By SEPI ALAVI
Roger White works both as a painter and writer, and he is also the co-founder of the art journal Paper Monument. White’s paint- ings are about the everyday and a sense of time and space that accompany daily experience. He suggests that the images in his paintings are components of a history of the present in which the mundane acts as a category of experience. In this sense, the mundane itself seems to be on the verge of historicization. (He’s also a nice guy, who, full dis- closer was one the first friend’s I made in Vermont…)
1. What job would you have if you weren’t a painter?
My grandfather and my father were both lettuce farmers, so I guess that would probably have to be it.
2. What conversation would you like to have with any dead artist?
It’s funny, but I think I’d just like to sit quietly and watch Hans Memling (1430-1494) work on one of his portraits. Just to know what that kind of painting looked like in action.
3. If you could collaborate/work with any living artist who would it be, and what sort of sort of project would you like to undertake?
It’s too hard to decide! I’ve always hoped to be asked to illustrate someone’s poems, because the painting–poetry nexus has such a wonderful history.
4. Describe the experience that led you to become a painter.
My grandmother was a quiltmaker and all-around crafter. She studied fine art and costume design at the Chouinard Institute in California and gave me my first oil painting lessons when I was about twelve—we painted a taxidermy duck.
5. Are there any painters that you wish had a wider audience?
There was just a book published on the work of Miyoko Ito (1918-1983) and I can’t recommend it enough.
6. Why live in Vermont?
It’s a good place to hear yourself think.
7. What’s your favorite smell?
Rain on cement. Coffee is a close second. (Actually, no, it’s coffee.)
8. What book(s) are you reading right now?
Dr. No by Percival Everett.
9. What does your daily routine look like?
It involves a lot of dogwalking, email, kid transportation, and limited painting roughly between the hours of ten and three.
10. How you think about your work locally versus your national presence.
I haven’t exhibited my work very much in Vermont, if at all. So my local presence trails my national presence (but only slightly!) For artists working outside the major world art centers, I think the internet is a good thing in terms of seeing art and having one’s art seen—as long as you don’t forget that you can’t actually see a painting online.
11. Given that your work is a capture of a single moment in time, is there a work of art that is time based (play, movie, song etc.) that you draw inspiration from?
The paintings are probably informed by whatever music I have on in the studio at the time, but maybe not in ways that would be noticeable (even to me). There’s something very rhythmic about color, and coloristic about rhythm—painting and music are highly compatible roommates.
12. Is there a childhood object that you still have? (If not, is there one that you wish you still had?)
At some point after high schooI threw out a lot of mix tapes, and I certainly wish I had those back.
13. What’s your ideal dinner—food, company, & location?
Sushi, with my family, anywhere!
