Artist Talk: Jim Condron

"Picking Up the Pieces"

The artist talk between Jim Condron and Ann Landi was not as insightful as I hoped it to be. While it was nice to hear from Landi, the Skype call did not allow for a strong connection that being there in person gives. Also I felt that the moderator did not do a great job directing the conversation. It was very choppy and she did not appear to know her subject well especially when talking to Landi. She should have let it be more of a conversation between Landi and Condron. Condron did not appear comfortable addressing the crowd and even admitted that he does not like talking about his work. He often mumbled, making it difficult to understand what he was saying. There were also times when they referenced things that they assumed everyone in the crowd understood which left me out of the conversation.

      What I did gather from the talk is that Condron started as a painter and then moved to sculpture. His crazy titles comes from sections of books or articles that he finds, but I still do not see a connection between the art and the title. I find that his artwork in the gallery is extremely difficult to interpret. To me it appears like a bunch of trash that is jumbled together. So it surprised me when he talked about the amount of time that he takes making the small pieces and that he does not feel comfortable making bigger sculptures yet. I find Condron's paintings to be more pleasing to observe and I wish he had taken us through a step by step explanation about one of his sculptures because that would have been a better visualization about how he thinks as an artist.