Anna van Schaap: Hope and Tragedy // Part 1

To kick-off the two-part season 7 finale, Anna van Schaap (fine artist, tattoo artist,  curator) sits down with Aaron McCall to talk about building a creative life that refuses to be small. She gets into finding her voice and claiming her space out of passion and defiance, and carving out something different for women and queer folks in an industry with a history of the opposite. They talk about art history, women in art created by women in art, and the cost of going all in on something you were told wasn't for you. It's about volition, visibility, and holding hope and tragedy at the same time.

Keep up with Anna van Schaap:
annavanschaap.com
IG: @theother_twistedsister
IG: @theother_twistedsister_tattoos
IG: @theother_twistedsister_photos

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This episode is supported by:
Creative Mornings Grand Rapids
Merchants & Makers
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Writer/Producer/Editor/Host:
Aaron McCall
aaronmccall.net
IG: @aaron_mccall
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Co-Host/Sidekick/Photographer:
Joe Matteson
themattesons.co
IG: @joe_dustin
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Music:
"Noises" by Mike Mains & The Branches
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Support the Podcast:
Buy Merch
——
Follow Bad Idea Social Club:
badideasocialclub.com
IG: @badideasocialclub

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:53

I don't need to even read the name. Like I know when a man is painted an image of a woman because I'm like, women don't look like that. Um, nobody's boobs look like that. If you've ever actually seen a fucking pair of tits, that's not what it looks like.

SPEAKER_03 1:06

You're part of hearing all these noises in my head. I can't see them go away.

SPEAKER_02 1:27

Nice, dude. Thanks. Yeah, I am I am sexy dirty right now.

SPEAKER_01 1:34

And aware.

SPEAKER_02 1:35

Yeah, very much so. Hey everybody, welcome back to Bad Idea Social Club. My name is Joe Madison.

SPEAKER_01 1:42

And I am Aaron McCall, and we are in the home stretch. This is going to wrap up season seven, but don't worry, we have an episode this week and next week. This one's a two-parter. Because I so I sat down with artist, tattooer, curator, photographer, Anna Van Scott. And you know, like I try to keep these uh, you know, like about an hour, give or take. You know what I mean? Like after all the editing, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Joe, she didn't have anything I could cut, man.

SPEAKER_02 2:15

That's amazing. That's amazing.

SPEAKER_01 2:17

Yeah. So I'm I'm really, really stoked about this conversation. Um Anna has spent the last 14 years building something in Detroit that is genuinely unlike anything else. She paints, she tattoos, she curates, she uh uh she shoots protest photography for um the National Press uh Photographers Association. And uh she does all of it with this like ferocity that is uh hard to describe until you like hear her talk about it. And Anna is one of those people who was told no early and often, and somehow uh it just kind of like made her more in. Like she bought in and she bit down even harder. And uh I think her work kind of speaks for itself because it's um it's brutal, it's beautiful, it's unapologetic, and it's uh alive. Um and so we got into uh art history and why women need to see uh images of women created by women. Um yeah, no, I know. Um we talked about the cost of building a creative life uh when you were told it wasn't for you, and carving out something safe in an industry that has a long history of misogynistic fucking bullshit. And you know, there's there's a version of hearing you don't belong here that makes people kind of back off, retreat, kind of question the space they're taking up. But there is this other version too where where when somebody gets told no enough times and they just decide to build the whole fucking thing themselves, um Anna is one of those people. And and I don't know, I think I think I am too. I think you are too.

SPEAKER_02 4:11

I hope so. I hope so. What I will say is that I hope so much so and hope I'm instilling in my daughter that that's who she is. It's like I want that conviction in things that she believes where it's like you're not gonna tell me anything.

SPEAKER_01 4:25

God, I love that. I uh I don't want to waste a bunch of time. So let's just let's just get into this one. Um part one with uh Annaban Scott. Here you go.

SPEAKER_00 4:37

So much hair. Just like a fucking mane everywhere I go. All right. Are these for boys' heads? I feel like this is no They're adjustable. Okay, what am I doing?

SPEAKER_01 4:48

Yeah, you just just push it down. Yeah, they're they're extended all the way.

SPEAKER_00 4:54

I'm like, damn, you have big-headed people on this podcast. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 4:58

You have no idea.

SPEAKER_00 4:59

I'm just kidding. Hello. You're like big heads and egos is actually the uh other name for it. That fits. I'm here for both. I have well, I have a normal size head, but I've got a decent ego.

SPEAKER_01 5:14

Well, you got a lot of cats.

SPEAKER_00 5:15

I have a lot of cats.

SPEAKER_01 5:16

I want to like we'll we'll get to the art stuff, but like I want to talk about the cats first.

SPEAKER_00 5:20

Full deep dive into the cats is like a great intro. Um, so I actually just had the one for like 10 years. He's truly his name's Baby. He's named after the old movie Bringing Up Baby, Catherine Hepburn, Carrie Grant. If you haven't seen it and you like old movies, absolutely go watch that. It's one of the absolute best and the better Hepburn, as far as I'm concerned. Uh, because she was a baddie and a badass and a feminist too. But um, yeah, there's like a leopard in this movie, uh, like a genuine, like back when they used to just like not CGI stuff. Like, oh, also, can I swear? Because I almost was like shit. I have a bit of a potty mouth, I'm not gonna lie. But um, yeah, and it's such a great little old movie. And um, but yeah, so the leopard like gets loose and like wreaks havoc. It actually is a pet in the movie, but it like goes and does its thing.

SPEAKER_01 6:06

It's like really old.

SPEAKER_00 6:07

Yeah, it's like black and white.

SPEAKER_01 6:08

Like Cat the Rebecca, carry girl, like I know what you're talking about because it's in the public domain now. Yes. So when I was putting together the intro for our um for this podcast, for like, you know, because this is our first season that we're doing video. I was looking at some like interesting stuff and like it come up.

