For the first six month of 2022 I was working on a large scale commission for the lobby of Two Allen Center in Houston, TX. I worked closely with Kimberly Landa and Kinzelman Art consultants to make it happen. below is an interview I did with them about the project.
KAC ARTIST Q&A
Over the course of the past year, Kinzelman Art Consulting has partnered with Brookfield Properties to select an artist to commission a custom work for their newly renovated lobby in Two Allen Center located in Downtown, Houston.
"The lobby of Two Allen Center is a central location for Allen Center, making this an important moment to engage campus employees and visitors. Working with Kinzelman Art Consulting made for a smooth process from art direction to development and final installation. We are pleased to feature this original piece as a new focal point in the lobby, and thank KAC for helping to bring this vision to life. Caitlin Teal perfectly captured the essence of the space."
-Tyler Merritt, Vice President, Asset Management
The artist, Caitlin Teal Price from Washington DC, was selected to fulfill the commission of a large work to be placed in the reception area of the Two Allen Center building. Caitlin traveled to Houston this month to meet the KAC team and install her site-specific work. We sat down with Caitlin to ask about her working process and experience with the commission.
Artist Caitlin Teal Price at Two Allen Center
[KL]: How did you arrive to your unique working process?
[CTP]: I believe it was in 2017 when I started working out the scratch drawings. Previously, I made most of my work away from home and out in the world. But by 2017 I was in the middle of a life transition, and more confined to my studio. I tried a number of ways to satisfy a new studio workflow, but it wasn’t until I started using an X-ACTO blade to etch into my photographic prints that I found my flow. The marks were very crude at first and I was unsure that it would work. But it turns out that I really enjoy the process, so I kept at it. The work has evolved and continues to evolve over time and with each piece. Now I use photographs with strong compositions as the jumping off point for the etched abstractions that I work into the print. I also now use different X-ACTO blades with varying degrees of dullness to get the variation in the marks that I make. From conception to completion each work takes over a month to create.
The Artist's studio in Washington DC
[KL]: Your process is so labor intensive and must require a lot of patience. Would you say it’s meditative? Stressful? Give us some insight into the mental/emotional aspect of your practice.
[CTP]: I would say that it is both meditative and stressful and sometimes confusing and often fun and satisfying. The work takes so long to make that I have a range of emotions when I’m in the middle of it. Before I start the piece, I figure out a general plan. I make a smaller study of the work and use it as a kind of map that I can reference as I make the full-size work. I expect the work to evolve and change from the original plan, so I leave myself open to that. As I work on the final piece, I need to be aware of what marks I am making, and I need to be able to anticipate what’s next. This technique of scratching into the print is unforgiving. I cannot undo the marks, so I need to be careful and deliberate when I make them. I find that its trouble when I get too lost in thought so most of the time, I am pretty focused. Because each piece requires such long periods of sitting or standing with the work, I listen to podcasts and music to keep me company.
TYart installing Caitlin's work in the Two Allen Center lobby.
[KL]: What made you decide on this particular composition and coloration for this project?
[CTP]: When figuring out the composition for this piece, I was thinking about the space it was going to hang and who was going to occupy that space. The placement of the tryptic is above the reception desk at Two Allen Center in a large, sunny, open, beautiful room connecting the three Allen Center buildings. It is a space where people pass though busily from one meeting to the next but also pause to recharge. It is a space of energy and of rest. I wanted the piece to reflect that by suggesting movement and ambition as the shapes rise and reach out of a place of rest. The blue works are a mirror of one another suggesting community and cooperation. The orange piece bridges and connects the left and right and reads as has both weighted and light at the same I chose the colors blue and orange because when combined they are energetic and surprising while at the same time familiar and comforting.
Caitlin Teal Price's site specific commission, "Untitled (reach to rest)" in Two Allen Center.
[KL]: What was your experience like collaborating with KAC?
[CTP]: It was amazing to have the opportunity to collaborate with KAC! When working on a commission, especially of this scale, it is so important that the vision of the artist is supported and trusted, and I love that Kimberly and Julie put that trust in me.
They supported me through the entire process and gave me the freedom to make the work that I envisioned, and I cannot thank them enough for that!