STARKVILLE — On the first Friday of each month, a new artist”s work is put on display at Cre8tive Warehouse at Washington and Lampkin streets in downtown Starkville. The pieces then remain on display for a few weeks before another artist takes over the Warehouse”s gallery space.
Jason Baldwin, of Alexandria, La., is the featured artist this month. He”s a former professor at Mississippi State University who is part of a three-man traveling art show dubbed “It Came From Left Field.”
Baldwin”s work is displayed on everything from skateboard decks to canvas and will remain in Starkville through Oct. 24th. He flew in Thursday from Vermont, where he has worked for the past year, just for his art show opening Friday at Cre8tive Warehouse.
So how did you end up in Starkville?
Actually I was teaching here for a year at Mississippi State. I was teaching their arts and computer class, but before then I was teaching at the University of Southern Indiana. Herbert Reith is a professor here, a drawing professor, and he told me about an opening they had here in the art department. So I applied for it and they interviewed me and I got the job. I lived down here for a year and then I applied for a job at Norwich University in Vermont and they offered me the job there, so I moved to Vermont. It”s a totally different state of mind and of, well, mostly just the seasons and the weather. When I left, it was supposed to snow that day. This was on Thursday. I got here and it was 83 (degrees).
So how did you end up getting this art show here?
I met Eric (Abbott, one of the founders of Cre8tive Warehouse) when I was teaching at Mississippi State. He was actually working for the art department and I know (local artist and musician) Jason Triplett, and I saw his show he had come here online, so I just e-mailed Eric and said, “Hey. Can I get a show?” He said, “Sure.”
Do you have a theme behind your works? How would you describe what you do?
Well, Jason Triplett, Herbert Reith and myself have a show called “It Came From Left Field,” and it”s been kind of traveling around the state. As a sort of gag, I was going to do a sort of skateboard painting for each of us. A lot of people call us “fielder agents,” which is kind of our little gimmick, I guess, so I was going to do a board for each of us as agents, with Agent Ming Donkey (a nickname for Triplett) and Agent Herb and so forth. So it started off with that and then other people were like, “Hey. Make an agent deck of me.” People started sending me images and I actually posted it, like “Hey. If you want to be an agent, send me a photograph.” So everybody started sending me photographs. I have about 10 more that I have to do. So it started off as this friendly gag and it”s sort of caught on. And I enjoy doing it. I get to have a more serious series of artwork that I”ve been doing, but this is more like something I do on the side for fun.
So they”re not really caricatures of people. They”re actually portraits?
Yeah. They”re portraits. I”d say, “Give me an agent name that you like.” And they would kind of come up with their own persona and so forth. At the end, I hope to have anywhere from 25 to 30 agents and then hopefully do a series of paintings. Just have fun with it. I may make a small graphic novel out of it.
How did you decide to do these on skateboards?
Going back to the first three with Herb and Triplett and myself, we were all skateboarders when we were growing up and I still skate every now and then. Just the shape of it and the wood panel, it was just a really nice shape to paint on. It kind of caught on.
What other kind of stuff do you do arts-wise?
A lot of what you”d call more mixed media collage work, but it”s mainly self portraits — more abstract self portraits based on childhood experiences. Even on these (at the Cre8tive Warehouse) in the background you”ll see childhood books on portions of those. Those are actually books I had as a child that are starting to fall apart because they”re so old. Instead of just throwing them away, I”ll actually take them apart and use that as the base, and that will give me a sort of rough narrative that I can work from, or start painting on top of.
Were you always an artistic person growing up?
Yeah. My mom was a self-taught artist, so growing up we all had to draw. If it was raining outside, what would we do instead of turning on the TV? We would draw. We were always drawing, from when I was a little kid on.
Did you ever picture yourself being in this position now, where you”re doing what you do and making a career out of it?
Growing up I never thought I would be an artist or an art professor, like I am now. I knew I was always going to pursue my artwork, but actually do it for a living? No. I didn”t think that was going to happen, but I”m glad it turned out that way.
What do you think of the arts scene in Starkville?
It”s growing. I mean, definitely when I left there was kind of an underground art scene, but it was coming mainly from Mississippi State, from the faculty there. But now with what Eric and them are doing with this Cre8tive Warehouse, and with the First Fridays, now they have other businesses (participating), I”m enjoying it. I”m glad they”re doing that. I think we need to get more arts integrated into the community.
Do you ever see yourself moving back down this way?
You never know. Once you”ve lived in the South, you really can”t escape it. You always end up coming back, especially for the food.
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