My name is Tanvi Sharma and I am a rising Junior Painting and Humanistic Studies Major. During the summer of 2018, I was an intern with the artist Matt Bollinger, based in Holmes, New York. I had been interested in Matt’s process of combining digital and analog media and creating compelling narratives since a couple of years. During the spring semester I had been working on creating similar work of my own and decided to shoot Matt an email. He turned out to be a friend of my professor, Sangram Majumdar and he went on to recommend me to Matt. Matt agreed to have me work with him for the summer, which turned out to be the most enriching experience.
The experience included long conversations with Matt about his practice, the art world and what he wants to do in the future. I think the most valuable thing I have gained from this experience is getting to intimately know a working artist I strongly look up to. During the day I would set up the studio and discuss what Matt has planned for the day. We would conduct experiments with different equipment and processes, in an attempt to explore alternative methods of animating while still retaining the painted nature of the work. This opened me to up to formulating various approaches with my own work. I learnt a lot of technical tool handling and process information and got familiar with the shifting nature of work. The internship was a good way for me to talk about my thoughts with a professional and get feedback, I kept a diary and recorded them. Matt recommended that I think of interesting visuals instead of concepts when starting work and gave me an assignment with some constraints that I could apply what I’ve learnt to. I painted, stretched canvasses and built structures. We discussed our literary interests extensively and every week Matt and Anne gave me a book to read.
I realized that while I want to make work that’s fairly self driven, I don’t want to do things that are just painting anymore. This internship was a good way and time for me to figure out my interests and what I want do in my field. I’m leaning more towards media that more democratic such as graphic design and perhaps illustration that involve elements of motion graphics and animated visuals while grounding myself in the basics of what makes a good painting work. I want to exercise my writing and do something with an academic research element involved.
I’m happy I spent this summer figuring out what I want out of the next two years of my academic career, it helped me clearly define my goals and gave me more matter to think about.
