Guest Editor Profile – lisa young kutsukake

lisa young kutsukake

Between Toronto and Chicago
Web presence: I don’t much want one. If asked politely, I will mail a catalogue with a nice letter.

I work on two projects at a time. One will be in the research and collection stage, the other will be at the fabrication stage, which means it’s on autopilot. Organization of space needs to be tender to both poles. I am an organized worker. Ant. And slow. Turtle. And mostly work on a cool to the touch studio floor while sitting on newspaper to keep my bum warm. Cat.

Twirl left for research. Twirl right for fabrication.

I hate messes. Visual noise is distressing. Now, I keep materials categorized and stacked in jars, boxes, sometimes bowls, but out of sight. Everything is listed and itemized. I know where everything is at every moment. That way I don’t have to see it. If there’s a system I can forget about extraneous information. I like empty sightlines in my workspace. I like being near the horizon line between the white floor and white walls. Tabula Rasa. The work day/night isn’t done until any visible mess has been incorporated into the project. I keep a single box for disorganized stuff to fiddle and play with if I’m having trouble concentrating on any given day.

It never happens the same way twice.

A first edition Julia Kristeva novel, complete with an intelligent conversation between two in the margins.