Jourden & Null: When we first saw your work in Chicago, we were reminded of the work of [Michael] Kelley, [Jim] Shaw, R Crumb, [Philip] Guston..., but now we see the work as being Nathan Redwood's. Do you feel that you have made the transition to a more independent autonomous voice?

Redwood: funny, i thought the work you refer to was very much nathan redwood. they were basically my sketchbooks in a larger painted narrative format. of course, i was fresh out of school. there were many artists on my mind including the ones you mentioned. i do feel a new wave or body of work has superseded the past. this being my more recent ptgs. on many levels im expressing a narrative that is about the construction of the narrative itself. the building blocks on the ptgs surface, the drywall, wood, and masonry are being painted in such a way as to reveal the process by which the paint itself can develop into particular forms, recognizable ones. like when paint looks like wood. these forms are literally the beginning foundation/framework for a mass narrative that is attempting to reveal itself through the process of painting. i feel this foundation is the most natural environment for the paint im placing on canvas to grow in. in this respect i couldnt feel more autonomous.

Jourden & Null: Your previous work contained a clear delineation between figure and ground – where today subjects in your recent work tend to dematerialize into the background. Is there a moment of schism or re-evaluation in these new canvases?

Redwood: if anything i would say there is less separation. instead of a flat colored background that subjects sit atop (previous work) there are now entire landscapes in which figures/forms exist. this work is more unified in terms of figure/ground relationships. one form relates to its neighbor. they melt and grow together in many ways.

Jourden & Null: We would agree with your position that they melt and grow together. How did this difference came about. When did your approach become more about the totality of the canvas and less about the singularity of the narrative?

Redwood: its happened over a long period of time. slowly watching how paint reveals itself on canvas on a primed surface. in the last five years ive been working with extremely liquefied paint. watered down acrylic washes that are then applied to a primed surface that is almost as smooth as glass. this surface allows the paint to flow in a consistent line without breaking up. like a ball point pen on paper. you can scribble with a pen on paper. I figured out how to scribble a three-dimensional painted line on a flat surface on canvas. this process is the impetus for my developing narrative.

Jourden & Null: In keeping with this formal/technical element, the speed at which the acrylic paint dries must play into your work. Can you elaborate on this factor and how it relates to your process?

Redwood: acrylic polymer dries very fast. i even use a heat gun to make it [dry] faster and right before the paint dries when there is still a few wet spots i  wipe the surface clean. the end result looks much like a wax resist process and recalls printmaking such as lithography, woodcut reliefs, intaglio, and off set prints. i like this application and removal of paint, its full of surprises.

Jourden & Null: Your work now seems to be a portrait of a mindscape. It is tense/dense, inviting, psychological: an intimate portrait in dysfunction—not a pristine forest of unraveled narratives, but a post-Katrina wastescape where natural timbers and processed woods become one—a blender of entrapment. There is a logjam in the mind, a psychological portrait of loss and dysfunction. This work seems much more powerful to us, because it connects the viewer to contemporary issues of displacement—domestic neurosis, of things being destroyed—or in flux … A tension between external forces destroying the body and internal entropy. Do you feel that the more expressive nature of your use of paint (its atmospheric qualities) juxtaposed with more structured framework, that references architecture, begins to reference rooms of the psyche?

Redwood: im sitting in this restaurant in portland right now as we conduct this interview via e-mail. in front of me are eleven logs stacked on top of each other to make up a wall. a passage is cut out of the center through which a tiny room is revealed displaying a yellowish window to the outdoors. to my left is a large wall-sized mirror reflecting the logs. together with the reflection, the logs look about twenty feet long. in the mirror i thought i recognized someone and turned around to see that i actually did. some sort of deja vu came over me. a fourth dimension comes to mind, what is it? 'post-Katrina wastescape' is an interesting choice of words. New Orleans is definitely a place in my mind where all kinds of rebuilding are taking place for bad or good. there is no choice but to rebuild for the people who have remained in ravaged areas. it is the beginning of change. im interested in the emotions involved in that type of change. even though something has totally been destroyed, attempts are being made to rebuild, to overcome or to move forward. life is in flux always, everywhere. this notion is also an impetus for my work. to start over from scratch. the gesture, the marking systems of the paint and the subjects that paint represents attempts to reveal this rebuilding process in my painting. one example would be 'station to station' a ptg where two massive trees are constructed from processed wood for branches and piles of flat painted paint for foliage. it was a sort of landscape remodel. i think these kinds of relationships in my painting can help discover or come to terms with the residue of the psyche in an effort to rebuild it to keep it healthy, alive.

Jourden & Null: We’re glad you brought up Station-to-Station, because we think it’s quite a dramatic piece, [maybe] the most engaging piece in the series. There is incredible structure in the paint. You talk about the idea of a healthy mind or body—in your tactics of deconstructing bodies and the elusive psychological narrative that runs through your work, are you healing yourself through deconstructing and recombining, or are there larger fish to fry beyond your own personal demons?

