Artist Interview

I interviewed John McGaughty, a local artist, to learn more about art. He had some very interesting answers to some of my questions. We met at his home close to his former gallery on Ray St. I didn’t know that he had closed his gallery on Ray St. prior to asking for an interview because apparently the Ray At Night website had not been updated after his closing. I asked some fairly simple questions. For example, “What does art mean to you?” and “What drove you to become an artist?” His definition of art was that art was multifaceted and subjective, meaning art is to each person different, he also mentioned that many careers that we do not think as art, is in fact art, like architecture, writing and poetry. Art was to John a way of expressing how he sees the world. John knew he wanted to become an artist since he was a kid and loved to draw and make things. When asked whether or not other opinions mattered, he replied, “You must learn to deal with others opinions, with age comes maturity and tolerance.” So that was one thing that stuck to me, many people will say that your art is bad or its not “real” art, but you just have to go past that and keep producing what you want. Another question was “Where do you get your inspiration from?” and he said nature. Now that was an answer that I had heard before when I was researching John Constable, a Romanticism artist, he said, “nature is the fountain’s head, the source from whence all originality must spring.” So that was kind of helpful to me in trying to understand what he painted. When I saw some of his art, it was very much so representative of nature and varies aspects of it. John also moves freely between different forms of art, for example drawing, painting, sculpting, and printmaking are all forms of art he enjoys. Another thing that he said that left a mark on me was that artists are like rock stars, there are so many, but yet only a very small amount are known. When talking to him I realized that there are artists all around me, but it is how they act upon the artist within, that is how they will become an artist. He thought of art not as a job or working, but as a lifestyle and way of life. John believes that giving back to the community and to your favorite causes is something that is important to becoming an artist. When you donate something, you get your work seen and get exposed into the world of art purchasing. That was another thing he mentioned, many artists make very little for a living and many see suffering and art going hand in hand, some artists will say others are not artists because they are not suffering enough. The whole experience was really eye opening, because I have this picture of a stereotypical artist and what artists really are is nothing like what many people think.