SPEAKER_00 6:25

It did come up.

SPEAKER_01 6:26

I was like, I was scrolling through it trying to find some interesting footage and stuff like that. I ended up leaning on a lot of cartoons, but like so cute.

SPEAKER_00 6:32

That is literally what the love of my life is named after Baby the Leopard from bringing up baby, because he's a little bangle, so he's got little leopard spots. Um, but yeah, he was like my only child. He truly like I have a wonderful partner, and he doesn't mind me saying it. Like, this cat is the love of my life. This is like my true and honest to God soulmate. I am deeply convinced, and we'll talk about it whenever anyone will listen, that this little creature, like in a past life, was like a gay 17th century dandy. And we very much had the same relationship we have now where like everything is his and I just like live to serve him. Like, yes, no, like he very much like I obviously was like one of the favorite servants back in the 17th century. Like, I was the beloved one that he you know turned to for love and guidance because he wasn't, you know, raised with love by his own parents. Like, I am that. So we have had I I it's a weird feeling before I even really knew I actually believed about like life, death, past lives, like whatever it is, however woo you want to get about it. I very literally had the weirdest feeling when I held this tiny creature in my hands for the first time. I had I distinctly remember feeling like I know this little thing. And I've never had like we've you know, I grew up with a house full of pets. My dad and his brothers actually owned uh small mom and pop pet stores right here in Grand Rapids. It was called the Pet Shop, Curious World. Um, they had about, you know, at the height, they had like seven stores. So I grew up with just animals everywhere. I grew up in pet stores. I like animals are a huge part of my life. I think when you're like a weird, odd child that um doesn't know how to always relate to people in a normal way, like animals are a go-to for people that are just sort of on the fringe of norm normalcy because animals are just unconditional love.

SPEAKER_01 8:24

Well, and they're and they're objectively better than people. I've said that a thousand times.

SPEAKER_00 8:27

Yeah, yeah. Because they just they don't have the malice that is in inside some people, you know, for sure. But anyway, so this little creature, love of my life, he is going on 14, and that's the hardest thing to talk about. But he's so healthy and he's doing great. Um, but yeah, then a couple years ago, um I had a pregnant mama cat show up at my house. Uh, her name is Beef. She's like the mom of my colony. I love that name. Well, it comes from because she, um, even though she was like starving and pregnant and a feral, I would like feed her and she refused to eat beef flavored food. And I'm like, ma'am, you are starving to death. I love that you're still a picky bitch. Um, so I call her Beef because she's also just a tiny, like seven-pound little thing. She's so tiny. So calling her like beefy is hilarious to me. But she gave birth to two kittens, and that was unfortunately also the same spring and summer that my dad got very, very ill. So I was more or less like living back in Grand Rapids because he was in and out of hospitals like over and over and over. And we can get into that later because I did actually end up losing him. But um, so these kittens were always on my mind, and I was returning back to Detroit like every like every other weekend or whenever when I could get back, you know, check on the house, da-da-da. Like baby was coming home with me. So, and I didn't have any other cats at the time. But beef and these kittens were always on my mind, and then my dad actually ended up passing away. And unfortunately, also my grandmother had passed six weeks before my dad. So my mom lost her husband and her mother all in one. The family, we were just one of the worst times of my life, and um, so I ended up staying for a month, like just at my mom's here in Grand Rapids after that all happened, because we also had two funerals we had to plan, and um uh, and then so anyway, I was it's like a month had gone by, and I'm like, I have to go back to Detroit. I have to go back to my life essentially. I've like abandoned my life at this point. Um, and I, you know, I'm driving back and I'm on my way home, turning down the street, and I just immediately burst into tears because I think like deep down I wasn't really ready to be home on my own, away from my mom, away from my sister, away from family. Um, like I wasn't ready to go back to life as normal, you know, because it's not normal anymore. No, it's not normal anymore. It's like one of the people that made you who you are no longer exists, so it's nothing will be normal again. But um, I and the kittens crossed my mind. I was like, I wonder if they're still around. And I literally pulled into the driveway, and these two little shits are just sitting in the driveway, like, what up, girl? Isn't that kind of the best though? A hundred percent. Because I'll tell you what, my dad's two love languages were animals and gifts. He was not always the most expressive person, he wasn't always the greatest at, you know, being like, I love you, kid, I'm proud of you. He showed it in his own way, but he loved giving gifts and he loved animals. And I knew instantaneously in that moment that that was my dad's final gift to me. He left these two kittens for me because I really did. I struggled for the next several months to like get out of bed to, you know, and and but there were several days where I'm like, nope, you gotta get up because you gotta go check on the kittens, especially the little girl. She was pretty sick, she had like a bad upper respiratory. So she'd like wait on the porch for me every morning and I'd go down and I'd like to clean her little snotty face off and give her, you know, meds and food. And so there were days where like I really was struggling. Like, I don't know how to get up, I don't know how to do this today. But what got me up was these that I like I knew I had to go feed these little kittens outside, and um they you know, they'd just be like sitting there waiting for me, and I would sit out, and this was now, you know, end of August, D beginning of September. So it was still pretty nice weather, and I'd just like sit outside in the fresh air with the kittens in the sun, play in the driveway, and yeah, sorry, my rings work. Um, and that was that. That's how these two kittens became mine. So their mom, beef, she still like stuck around, but she like she got them to about eight, 10 months and was like, okay, I'm gonna go now. These are yours. And I was like, um, Mam, please don't get your children. And she's like, No, you got it, girl. Yeah, you're a beef now. Um so she still come, you know, she was still coming by every couple of days, but she very much was like, I don't need to raise these kittens anymore. And I think it was also a very teen mom situation, like, oh, like babies having babies over there. Um, so I yeah, the and then the little girl cat, um, their names now are chicken and shrimp. Because the little girl, she's so tiny, she's like six and a half pounds, and then chicken is literally afraid of everything, like he's afraid of his own shadow, truly. Um, so their names are very fitting, they're a little chicken and shrimp. Um, but uh yeah, she ended up shrimp getting ended up getting like quite a bit sicker quickly, and I ended up making the decision to take them inside. So they're now in with me. But beef step kept you know coming around, so I kept feeding her, and Detroit has a horrific feral cat population problem.