Redwood: healthy mind, demons? it sounds so art therapeutic. im thinking more existentially. what are the boundaries of the imagination and how much of it is self-inflicted? how far can this practice take me and to what end? is there a better place to exist in then the one that is imagined/invented...the real world isnt real anymore. was it ever? im looking for a certain understanding through the process of ptg, a system without the system. to answer the fish-fry question its like someone once said, [there’s] a ten-thousand year history of ptg to answer to. im aware of it and it is inspiring but does it even matter? i think it does matter but all these questions have already been answered anyway—right? every new generation has a new mind of work. im interested in the developing network of ideas today. ive been made aware of those fluctuating ideas through the process of painting composition. theres a trail that a painter just has to follow when they paint. it is unique to any individual who is taking painting seriously. the discovery of paints functionality, the composite whole of the known styles of painting and the passing of time in the studio has raised enough questions in my mind to last a lifetime. i want the paint i apply on canvas to exploit itself through the subjects it represents rather than my own personal psyche or 'demons' as you call them.

Jourden & Null: So the narrative then is less within yourself and more what is disguised in the canvas? Or is there an initial kernel that is dislodged from your mind in the act of painting? For instance the other day you mentioned your lack of connect, because of your environs in LA—it would seem to us that this imposed isolation from the outside [world] has nested within the work and not just on a tectonic level.

Redwood: my aim is to achieve a gesture that dictates a narrative more so than my own ideals. in terms of location ... this work is not geographically impaired, nor have i ever thought of any work ive done in such a way. being isolated is a developing trait. a discipline that allows the slow practice of painting to come about more naturally. i just thought of neurosis again. you mentioned it earlier and its floating in the back of my mind now ... it is more than obvious that we are living in a continually flattened out tectonic landscape give or take a few thousand miles of ocean in between. however, a virtual Pangea is more prevalent today than ever before. technologically acute individuals or basically anyone under the age of twenty-one fanatically probing any microchip with volume control. isolation today is a gift i embrace and struggle with simultaneously.

Jourden & Null: In the 90's, the band Ministry did this tour where the band and the audience were divided by a floor-to-ceiling cyclone fence. Conceptually this was beautiful, and deceptively simple. Both the audience and the band became objectified. The fence was protecting whom from whom? There was tension because the boundary between the audience and performer became blurred. The tension in your work is the result of a similar ambiguity, one can look at the work and can have opposite ways of interpreting it and both could be correct. Are the figures of lumber and wood dissolving into the frenzied torrent of lumber and limbs or are these figures, trying to develop out of the chaos? Is the self or the mind trying to mend itself—a game of improvising, trying to build it from grabbing at what surrounds it?

Redwood: ive never seen Ministry but the structure of this stage setting you mentioned is very interesting to me. i picture a ginormous chain link fence spiraling through the energy of this musical scene. a filter for thought. rather than a separator it is a combining instrument in this kind of venue. ive drawn chain link fences and brick walls recently. im glad you mentioned music. all forms of music have greatly influenced me in the studio. i almost always paint to music. some recent songs came from the karate kid soundtrack, desmond dekker, leadbelly, and jose gonzalez. how about ambiguity through narration but with recognizable structure and imaginary, illusionistic functions? the surrealists and neo surrealists come to mind. something that puts your head in the clouds and feet on the ground simultaneously. ya, that would be cool. id have to be really tall. maybe some really long stilts? i like how you end the question. i think as artists we always pull from the surrounding environment. even if we are unaware of it. whatever 'it' is will find a way into the work. its the same when i travel, information is everywhere rolling over itself beautifully and grotesquely. what i mean is i utilize what is in front of me and its not always a pretty thing but it regenerates/formulates into something new something fresh.

Jourden & Null: On a similar note, the timbers can represent the external world that one is trying to negotiate or a self constructed one—again the line between self and the external world is constantly migrating—where do we begin and end in terms of our physicality? Does our environment become us and vice versa. Do you feel your work is sympathetic to any or all of these possibilities?

Redwood: so this must be the death question? i dont know where we end in terms of our physicality. physically we will ultimately become a part of the earth. its a good question thinking back on this interview. i mean it is coming to an end. the great big end. the interview that is. im always thinking about life and death when im painting. more death id say. i dont know why? i dont think my work is apocalyptic. its more post-apocalypse if anything.  earlier i mentioned how the act of painting raises all these questions for me. we have to keep dreaming, thinking, asking questions, demanding answers. painting does that for me. like that [line] in the Talking Heads [song, Artists Only] — 'im cleaning my brain.' then i step back from the surface [of the canvas] and the questions start rollin' again.