There’s an art to everything, from the way we drink our coffee to the way we parent our kids — art is all around us. And perhaps there’s no better Wiltonian than artist Mathew Tucker to bring that to light. His new solo exhibition, “Terra-Forming,” opened at the Wilton Library this month and if you haven’t yet had the opportunity to check it out, you’re missing a rare and transcendent moment to be transported into the lens of the natural world. Tucker’s work illustrates the often overlooked but significantly profound recognition that we could all do with a little less screen time and a little more green time. Lesley Kirschner caught up with this girl dad for some lattes, laughs and humbling moments on what it means to be an artist (and parent) in the real world.

1. Stick figures are challenging for me and I wonder, what’s the creative process like for you and how does your attention and focus have to change and shift in order to be flexible as an artist…

Mathew Tucker: If I’m working on something that takes a lot of cognitive power to figure out or needs solving then I can’t listen to a podcast, but I’ll listen to different types of music depending on the task. If I’ve already established all the things that I need to think about in terms of where things go and I’m just executing it, just painting, I can totally listen to podcasts and different kinds of music. But I think that there’s very different brain functions for the different things that you’re doing.

Sometimes I get a little bit stuck on the details but once I get past that and when I’m just painting, it feels very intuitive. That’s when time feels different and I kind of get lost in there. I think of it as a little bit of a meditative state. I’m not particularly good with transitions and conversely, the other way around. So if I’ve not been in the studio, I need to start working, I need to do a lot of procrastinating — it’s kind of part of my process. I need to do a bunch of stuff that eases me into it. But if I’m in the studio and I’m really into something and then I realize my alarm goes off and I’ve got half an hour until I have to pick up the girls… being in that mental space, and then having to transition to “Daddy” can be very difficult.

I think as an artist, you don’t have the same accountability as if you had a (salaried) job, that sort of sense of accountability and needing to get things done is very much external and mine is very… internal, so I respond well to the deadlines that I find for myself — I need a little bit of pressure. I guess if left to my own devices, I’m too fluid, I revert, and there’s not the same sense of urgency; but with the kids, I don’t want it to rush by and I’ve found my desire for the time to pass quickly has declined as they’ve gotten older.

2. Is your work a metaphor for something you yourself have worked through? Can you give some backstory on the concept of “looking through the window” and how that shows up in your art? 

Tucker: I think there’s three main components to that but yeah, I think one is the idea of looking out upon the world of objects and things that are set and so the paintings often have something that separates the viewer from the view…something in the foreground. It’s kind of about our relationship with how we see the world and there’s certainly a way of thinking that we’re not just viewing the world but that we’re part of it, we’re connected to it; and I think that comes from the spiritual teachings present in Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity… everything being sort of connected. I think that’s a component of it.

I think it’s also about how we perceive our relationship with nature. So the idea that as we progress technologically, we often feel a greater sense of separation from nature because it’s often viewed through some form of media. So, typically one of the things with all my paintings I’ve been making, all the ones in the [Wilton Library] show are in portrait format — so vertical — and when you have that format, it sort of objectifies things in the way that a person in a portrait is painted in that orientation versus landscapes. I mean, landscape is just the description of a canvas that’s turned horizontally and when we do that, we open up to the way that we see a view which is scanning left to right; whereas when we look at people, we look at them up and down. It sort of references the idea of the phone screen that we look at because, they’re all up and down portraits.

But I think the idea is that historically, landscape painting was about trying to attempt some sort of realism… so that you were standing there and it was in landscape format, it ran horizontally and you were kind of immersed in it. I think that, not just in my paintings, but in contemporary landscape paintings, the artists are thinking about a way to sort of disrupt that illusion so that you’re more aware of the image as an object. But I think that plays to the idea that we are less connected to the landscape. It’s easy to be here and be quite connected to the landscape. I spend a lot of time outside in it but I think that we conceptualize it as this other thing. So when we get food, we don’t always think about where it’s coming from, and natural resources…we kind of (not all of us) as a society have come to believe that nature and the landscape are this other thing that we sort of extract from; and I think of some people almost don’t like going outside, they want air conditioning all the time… I think they’re missing something if they don’t connect. 

