They say 'home is where the heart is' - with an appreciation for color and perspective, artist Lisa Ashinoff uses her practice as a means to create order and form by exploring the unspoken dialogues between the architectural stylings of America's most iconic design movements. For Ashinoff, a central part of her inspiration harkens back to childhood.
"I grew up in a chaotic household. Intuitively I was drawn to build constructs of ordered landscapes that gave me a feeling of space. My art empowered me to bring calm inside my home.”
"I grew up in a chaotic household. Intuitively I was drawn to build constructs of ordered landscapes that gave me a feeling of space. My art empowered me to bring calm inside my home.”
Square One Gallery got the chance to take a look behind the curtain and speak to Ashinoff about her studio practice, and how she puts the puzzle pieces together to create her landmark works.
Your work tends to feature prominent architectural styles and plays off symmetry, balance and a combination of hues to produce an incredible visual. Could you tell us more about some of the specific locations or any architecture featured in the pieces?
I love interpreting mid-century houses from prominent architects into my style and letting their proportions and shapes shine new again. How boring would our world be with all the same houses? In my recent piece "Hayworth " I chose a funky dingbat to glamorize as my focal in the painting. Below is a description of a typical dingbat. My title is an homage to the district.
I love interpreting mid-century houses from prominent architects into my style and letting their proportions and shapes shine new again. How boring would our world be with all the same houses? In my recent piece "Hayworth " I chose a funky dingbat to glamorize as my focal in the painting. Below is a description of a typical dingbat. My title is an homage to the district.
"The Hayworth Dingbat Apartment Historic District consists of 18 two-story multi-family residences along a single block of Hayworth Avenue between Melrose Avenue and Clinton Street. These multi-family residences display the features typical of the dingbat apartment building, including flat or nearly flat roofs, stucco exteriors, aluminum-frame windows, and minimal exterior decoration applied to the street-facing elevation. The buildings occupy the full depth of their lots, accommodating between six and ten residential units each. They have little or no landscaping; the dominant visual feature is the open carport."
California historian Leonard Pitt once wrote that “the dingbat typifies Los Angeles apartment building architecture at its worst.” - I wanted to take a piece of low-quality architecture and make it beautiful. In my painting Camino, the bottom right house is a tribute to a Palmer and Krisel house in Palm Springs on East Apache Road.
Could you tell us a bit more about your "ordered landscapes' and how you choose your layouts to portray these scenes?
My compositions begin when a single house pulls me in. I start by designing a collection of six or more houses when creating a series of work. Each series tends to have an architectural style, level of detail, or vibe I’m being pulled towards. Usually there is a relationship between two houses that I want to explore. When I’m working on a big piece with five or six houses, I tend to move and sub the houses around till there is a strong focal, a flow, the right amount of negative space and what I consider “an interesting conversation.” Finding the last house in my bigger compositions can be like a jigsaw puzzle. I obsess over the angles, complexity and uniqueness that will be most complimentary to the composition. Throughout my design process I build in the landscaping and the structures, considering the opportunities I will need to balance the color. I love pattern play. I love finding the right organic shapes of trees and shrubs. And I love funking things up. Once I’m happy with a composition, I work out the color palette. When the composition has the right elements and right colors there is hum that I can feel. There are many iterations that just don’t hum before landing on my final composition.
Are there any artists or artistic movements that have influenced / shaped your work? And how does your earliest work compare to your current body?
My earliest work compared to my current work shared my interest in exploring spacial relationships via color and line. The fascination began with a tribute to a Paul Klee painting “Highways and Byways.” My work quickly evolved, utilizing more geometric shapes and architectural elements. My process has become more sophisticated and neurotic. This has allowed for a finer level of detail and a higher level of craftsmanship. I would credit the Bauhaus as being the most influential artistic movement on my work. As a self reflection, I see my earlier work reflecting my curiosity and busy brain. I see my current work revealing a calmer and more orderly self.
Could you give us some insight into your daily studio practice? What a typical day in the studio would look like?
A typical day in the studio starts with putting away yesterday’s brushes, getting my paint-mixing stand set up (scaffolding I wheel around the room to follow the light) and staring at my progress. I love lists and decision maps to keep me focused. On a good day I will spend the entire daylight hours mixing paint and hopefully get 4 or 5 globs of color done. By the sunset hours when my arm is tiring, I will start applying the colors one by one, and work till dinner time or bedtime. There is almost always music playing and my dog Anderson sleeping somewhere precariously. During the mixing hours, swatches of paint are scraped and painted on and off, over and over, till I achieve the exact color I like. After the colors are mixed, I wrap up my backup paint to save as touch up packets.
Who is your favorite current living artist?
I can’t pick just one, that’s too hard. Does any artist have just one favorite? Two of my of my current favorite living artists are Jules de Balincourt and Guy Yanai. Also, I’m a Hockney and Fischl fan.
Any advice for practicing artists?
My advice for practicing artists is to forget the rules and find out what makes you excited, pursue it hard, and keep creating. Learning and evolving come from creating the work. Every artist has a unique story and talent so there is no need to worry what someone else is doing. Be your own weird.
Aug 26, 2024