SPEAKER_01 13:33

Like dogs too.

SPEAKER_00 13:34

Dogs too, absolutely. But I think the like feral cat population is somewhere between like 60 and 70,000 feral cats in the city of Detroit alone. We're not talking metro, we're talking the city, because there's no real programs for like TNRing and like cats just breed with each other and kittens on kittens and kittens on kittens. So anyway, you put food out, you're gonna get cats. So, end of a very long story. I now am the mother of an outdoor colony of like four regulars. Beef ended up getting herself knocked out one more time, little slit.

SPEAKER_01 14:08

Classic beef.

SPEAKER_00 14:09

Classic beef. Um, and then uh uh she did end up having a couple kittens, and then I got all those guys spayed and neutered when everybody was old enough. And but now still, like every season, I put up food and like another one shows up, another one shows up, another one shows up. So I have just consistently been spaying, neutering cats right and left, and then the kittens when I, you know, they're very easy to find homes for, and it's like oh, one last baby on the street. So like I think I'm up to like five or six rehomed kittens now, two rehomed adults, and then my so this just kind of happened to you. Yeah, yeah. In the last it's not even been four years, but yes, like well, beef showed up four years ago, but like I officially guess became a colony caregiver at like about three and a half-ish years ago now.

SPEAKER_01 14:58

And then I might be I might be hitting you up because I I miss having a cat around here. Oh my god, I really do. I think it's been I think it's been two years since Daphne passed away. And she was I mean, she was sixteen, seventeen, something like that. Um huge bitch.

SPEAKER_00 15:14

Like we love a savvy bitch.

SPEAKER_01 15:16

Hated everybody but me, which I kind of love.

SPEAKER_00 15:18

Oh yeah. I mean that one animal that's like, this is mine and mine alone. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:24

Yeah. And she and and and she wasn't like uh like uh oh, I don't want to be around you, so I'm not gonna come around you. Like she would like come around you and like like rub on you and stuff, and I would always try to tell people, like, this is a trap.

SPEAKER_00 15:37

Yeah, don't touch the cat.

SPEAKER_01 15:39

Like she's she's trying to hurt you. Uh-huh. And everybody would always be like, Oh no, I'm the cat whisperer. I can and I'm like, I fucking promise you you're not. Uh, but if you insist, I'll go get the band-aids. And uh and being a big thing.

SPEAKER_00 15:52

Have you been to the urgent care recently? Would you like to? Which is also a funny story because I did land uh uh land myself in the hospital twice last year, and one of them was actually a cat bite um from one of my regulars. What? It it was totally not not his fault, but not his fault. Like he's a big tomcat, super possessive, like he's a mean boy to everybody but me, and I know it. Um, and he doesn't like other cats because he's super territorial. So, other than his actual children who are part of my colony, two of his two of the kids are um also beefs lover. She's at the center of everything, little beefer. Um his name's Fancy. He's named after the uh uh song Fancy, which like Reba McIntyre covered, and then one of my favorite artists of all time. Yeah, Reba is not the original. That is a cover. Like she she's the one known for it, but she covered that song. The original is like you wouldn't even know the name. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:49

You don't know the name, do you? No, not off the top of my head.

SPEAKER_00 16:52

Um, but I actually didn't even know the Reba cover because I live under a rock and you know, like little do I leave my house ever. But uh I originally heard the song because I am in love with Orville Peck. In love. I mean, it would be totally me to be in love with like a gay cowboy, but I am I am in love with Orville Peck. Classic beef. Classic beef. Yeah, but so there's like you know, the song Fancy, it's recovered by Orville, who obviously is a man, so when he's singing, it takes on this whole new like femme boy, you know, kind of thing, and um, other than just being turned out to rich men for prostitution, like the femme boy being turned out kind of thing. Um, and fancy, the first time I ever met him, he's so pretty, he's like a long, beautiful haired cat. I he and he showed up on December 1st, so I called him Mariah Carey because that's when that bitch shows up. Um and he's so beautiful and elegant. I was like, Mariah Carey fits him. Um, and then it was like months in that I realized he had like a huge set of balls, and I was like, oh shit, you're a boy. So that's where his name comes from. Fancy. Um, but yeah, anyway, so he uh was super territorial, like the yard, the domain, the cats, it was his, and he didn't like um anybody coming in. And there's this little kitten, like little itty bitty black kitten, uh, that I was trying to save. I was like trying to, you know, get him to warm up to me so I could rehome him. I did. He's happy, he's love. He's like with my partner's um uh cousin now, so I also get to see him, and he's just like spoiled, rotten. I love it. But uh anyway, so I'm like trying to save this little black cat, and I've like finally got him to associate me with like food, you know, cut like at work getting to the point, like I'm gonna trap him, I'm gonna get him inside. And I go out to feed everybody, and he sees me and comes like darting across the street. And Fancy's on the porch already. And uh I like see it in slow-mo in my mind, and I knew it was just like a weird gut reaction where you just you don't even know what you're doing until you're doing it. But I see Fancy go like full airplane ears, and I'm like, fuck. Oh, it's on like the back goes straight up, the hair goes straight up, and I'm like, shit. He like corners this kitten, and as he's like lunging at the kitten, and again, he's got this is a like a 14-pound tomcat, and we're talking like a seven-week old, if that's a bull. He's not a bully, just a big boy, and he's very territorial. So I was like, This kid, this is a death sentence, like approaching. Um, so as he lunges at this poor kitten, I uh just react and I like grab fancy. And he turns around and he just sinks his teeth like into my thumb right here. And I've never actually seen a cat do this, and I swear to god, this happened. He fucking shook my hand like a pit ball, like no shit. Like he meant business. Um, so I knew I was immediately in trouble because cat bites are like instantaneous infections. Their mouths are just so gross, and they're like little needle teeth just like deposit um bacteria like into your body. But it was like 11 o'clock at night. I'm like, I'm not going to the hospital. Urgent care is closed. I will go, I'm gonna wake up eight at 8 a.m. and go first thing in the morning. By the time I woke up, my hand was like a baseball mist.

