say one of the most rewarding things about being an artist is to be able to see the potential in quite literally anything.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

While I am still emerging as an artist, I feel as though time and time again I have had to overcome a lot of self-doubt and negative self-talk within my creative journey. One example of my resilience as an artist is my ability to create opportunities for myself. For example, while in undergrad at The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, a previous professor of mine named Raquel Mullins reached out to me discussing a show at her new gallery. She was interested in having some of my work in a show titled “Touch.” I was honored to have even been thought of, but after that show I immediately asked to intern at the gallery and learn how a contemporary gallery operates. I was there to install for each show and this gave me the opportunity to meet so many artists from all stages in their careers. After about a year, she asked me to join her curatorial collective and essentially run the gallery with a team of three other artists. It was such an incredible feeling to be seen for the work and dedication I had put into this gallery and now I can proudly say that I curate shows for Wavelength Space in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Since then, I have stuck my neck out and interned at several other spaces in Chattanooga such as ArtsBuild and Scenic City Clay Arts and it’s all because I dedicated myself to engaging with other spaces in this city and had an innate interest to become a pat of this community.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: summertomes_studio
• Other: Email: [email protected]