Gillespie: Well, there are a lot of things I hope to get out of an exhibition like that. I hope that people like the work naturally. I hope that they think that it’s of quality. I don’t want anybody to think that I just phoned it in, or just gave them something stupid. The Giant Robot is a pretty good place. It’s a place that I really like and I respect. So, I’m super honored to be there. In college I worked for the university library system, and after college, I worked for the city library system. And on my breaks I read Giant Robot magazine, and I would think to myself, “Oh, this would be super sweet if I got to see the gallery,” let alone show there. I didn’t really expect to show there. And then just kind of as a fluke, a friend of mine in the East Bay was talking to the director at Giant Robot and it was a drawing show, and naturally, that’s what I was working on. And they said, “Oh, you should look at this guy’s website.” And one thing led to another. And this was last year. This was my first time there. So, I’m really excited to show there, daydreaming at the library a few years ago, just even visiting Giant Robot let alone being there.
Gillespie: Then also, you hope you sell stuff so you can pay the rent, you know?
Rumpus: Right.
Gillespie: And I’m extremely uncomfortable when it comes to money. Like super uncomfortable when it comes to money.
Rumpus: So who handles that for you?
Gillespie: Oh man. In the old days my wife used to do it. When I have shows, people would be like, “Oh, I wanna buy that painting.” And I’m saying, “I’m sorry you have to go talk to Alisa. I totally cannot talk to you about this. You know, but thank you,” is what I would say. And now fortunately, the more that you’re around, the higher quality of the galleries you show at, then they take care of it. I don’t have to deal with that. And then, eventually, when you get representation, then you never have to think about that again.
Rumpus: That’s one ideal.
Gillespie: Yeah, that’s one ideal. Exactly.
Rumpus: I gathered from your aversion to cars and phones that maybe you would have preferred living in pre-industrial times.
Gillespie: Yeah, I don’t know because I am computer crazy. I am laptop bananas. And I make these videos on it, and I don’t want an iPhone, but I would love an iTouch. Like if I could have the Internet at my disposal constantly, yeah, I now surprise myself ’cause I didn’t use to be like that.
Rumpus: So, the Internet because you have access to information, you get to play around?
Gillespie: Yeah I love too much information. I’m way into that. I remember when I was in school, I took a graphic design class. When I first went to college, they were still teaching both hand graphic design and computer graphic design. It was like a weird this-era-was-over, this-era-was-starting. And so a lot of the graphic design classes I took, you’re painting and coloring things by hand and then not using any sort of computers or PhotoShop. The first graphic design class I took, I just had a horrible time and it really turned me off. But since then, I’ve taught myself PhotoShop and all these video editing programs and things. So, I guess if I want to know how to do it, then I’m willing to try, but otherwise, I’m kind of a dinosaur sometimes.
Rumpus: So, you like the ongoing education from the Internet?
Gillespie: I mean it’s a means to an end. Initially, I identified myself so much as a painter and that’s such an old medium. And, particularly now, even in drawing, that’s even older than that. So, I am pretty aware of that type of work. And so it was really contrary to sit at a computer all day. But now I love sitting on a computer all day.
Rumpus: America always gets a bad rap, probably rightfully so, for having an under-appreciation of the arts in general. And it seems to me that it would be just an uphill battle to try and make a living as an artist here. Or maybe that’s just always been true.
Gillespie: Well, where I’m from, it’s a super uphill battle to be an artist. I mean, there’s not any really major galleries in Nebraska. I mean there are some really quality places, but it’s nothing like here, or obviously, in New York. So, it’s sort of like living in an art bubble, which on one hand is totally awesome because it’s very supportive within that bubble and within those confines of your community. And then you get out and you lose that sense of community. You know, I had a kind of a culture shock when I moved here, because everything is so spread out and different, and I didn’t really know how to work in that.
Rumpus: A friend of yours has said he suspects much of your artwork is “a manifestation of your encounters with the uncontrollable world.” Is that off the wall? How much do you feel is controllable?
Gillespie: Maybe. I guess so. I could think of that in certain ways that might apply as like these double vision drawings that I’ve been making for the last, maybe, year or so. That was when we first moved here. When you’re in the Midwest, you look people in the eye when you’re walking down the street. In here, you don’t look people in the eye when you walk down the street. At least, you know, typically. So, I just looked like a dope walking down the street all the time, looking at people and smiling. So then you train yourself not to do that. And maybe glance. And so those drawings kind of grew out of, like I guess, something that I couldn’t control, but sort of society’s idea of how it functions here in the Bay Area, or in a larger city. So, when you would look at the person and then look away and look again and look away, and it would kind of, in your mind, it would get mixed up. And that’s sort of where the double drawings started to work out, because it would be of fractions of people, seconds of people in time. It’s amazing. That’s initially how it started.
Rumpus: Is there any news about what you’re working on next?
Gillespie: Next, I’m gonna put out a DVD before we leave here. This summer, I’ll put out a DVD of all these newer videos, not the old silly videos. I say they’re silly, but I like the old ones. I should say they’re whimsical. So I’ll be putting that out soon. And I’m just really excited. I’ve been drawing for the last two years, and I’m excited to start painting again. I’m excited to see how those turned out. Having drawn now, I think that I’m paying attention more to detail and subtlety that I didn’t before with painting because painting was sort of planes of color, planes of tonal shifts, like, colliding with each other, and the relationship that maybe a gray has up against an orange, and how those two speak to each other, and—whereas with drawing since it was just black and white, there was a lot more subtlety. And so I wonder if I’m going to start painting a lot more subtly. I don’t know.
Jake Gillespie’s show at Giant Robot in San Francisco runs from March 12 to April 14. Check out more of his work on his website and on his YouTube page.