SPEAKER_01 20:05

I was gonna say this feels like a mistake.

SPEAKER_00 20:07

It was a huge mistake. I should have gone right to the hospital. So I waited for hours at urgent care. Finally, they saw me. Actually, it was a long story, but they actually had ended up sending me to another urgent care for an x-ray on my hand because they were like, we have to make sure there's no teeth in it or whatever. Um, they cleared me and then the doctor came in. He took one lookup at in this point, I so there's two bite wounds on either side, and um, there's like two lines of red just running up my arm, like like continuously growing up my arm as I'm like waiting, waiting, waiting to see the doctors at urgent care, da-da-da. Cause we're now it's like 1 p.m. Like I'd basically like been on site trying to get help by like 8, 8:30. Um, so at this point, like the red is just now creeping up my arm, and I'm like, well, that's not good. Um, the doctor comes in, takes one look at me, and he goes, You gotta go to the ER. Like, you grab your stuff, you need to go directly to the ER. And I'm like, okay, cool, what's going on? He's like, so though those red lines you see, that infection is in your lymphatic system. It is traveling up your arm. And if it hits here, it goes now straight to your heart. Fuck. Like that bacteria goes straight to your heart. We're talking sepsis, you can die from that. So I go to the ER, I wait for about an hour there until they got to see me. And they bring down like a hand surgeon specialist. They're like looking this thing over because also I let them know, like, hey, my hands, like my right hand is my life. Like, I'm an artist and a tattoo artist. If I don't have these things, I have no life. Um, and they're like, Yep, we're gonna bring down the hand surgeon. They want to make sure we don't have to like open it up and debris it. Oh my god, it was such a nightmare. Finally, they decided, like, I'm okay, but they're like, We're gonna keep you overnight. You need three rounds of antibodies, like intravenous antibiotics, like directly into your so over the course of several hours, I'm watching this like still climbing, even with the antibiotics in my system. And it got about here before it started finally receding. But I was like, Oh my god, oh my god, I'm going to die. Like, you're just like watching the red like crawl up your veins. You're like, this is so bad. And my partner, you know, I called him immediately, so he stayed in the hospital with me overnight. And like every couple hours, you'd be like, Let me take a photo for the doctor. We're just like, hey, doc, is this okay? He's like, You're fine. You just need to stay on the animal because it takes a minute for a tour. Yeah. So cat bites, guys, don't play with that. Get help if you get bit by a cat. Don't wait on it, or you will get a nice hospital bill.

SPEAKER_01 22:35

Jesus Christ. Well, let's back up a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 22:37

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 22:37

Let's back up a little bit. Um, I feel like to understand where you're at with your work, I feel like I want to go all the way back.

SPEAKER_00 22:43

Oh boy. Okay. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 22:44

So just what kind of kid were you? How'd you grow up?

SPEAKER_00 22:47

Well, I grew up right here in Grand Rapids, Michigan, eight minutes away from where we are recording this right now.

unknown 22:52

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 22:53

Very funny. Um, and uh I will say, you know, people are like, oh, how long have you been an artist? Or like, you know, um, forever, like truly forever.

SPEAKER_01 23:03

Was it was it serious forever?

SPEAKER_00 23:06

I yeah, I I honestly, yes, because I was the kid that you could very literally leave with a coloring book and like a set of crayons, and you would find me there hours later. Like, I that's what I wanted to do. I just wanted to draw and color. Um, you know, I remember like going out to restaurants. There was like a restaurant right on 28th Street. It's called the Ground Round, and you know, close to our house. We went there often when we did. They had free popcorn. Um, and they had these placemats, and my uh, we walk in and we went there enough that like I think they kind of knew us. So they'd give me two placemats that I would just turn over and they'd give me a box of crayons, and I would just sit like quiet as a mouse. Both my sister and I, she was also very, very artistically talented. Um, and uh, you know, both my parents worked full-time. Um, so like summer times we had babysitters, and um, to my parents' massive credit, I think particularly and especially my mom, because I'm not sure how involved in the decision making my dad was with that, but my mom really truly uh did her due diligence to find babysitters that would do arts and crafts with us. Like we had one who we would like go to her house for the day, my sister and I, and she had two girls both roughly around our age, and like we did so many crafts with her. Like we would have like an activity every day that we would do. And then as we got a little bit older, um, you know, my mom I uh hired, it was like her boss's daughter, I guess, was like, you know, teenage, late teenage, so looking to do babysitting. And she would, I mean, we would do all sorts of just fun craft things, and that I can genuinely say I was a pretty unhappy teenager. I definitely had it, I think things were rough. Um, and I don't think I like fit in very well as a young person because I'm I was odd. I'm not, you know, now it's like people love that. They're like you're quirky, you're unique, and people love the uniqueness, but everything about when you're younger, it's all about fitting in. And I didn't, and I didn't know how to, I like didn't understand that. So um, for me it was just like animals and coloring were my two happy places, and animals are just making things, like craft anything, like anything at all. And then my mom did actually put my sister and I into like a little summer program for art stuff, like where we started really learning the basics, like skills, like not just like you like doing this, but let's learn some foundational skills. Um, and I do remember though I started getting, I'm two years younger than my older sister, and I started getting a little bit better than her quite quickly. And so my sister always says, like, you know, I probably would have been an artist, but because I was growing in my skills, she was like, I had to go find something else to do because like I couldn't do something like my little sister's outdoing me.

