Artist Interview: Tina Scepanovic

A R T I S T I N T E R V I E W TINA SCEPANOVIC

Tina uses historical finishes on modern forms to transform everyday objects into art. By honoring methods that date back to the Renaissance, her practice seeks to preserve a dying art form and bring awareness to the human behind our things. Her work is guided by the aspiration to reclaim the intention and integrity of traditional artisanship, and informed through the perspectives of science, music, and design. Each piece is a unique meditation that undergoes up to fifty surface manipulations performed entirely by hand.

Tell us a bit about yourself (Where are you from? Where do you live? How did you become an artist? Did you always want to be one?)

I was born and raised in Silicon Valley, surrounded by apple orchards and the buzz of tech. Growing up, I was always up to something. Whether it was extracting “ink” out of leaves in the backyard or gluing cork board into high heels, I had no trouble entertaining myself with whatever was within my reach. My parents would say endearingly, “你的花样很多—you are full of ideas. ”

I ended up majoring in Psychobiology at UCLA. While I took school very seriously, I also spent every ounce of free time composing and arranging music and painting. That should have been a clear sign that I was meant to do something creative with my life. Instead I launched a career in biotech consulting after graduating. It wasn’t until I moved to NYC and had my first child that I surrendered to that creative itch. I initially embarked on a path in music and pursued a Masters in Music Education at Columbia University. I ran a community choir for a few years before encountering a health issue that affected my voice. Unable to express myself using my instrument, I was pretty devastated.

On a whim I decided to enroll in a furniture painting workshop at the Isabel O’Neil Studio, an artisan community dedicated to historical finishes. When I picked up that brush in my first class, time stopped and the memories came flashing back. I remembered those countless hours I spent as a child drawing, coloring, conjuring, and tinkering. That’s when I realized maybe there was an artist in me this entire time.

What themes or ideas do you pursue in your work? I often explore extremes or opposites by merging them in a playful way. There is usually an element of bridging old and new. Even in my earlier days as a musician, I would reinterpret Italian arias as jazz tunes, or imagine the latest pop songs in SATB for choir. My artwork also strives to create a dialogue between modern and traditional. For example, I use techniques that date back to the Renaissance on contemporary forms. One of my underlying missions is to preserve this dying art form by appealing to a younger audience. I am also interested in capturing the passing of time visually. I am personally drawn to art that possesses an underlying obsessive quality. I find myself gazing in awe of how one person simply took the time. This concept can be translated in a number of ways — through depth of layers, repetition, scale, or detail. Finally, I am guided by the principle that you can create something magnificent from nearly nothing. I often attempt to exhaust a tiny concept, motif, shape, or idea—either through repetition or themes and variations—until a new meaning emerges.

Gobstoppers in Limestone Porphyry

Buttons No. 6 - completed in eggshell lacquer Are your works purely visual or do they also have a symbolic meaning?

There is usually a story I’m trying to tell and I ask how I might communicate those ideas visually. My Gobstoppers were inspired by the themes of lockdown when the rinse and repeat of daily life led to a blurring of time. I could no longer distinguish one moment from another. There was also a complete loss of personal space and I found myself craving boundaries. So there was this desire to impose some kind of structure and order in my life. I started iterating with different “rhythms” of life as I was experiencing them. My 5X6 piece was a play on our concept of one month being approximately 30 days. However, rather than four weeks of seven days consisting of five weekdays and the weekend, I omitted “weekends” altogether. At the time, we had suddenly lost the typical external references we relied on to make this distinction; no one was leaving home for work or school let alone getting dressed in the morning. I was delighted when someone picked up on this and interpreted my pieces as abstractions of calendars. As a whole, the series is meant to be somewhat humorous because I never get it right. Each composition is ultimately miscalculated, whether you’re thinking in terms of a week or a month. But the effort is clearly there, and I hope that conveys a sense of optimism.

Can you tell us about your process and materials?

My training is rooted in furniture so my base material is often wood. At times people ask if I can just slap two coats on something and call it done. The answer is no, unless I want it to look like I slapped two coats on it and called it done! In fact, depending on what I’m trying to achieve I sometimes need to manipulate an object over fifty times. For me, it’s never about finishing as fast as I can.

Mapping out spacing in 2-D

Eggshell lacquer technique I have two separate workflows: oil-based and water-based. The major difference is cure time. No matter what, all surfaces must be prepared. Raw wood is thirsty and behaves in a special way due to humidity and the presence of tannins. So the first steps require controlling absorption and isolating the possibility of distortion that comes with mechanical or chemical changes. I usually start with something that is alcohol or oil-based to seal the surface and prevent further raising of the grain. I then sand smooth. I’ve learned over time that the result is only as good as every layer before. Mistakes are never hidden—only enhanced.

I am then able to start lacquering. I build up colors with multiple thin coats and then wet sand to perfection. Even with a simple solid finish, there is always a bit of adding followed by a bit of taking away. I enjoy this mindful process as it provides windows for me to interact with the piece. So when you look closely, there’s evidence of the human hand. Sometimes I toss the brushes aside altogether and just use my hands. Base finishes can be pulled in an infinite number of ways to build depth and achieve different looks. I experiment with all kinds of materials in this stage — tar, gold, waxes, glazes, eggshells.

