DAVID STEINDL
David Steindl is an artist from Maine who is currently based in NYC.
Through figurative paintings and drawings that oscillate between whimsy and seriousness: David speculatively examines aspects of contemporary American life.
@david_steindl
davidsteindldavidsteindl.com
All Photos of David were taken by Nella on 35mm.
All photos of artwork are credit to David Steindl.
Through figurative paintings and drawings that oscillate between whimsy and seriousness: David speculatively examines aspects of contemporary American life.
@david_steindl
davidsteindldavidsteindl.com
All Photos of David were taken by Nella on 35mm.
All photos of artwork are credit to David Steindl.
What's going on in your life right now ?
I've been working a lot. I got this job in January, and now I'm stretching raw canvases, linens, preprinted materials, and paintings, and also doing woodworking stuff for that.
Do you feel like your work has influenced your artwork in any way ?
Yeah, it’s like the tone that my life had in school, too.
When you have an actual job, the time that you have to make your work becomes more precious, and I feel like I can loiter less now. I’m really lucky to be working with what I do at the highest level that I can. I really don’t understand why they hired me *laughs.*
I was stretching canvases for Charline von Heyl yesterday and spent time in her studio and was like, WTF am I doing here. The kind of professionalism and efficiency that I’ve learnt from that helps a lot, maybe even more than the technical skills.
What are the first and last things that you think about in the day ?
The first thing is: Oh god, how do I get there on time…
The last thing I think about… I live with my girlfriend, and we try to make these kinds of routines for decompressing. She also owns her own business, and we both work really hard. We try to make time to unwind.
I think the last thing I think about is: How grateful I am for everything and being able to be an artist.
If it’s too hard, it’s not fun.
How would you describe your artwork in a nutshell these days ?
Well, in school, I was very passionate, and the things that I was interested in outside of art I almost tried to illustrate. The work took on this really weird quality of narrative painting, like a quasi-narrative quality, and I’ve tried to abandon that and not think of art in the way that I used to. I think a lot of that has to do with working in the industry as a fabricator and no longer just a student.
I’ve been thinking about giving the work more physical, emotional and sexual thinking. I do have a conceptual framework, but a lot of what I've been thinking about is if I could see a painting first thing in the morning and last thing at night and still be interested in it.
How much have you been working on your art, and how do you feel about working [on art] in these times ?
I draw and paint every day. I also work 40 hours a week. Beyond hanging out with my girlfriend and getting drunk with my friends, I'm probably spending thirty hours a week on my art practice; then, I try to do what I would want other people to do.
I’m a very pensive and sensitive person. I’m no activist, but I’m trying to be the citizen who would imagine a better version of this country. That's because I think that’s the most I can do.
…and cultivating relationships with other people.
Art isn’t necessarily a place where people come to “learn,” which I found out after school. Art is something else, and it's not a place that I come to learn. I wanna talk to my friends from all over the world about what’s going on more than I want to bring it into my work.
You’re from Maine, and I feel like your work has a strong sense of region: Can you talk a bit about that ?
It’s great that you bring that up because last night, I decided that my next series will be about places. I've been doing a lot of figurative work, and it has a lot of conventions relating to narrative, but place has always been important, and I’m going to try to lean into it.
I took a road trip all around the US with my dad this summer.
My dad grew up in Vegas. It was such an amazing thing to see his life, and it widened up my perspective. Since we drove, seeing these crazy places out of the car was just amazing.
I think the Northeast is just where I’m from and will always be a part of my work, and I think that the place also just has a lot of the version of whiteness that I’ve been okay with exploring right now. Like, you go to a lot of these places and get to see some real crazy motherfuckers; like even in New England - the WASP-y people sometimes…
We’ve been talking about time, but I'm thinking so much about the place too: Where are the people I believe in ? How can I put that in pictorial space ? How am I using this within the complexity of “Oh America’s natural beauty,” but then also the mistrust that I have of the people here ?
It’s just weird *laughs.*
I’ve been thinking a lot about American road trips, too. For many American artists, the cross-country road trip seems to become a catalysing thing for them and their artwork. Do you have any more thoughts about that and how it made you feel ?
Hm… How it made me feel: disturbed.
I mean, that's just how artists are. They just look away from things sometimes, and I just feel deeply weirded out.
You have to also think about the massive carbon footprint of that. You see things like giant semi-trucks and the scale of industry in the United States, and it’s just mind-boggling.
I also got to spend three weeks with my dad.
We’ve always been close, but I didn’t get to spend much time with him until later in life. Despite all of the sociopolitical stuff that I have a gripe with, the time with my dad was just, I mean, incredible. It all reminded me of why I feel the way that I feel about things, sometimes.
