Today we’d like to introduce you to Allison Van Pelt.
Every artist has a unique story. Can you briefly walk us through yours?
I was born and raised in Chicago. As a highly emotional young person, anything creative became a passion of mine. I found using emotion was to my benefit in creative fields, unlike everything else. Therefore acting, dancing, singing, playing the piano, watching films, painting, and drawing all became passions of mine that I balanced. As I got older I directed that focus towards art, and after school drawing became the most important to me.
My mother always encouraged and supported me. She was a yoga teacher, a Swami, a shiatsu practitioner, and reader of astrology charts. She was a highly spiritual person and those messages carry through as background ideas in my work. The ideas of reincarnation, meditation, chakras, reaching a higher plane, the third eye as a gateway towards seeing the truth, all come from my childhood. It took me a long time to figure out how to express these concepts symbolically in my own voice. When she passed away drawing became a necessary outlet for me to express those painful, and at times angry and turbulent emotions. It was at that time that I finally started to find my own voice artistically.
Please tell us about your art.
I see drawing as an extension to meditation. Through my abstract line work, I explore chance and failure. I learn to accept each mark with no possibility of undoing it. I then go in with organized line work, making sense or order of the chaos. This is partly why I am more inclined to draw by hand opposed to digital. In digital drawing I am too tempted to erase. Drawing by hand, especially just in ink, I am able to commit, even when I hate it, but eventually am able to make it into something I love. It is a good lesson for life in general.
Many of my characters represent unexpressed feelings often in relation to death. I draw from my own experiences with grief, loneliness, anguish, and, at times, rage. Because they come from pure feelings, I think that other people can tap into that based on their own experiences in life. We all feel versions of these feelings and are unable to talk about them in society.
My work is mainly surrealistic. It balances being dark and eerie but at the same time cute and girly. All of my characters are mainly feminine whether they are female or not. The eyeless creatures represent lost souls with no purpose. They follow without thinking. Some are terrified, screaming, or laying around hopelessly. There is also a head creature. She wears lilies, the flower of death, at her horns and thighs. She leads the little creatures around and takes delight in misery. The headless woman, another character, often leads the creatures as well. She is unable to decide on one soul and therefore uses many heads, representing souls, at all times to steer her forward. She is found leading the creatures on quests and out of hopelessness. All of her heads represent different personalities and ways of seeing. However, often included are the child, the warrior, and the crone, my take on the three stages of feminine life. The house heads represent a person who has experienced a traumatic event and is left hollow. In some drawings, she is without a thought, birds now living inside. In other depictions, mini versions of herself are escaping the corroding home. Eyes are a big motif in most of my work as well. Characters are found without them, or pupils, or have eyes in strange locations including at the temple between their eyebrows, their stomach, and nipples. Locations and lack of eyes represent whether a character sees truth or which chakra they see life from.
We often hear from artists that being an artist can be lonely. Any advice for those looking to connect with other artists?
Being an artist can be lonely at times. I create the best art, I find, when I am alone and at home. So working anywhere outdoors or around others tends to distract from my concentration. I can only do so casually and not on my serious work. However, the true goal in life is to not be lonely in your own company. As long as you are creating, loneliness isn’t important. I do try to always take breaks though, reaching out to friends. School and art classes are a great way to find other artists. Also showing work is a good way bond with others.
How or where can people see your work? How can people support your work?
My website and Instagram page are regularly updated. On my Instagram account, you are able to view my process towards creating a piece. I include videos and pictures of the process. On my website, you are able to view the details of the pieces better. I regularly accept commissions on the site. I am in the midst of setting up my online store and you will be able to buy pieces there as well. I also show at fairs and shows around Chicago.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.avanpeltstudio.com
- Email: avanpeltstudio@gmail.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/avanpeltstudio/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/allisonvanpelt2
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