Small Press Intravues:
Occasional Interviews with writers working and
publishing in the small press ecosystem
Interview #8: Kristine Snodgrass is an artist, poet, professor, curator, and publisher living in Tallahassee, Florida. She is the author most recently of American Apparell from AlienBuddha Press and Rather, from Contagion Press. The proud founder and curator of Women Asemic Artists & Visual Poets (WAAVe), Snodgrass searches to create an online space for women in the asemic and vispo communities to share work, offer support, and network. Her asemic and vispo work has been published in Utsanga (Italy), Slow Forward and featured in Asemic Front 2 (AF2), South Florida Poetry Journal, Voices de la Luna, Brave New Word, and Talking About Strawberries. She is the art editor for SoFloPoJo. Snodgrass has collaborated with many poets and artists and is always searching for new collaborations. You can find some of her writing about collaboration at TRIVIA: Voices of Feminism. Her next book, RANK, is forthcoming from JackLeg Press (2021). More about Kristine Snodgrass at kristinesnodgrass.com.
Michael Sikkema: You are a poet, a professor, a curator, an editor, a publisher, and more. Are there projects that you're working on right now that you're particularly excited about and want to share with us?
Kristine Snodgrass: Wow! That sounds like so much when you list it like that. I feel like I am Kristine! There are several projects I am working on right now. One of the most thrilling ones is an anthology I am editing: WAAVe Global Gallery. This is a gallery-type anthology sponsored by the Women Asemic Artist and Visual Poets group and published by Hysterical Books. The book has six editors each choosing or chosen six or more contributors for a "gallery" section. Each section is themed by the editor. The idea is to showcase as many women asemic writers and visual poets as possible. I think that the women in the asemic world have not been published enough. It seems to me that the same people continue to get published by the same presses. I am hoping to change that. I am very proud of the anthology.
I am also doing several collab projects! I have, also, just signed a contract with JackLeg Press for my second glitch book, RANK. This book still explores the intersections of glitching, distortion, bodies, and societal infrastructures, but I think it is much more complex and the glitches are more obliterated. I am finding that the more things are obliterated, the more they are built; I refer to these glitches "glitch infrastructures". I have been thinking a lot about structures and strictures, even--how we build things and how things build us. I think after doing thousands of glitches--all that deconstruction--they just have to build back up again. And organically, too, which is weird because it is all digital. What do I put my hands on and take apart and build up? Like gardening, or working on a car. None of that. Maybe we need that kind of work as humans.
MS: Much of your work, your working, seems to be creating community and spaces for other people. You also have a great reputation as a collaborator? Can you talk about community and collaboration and what it means to you?
KS: I love this question. I will start with community. I do not intend to make or build (the building!) community--that may sound surprising. I think what drives me in most things that I do is that I get mad; when I see things that I think are not right I want to fix them. Isn't that egotistical? Wow. For instance, I was surprised there was not a group for women asemic artists and visual poets. I talked with some ladies and we agreed to start one! A lot of women are shy about their work--for many reasons--and I have also heard stories of women feeling bullied in big groups. I try to reach out to as many women as I can and to share their work, or collab with them, or publish them. I just do it. When I am attached to something, it is hard for me to let go. If people are shy, I want to encourage them, if they are scared, I will fight for them. That is it. The many friends I have met online have been so special in my life. So many of the women are a total inspiration to me. The WAAVe group has been a special joy. I think there are a lot of people out there building community. I am in admiration of Amanda Earl and Sylvia Van Nooten, for instance. They are leaders in the asemic and vispo world and we could not live without them. SO many others offer space and support. We are all different, yet the same. Does that make sense?
