Ep 27 - Understanding Light with Katie Woodward
In the new episode, I speak with NYC-based artist and urban-sketcher Katie Woodward. Katie has made paintings that are both very large and very small. As a scenic artist for the theater she has worked on backdrops spanning several feet, and as an urban-sketcher she makes tiny watercolor cityscapes just a couple of inches wide.
What’s it like to make art for the theater? What is inherently different about painting big and small, and what is strangely similar to both?
Working in stage design demands a wide array of crafting skills, and Katie shares wonderful stories of some of her memorable work. We also talk about her upcoming book - Understanding Light - where she brings together the art and ideas of her favorite artists across different media.
Follow Katie's work on Instagram and her website. To pre-order her book, visit here or find it on Amazon.
Listen to our conversation on your choice of streaming service below:
Spotify | Apple | PocketCasts | Google | Web | Gaana
Transcript
Hello and welcome to the SneakyArt Podcast, I'm your host Nishant Jain. Today I'm speaking with New York-based Katie Woodward, who paints both really big surfaces and really small surfaces with nothing in-between. In this conversation, I am curious to find out why. As a scenic painter for the theater, Katie has painted backdrops for many plays. And as I learn, her job wasn't limited to just the backdrops. She has also worked on creating props used for decoration and stage design, which needs the bringing together of diverse, valuable crafting skills. She tells me about these different things that go into stage design, before we get to the subject of urban sketching. As an urban-sketcher, Katie is known for her tiny paintings of New York city-scapes. I ask her about the experience of producing art in the most celebrated city in the world. We conclude our conversation by speaking about Katie's upcoming book, Understanding Light, for which she has brought together works and ideas from many of her favorite painters across different media.
Today's episode is a short one, as long-time listeners of the show will have noticed. I hope you like it nonetheless. I learned many amazing things from Katie. I would like to thank the listeners who support my work every month via BuyMeACoffee and Substack. A couple of months ago I had said that I will keep thanking my supporters by name until they are too many for me to say in one breath. I forecast that the day that that happens would be both a sad and a joyous day. So with mixed feelings, but definitely more delighted than disappointed, I announce that with this episode I have reached that milestone. I can no longer name all my supporters in one breath. And believe me, I tried more than a couple of times to do it.
So instead of thanking them by name, let me tell you what they have made possible with their generous support. Thanks to my supporters, I am able to keep on having these enriching conversations with artists and urban sketchers, do all the research around it, actually have the conversation, edit afterwards, and bring together the episode in the form you hear right now. Thank you, dear supporters, for making this episode possible.
I also want to take some time to share a couple of new developments I am very excited about.
The first is about my email newsletter, the SneakyArt Post. Earlier this month, I added a subscription-model to this service. This means that in addition to my free newsletter, I am also writing and recording more content exclusively for subscribers. My subscriber posts are both text and audio, so you can even think of it as a second podcast. For example, I am currently working on my second book of SneakyArt. My supporters get a sneak peek into passages from that work, with the text and drawings, and also an audio narration. I am making bonus commentaries around my podcast conversations. Bonus commentaries are an opportunity to travel further along some of the more interesting tangents than come up while speaking with my guests. Subscribers also get the chance to ask me questions, suggest guests for future episodes, and pose questions for upcoming guests. Aside from all this, I have some more super-ambitious plans for subscriber content in the next few weeks, and I am quite excited to share that soon. If these things interest you, head over to my Substack page and become a subscriber. You can also become a supporter on BuyMeACoffee to get these same benefits.
The second new development is the addition of a SneakyArt Discord server. Discord is fast becoming my favorite place to join various communities around specific subjects. I decided to start a SneakyArt Discord as an exclusive space for people who support or have supported my work at any time. Here we can chat about podcast episodes, share our own art, and speak to and learn from one another. I will be hanging out on the SneakyArt Discord quite often, and it is a great place to get in touch with me directly.
If you are not a monthly supporter but would like to receive the Discord benefits, the cost of admission is just one cup of coffee. Tap the Buy Me A Coffee button in the shownotes of this episode to support my work, and join our little community!
I am very proud of the work I have been able to do this past year with both the newsletter and the podcast. It gives me the confidence to take the next step in the independent creator journey, which is this subscription model. The philosopher Isaiah Berlin postulated that there are two types of freedom - positive and negative freedom. Simply described, positive freedom is the freedom to and negative freedom is the freedom from. The subscription model grants me both these kinds of freedom, and that makes me very happy. Listener enthusiasm and feedback gives me the freedom to do exactly what I want on my own terms. And at the same time, the financial support grants me freedom from accountability to faceless institutions and authority figures. I don't want to seek sponsors and I don't want to explain to any marketing dept why their brand should support me. Instead my accountability is to the fans and supporters who enjoy my work and want more of it. This is the promise of the creator economy, and I am happy to be part of this new world with you. Visit my Substack newsletter or my BuyMeACoffee page using the links in the shownotes for more information.
Let's begin today's episode. I start by asking Katie about the differences, and also the similarities, between working on huge theatrical backdrops several feet long, and pieces of watercolor paper 2 inch wide. Her answer is quite fascinating...
They talk about COVID in New York city, and how Katie has pivoted her work since the first lockdown.
"What are some things that don't change with size of the canvas?"
Nishant asks how Katie got into theatrical painting.
Nishant asks about the kind of skills and education that teaches people to make props and do theatrical design work.
They talk about some props and stage design elements Katie has made for the stage, and how she went about doing some of the memorable ones.
What directions does a scenic artist get to begin working? What materials do they use?
How did Katie come to be interested in urban-sketching? They talk about being an urban sketcher in NYC.
Was it difficult for her to be an urban sketcher after working out of references and other paintings for so many years?
They talk about the effect of lighting in paintings, and Katie's ideas while putting together her new book, Understanding Light.
Nishant asks how Katie progresses over the page, whether she focuses on sections or doing layers over the whole page.
How does Katie account for changing light and overcast days in regard to depicting lighting in her scene?
Nishant asks about the interesting artists she reached out to for her book.