SPEAKER_01 26:00

She didn't feel like she was, or she couldn't, she felt like she couldn't keep up.

SPEAKER_00 26:03

Yes, yeah, or just like yeah, I don't know. We also, my sister is one of my favorite people in the world, but we are very literally night and day, polar opposites, like have nothing in common, don't look alike. Like if she, you know, likes up, I like down. If she likes left, I like right, you know, it's just like I don't know how we ended up so different, like morally and ethically, chorally, we're very similar, but just like how we approach life. We could not have taken two different approaches. And so I think there is like some oppositional thing in us that like if one did something, the other had to do something opposite, and because I have very clearly staked some kind of claim on art, she was like, Well, fuck that, you know. So she she uh, you know, has mentioned before and has gotten on me before, like, oh yeah, I probably would have, you know, maybe had some career or life in art because she runs, she was very talented. I mean, half the reason I think I loved art is because she did art and like you're the little sister, so you want to be cool, like big sister, and do what big sister does, and she liked art, so I like art, but um, and then it became one of those things. I it it's funny, and I've talked about this before, how we end up doing the things that we do. Because I think a lot of times part of it is passion and interest, part of it is skill and talent, and part of it is also the way that people celebrate how you do things. And I got a lot of accolades very early on from, I mean, I can remember as early as like kindergarten first grade, like having art teachers be like, shh, this is there's some exceptional skill keel here. And um I think you know, when you're young and you are looking for validation and you are looking for your place, especially when you're a weirdo and don't really know what that place is. Anytime someone says, like, you know, has any kind of validation for what you're doing, how you're doing it, celebratory of your anything that you have to offer, you lean more heavily into it. So I also think it's a a part of this like puzzle piece of how I came to be is I had a lot of really great art teachers along the way that just really pushed and celebrated and made sure that I understood, like, you know, what you have to offer is rare and exceptional. Keep going, keep pushing, keep being interested in this. You have the passion for it, but it was really the first thing I can ever remember in my life where someone was like, you are exceptional. You are exceptional.

SPEAKER_01 28:32

What a feeling too.

SPEAKER_00 28:32

Yeah, and it, yeah, and you so of course you lean into it when people are like, you are exceptional. And and that's to say, like, you know, I went on later in life and was like, oh, I, you know, it was fairly exceptional on a lot of things, but I grew up, you know, I went to City High School here in Grand Rapids, which is like, I think at the time I went there, it was truly ranked like the 13th best high school in the country. Like my peers, we were all nerds. We were all just like like so intelligence was just like what was around me. I didn't realize like, oh, you are exceptionally intelligent because everyone around me was that level. Like that's what I was, you know, you start there at like seventh grade, and most of the kids actually started in one of the uh two schools, Blandford or Zoo School. Uh so I went to Zoo School, which fed directly into City Middle, which then became City High. So it was like a literal seven straight years of just being around exceptionally intellectual young folk. Also very rare. Yes, very rare. So I didn't realize, like, oh, your brain is half of your superpower. It's not just your talent, it's how you think about things because everyone around me, I was like, I'm just average, I'm a normal person. And then you go out in the world and you're like, like, oh shit, I'm dope. Yeah, so brain, brain, brain. Got it, got it, got it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 29:51

But God, I love that. So if we fast forward a little bit, um your your work has this and I mean this in the in the in the most whatever, fucking.

SPEAKER_00 30:01

I've heard it all. I've heard it all.

SPEAKER_01 30:03

Your work has this like brutality to it.

SPEAKER_00 30:05

Yeah, oh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 30:06

I fucking love that.

SPEAKER_00 30:07

Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 30:08

I I I can tell you what I feel when when I when I see it, but like I want to know about where you're coming from. I want to know about it.

SPEAKER_00 30:15

Let's hear what you feel first. Because I feel like when I then say where I'm coming from, people are like, oh, okay, that changes, maybe this or that. So I personally also think like as an artist, understanding how other people interpret what you create is half of your process because it can actually be misunderstood or misinterpreted. So having other people's input is wonderful.

SPEAKER_01 30:39

So I see I think I think the first thing I see is is and I'm obviously projecting, I'm putting my own experiences on it. Yeah, let's hear it. Um I'm seeing pain, right? And I'm seeing uh like like the word uh bruised kind of comes to mind. And but I'm also seeing strength and power and a certain level of hey, go fuck right off in it.