How do you feel about the environmental future ?
I got pictures today of my hometown getting flooded again. It’s just heartbreaking because a lot of the places that I love won't be there (in the future.) Yeah, it’s something I feel openly emotional about. I think maybe more than most.
Most people are just like, “OHH HUMANITY WON’T SURVIVE !!!” and it's just like: yeah, we’re gonna survive, but the people that aren’t rich or geographically safe are not gonna be okay…
What do you think about the role of the artist as an observer ? Have you always been an observing person ?
Yeah, I spent a lot of time alone as a kid. It takes me a long time to… I’m not necessarily indecisive, but it takes me some time to think things through. Like, for the past two summers, I've been thinking a lot about wearing a tank top. I’ve thought for two years if I would be a tank top person, like “Do I... Hm…”
If I have a question, I’m more inclined to read 5 or ten books about it before I come up with an answer or pretend like I know. I start all of my thoughts from a real place of doubt, which is inconvenient for my personal life sometimes, but…
I’m very bad at arguing *laughs,* but yeah, that's just the observation part, that’s just my personality.
In your artwork, you’ve dealt a lot with themes of leisure. Do you think it has anything to do with where you come from and the types of activities that people engage in there ?
I think that it's less about where I come from. Leisure is more interesting for me from a historical and economic perspective. For hundreds of years, 50% of a nation’s GDP had to be for its “military.” Up until recently, like the Industrial Revolution, leisure time was quite literally invented. Defined leisure time didn’t really exist, which is crazy.
So, it’s more that the times and my opinion on it all can be more of an emerging quality of my artwork. I don’t have to say as much if I just do a picture of somebody golfing because it’s just loaded in. That’s what I love about those things.
How do you feel about working in New York ? Has it changed your artwork at all ?
I was having a really difficult time before I came here.
I went to a St Vincent concert recently, and she spoke about that a bit, like how she is from Texas but kind of had to come here to be able to experiment freely.
You know, catching up with old high school friends in the studio or in New York now, they’re always like, “Yeah, David was always kind of weird…”
I needed a place where I could experiment freely.
Is academicism in art is good, bad, or in-between ?
I think that David Salle is a perfect example of what I like [in terms of academicism.]
I think that… Oof, well, this is going to be a really hot take, but Andrew Woolbright’s style of talking about art is an example of what I don’t like. I read one of his articles recently in the Brooklyn Rail and the way he was talking about it just kind of sucked the life out of everything, even though I admire his work. So, it’s like a double-edged sword; it’s not really personal. His level of writing, that level of academicism, pulls the life out of work.
Rigor is important, but putting a level of jargon between people is not important. We have the Internet now: you can be in the middle of nowhere Maine and discover post-minimalism. That level of education is not elitist in the way that the jargon-type things are.
How do you feel about the current art world: in-terms of elitism ?
I had a conversation with Mary Jones recently in her studio, and she was talking about success. [Success] is not so pinned down, and it comes and goes, but the Armory [Show] was crazy this year. I think that there has never been a time, historically, where so many emerging artists can scrape by and create as freely as they do. However, the spaces for public discourse and mainstream attention are really attached to those ridiculously high auction prices.
I think that elitism is natural in art, but it shouldn’t be so tied to how much it costs.
Have you been to the gallery Blade Study ?
I haven’t.
It's really weird; it’s super super weird, and they do a program of super out there artists in the Lower East Side. It’s super super fun. I hated the work, but I loved that I could hate the work. *laughs*
So, when I think about your artwork and think about seeing you work on it in school, I view you as very disciplined. Does that assumption hold true ?
Oh yeah definitely, *laughs.*
Just a few things: I am very motivated to be the best artist that I can be, but I’m also very motivated to hang out with my friends and my girlfriend, and get paid *laughs,* and like have room for everything. I'm very holistic about it.
Yes, I might be a studio apprentice, but I’m also drawing at home, drawing at work, and here too (David’s Studio).
I also view you as a very painter’s painter, if that makes sense, but at the same time, your work feels like it’s playing a game with its viewer.
Yes, that goal in my work kind of came from reading Byung-Chul Han and Hegel as well, who was super influenced by other-ness or negativity, as he calls it. Like, look at the Armory, it was work that was positive work, that was known, understandable or graspable, and that kind of gives itself away.
I’m really interested in artwork that maintains some of its secrets. It was really cool the way you described it as playing a game: I think that I try to cultivate that sense of foreignness because it’s the only thing that keeps me interested in the work. It’s always excessively organised or staged in a very intentional way, but it’s like the result of 10 or 15 sketches and chance.
What is the role that humor plays in your work, and do you enjoy comedy as a “thing” outside of your artwork ?
