Will Reed is a Brooklyn-based painter. His work speaks for itself. Will received a BA, Summa Cum Laude, Studio Art; a BA, Psychology, Magna Cum Laude, and minors in Religion and Philosphy from Lyon College, Batesville, AR. Will received his Post-Baccalaureate Certificate of Fine Art at Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA), Baltimore, MD, and is currenting working on a MFA, Painting, New York Studio School, New York, NY. Also, a Master’s of Art Education at Columbia University, New York, NY.
In this interview, Will discusses why and what he paints, what women he finds attractive, and brushes his inspiration, which includes filmmakers Andrei Tarkovsky, Alfred Hitchcock, Michelangelo Antonioni, Bela Tarr, and more.
(1) Why do you paint?
I feel that I am carrying a torch, the torch of the original imagists of Lascaux and Avignon those wonderful, magical cave painters (probably women) in the prehistoric times. It is a powerful notion that profound and poetic images can come into being from primitive and simple means — pigment, natural oils, fabric supports, etc. They were making these amazing metaphors for their existence and that is essentially what I am doing today. Painting and drawing both have a very physical visceral quality that other 2-D media simply lack. I am a practitioner of a communicative form that predates written language and I think that is a very special and powerful thing given the contemporary art climate.
