CALEB HAHNE QUINTANA
Name: Caleb Hahne Quintana
Age: 29
Birthplace: Denver, Colorado, USA
Home: Brooklyn, New York, USA
Disciplines: Painting and drawing
The Other Side Is The Day (Self Portrait In Blue), 2021, courtesy of the artist and 1969 Gallery
What’s usually the starting point of your practice, and when does your work feel complete?
Almost everything starts with a drawing. I have a visual lexicon I pull from rooted in my experiences; essentially, a diary. Drawing is an extension of language and for me, it’s the way that I react and reflect on the world. Then, the painting becomes an extension of that. It’s hard to say when I find a work complete - I always feel like it could be ‘better’, but also paintings have millions of different decisions that lead to other outcomes, so I find that the hardest part is learning the intuition that tells you that a painting is complete. I also work on a lot of things at once so that helps me leave things as they are.
What are you obsessed with?
Painting, drawing, Jiu-Jitsu and my cat Max.
What are the interactions that you seek between your work and the viewer?
I want the viewer to feel a part of the painting. All of my decisions in scale, color, composition and gaze are used to engage with the viewer in a way that sets them into the work not as a voyeur, but as the second figure in the painting. I want people to question their own histories and engage in their own type of archiving.
What is your commitment, both artistically and personally?
Good question. I think of them existing in unison. Again, I want people to question their own histories while also being able to engage and empathize with others. My commitment is to care for myself in order to care for others, which in return allows me to make paintings about myself in a way that is colloquial.
Who are some of the artists that have been the biggest in!uence on you?
On Kawara, Enrique Martinez Celaya, Rebecca Solnit, Christophe Lemaire, Liu Xiaodong.
Where is the beauty for you today?
The breath. The pause. The land.
In The Eyes of Paradise, 2022, courtesy of the artist and 1969 Gallery