SPEAKER_00 31:06

Okay, that's pretty accurate. I mean there's nothing in there that I I don't think fits. Um, and especially I would say the body of work that I am most known for, that shows the most, that like, you know, I saw a lot of prints of that people seem to be drawn to the most, um, was definitely made during one of, I would say, like the darkest periods of my life. And uh, you know, truthfully, I have lived through some very horrible things. Um, I've had horrible things happen to me. I've had people do horrible things to me, um, which is I think the story of most women when you really ask them about their experiences in this world and um but uh I and I I definitely want to couch that and like every experience is unique, but I think that there is a certain brutality you walk away from um having lived through a lot of these experiences that women do, um, and also living through by proxy a lot of these experiences. Like even if you are a woman lucky enough to not have had some of these horrific things happen to you, you know women that have like you are you have best friends, sisters, mothers, aunts that have survived a lot of um horrific things. Um, so you you still live it in a way, even if you haven't like embodied um having to survive certain things. But um yeah, I um actually I so I will say there's been several periods in my life that were very dark and gruesome. Um, but uh this was this body of work that I made, I think that you were probably referring to because it's my most well-known and it has sort of those um descriptors to it. Uh it was made during a time I think I can now look back on and say, I was just so unhappy. Like I just I was in a relationship with a person who was like a true to form emotionally abusive narcissist who was just um that's the hard that's the stuff that's hard to talk about because when you finally sort of become who you want to be as a person and you start embodying like the strength of who you are, uh it's very hard for me to talk about that period because I'm like the the woman I am today would be like no fucks given, you are not welcome in my life. Like I would never put up with what I did, but I was young, I was impressionable, I was very broken by the world, very broken by a lot of things that have happened to me. I was looking for love and validation in really wrong ways and sources, and you know, unfortunately, also with narcissists, they see brokenness, they're so good at identifying it and um and exploit it, and exploiting it, and they also don't present themselves as a narcissist, right? It was like years into this relationship before the mask really started slipping, and you're now years in. I'm now in my you know, mid to late 20s, and it's like you've invested already so much time and energy, and you just keep thinking like, and that is the insidiousness of narcissism, is they are so capable of blaming you. Like you are doing something wrong. You, it's because of you I'm acting in this manner, blah, blah, blah. So you're just like, I I what a horrible person I must be. That like my favorite person in the world is now, you know, become this monster, like, and but you know, then you're on the other side of it one day and you look back and you're like, Oh, it's crazy, because like everyone he ever had a relationship felt that way and said that way about him. Like, there's a problem here, there's a common denominator, and it's not you, baby. Yeah, um, so yeah, I was with a person that just like in every way, shape, or form, um, he found someone that he thought was like broken, but also very strong, very intelligent, very self-possessed, very confident. And he spent the next like five-ish years breaking that to pieces. And I was shattered by the end of that relationship. I was just like a shell of a person that um I had to rebuild, and that work is literally um a big part of it. That's how you rebuild, right? It's through the work. Yeah, and I think that's why there's like so much devastation, so much um brutality, so much pain in the work, but also the power, the strength, the vitality. Um, and along the way, also. So, one thing I will always advocate for I'm gonna backtrack a little bit, uh, because I like to talk about this when I'm given the opportunity. The one thing I think artists fail at doing is recognizing being a fine artist truly as a career. It's the only career I can think of off the top of my head where like you don't have to um do your due diligence to learn your career in order to be a part of it. Where people are just like, well, I have a vision, I make art, blah, blah, blah, but they don't know art history, they don't understand art history. They like uh to me, it's like a doctor walking in, like, yeah, I'm gonna take your appendance out. I've never done that before, but like, I, you know, I'm really good with a scalpel. So um, I don't see it as any different. And and that's to me the difference between a fine artist who is operating as career, fine artists, and someone who loves art, makes art, it's part of their craft, it's a part of their passion, it's a part of their hobbies. And you can have unbelievably talented hobbyists, but a fine artist is a career like anything else. It involves, you know, marketing, it involves image, it involves work, it involves selling, it involves like it, it, it's a whole, it's a whole career. And we don't make enough distinctions when we talk about it. And for people that have aspirations to have a career in the fine art world, the one thing I feel uh that I see lacking every time is a understanding of the history of the craft. Um like literally not even having a basic art knowledge. Like when you're like you bring up, you know, let's talk about constructivism, let's talk about, you know, how that came out of post-industrialization. You know, like they don't understand that art is a reflection of the periods in which those um movements came about. It reflected what was going on in the world around them, or it was a reaction to it, you know, like dataism coming on the back of constructivism because it was a reaction to industrialization and this need to like want to experience humanity again. And, you know, I think right now we are in a re-emergence of sort of Renaissance era art, like painting, da-da-da, because everyone is acting like um, you know, post they want to re-they're reacting to this digitalized world. They want to get back to the basics of fine art, like everything that has nothing to do with the digital world, because everyone's so just sick of being inundated with AI and digitalness and you know, the removal that the hu the human removal that is sort of incorporated into the digitizing.

SPEAKER_01 37:55

Literally getting your hands dirty.

SPEAKER_00 37:56

Yes, literally getting your hands dirty. Um so you're seeing like a re-emergence of painting and um like film photography and just things where you're like, yeah, you're in the chemicals, you're in the muck, uh the gritty stuff. The gritty stuff. And anyway, so um I I love art history. I love it. I'm an actual art history nerd. It's one of the degrees I do have. And um my favorite era, like absolute favorite era, and all of the artists that have come like as major influences to me really come from like post-Renaissance, Baroque era. So you had the Renaissance, which has, you know, so many of the artists I love and admire, but piggybacking off of the Renaissance, like the imagery you saw in the Renaissance when you're talking from an art historical standpoint, is these very um uh these very objectified views of women. Like women were actually objects in paintings. The artists were men, the artisanships that were available were for men, it was images of women painted by men for men to be purchased and looked at. It was, and these women very literally, it is the definition of objectification. They were truly turned into objects for voyeurship, for like looking at and liking. Um, they had like everything about images from the Renaissance, like these women, there's so much passivity to them that there is almost a lack of humanity because there is a lack of volition involved. And I love the Broke era because it takes some of the most beautiful elements of the Renaissance, but it put volition back into the body. And it also started bringing in the introduction of these really badass women artists and men that also worked with these women artists and like, you know, taught these women artists, and like were obviously influenced by their take on the world, and um like, you know, one I love to talk about, and I'm so excited. It's been like I would say the last 10 years, she has had this like massive re-emergence. Her name is Gentilici, um, and she is, you know, sort of listed a little bit as a contemporary of Carvaggio, although she actually didn't train directly under Carvaggio, but someone associated in his circle, and Carvaggio is one of my favorites as well. Same.

SPEAKER_01 40:08

Have you been to the museum in Rome?

SPEAKER_00 40:09

I have not. I've never been to Rome. It's fucking awesome. It is not about it.

SPEAKER_01 40:13

I was losing my mind when I was in there.

SPEAKER_00 40:16

I believe it.

SPEAKER_01 40:16

I still And it's just in like it's just in like a small building in a park.

SPEAKER_00 40:20

Yeah, but that's like the some of the best. That's when you're just like you walk in, you're like, what?

