Grear Patterson (GP):

“All the while Dudley Lyle never achieved a smile, although his frown never made it to town his sadness was felt by all.”

^{*Courtesy of the Museum of Modern Art.}

I wrote this poem in 2007. It’s meaningful to me because addressing sadness as universal experience has helped me. Just today, I listened to Frank Sinatra while making pizza for my two children and the amount of times he sang about loneliness and longing struck me. We are all starting out alone and searching for our own place and tribe. It is often the case that we are already a part of it.

GP: Earlier in my career, I explored themes of inductive reasoning, which led me to create the “Duck-Test”-series. My life was always surrounded by science and its notions because of my dad’s world as a science publisher which he started by selling books door-to-door.

My dad would later go on to make the “Powers of Ten” designed by my name sake Malcolm Grear. The idea of knowing what you don’t know was prevalent, but also the saying, “If it looks like a duck and walks like a duck, it’s probably a duck” stuck with me as things were not always what they seemed. 

Currently, I’m interested in themes of form and counter form - the relationship between now and the eternal. How to make things that last and can engage people to feel better and how we all deal with loss as well as the beginning of the shift from being the youngest to the oldest if we are lucky enough to do so.

GP: Growing up in Hillsborough, North Carolina, I lived with two Mies van der Rohe chairs that are burned into my memory and must have influenced how I think about the simplicity and beauty of shapes. Later, I went on to create projects that appeared in the Barcelona Pavilion, which was designed by Mies van der Rohe.

My painting “Old and the Sea” hangs between a David Salle and an Andy Warhol in the legendary Seagram Building (also designed by Mies van der Rohe) where my dad used to have lunch and take meetings. 

When I return home, I see those Mies van der Rohe chairs worn down by my dad’s elbows. I think about the wear and tear I utilize in my practice with other shaped works. That house has shaped my works. I built my first tree house there, a work that I would later recreate at the Depart Foundation in Los Angeles.

As a child, I loved to sail in the pond next to my home. My friends and I would dig up and throw mud from the bottom of the pond. I always remember the mud had little red worms in it.  When I attended the American Academy in Rome, I replicated that sail boat in the main fountain of the Academy to remind me of home.

I even shot my first film “Giants Being Lonely” in my childhood home.

GP: Today, Barcelona is my main home where I live with my wife Steffy Argelich and children. I drive them to school, we go to country to climb mountains by the sea. I work in the studio while they sleep. My wife and I make movies during the day (most recently, “Caballo” directed by Steffy) and oversee our endeavors before I pick them up from school.

I started Sphaera to give artists from around the globe a “virtual home” that promotes artists’ careers, designed to inspire each other and foster collaboration across mediums and culture.

With that, I’m kicking off the Artist Selects edition below, which highlights third party artists’ work that I’m into right now. I hope you find something that connects or inspires you.

I’m recommending an eclectic mix from around the world.

One of my favorite photographers is Walker Evans. VIEW his photos here.

I love this restaurant. It always reminds me of being out to sea. Attention to detail at its best. 

Kimy Gringoire, I’d love to see your recs as the next Artist Contributor for Sphaera’s Artist Selects.

Kimy Gringoire, is a leading Belgian-Korean artist and designer based between Brussels and Paris who initially trained in jewelry. Her practice has grown beyond jewelry into glass forms, installations, and performance. Kimy is a unique and unstoppable force in any creative arena she steps into.

— Grear Patterson

If you’d like to read more, check out Sphaera: Edition #1

Each edition of Sphaera alternates between a story or interview from a respected journalist drawn from the worlds of art, film, fashion, photography, publishing, music or design and a handpicked Artist curating his/her Artist Selects to spotlight peers, legends, and up and comers.