Grace Hager: Right Place, Right Time

When I think about the greater theme of time, I am tempted, in a deeply human fashion, to think forward into the future and look backward at the past. The challenge of our time, and possibly always and forever, is staying in the present. I am reminded of the words of Carl Pope, a visiting artist during my first semester of grad school at MECA&D. He implored us to “know what time it is.” As a new graduate student barely a week back into session, I surely was keeping track of time, desperately gauging how much I could possibly fit in each day of the MFA Summer Intensive, an aptly named session for its use of almost every waking hour (and then some). Although appropriate for this intense period, Pope’s words were not about time read out from the clock, but about being a part of time, understanding what is happening around you and how you fit into a greater tapestry connected by the notion of “the times.” His advice to a group of aspiring artists was to find themselves in time, and by knowing what time it is, one could create works that were sourced from the deeply personal that resonate beyond to reach the collective.

Luckily, the process of making art roots me in the present moment. In fact, it demands it. “It” being the greater force that occasionally visits me in my studio that I feel I channel to produce my most poignant work. When I know something is truly happening in the studio, time releases from its metronome-like march forward and becomes fluid—sometimes moving more quickly and sometimes seeming to stand almost completely still. Time is mystical in the studio. The space in my mind that normally senses the passage of time turns its attention inward to something more primal, a more profound rhythm, and maybe it is this deep psychic space from which the best creative work crawls out. For me, this space is sacred and hard to access, like the ancient caves of Lascaux ritually adorned with painted animals and hunting scenes, visited when their own magic needed to be called forth. In an era rife with all the consequences of late-stage capitalism, be it competing crises in endless news cycles, gig economies and multiple inboxes, or simply social media pings, attention spans struggle against the weight of a plate-spinning, omnitasking world. Maximizing every moment, extracting time’s resources to turn them into capital. This is the imperative that the activity of art resists through rewarding time spent on slowness—switchbacks, meandering, navel-gazing, and all less linear or recognizable productive enterprise.

Hanging on the wall of every studio I have inhabited, I keep a copy of Sister Corita Kent’s Ten Rules. They are solid companions for anyone finding themselves spending ever more time in pursuit of a studio practice, giving a different glimmer of guidance every time they are read, with what stands out determined by the moment in which they are met. As a lover of movies, television, and film, I am a fan of her “helpful hint” listed below the rules: “Look at movies carefully, often.” Originally written in the late ‘60s, Sister Corita’s helpful hint feels ever more timely today, where in contemporary art traditionally “high” and “low” cultural production sits across a more level playing field, from canonized Modern painters to Hollywood movies, or more recent additions to respectability, such as previously marginalized genres like Japanese anime or horror films. As an artist whose work sports graphic qualities like bold color and strong shape, I frequently think about a sense of pause or slower movement within a singular, still image. How does time function in a painting or a static object like sculpture compared to the sequential medium of film?

Within my chosen subject of the landscape, awe-inspiring moments are suspended in time. The evergreen inspiration of the sunset is translated into painted and sculpted compositions where the sun or moon are paused in motion, transforming a daily sight into a surreal moment where it could be read as simultaneously rising or setting. I introduce a greater magicality and emotionality to visions drawn from the natural world through my use of heightened color. Color and magic are intrinsically linked—aligned by their associations with naivety and non-academic, immeasurable affects or subjective feelings. My use of vibrant color gives form to this multifaceted emotional experience within my observed, remembered, and imagined landscapes, further transforming my subjects beyond the typical and into the mystical. This kind of emotional intermingling is key to the kinds of moments I hope to extend beyond the fleeting, where time, similar to my experience working in the studio, moves in strange ways.

Time in painting is different from time in ceramics, however; they are united through a sort of agrarian time developed in response to the elements of nature. In 2020, long before I had begun a ceramic practice, and following the loss of my arts job to an early round of pandemic layoffs, I found myself painting every day in my home studio during the COVID-19 lockdown. As an artist who loves vibrant color, I quickly noticed how my most valuable studio hours aligned with the daylight hours—where I could see colors most clearly. Because of this relationship to daylight, the activity of painting began to dictate the structure of my days, similar to how it might dictate the day of a fisherman or farmer.

Ceramics are rooted in the timescale of a different natural element: water. Moisture, in the clay and the air, determines the urgency and timing of the work. Even the final stage of firing must yield to moisture, promising disastrous outcomes for overzealous potters who rush the clay. As a landscape-based artist, being ruled by these natural elements—daylight, water, fire, and earth—across my multiple mediums resonates. My practice asks that I must be humble and act in harmony with the rhythms of the natural world.

The more time passes and the longer I make art, (and, maybe too, the older I get) the more I trust when the time is right. In my practice, I treasure the moments when forces align. Artists deal with incredible amounts of rejection. However, when acceptance comes (and it does, even after long years), it feels like a mutual embrace, a connection with others, or the self, at just the perfect time. As a perfectionist in recovery, the word “perfect” still carries significant weight and shouldn’t be thrown around lightly. However, I find these moments as close to perfect as can be: seeing a deer through a stand of pines as the sun dips below a hill or finally getting the chance to exhibit alongside a long-admired friend. It’s this sense of being in the right place at the right time that makes me feel fortunate and believe in powers greater than myself. In my studio work, I hope some semblance of this experience surfaces. Through combined spectral coloring and the serendipitous alignment of natural elements, my work creates a synergistic moment that recalls this feeling of being in the right place at the right time to catch a glimpse of the miraculous.

 

Image at top: Grace Hager, Mirage, oil on canvas, 30 x 36 in., 2023 (photo: Art Archival/Joel Tsui).