SPEAKER_01 40:25

I know. I was I was losing my fucking mind.

SPEAKER_00 40:27

Um, my favorite museum I've ever been to, uh, Amsterdam, the Rijksmuseum, where like the hall of essentially, you know, the most famous Dutch painters, including one of my favorites, Rembrandt, like the master of light. No one has ever painted light the way that he does, no one ever will again. Just and standing in front of like the Night's Watch painting, which is I don't actually know the dimensions, but I'm not exaggerating. And I say I think it's like 30 by 30 feet, maybe bigger. It's just, it's a wall. It's a painting. Like I've never understood. You look at these images and books your whole life until you stand in front of them. And I like cried. I cried in front of that painting because it was so overwhelming to see it in person. Um, but it was also so overwhelming because, you know, again, this is a little bit where like ego comes in because I actually don't think at the time I saw that I was quite where I like creatively am or tech tech technical skill am now. But I remember being like, my work isn't that far off from being able to exist here. Now I think I was a little full of myself when I actually thought that. So I could also be very full of myself today. But ego is also a part I think of an art. Like everyone your whole life will tell you, like, like, okay, good luck. You're probably not gonna make it. So somebody's gotta believe in you. So you have to be the first person that, like, in almost a unabashedly silly way, like, I'm gonna make it. I'm gonna be the one in a million, because no one else is gonna tell me.

SPEAKER_01 41:52

Not this blow of smoke, but I think you belong there.

SPEAKER_00 41:54

Thank you. Thank you very much. But yeah, so um, anyway, Gentileci, going back a little bit on my diatribe here, uh, she was a contemporary in circles with Carvaggio, but she um, her father also was a very famous broke painter and um ended up working as uh an apprentice under a contemporary of her father's. And this man, very famously, and this is like all documented, this isn't just hearsay, like this is in Italian documents you can look at today. Um, he raped her, and um, she very famously took him to court and fought him, which is not something you did at the time. Like, and um the whole court uh proceeding is documented. You can read it all, where they literally like did things that were basically forms of torture. Like they would they put her in um something called a thumb binder where they just like screw into your thumb because they were like like trying to get her to admit that she's lying because they assume like if I torture you and torture you and torture you, you'll eventually break and be like, I'm lying, I made it up. And she was like, break my fucking thumbs. Like, I'm I did not make this up. This man did this to me. Um, and so very, very famously, if not infamously, he they the court actually found in her favor and was like, Yeah, we he did this to you. Immediately, because he was a famous painter as well. Um, the Pope sent for him to come do some kind of like fresca, mural, whatever at the Vatican at the time. And he was like shipped out, never ever received, even though the court found him guilty, never received a single form of punishment for what he did to her. And she was like a child at the time, by the way. She was like 16 or 17 when he did this, and he was like a 40-year-old man. Um, so pedophilia goes back way, way before, way before current times, guys.

SPEAKER_01 43:42

Um by the way, my my laugh was out of discomfort.

SPEAKER_00 43:46

Of course, of course, of course. Yeah, just a bit. Um, but uh yeah, so um the end of the story, which is like one of my I think about her constantly, and one of the reasons, other than she is so talented, like one of the most insanely talented, you know, uh uh Italian painters of her time. Um she super infamously painted um the scene of Her Fernes uh beheading uh Samson. I think it's Samson, I might be saying that wrong, but um anyway, it's an extremely famous biblical scene. I'm not up to date on my Bible, so sorry if I'm like quoting that wrong, but it's a very famous biblical scene where um, you know, a woman from the Bible like beheads a man um in service to it's the one where the blood is just fucking gotchak. And um what she did was paint herself as the woman with the sword and painted her rapist as the man that she beheaded. So she literally gets to behead her rapist for the rest of human time. When I tell you that's a baddie. Okay. Um, so that's what I mean when I say, and that is obviously an extreme example of it, but when I say like the Baroque era put volition back into the femme body that like the Renaissance never had. And I feel so deeply inspired by um the humanization of these women in that way, that they literally had agency. Like it asks the viewer to reframe their relationship with how they look at these. There's no, it's not a voyeurship. Like they are like almost ostentatiously looking back, like judging the viewer, judging them in such a direct and really meaningful way that there is humanity in the soul again in those paintings.

SPEAKER_01 45:37

So so what do you think happens when that perspective uh comes from a woman in 2026?