3. Do you sometimes find people’s reactions to your art or the particular pieces they’re attracted to telling? Like looking at a Rorschach… it’s not maybe what you intended but their (viewing) experience is their own?

Tucker: Yeah, absolutely. It’s almost impossible to make something for someone else. You certainly can have people in mind and have people that connect with your work but you can’t really make it for them. You can only really make it for yourself and hope that it connects with people. You’re never gonna control the narrative and artists often want to do this because we feel vulnerable, because we’re making something and we’re putting out into the world and people are going to look at it and judge it, and it’s very hard for artists, myself included, even though I’m aware of it, to separate yourself from the artwork.

One of the big differences between design and art is that design is sort of working to a brief and trying to solve a different kind of problem, and art is very much more of an open process… of finding things can change. Mathew tucker

People will say things, constructive things and critique. People will point out things that you’ve never considered. When I did my MFA at Hunter, I was working as an art handler in the city, installing and handling artwork for Christie’s and the big auctions, and a big component of the MFA was critique. You make work, you put it up on the walls, and all of your friends and colleagues would talk about the work with the professors; and sometimes it felt like you were being attacked and sometimes people got it. Sometimes people would actually come out with really, really insightful things which I kind of aligned it to.

It’s almost like psychotherapy or something when you get a very good therapist and they’ll show you something that you hadn’t necessarily noticed about yourself or help you tease it out and I think most artists are actually trying to tease things out. That’s the whole point of taking what was an idea or concept and making it into art. You’re working through ideas and trying to find a way to express things.

Finding your way through the labyrinth?

Tucker: Yeah. Right? And you have an idea about what you want to do and what you end up making is almost never what you intended to make. Stuff happens along the way. Ideas change and in actual fact, if you did make exactly what you were thinking, I don’t know how artful it would be or that it would feel very manufactured. I don’t want to be disparaging about design. Design is fantastic — very important and I studied and loved it too. But one of the big differences between design and art is that design is sort of working to a brief and trying to solve a different kind of problem and art is very much more of an open process… of finding things can change. I think that’s the difference there; and that’s not to say that there can’t be really great sort of accidents occurring in design. I think it’s just a slightly different mindset — subtle but different intentions maybe.

4. What takes the cake and leaves you eating it, too, in the town we call home? What tops the Wilton Hot List?

Tucker: I mean, I don’t want to promote anything but… Rise [Doughnuts]. You know, the first few times that we’d gone there my girls were like, “It’s not Dunkin’ Donuts,” because you know, they like the “pink” and the “shiny” but then after, I don’t know, maybe just a couple more visits it became  a really big thing.

But yeah, it’s the fact that it’s the sort of town that has that. I mean… when we were looking, (we were in Brooklyn), we’d been considering moving out of the city but it had to be like a 45 minute commute and then, because my wife works in Soho, we still wanted to be close. So we kind of looked at the map and we came across Wilton. We really wanted to have good schools and we love the schools. The girls love their teachers… the bus.

You’re enchanted with it…

Tucker: I love it. I love that after this, I can meet my girls at Comstock and the school bus brings them there. I love the fact that we go and watch their dance recitals at the Clune Center. And like all the friends that we’ve met… when you move from somewhere, you hope to make some new friends. You never quite know if you’re gonna find your people but then suddenly we started making all these friends and I didn’t have that expectation. I thought we’d meet some nice people and have some friends, but we’ve met some really good friends and… it’s great.

I would also say the library. The library is wonderful. I mean, really… the programs that they do. It’s kind of a shame, because there’s so many resources for adults that we haven’t tapped into yet but I know they’re there and I love the space. But most of the time we’re going in there it’s just with the kids and they’re doing programs and stuff.