Onto collaboration! I have said before that I was born and raised on collaboration. When I was in Miami I met Denise Duhamel, and later, Maureen Seaton who became a beloved teacher and friend. The two had been collaborating since I think the late eighties, early nineties. When I worked with them both as teachers, I just learned it. Of course, this was in what some may call "conventional" or words on a page poetry. I was lucky to be able to collab with Maureen Seaton and create books with her and Neil de la Flor. Maureen and I just published another chapbook, Zero Zero; it was a bunch of poems she found that was probably 12-15 years old! I was so happy we could get that out. I just continued to work with folks and it has really evolved--I guess I am known for my collaborations? Collaborating is such a part of who I am, like all of my art. I do not have much separation between my life and my self and my art. Collaborating is definitely a relationship for me. And like all relationships, it has all kinds of things that can go swimmingly or go wrong. I can usually tell right away how the energy or connection with the person is going to be. If I don't feel a connection, the work will most likely be static as well. I have had a few people ask to collab with me and the spirit was just not there, but we did the work. That sounds kind of sad! I have to be invested in the whole collaboration. There are a couple of collaborators who I am obsessed with. I won't name them so they are not embarrassed, but these works have been my best, I think. Can you imagine being obsessed by me? I have an intensity that I think is probably exhausting for people, so to stay afloat with me for a while is pretty good. I have also considered that there is a difference, for me, when collaborating with a specific gender. I admit that when I collaborate with men, there is a tension and eroticism. You can see it in my work with De Villo Sloan (Whistle) or Collin J. Rae (Glitchfetisch, BEAST), for instance (see my website for more on these). When I collaborate with women, I do have a distinctive spirit. I love collaboration with Karla Van Vliet. We have a lovely connection and she is one person I can talk to on the phone for hours. I am a fan and very biased! Right now, I am collaborating with Andrew Brenza and that work is going in an interesting direction. I have also been working with Adam Roussopoulos, and hope to have a project out with him. And, of course, I want to collaborate with you more!
MS: You touch on the idea of feminism, and I wonder if you could elaborate on what that idea means to you? How does the idea of feminism affect your own art making and the way that you create space for others?
KS: A friend of the poet Diane Wakoski told me that Diane never referred to herself as a feminist. I thought, yes this is my current feeling about it; I felt relieved, a bit.
**
Last night I was thinking about feminism. I asked my daughter if she considered herself a feminist (she is 18) and she said "no" because she finds the term problematic and that it has been relegated to a "certain kind of person". This struck me because I would have said the same thing at her age. There is a negative stereotype of a feminist as this radical, man-hating, hairy, mean loud-mouth; that is a shame and is just terrible!, but the other thing to consider is that stereotypes must be broken and examined. Step back and take a look. I have read feminist theory and asked friends and had conversations about feminism. I am familiar with the basics, but I am not a theorist. As an artist I do not believe my role is to employ or explore theoretical frameworks, specifically. My art is my life and I discover it as I go; it is not planned or preplanned or very well thought out. It is intuitive. To define myself as a feminist as a label seems kind of useless to me in this artistic space of mine. In contradiction, I do think that the glitches in American Apparell and Rank really address concepts of feminisms: gender is the main focus, promoting freedom for women, resisting and destroying inequalities, searching for transformation and change, positive views of sex and sexual freedom, personal is political, confronting the male gaze. Maybe that is conflicted and ridiculous and does not make sense, but it is how I currently think. And that is honest. There are two people here, it seems to me: the artist and the critic. I want to stay away from the critic.
People, in their comments on my work, have defined it as feminist (my publisher JackLeg Press, for example). You will notice that De Villo Sloan avoids the term “feminist” in his review of my book of glitches, AMERICAN APPARELL, and I think that is significant. (For the record, I have not had a review of my book written by a woman or gender non-conforming human.) Few people, if any, know my work better than Sloan.
In terms of creating spaces for women, I would say that addresses the idea of equality and equity. Women are underrepresented in the asemic and vispo worlds, I figure I can use my publishing outlets and assertiveness to help out there. Some men have expressed concern that there is a women’s group that is exclusionary, and I think that is the pith of the problem—whiny men, but they must be confronted and educated, too.
**
I glitch t-shirts that appear in my ads on Facebook; these shirts have what I call "quick phrases" of a feminist nature like "brains are the new tits" or "tacos, orgasms, social justice". The whole thing is so absurd, you know? What commodity is this feminism now? I do not object to the t-shirts as a thing at all, it is just that they are placed in my, I identify as a woman, Facebook account purposely with one goal: to make money. That is absurd, intrusive, and without boundary. A weird patriarchal commitment to Capitalist oppression, or something. Now we are back to revolution!