SPEAKER_00 45:43

Uh everything, which is why I'm such a huge advocate for um the necessity to have more female artists. Like obviously, points of view across, you know, every gender, race, background, ideas, religions, like we need it all. But again, from an art historical standpoint, we have left women out of the conversation, more or less, for all of art history. Like, still today, um, this statistic might have changed because this was from a couple years ago. Um, so it might have gotten better or worse, honestly. But um, as of like not even three, four years ago, women like uh women made up about 75% of all graduating MFAs in this country. So master's of fine arts degrees. These are people who are pursuing art at its highest level. You are pursuing it as a career when you are going and actually getting your master's in your fine art and fine art. Um, so they made up about 75% of women trying to be professional artists in the world. They were less than 14% of gallery and museum represented artists. Less than it was like 13.8%. So it's not a lack of talent, it's not a lack of desire, it's not a lack of ambition, it's a lack of opportunity. Because women don't get that opportunity. Still, we still live in a world where it we are talking about mass amounts of inequity, and when it's very hard sometimes to talk about that because we see the world around us and it's not like good men, good people are actively engaging in inequity across the board or doing things that actually harm women, but we still live in a world where those opportunities are majorly disparative. And the opportunities that are doled out to women are given to women that still are operating a lot of times in the same patriarchal norms where they their work is very much either an uh exploitation of other women or an exploitation of themselves. Like the work I see, you know, I walk into a gallery and like the amount of just like boobs everywhere, and it's like men. Oh my god, you can just like I don't need to even read the name. Like, I know when a man is painted an image of a woman because I'm like, women don't look like that. Um, nobody's boobs look like that. If you've ever actually seen a fucking paired tits, that's not what it looks like. So a man painted that, and he painted it after watching too much porn. Um, but it is like the there's just like one, the bodies are too perfect, and two, there's no soul in the woman, and you just know that it was a man that painted it because he has no idea what it feels like to embody being a woman in this world. And that's why women need to see images of themselves as painted by themselves, because they need I think we need the reference point as women to understand ourselves and how the collectively we see each other. Like there's been so much change for women in the last 10 years, and it's because women are now, we have platforms to communicate, to talk to each other, to share ideas and realize, oh, we're not alone. And I think, you know, when you're talking about a portrait, a portrait of someone is not just an image of them recreated. It is the evocation of that person if you do it well, if you do it the right way. It is not just an image representation, it is an evocation of who they are. And I don't really believe in my heart of hearts that a man can truly understand, can truly paint a woman in her in her fullness without understanding what it is to be a woman in this world. It is the pain, it is the agony, it is the, you know, I use this line when I like um submit to uh grants, whatever's um a lot. So forgive me if you've ever heard me say this before, because I do re-reuse and recycle, be kind. Um, but uh I think to be a woman is truly to hold hope and tragedy and simultaneity. And you don't know what that's like unless you are literally operating on that fence line every day, which is where women come from. And I think women, you have to feel it in order to make it. Um otherwise, there is something hollow about the recreation of these images by men. So we need more women, we need more mint women painting images of women, of womanhood, of the pain, of the tragedy, of the beauty, of the strength, of the, you know, put volition into the body and let it exist in the world. And the more conversations we have around actual representations of women, the more we talk about the things women don't talk about, the more we platform um what women have been through, what women have to say, what women think, what women feel. And that's when things in the world change. That's how artists become, you know, ciphers of the world around them. You take what is happening in the world, you cipher it through your body and you make something with it from your own idea of what's going on. And um, that's how you change people's viewpoints because it you can't understand what it is to be something until you know it's placed in front of you and you can see it in its wholeness. And still you just have to accept, like, or you have to see it and be open to accepting like that's what it is to be a woman, or you know, as a white woman, I have to accept from women of color like what it is to be a woman of color in this world. Because I don't know. Like I I have I I like deeply just want to constantly surround myself with these images because I will never understand that. I can understand the difficulty of womanhood, but I can't understand the the the duality difficulty of being women and women of color in the world.

SPEAKER_01 51:17

Yeah, well it's you know, it's it's the the only perspectives that like were truly afforded are our our own.

SPEAKER_00 51:25

Yeah, yeah, a hundred percent. A hundred percent. And it's so strange to me that so many people in the world want to live in that singular perspective, that you are so not just happy, but actually like aggressively intent on remaining in that one understanding of the world around you when the world around you is so big and so beautiful and has so much to offer, but what's being offered is other people's ideas about being alive, what they think, their beliefs, their how they love, how they live. Like that's what it is to be human. Why do you want to like cut yourself so short? And why are you so adamant on doing it in such a hurtful, hurtful way? Like you're hurting yourselves, you're hurting others. Like, what is this? Why you such a small life?

SPEAKER_01 52:14

Everywhere. It's everywhere, it's everywhere you turn, and I feel like every fucking day.

SPEAKER_00 52:18

Every day. It's like a diluge we're living through right now, just hit in the face constantly with terror, horror. I think everyone's exhausted. I talk about it so you know, often with my clients on a day-to-day basis. We make jokes, but I don't think anybody's really joking about like tattoos. When they come in for tattoos, it's also like a bit of therapy. But really, I think it's just a space where they feel safe to be like, I'm not okay, and to have that validated. Because I will absolutely be like, you shouldn't feel okay. I think people walking around like everything's honky doy right now, like something's fundamentally wrong with you if you are okay right now.

SPEAKER_01 52:54

When somebody sits down with you, like like they're handing you their trust.

SPEAKER_00 52:57

Oh my god. Yeah. Yeah. It is um I everyone assumes I went into tattooing because it it's like an art form that you can make money on, you can live on, you know, you you get to use your your creative skills. Uh, and that's not wrong, that it's very rare as a fine artist to also have a you know everyday job as well, where you get to directly use the skills that bring you joy and happiness. But what actually is the number one thing that like makes tattooing um just light my heart on fire is spending every single day, like day to day, with so many amazing people. Like I get to do a job where I get to actually make art and I get to hold people hostage for like four or five hours and pick their brain and get to know them as a person and connect with them. Um, I've walked away from this business, you know, it's been three-quarters of a decade now. And uh I like by the hundreds now know so many people, like regulars that just come back and I've like watched their lives grow. I have watched them get married, have children, like buy a house. Like it's just so extraordinary to watch the life that comes in. Um, but it also is such a sacred form of trust where someone is like, I'm giving you permission to literally alter my body in a way that is a forever thing. But also I want to go back to that. So just let's bookmark that because I have a really interesting, I think, take on like the foreverness of tattooing at from an oil painter's perspective. Um, but uh yeah, so just like in this very forever, or at least forever in this lifetime way, and um the fact that again, I it's it's hard because there's only so much you can talk about it for before people sort of like tune out to it. Um, but how men in the industry have absolutely beyond abused that right, abused that trust, abused that privilege.

SPEAKER_02 55:02

All right, this feels like a really good spot to take a breather. Um, we'll put a pause on it for right now. We'll come back next week with part two of this conversation, and we'll get the completion of the story.

SPEAKER_03 55:17

I can't even make them go away.

SPEAKER_01 55:21

Bad Idea Social Club is an independent podcast made possible by Merc Sales, Reviews, and Listener Support. And it's created and hosted by me, graphics and call, and co-hosted by photographer GilMatter. Music is noticed by Mike Mate and the branches.