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interview with

Henry Denander

1) What inspired your “Blues Series”?

I read the wonderful book “Blues faces” by Ann & Samuel Charters with photos and stories of all the blues people they met while Sam worked as a record producer. Ann's photos of Sleepy John Estes, Daddy Hotcakes, Lightning Hopkins and Willie Dixon gave me the inspiration. The paintings are more inspired by these photos than true portraits.

2) Could you describe the process you undergo when creating a new painting?

When I work with water colors I don’t plan anything in advance but somewhere in the back of my head there is a photo or a record or a story or a poem (my own or someone else’s) that inspire me. I usually paint early in the morning or late at night. My “studio” is a separate desk in my office. I am a freelancer working from home and I can, if the inspiration for art overtakes my need for working with contracts and taxes, move over to my “studio”…

I have started to use the watercolors a bit like oil paint or acrylics, painting with several layers and using pen and the water color pens that dissolve in the not yet dried paint. Also I work fast and try to catch the way the wet paint is moving and sometimes running and I try to stop on the right note. Sometimes the effect changes when the paint dries, sometimes with a desired effect and sometimes I go back at the painting, adding another layer.

I seldom do any digital corrections when putting stuff on the internet but I do clean out any shades made from scanning the rough, handmade paper. Sometimes I cut a painting digitally to get a frame effect.

3) From the moment of its inception down to the final stroke of the brush, how long does it take you to complete a painting?

I work fast and paintings like these will probably take less than an hour in the first set but usually I hang them and study them for a couple of days, sometimes longer, to see if they are good enough or if there’s something to be added.

4) Who or what has had the most influence on your artwork?

I am inspired and influenced by all things around me, what I see, read and hear. Music has always been a big influence and inspiration.

5) What’s next for Henry Denander? Any particular subject or themes you intend to explore with your brush in the near future?

I’m at the moment working on artwork for my next book of poems that will be published early in 2004. And I am doing a series of author portraits for two different publishers. I am also working on a joint project with Gerald Locklin; making paintings based on some of his wonderful jazz poems. If it all works out, the idea is that our words and paintings will be a part of an exhibition in early 2004.

And for the last few days I have been painting a series of tenor sax players, inspired by Sonny Rollins’ album Saxophone Colossus.

one, two, three –

miles davis told red garland to
play some block chords and
his voice sounded like he’d been
smoking for fifty years

the tune was “you’re my everything”
and already in 1956 miles knew what
he wanted

-- Henry Denander