Yve Holtzclaw

“this is what i really look like” Exhibition Feature

Yve Holtzclaw (they/them) is a featured artist in this is what i really look like, an exhibition curated by Bean Pecorari at the Brookline Art Center’s Beacon Street Gallery, on view from July 22 to October 28, 2023.

Yve is an interdisciplinary genderqueer artist and educator from Atlanta, Georgia working primarily with clay and fibers. Their work is inspired by architecture, performance, and animal life, with a particular interest in both invasive and domesticated animals. Since graduating from Massachusetts College of Art and Design with their BFA in 2020, they have been awarded a long term residency in ceramics at the Kirk Newman Art School and organized exhibitions both locally and nationally. Yve currently resides in Kalamazoo, Michigan where they work as a studio technician at the Kalamazoo Institute of Art and collectively run a studio and gallery.

• Artist Statement

  Drawing from my experiences as an adolescent, I toy with the absurdity of my early anxiety, alienation, and self expression by depicting myself as a goose, as a deer, and as a cactus. These pieces investigate how gender transition altered my perception of my identity and my childhood. Exploring gender as a performance, I find myself relating to the pests of suburbia - the opossum, the honeysuckle, the kudzu. I draw from life in my sketchbook and I layer my experience and my imagination until they are indistinguishable; I then draw and paint scenes, then sculpt my characters, then sew their setting, and paint what I want. For me, tension between a flatness and dimensionality reflects the surreal qualities of gender, growing up, and memory. Through using secondhand materials, firing pieces repeatedly, and applying cold finishes, I am interested in evoking nostalgia connected to a familiar and yet unknown place, leaning into the feeling of stepping into a painting, a comic, or a dream.

Tell us about your background as a visual artist and educator. How did you become a part of the BAC community?

I came to Boston in 2016 to study ceramics at Massachusetts College of Art and Design - while I was completing my BFA, I started working at Brookline Adult & Community Education teaching night classes and moved to Brookline shortly after. The classes were mostly pottery and some hand building and I really came to love my regular students and the opportunity to teach and develop a community in the area. I got connected with the BAC specifically when Bean reached out to organize this show!

What is “ART” to you?

To me, art is the way that we make meaning of our experiences and tell stories about ourselves to others. I have found art to be a safe haven for me to experience my emotions, to find community, and try to understand the interconnectedness of the world as I experience it. It is how I honor my memories, and the way that I make meaning from messier or more unpleasant parts of life.

Your practice involves many different mediums, including ceramics, sculpture, fibers, installation, as well as painting. When approaching a project, how do you decide what medium to use?  Do certain methods of art creation speak best to specific concepts for you?

It can be tricky! I will often do the same image with a few different approaches before settling on the one that works. My practice is centered on drawing - I develop a strong sense of the composition, texture, and setting for the piece before I start working with different materials. I try to choose materials that help build the structure and scale I am looking for and which will fill the objects with meaning. I love looking at old houses with layered additions and decorations that tell a story of the owners; I am curious about the information each layer gives. If it was burnt, worn... I like to choose materials that give a similar sense of history to the work. Clay, clothing, wood, and metal all carry a sense of memory and place. I try to choose materials that contain the sensorial and historical meaning I am hoping to convey in the specific work.

What draws you to using your work to explore daily life, as well as our effects on the environment and its return effect on us?

I think that people can tell when something is drawn from real life and I like to think that if I give something honest from my life to the work, then people will be able to better connect to the work. I am really attached to making meaning out of my experiences, and I often wonder how to cope with a world that is ultimately meaningless and not too concerned with its own wellbeing. I think that ignoring that - the things falling apart, I mean - is just as bad as making decisions that contribute to the decaying state of things. I guess that it’s important to me to really visualize, name, and contextualize the harder things in the world. In my life, I deal with compulsive and intrusive thoughts and one of the things that is helpful to me is seeing a thought all of the way through. I like to visualize and imagine the potential outcomes of climate changes, or rapid urbanization, or even my own queerness as something tangible, real, and something that can be talked about. My work has a sort of cute appearance which I think helps to balance the themes that I am interested in and hopefully provide an entry point for people.

What has been the most challenging part of your journey as an interdisciplinary artist?

It has been difficult to build the skill and the confidence to be able to stand beside the work and say “this is how I do this.” I am frequently using materials which have a rich and deeply technical history in a pretty unconventional way in my work. I am still working on the confidence part. I feel like finding where my work belongs is part of that challenge - I find myself teetering between craft and art spaces, never really fitting neatly into one of them. I’ve tried to make that a funny analogy for gender - I am non-binary, my craft is non-binary, the boxes weren’t really made for me anyways. So I guess that’s the part where I am working on my confidence - I want to be able to stand beside my work and who I am and be okay to make my own way in my life and in my art.

What has been the most rewarding aspect of being a fine artist and an advocate for your community? 

I have been most rewarded in my experiences teaching - I feel really moved to acknowledge that everything that I know and I learned was passed down from the artists and craftspeople who came before me. I am immensely grateful to my teachers and mentors who have guided me and it feels like a true honor to help connect other people to their practice as they connected me with mine. In terms of advocacy, I believe that existing openly as a trans person in the arts helps to create a sense of safety and community for other queer people to live their truth and pursue their practice. My most rewarding experiences have been when I teach children classes and my students feel comfortable sharing their pronouns with me or the class - I hope to make everyone feel comfortable when they are in my classroom. I am really grateful to be able to be out and I aim to do my best to represent my community through my actions.

To see more of Yve’s work, visit this is what i really look like at the Beacon Street Gallery, on view from July 22 - October 28. Be sure to view their work on their Instagram page, @yve.ceramics, as well as their website, https://www.yveholtzclaw.com/.