For my art, because I live my art, it will reflect what I am thinking and living. I have a reactionary/defiant nature and that comes out with the glitching. It is pure power. I suppose feminism explores power dynamics. I have also said that glitching can be like an erotic act. We all have sexual power and I am not afraid of mine. It has taken me some years to come to this. Glitching is also very destructive, but it can be a delicate and soulful thing. It is an act and I share it with collaborators and with myself. When I do solo glitching, there is a surge and a liberation. Maybe that is feminist: to liberate your sexuality, to live in it truthfully. I certainly work toward that.
I have spent all this time talking about feminism and then insisting that I am not a feminist. That is very Kristine!
MS: Can you talk more about glitching and deconstruction? Could you also maybe link to some of your pieces or pieces of others that you love?
https://www.facebook.com/kristine.snodgrass/
https://www.kristinesnodgrass.com/american-apparell
KS: If we are looking at glitching through a solely "deconstructive" lens than we are missing out. I have argued that the glitch is asemic. Recently, in a letter to De Villo Sloan, Jim Leftwich—who coined the term asemic along with Tim Gaze in the 90s—confirmed that my work is under an asemic umbrella. Marco Giovenale's book GLITCHASEMICS (Post Asemic Press) is cool and has a prefatory critical essay by critical theorist Michael Betancourt that looks into the asemic/glitch connection quite intensively. I recommend it to anyone interested in this stuff. I will say honestly and keeping with my ideas that I am not a fan of including an introductory piece to a book of art (or poems for that matter) unless it is an invitation. We should be mindful of herding the readers before they start their journey. Of course, this is a classic argument between artists and critics, but also just me. Glitching—and to be honest, the glitching I do is not considered a "real" glitching, but a copycat of sorts in terms of the look of the product—is data-bending an original source image. The base asemic definition is work that looks like an official writing system without semantic meaning. There are new and growing variations on this that we won't go into here. The glitch obliterates (maybe akin to deconstruct?) a workable, recognizable, even definable image source. What is left is still an image, if not remnants, rather altered and still beautiful. It is somewhere between asemics and abstract expressionism (I am a huge fan of Joan Mitchell and Helen Frankenthaler, btw) I guess. The destruction of the original image source reimagines a meaning, loses a meaning. That is why people freak out when they can't find the meaning in a glitch. They all want to see some of the original image. Especially if the original image was sexy, like a woman's body outline or a foot in a high heel shoe (oh the feet!). The glitch then leaves the space of deconstruction flying vastly and beautifully into a creating moment. I believe the creation is most prominent in the aesthetic.
**
Back to AMERICAN APPARELL. I call the glitches in there "femmeglitch". It was a term I coined on a whim and then became an interesting journey. Frankly, I thought it was cute and addressed the feminine aspect of the original images that were being glitched in that series. It also made me think of Femme Fatale. What was cool, is that some fellow--a collagist and fluxist--was flummoxed as to the term and kind of challenged it! What does her sex have to do with the art, he said. Well, what kind of question is that? So that was good because I think I worked out some ideas about femmeglitch. I think I realized that the gendered aspect of the term (sex and gender are different things) had to be related to not only what was being glitched, but the power of the glitch to me. Art has force and sometimes it hits too hard.
MS: Can you talk a little about your asemic practice? I'm curious about how it links up with ideas of concealment, revealing/revelation, performance, defying expectations and so on. When I think of spectators, voyeuers, the gaze, etc, all those ideas come up. Do you see asemic work as related to glitching?
KS: I used to think that my image on social media was performative as social media is a great platform for performance. I control my image and how it is shared. In truth, my sexuality belongs to me and that is authority. Female sexuality is the thing that is desired the most by the patriarchy--well, maybe a particular privileged sexuality-- and what I do appears to be a performance, but that is not the case as the performance idea and term is an application from the sexualized language of the dominant and oppressive language system we employ--sexually performative. In order for a sexual liberation and reclamation to have power it has to be a performance? Maybe, maybe not. Really, I am taking ownership of my sexuality that alleviates both a personal and collective trauma/oppression, in my eyes. That is the revolution.
