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January/February 2008

AOD:
Tell us a little bit about your background? Where are you from originally?

JOSHUA BRONAUGH:
I was born in Bavaria, and have lived in several places in the United States and Europe. I travel as often as I can, and have taught art for colleges in the United States and Ukraine.

AOD:
Who or what has influenced your work? Are there any artists, in particular, you admire?

JOSHUA BRONAUGH:
For a while, I was reading as much phenomenology (the study of what and how we perceive and interpret the world) as I could get my hands on, particularly Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Maurice Blanchot.

Frank Auerbach and Lukasz Banach, for their rigor in ignoring schemata, even their own.

AOD:
Your portraits use a vast array of colors to capture a person’s emotion. How did your painting style develop? How do you select a feature, such as a face, to focus on within your paintings?

JOSHUA BRONAUGH:
At some point I made a decision to make paintings that, although hinged on the armature of an image, had expressive surfaces, collecting hundreds of abstract marks. I’m pleased when I look at a painting, especially one of my own, if I have to take a moment for the image to emerge.

If I’m interested in an individual (and I usually am), I paint a portrait. If I’m interested in space, I paint an entire figure. Either will accommodate the other things that I am interested in, like palette or mood.

AOD:
What materials do you use to produce your work?

JOSHUA BRONAUGH:
I only paint with oil. Lately, I have been using a lot of medium formulas, including liquins, waxes, milk, and megilp. When I draw I use graphite diluted with turpentine.

AOD:
Take us through the process of one of your favorite paintings. (From idea, sketches, etc.)

JOSHUA BRONAUGH:
I start by painting the entire image, ignoring faults or mistakes in proportion and color. I then paint that image out with a layer of milk colored paint mixed to a creamy, transparent consistency. Through this layer of “milk” the previous layer remains only as a specter into which I will begin painting again. Before a painting is finished, I may have painted out the image 20 or 30 times. The grey portrait of Julia (Yulia) was like this. Then again, I sometimes nail it on the first try.

AOD:
How do you keep yourself motivated and interested in painting? Do most, if not all, of your artworks reflect your mood at the time of creation?

JOSHUA BRONAUGH:
Painting allows me to think in any way I need (or want), I think of paint as inseparable from thought. It is a cliché, but painting really has no limits other than those that are self-imposed. It is in that freedom that I learn and develop.

The work does reflect my mood and even allows me to retain that mood or original sensation. Making these paintings isn’t so different from struggling to remember something that has just left my mind, encouraging that item and, subsequently, my mood to remain in a constant state of re-emergence.

AOD:
Is there any advice you’d give to those aspiring to be artists?

JOSHUA BRONAUGH:
Work more often than you think you should. Read more than you think you should. Network. Be respectful.

For more information about Joshua Bronaugh visit:

joshuabronaugh.com