Tina inspecting a piece before install

Tell us about a typical day in the studio. After my kids are shuttled to school, I always make a cup of tea and do some meditative stretches. Then I come up with a game plan. My days are a puzzle in optimizing the best use of time and space. My square footage is limited, my materials have various cure times, and my pieces require different conditions depending on the stage they are in. Some call for ventilation, others call for a completely dust-free environment. I map this all out and figure out where to set everything up. I reserve the most brain-intensive activities for the first half of the day. Techniques like gilding or glazing have particularly high stakes and require me to be precise and totally “on. ” I spend afternoons prepping, sanding, catching up on administrative duties, and exploring new ideas. But I’m always fighting the clock. When 3PM rolls around, I pick up my kids from school and it is a bit harder to step back into the studio. However, they are pretty independent now so I often sneak back in there to complete a thing or two here and there. For example, if I’m gilding I might prepare the adhesive in the evening so it comes to tack in time for the next morning’s work.

Do you actively search for inspiration or wait for inspiration to find you? Either I am always looking, or inspiration always seems to find me! It is sort of a channel that is always turned on in my brain. For me, inspiration doesn’t always have to be visual. Sometimes I am inspired by sound, smell, or memory. Other times it can be purely technical. I frequently look at materials in nature and wonder how I might recreate them in my laboratory.

Lacquering in the carport

Would you say other artists or art genres have influenced your sense of aesthetics? If yes, how?

Music is a huge influence. I often think about rhythm, melody, harmony, and tension in visual terms. As for specific artists, Louise Nevelson comes to mind first. Her use of found wooden objects in massive assemblages resonates with my “trash to treasure” sensibility. I also love that she openly drew from her personal life to bring meaning to her pieces. The other artists that inspire me all seem to have straddled the fine arts and applied arts. Jean Dunand was not only a painter and sculptor but also a metal worker. He traded his metal skills for the expertise of lacquer artist Seizo Sugawara, and started using lacquered wood, eggshell, mother of pearl, and gold leaf in his creations.

Do you find artistic life lonely? What do you do to remedy this?

Buttons No. 5 in Malachite using oil, glazes, and lacquer At times I do find artist life lonely. I seem to operate on a pendulum between fine art and applied art, and while I believe there is fluidity and crossover between the two, I realize not everyone feels this way. So there’s a bit of imposter syndrome no matter where in the back and forth I am at any given moment, or who I’m speaking with. Of course, this could all just be in my head!

The other aspect is my practice borrows from a wide range of specialities, and sometimes I have to go digging to find the right community to bounce ideas off of. There’s the art and color theory and composition, but there’s also the technical side. I run into challenges all the time, and sometimes it can be related to woodworking or chemistry.

Thanks to social media I am gradually building a support network. I’ve connected with fellow artists, but also vendors and manufacturers across trades who are just a DM away when I get myself into trouble. Over the course of the past year, I also started scheduling 2-3 video studio meets every month to just get to know people and their practices. That has helped tremendously with the isolation.

How do you relax and recharge?

Believe it or not, I am the most relaxed and recharged when I work. However, being that my processes are generally slow, sometimes I fall into the trap of overthinking. About two years ago, I started interjecting spontaneous “improvisations” into my practice. Every few weeks, I give myself 20 minutes to complete a project from start to finish. I call this speed making. I’m not allowed to plan nor overthink. It’s sort of like those food competitions where they announce the dish and then the chefs scramble to grab whatever is in sight to accomplish their goal. For me, it means I snatch any materials sitting around me— acrylics, paper, trash, glue, scissors—and start tearing them up and going at it. I find this is the best way to bypass the brain and open a direct channel between the heart and hand.

What is your dream project?

I can currently only speak to the structure and scope of the dream but the details of what I want to explore and express are not yet entirely clear. At the top of my list are either a huge public art commission, or working on an architectural structure that will be standing hundreds of years from now. Maybe it is foolish to be concerned with legacy, but I always marvel at the work of artisans that came before me and feel the need to leave something behind too. I want to create something that just takes up a ton of space!

Freshly shellacked spheres Three kinds of metal leaf - copper, gold, and silver

Tell us a bit about the future (any plans, projects, news). I am currently working on a series that diverges a bit from my recent body of work. It is a modern play on historical motifs. I am toying with the idea of going very large scale, but before I dive in I am testing the concept on smaller prototypes. I am simultaneously using this opportunity to do research and development behind the scenes, as I have been wanting to replace some of my oil-based processes with water-based ones. If all goes well, the project will take me around six months to complete. I am also collaborating with a couple interior designers to create custom furniture and lighting pieces for their clients. What is really exciting here is there is a shared interest in borrowing historical methods to use on contemporary forms. We will likely use eggshell lacquer on a console and a porphyry finish on the lighting. Finally, I’m building a personal studio in our home. For years I didn’t feel ready to give myself this gift of a dedicated work space, but now, having outgrown my NYC studio and lined up a number of ongoing projects, there is no reason to hold back. For the first time in my life, I get to build a space around me! I am excited for the opportunity to grow my practice in both the number of projects I take on and the scale of my artwork.

Porphyry gobstopper

More about Tina: Website: www.tinascepanovic.com Instagram: tinascepanovic