Interview with Creatopia Magazine Spring 2022

Sophie's Alps - work in progress

 “Challenging Perspectives in New Ways”

By: Lily Clayton Hansen

Brian Wall’s fine art is for folks who want to dust off the cobwebs of their imagination.

Humans are naturally attracted to uncovering what is hidden however, so infrequently do they have the opportunity to play detective. In Brian Wall’s psychedelic, dreamy worlds one is compelled to seek out something new every time—and are rewarded for their efforts.

Wall’s artwork is good for the brain. When his collectors come down for their morning cup of coffee, they enjoy using their imagination to unwind the intricacies of his oil paintings. Repeating patterns, geometric grids, and a tension between abstract and analytical prompt the viewer to question, is what I first saw really there? “Some long-time collectors, a husband and wife, take a photo of my painting routinely and text it to one another so they can guess what that specific detail is,” Wall recalls smiling at their unique game. The lack of obvious imagery is his work’s currency and how he encourages viewers to access their creativity, which too often becomes dormant in daily life.

It makes sense that Wall wants to awaken new ideas in others as that’s what he desires for himself. He is a true craftsman that is constantly studying new techniques. However, Wall has also remained dedicated to the doodle-inspired, intuitive drawing style that he developed as a child. His work is often compared to M.C. Escher, famous for his impossible drawings. Both artists tend to appeal to psychiatrists, mathematicians, and scientists. Similar to an optical illusion, their manipulated perspectives and architectural lines, which fluidly transition into one another, appeal to those who like to exercise their minds. Artists like Dali and Picasso caught Wall’s eye early on yet, skateboard graphics and magazine photos influenced him more than the artistic canon. “I was such a perfectionist, I would work on my renderings for hours, copying magazine photos over and over until I got them right,” he remembers. Early on, similar to Escher, Wall realized that even without a drafting background his brain naturally built and broke geometric patterns. He went with it and aimed for perfection with the process.

Wall spent the bulk of his twenties working in the hospitality industry in his hometown of Denver, Colorado. When he left to pursue art professionally at the encouragement of his brother and best friend, he decided it was critical to have a paintbrush in his hand all the time. After doing some soul searching, Wall sought out a job as a decorative painter. He spent the next 15 years accentuating multi-million-dollar properties with murals and gold leafing. The high-pressure environment, where he was surrounded by top-notch professionals, trained his craftsmanship and prowess for creating 3-D images.

Building his own portfolio in the evening hours, Wall began accumulating enough material to exhibit. Early on, he attracted loyal collectors who gravitated towards his Surrealistic environments, non-sequiturs that blended familiar settings and shapes with commentaries on heavier themes. “I became convinced upon selling one of my first paintings “Leap of Faith,” which explored how stringent philosophies can be pounded into you, that buyers must have similar neurological patterns to myself where they enjoy drawing parallels between nonlinear concepts.” Wall also liked that his work gave viewers a break from the noise, technology, and routine that bombards daily life. Ironically, the mixture of structure and ambiguity in his work started to convert people who were typically anti-abstract. They liked his grounded style.

It was a move to Costa Rica in 2016, that inspired a new body of work influenced by the tropical environment that enveloped him. Wall capitalized on the exotic animals in the water and sky teaching himself how to translate his abstract style to fish, turtle, and bird outlines. The work was both a commercial success and challenged the artist’s abilities. Additionally, the remote setting made him realize that seclusion was indistinguishable from his creativity. Keeping this in mind when the family chose to move back to the States, they selected Asheville, North Carolina as their new stomping grounds. This time a calm, wooded setting lit another fire.

The move was also an inflection point in Wall’s career in which he asked himself how can I push myself even further now that I have been creating this style of abstract art for years? Realism had always intrigued Wall, as had incorporating science and history-based themes. Looking at this chapter as an experimental phase, in which he had the confidence to explore, he decided to add some new tools to his belt. In studying realism techniques and planning out his extemporaneous process a little more, his work took on a headier direction. It is now about being a touch more thoughtful rather than just grabbing his materials and going. “I’ve always just walked towards the canvas and started painting, because I love creating so much yet, I’m excited by what might happen in being a bit more premeditated,” he muses.

In addition to having more foresight in terms of visual language, the new tonic that wall has created also carries a greater social responsibility. While he still intends to tease the eye through perspective, shadows, and depth, global issues like climate change have slowly crept into his work. He wants to tackle more serious topics in an aesthetically pleasing manner so they stick in people’s minds. “I’ve always challenged perceptions however, am not doing it on a deeper level such as a new scene that shows a child, in a dystopian setting, burying their head in a book rather than acknowledging the pollution around him,” he explains.

However, even as he consciously reins in his ad-libbed process Wall’s natural behavior to still go “a bit off the rails” will always be a part of his creative process. After all, it is the intellectually stimulating step-by-step practice of putting together a puzzle that has no end, that intrigues him. Even as his paintings become a bit more controlled, he’ll still always be interested in what comes out of the subliminal. “When you’re working intuitively you never know what’s going to happen,” he says with a wink.