I think that’s a really good question. I don’t think art is very fun, like that’s a thing that it’s not *laughs.* But the thing about humor is that it takes the stiffness out of it. I try to create an impression of life.
Okay, let’s play word association now. What comes to mind when you hear: “Good Times, Bad Times” ?
Hm... I think the fourth of July because I have a little tradition with my friends.
When I first got to New York, I threw a huge party of 40-60 people, including a bunch of Friends from home. The funny thing about it is, like, the fourth of July is such a… I mean, I don’t even have to explain. It’s so painful in this country that getting drunk with your friends is fun and seems like the only thing to do.
What is something overrated and something underrated ?
I think cars are overrated.
Why ?
Cause like... I think that’s such a bad answer…
I have a better one: cultural elitism. Not of rich people, but like when you’re with your artsy friends in a bar in Manhattan, and you see a bunch of like, forgive me for saying this, but a bunch of dudes with short hair and wearing whatever else is in trend right now. I think that artsy people making fun of those people need to stop. I think we need to stop making fun of each other *laughs.”
Something underrated is talking to strangers. I do it all the time, and it's usually the highlight of my day.
I’ve been thinking a lot about how with social media or instant messaging etc. we can sometimes forget our social necessities. We subconsciously redirect our energy meant for talking to random people around us into only talking to those that are familiar because we can reach them so easily.
How do you feel about that ? Like, do you think it is more fulfilling to make the effort to engage, considering the current state of things ?
Yeah definitely.
One of the most charming memories of my life to this point was when I went to Berlin with my girlfriend, it was my first time leaving the States. We were in this line for a club that was like 3 or 4 hours long when these two guys in their 30s came up to us and were like: “Hey the line is so long, we’re going to go back to our place, and we have like ‘bodega’ wine and cocaine. Do you wanna come ?” and we were like, “Sure !”
I mean, I don’t partake in hard drugs, but we still had an amazing conversation.
So, we go to this guy’s place, and he’s like a backpack designer, he grew up in Sweden and now lives in Berlin, his buddy has a kid. They had amazing art on their walls, and we just talked until 5 am. Never exchanged phone numbers or social media, but it was great, like purely like you just see another person…
We are social creatures; I think about it often. I don’t get [experiences like] that a lot.
I feel like there is a lot about what someone wants to grab and what someone wants to know. I try to be conscious of it: I try not to make things too grabable in my own life. Just because one can, doesn’t mean that you should.
I think about that a lot, too, like how valuable it is that there are people you see and may never see again, and just think about the random interaction you had with them without needing their contact.
I think yes, but also, the grand benefit of social media is the ability to have contact with so many people.
What’s one of your hot takes ?
I think a BLT with mayo is pretty good... I've never seen anyone else order it for some reason.
Hm… maybe I’ll try it sometime *laughs.*
DAVID RECOMMENDS...
TO DO:
Get dinnerware and glasses that you like because you use them every day. You can find good ones for very cheap if you just look, and you don't have to buy them at the store.
It’s important not to be turned off or bummed out by your surroundings every day.
TO SEE:
Wyckoff Ave. on a Saturday or Friday night.
True. When I was walking here (the wrong way) on Wyckoff a lot was going on, like dudes jamming on the street, etc.
Yeah, it’s lively. It’s very welcoming, and everyone can kind of hang out here. It’s not too insular, and you get people from all walks of life. I love that.
(More recently, David has added to see the NYPL Main Branch.)
TO WATCH:
Daredevil, the Marvel TV show. I think that Marvel has gotten a really bad rap lately, and for fantastic reasons of course. They were producing some dogshit for a while… but not a lot of contemporary TV or movies have such a compelling good and evil [ as Daredevil does, ] especially right now.
Well, first, I’m eternally bored by TV. A lot of TV is something you put on to do something else. But Daredevil is more like an older style of plot.
TO LISTEN:
Listen to Screamland by Father John Misty. It’s seven minutes, and there’s like a pause and another song afterwards [referring to the single on Soundcloud,] but I think Screamland might be the most fitting work of art that I’ve experienced for this time.
TO READ:
The Agony of Eros by Byung-Chul Han. It’s a book about love, about a hundred pages.
AN OBJECT:
A bike. It’s a great way to move around. It’s a better way to engage with Brooklyn and Queens.
TO THINK ABOUT:
Sustainability: Not in terms of humans destroying or preserving their environment, but as something that brings more life than it takes away. I read that in a book I was reading, and I was just floored. I was like HOLY SHIT... that’s so interesting. Even liveliness too: Art takes more liveliness than it uses.
David is @david_steindl on Instagram
and was interviewed in September 2024.
You can find more of his work @ davidsteindldavidsteindl.com