My asemic calligraphy is just distorted handwriting. When I write it I am thinking of words kind of like automatic writing. There is an expression there, but it is also working with an aesthetic on the page that is intuitive. I have created images with outlines of asemic handwriting--sometimes faces. I suppose those faces were revealed through an altered language. Perhaps transformative as I have thought of my work lately. Faces were a theme in so much of my work. The faces I created on paper evolved into selfies and a persona. It has been interesting to see that persona live on social media. I am and am not my Facebook persona.
When I post glitches on Twitter, I use hashtags like #sellme, #revolution, #bodypositivity. In terms of larger "systems" I think these words represent some of the issues my work may address. The commodification of female bodies, for instance, has been exacerbated by social media advertising. "Sell me" could refer to this and it is also perhaps a jab at the commodification of art in the art world. When I speak of revolution, it is perhaps a call for revolution as art often has done, historically. It is perhaps radical.
MS: Can we talk some more about process? In addition to wearing many hats in your art community, you also excel in many mediums of making. You work with software and paint and ink and more hands on stuff, using both digital and very very analogue ways of making art. Can you talk about that?
KS: I would love to talk about my hands on work. I think I am glitched-out in terms of discussing digital work. I have over talked about it to the point of changing my process there. I overthink and that can be baaadddd for my art.
For the ink and paint pieces I utilize an adaptation of the Surrealist decalcomania. The is just a press of paint between two pieces of glass. I use paper. The result is "blobs" or forms that are all unique and resemble the viscous maculae occurring naturally in the world. This is a technique I like to use when I feel overwhelmed with process and thought. It grounds me and helps me to remember that I am not a digital artist. I also write asemic calligraphy and often on these pieces. For some reason, I tend to gravitate toward red and yellow. I have a thing with yellow, although that changes periodically but usually comes back.
MS: Lastly, your work is very process-based, intuitive, and improvisational. I love that. I wonder if we could close with you talking about what obsesses you? Can you discuss obsession?
KS: OBSESSIONS: I have several. I may be an obsessive person, in general. I think I come off as aloof, cerebral, and a bit cold sometimes, but I am filled with fire and motion, so I get obsessed with collaborators (not all of them). I put a lot of my self and soul into collaboration which can be other worldly and devastating at the same time. I think this makes the art real. I am never fake in a collaborative experience. That would be against the collaboration rules! What you get is genuine and authentic, and sometimes that becomes very intense. When I finish large collab projects, it can be relentless depression for me. Why would I keep doing this? I don't know. So I obsess with collaboration.
I am also obsessive about color. I love intense yellow. I have a thing for Rasputin. I mean a thing, I mean he is my boyfriend. Not really. I am in awe of his ability to charm his way to the Czarina of Russia, and to hold her ear, among other things, so closely. He was also, at some points, unkillable. He was called a cult leader and I think that is underestimation. He was change. He was the universe. I am obsessed with sex, but so are most people, I think. Sex and eroticism can be a big part of my work, especially when using images of me. It also shows up in my written poetry a lot. When you get my books—solo and collab—you will see it. I am also obsessed and get obsessed with learning new things, especially in relation to people I adore. I have no problem researching music or poetry or artists to an obsessive degree to understand someone more. And I think all the time.
There are many women to boost. I do this on a regular basis. I think the readers should take some time, today, after they read this, to find more women artists to follow and support. Some artists to follow: Seiko Aoki, Lova Delis, Sylvia Van Nooten, Dixie Denman, Nicola Winborn, Karla Van Vliet. Some of my heroines are Cinzia Farina and Cheryl Penn. Naming names is hard because we all need eyes on us, you know? So keep your eyes on us. Really look.
I want to add that this has been a wonderful interview experience. I think you are so talented and creative and enjoyed going back and forth with you. I talk about weird things, so thank you for accepting me.
Peace.
MS: Thanks for all the work you do and for sharing with us!
Michael Sikkema makes poems, visual poems, collages, and compost.