5. On a separate note, were you ever a starving artist?

Tucker: I guess that’s interesting, because it’s such a stereotype and I think for good reason. I think even the most famous artists could easily walk down the street and not be recognized, because it’s just a different level of celebrity culture. What they put out is their artwork and not their looks, not their persona.

One of my favorite artists, Peter Doyle — he could walk down the street and nobody would know him. I didn’t go down the art route early on when I went to college the first time because — how do you make a living as an artist? I went to the sort of design side of things because it seemed like there was much more possibility to get employment and maybe start a company. You have a product to sell and you do have a product to sell as artists. As an artist it’s just different. It’s just a very different sort of economy and things.

So I went back to it years later, after working a lot of various jobs in London, corporate facing jobs. When I moved to Ireland, I started painting a lot more again and that’s when I decided to do my undergrad degree. So I did that in Ireland and certainly, all of that time I was living very, very close to the bone. I was very, very limited about where I could go and what I could do. In the winter, I remember having a stove. It was really charming, beautiful. I had this studio space that had a wood burning stove. And so, yeah, so part of my week was always making sure that I had food that I needed and enough stuff for the wood burning stove. But it was a happy time, because I did lots of stuff. I was surfing a lot. It was a simpler time — no kids, no kids, no medical bills. It was also a different country where you could do things much more easily.

Most of the time through college in New York, I was working for this art handling company and I was earning what you might say is decent money for the job that it was but certainly not like a New York salary or the sort of salary that you would need to be able to live comfortably in New York without worrying about stuff. So I certainly never had extra money but I’m sure there were people much worse off than me.

I think artists need money just like everyone else, but I think that they put more importance on being able to do what they love. Also, people have different perspectives about whether they want to monetize what they make, but I think people that do that are thinking of it as a career and a way to support themselves. You have to do what you love first and then try to find a way to monetize. And I think that’s also a very complicated area for people because it’s something so personal. It’s a complex thing I think for most artists which is actually probably why the gallery system works the way it does and has lasted so long — artists often need someone else to really champion their work and promote it; to do the side of things that artists often feel uncomfortable with.

Okay. I’m throwing in a bonus question – what’s important and not important at this point in your life?

Tucker: Ever since my two girls came along, they’re priority number one. They just are. So many kids were running around at the [Wilton Library Terra-Forming] opening and I wanted my kids to be there. They were excited about it. I feel like my wife’s a great example to my kids also because she has this great job and she’s doing really well and she’s an example to them of just a strong female character doing that. My career has always been important even if it’s been sort of in the background. I think that my family, in many ways, has always been the most important thing.

In your adult life, you learn so many little lessons along the way that you don’t expect to. I mean, I think just on a really simple level if I take a snapshot of right now — everyone’s healthy and happy. We have good friends around us and I think we’re so lucky. Sometimes I feel like Wilton is a bit of a bubble… and I mean that in a positive sense; like we’re contained sort of within the boundary of this town and it feels like something that everyone should be able to have. We have it and we’re lucky but it shouldn’t be beyond the reach of anyone. In a sense I mean that everyone should have access. So I feel very grateful for that.

What’s important to me? I want my career to expand but I don’t want to feel like I’m chasing things. People often ask me if I miss the city and I love the city. I also love going back to London. I love seeing that much artwork. I miss being around a lot of artists. My wife and I sometimes talk about how nice it was to be able to just walk down the street and go to a bar or restaurant, but every now and then we’ll go but the value that we get from living here and our kids having this much space,  so many activities, so much time outside… I wouldn’t give this up to get that.

You’re happy in your life?

(He smiles.)

Terra-Forming is on view at the Wilton Library (137 Old Ridgefield Rd.) now through Friday, Jan. 30. A majority of the works are available for purchase with a portion of the proceeds benefiting the library.