'Artists can save the world one painting at a time.'
Judy Takacs is a contemporary figurative realist artist based in Cleveland, Ohio. Her ‘Chicks With Balls’ project speaks of her unsung female heroes as well of her own drive and positivity. Judy is very generous in sharing her love of figurative art through social media channels.
Where is your current studio? What would be your dream studio?
My current studio and my dream studio are one and the same. We built it ten years ago in my house to meet all my art needs…and then some. It’s huge, has a kitchen-like washing up area with a fridge for palette storage, tons of storage for paintings and supplies, reclaimed wood ceiling beams, a walk out porch, and, my invention, a lovely low routed shelf that runs the length of one wall. I use this to prop paintings that are drying and under observation. Because of other architectural considerations, the studio is not North Light…but, here in Cleveland, Ohio…where its grey 9 months out of the year, all light is North Light…so it’s all good! Do you prefer to work in silence or does certain music inspire you? If I’m working on a particularly troublesome part, then I might turn the music off, but usually I am very inspired by my music. So inspired actually, that I try never to listen to my “painting music” when I’m not painting…because I don’t want to waste its novelty. I love happy upbeat songs with great melodies, no matter the genre…within reason. On my extensive itunes list right now are artists as disparate as: Led Zeppelin, Amy Winehouse, Count Basie, Mohammed Rafi, Tina Turner, Beethoven, Traffic, Tchaikovsky, Bob Dylan, The Hair movie soundtrack, Duke Ellington, Nina Simone, Cilla Black…I could go on!
Studio life can lead to isolation, how do you address this/ keep a balance? Right this very moment isolation is not an issue at all. Two of my three sons are home from college due to COVID closures. One has graduated and is looking for a position as a software developer (which may take him across the country or the world) and the other is working with experimental film maker, Robert Banks for a summer internship, so they are both home and I’m loving it. I break for lunch with the kids and end my painting day at dinner time. I also spend too much time on facebook, which feeds my need to socialize with others beyond my family…so, I have balance. I know I would be lonely though, if I didn’t have people to escape from.
Describe a moment you had an epiphany concerning your creative life.
There was no single defining moment, but, more a quiet realization that I should focus more on what I want to actually “SAY” with my art…save the world one painting at a time. My work has a feminist focus; the Chicks with Balls project presents real-life unsung female heroes and The Goddess Project points out how the wrongs we have come to accept in our world have been shaped by the stories we’ve been told via mythology from all the religions. What is your favourite/ least favourite part of the creative process?
Most Favorite part…when your concept gels beautifully with the model you’ve chosen to pose for it. Where the painting is kicking your butt a little, but you’re meeting the challenge beautifully with glowy, flowy, truthful colors and brushstrokes…and then comes the magic moment when a living, breathing human emerges from the paint. Least Favorite part…when you started your painting with an undeveloped composition and you’re fighting that the whole time. Still though, you’re painting…and hopefully learning too… so even that is not the WORST part of the creative process. I’d say the truly worst part is schlepping large paintings across town or across the state. You waste a painting day, you mess up your rotator cuff, you take Advil for several days afterwards and you know that in 6-8 weeks you’ll have to do it all again and bring them home because they didn’t sell.
Do you have a personal mantra or quote which serves to motivate you?
My favorite quote is by Henry Miller… "Every day we slaughter our finest impulses. That is why we get a heartache when we read those lines written by the hand of a master and recognize them as our own, as the tender shoots which we have stifled because we lacked the faith to believe in our own powers, our criterion of truth and beauty.”
How has your style evolved and what contributed to the changes?
My style evolution's have resulted from seeing the right artist’s work at the right time.
In Art school, I discovered Egon Schiele and my drawing and illustration style changed for years afterwards.
At that same time, Burton Silverman’s book, Breaking the Rules of Watercolor influenced my painting process in a major way. I still begin paintings with what I learned from that book.
Later, Lucian Freud was a huge influencer, and crunchy brushstrokes ruled.
Years later, as I was coming back into the world of painting after a decade long hiatus of graphic design and baby making, I discovered Rose Frantzen at the Portrait Society of America Conference. She was their star presenter that year, while her Portrait of Maquoketa project…180 portraits of ordinary people from her hometown… was on view at the National Portrait Gallery in DC. Seeing her frantic and delicious demos, meeting her and basking in the aura of her positive and energetic glow lit a fire under me that has yet to be extinguished.
Describe an obstacle you have faced and how did you overcome it.
Life obstacles…I could write a book, but I’m also protecting the stories of people I love. I will focus on art obstacles.
A very recent example is the obstacle of the worldwide COVID crisis. Because of Museum closures across the country, I was not able to give the second gallery talk I had planned to accompany my Chicks with Balls show at the Zanesville Museum of Art. Instead of cancelling the talk though, I tested uncharted waters (for me) and gave a somewhat different talk via facebook live, broadcasting from my home and studio, with my two sons as my film and technical crew.
The reach was worldwide, and I had a lot of fun doing it, so much fun in fact, that it spawned my weekly facebook live event, LIVING FIGURATIVELY. It’s part interior design show, part art appreciation show, all in service to trying to convince people to fill their homes with figurative art. Until further notice it airs every Thursday night at 6:00 PM EST via my facebook page! So, in this case, I took adversity and turned it into opportunity. Nature versus nurture: do you believe you have inherited abilities from creative parents, do you have creative siblings? Can you identify environmental factors or influences which led to your choices or directions?
My parents, who emigrated to the U.S. from Hungary in the late 1950s, were Math and English Professors and I was named after Hungary’s first woman poet, my ancestor, Dukai Takács Judit. No one in my family, however, was an artist, so I didn’t have built-in mentors to guide me in that direction at home. The math gene skipped a generation with me, but the writing gene sat down firmly in my soul. I write a blog and now two books about my Chicks with Balls project, and have started to do the same for the stories that inspire my Goddess Project.
Growing up I had the example of my parents both passionately involved in their respective fields of interest. It was part of our culture to be working all the time at the thing you love, and that is what I do now.
Is there something you regard as essential to your preparation or process?
Good reference of a great model and a compelling concept. If my reference is bad, or the concept falls apart, the painting will hit a point where I’m painting from ignorance instead of inspiration.
Detail a moment which was the highlight for you, thus far.
The official highlight of my art life was the opening of my first solo museum show. Chicks with Balls: Judy Takács paints unsung female heroes opened at the Zanesville Museum of Art in Zanesville, Ohio, February 2020. We squeaked in just under the wire before the COVID crisis shut the museum down a month later…with my paintings locked inside until June. Still though, the show was beautifully hung, the opening was amazing, well attended and some of the women who posed for the project even flew in from out of town for the weekend. I am excited that it will always be part of my personal corona story, that will no doubt be repeated again and again for the remaining decades of my life…turning adversity into opportunity!
How does your work respond to social trends?
One very specific example is from my Goddess Project, where I re-examine characters from mythology with a feminist lens. My painting, #Me(dusa)too points out how the story behind the familiar Medusa story, is one of classic rape-victim blaming.
I blog about this, and tell the story on my weekly Facebook Live TV Show. What do you hope to convey through your work?
I want people to be disarmed and step outside their own lives into the world of another. I want to build a bridge of understanding and empathy. Whether it is painting real people like my Chicks with Balls, or through allegories and characters from my Goddess Project series, I want to make human connections and that make viewers linger, connect and think.
Follow Judy!