Artist of the Week: Alessandro Echevarria

I've long been fascinated by the artist's sketchbook, they always carry around their notebooks or moleskins like the writers and their journal or diary. They capture ideas, draw what they see, doodle and sketch. To crack the covers of these private little collections is to see that artist at their most intimate, most experimental, most raw and unassuming. One artist that has revealed these unplanned and unrefined drawings with the world is Brooklyn's, by way of Vicenza, Italy, Alessandro Echevarria.

Alessandro not only sketches and doodles, he has the ability to turn these thoughts into more elaborate images and creations. That is the true genius of the artist, it is the ability to take the raw talent and make that deliberate decision to turn it to something bigger. Just as the the writer deciphers the cryptic scribbles of their notebook, the artist grabs those key drawings and shares their developed dreams with the world.

Recently, Alessandro was kind enough to answer a few of my questions.

Orange Alert (OA): In some of your drawings it looks you are capturing the literal deconstruction or dissection of your characters. Is that an accurate statement? How would you describe these images?
Alessandro Echevarria (AE): That is spot on. I started doing that a few years ago, and I guess I got obsessed with it. As a kid I was really fascinated with gore, and death. My father is a retired military doctor enamored with WWII. He had tons of medical, and airplane/weapon diagram books lying around. I've always really been into how things work, deconstructing, and looking into things, I'm still super curious, and always daydreaming on how everything works.
One day I just decided to take that process to my own drawings, and see what was inside. Ever since I've been using it as a way to express certain ideas, or just to show what I think is concealed.

OA: I really enjoy flipping through artists sketchbooks because they are less inhibited or refined than their finished works, and I love that you have put your sketches online. Do you feel that they are more personal than your finished work? What made you put them online?
AE: l love going through other people's sketchbooks. I think it's almost like looking into someone's head, because like you said they're less inhibited. I put them up for that reason, and as silly as it may sound because artists I respect did it... *cough* james jean *cough*

Figure drawing, and portraiture, is my personal little lifetime quest. Everyone's so different, and there's so much to see just in someone's face. Learning how to capture a likeness quickly and in as few lines as possible, or over a long time picking up every little subtlety is amazing, and I'm jealous of anyone that can do it well.
Though what I've made public of my sketchbook as far as content, is much less personal than my finished work. It is in fact a personal visual journal. I try to draw every time I'm on the subway, a bar or anywhere with people. I pick whoever I find interesting or beautiful in some way or another, and try to record what I can.
My finished work in some ways is a very personal expression. Something I put a lot more work, and thought into, but I don't know it's just two different sides of the same coin.

OA: You told me that you are going through a transitional period. How do you know you are in transition and in what direction are you heading artistically? Are you still proud of or comfortable with your older work?
AE: I'll be honest, I'm amazingly lazy sometimes, and wish I weren't, but I go through great creative frenzies and then I just do nothing for a while. (normal?) When I'm not really creating anything, I am thinking a lot, and learning things. So when I do start making again, I start doing things a bit differently and better. I did a lot of watercolor, ink and life drawing when my paints were in storage, and since I got back into painting acrylics; I've been trying to figure out how to reconcile what I've learned drawing from life, and using lots of watercolor with the acrylic painting. So as far as being in transition it's because I got better, and what I did before might not be representative of what I do now. I'd like to think my work is more carefully executed, a little bit deeper, and better thought out now. As I grow as a person so does my work, but what I was got me to where I am, so I'm not ashamed of my older work, it's just not who I am anymore.

OA: Growing up in Vicenza, do you feel art is a global platform or is it viewed, taught, or executed differently in Italy than in the US?
AE: I went to an Art high school for only a year in Vicenza before I figured out that I hated it, so much so that stopped drawing for 3 years. I can't really say how people feel or think about art back home, because it's not something I really thought much about at the time. Though, I felt like they were trying to mold us into little fine art robots at that school, and I had to leave. Over here, art is viewed so loosely, if you put a couple lines on a piece of paper, or some paint on canvas you're automatically an artist. Overall as far as artists or craft people go, we all do it for the love, or for a release, so in that sense it is a global platform. Art is a form of communication, I think somewhere in our DNA it's written that we all should try to make or enjoy artwork.

OA: How has you experience as an artist been different in the New York than in in Vicenza?
AE: I can barely stand to call myself or be called an artist now, and when I was in Vicenza I was so much younger, and even less artsy. I wouldn't know how to answer that question satisfyingly. I really didn't start showing work until I moved to Florida, and even then it wasn't by choice but by chance. In South Florida, if you do what I do, it's almost exotic, or at least peculiar. Here in New York, and moreso Brooklyn, everyone seems to be an artist of sort, or in some way affiliated with one. It's very commonplace, and for me it's hard to explain to people that I'm not really an artist, but that I just draw and paint.
Regardless, NYC is just so overwhelmingly beautiful, full of inspiration, and motivation. Like nowhere I've ever been before. Vicenza and Italy are pretty amazing too, but only in retrospect. At the time when I lived there I was too young to really enjoy what I had. I was too busy skateboarding and having a good time I guess.

OA: What's next for Alessandro Echevarria?
AE: Lots of art shows, commissions, and illustration work. I'm currently working on paintings for the Multiversal group show at Art Basel Miami "" which I get to attend (yes!). Then I'm making something for the Power in Numbers show at Nucleus Gallery in LA. (thanks Coop).
I also got invited to participate in a show at The Fall in Vancouver curated by Nomi Chi, this coming April. Though I'm open to more shows obviously. I also really want to make some books, zines, shirts, animations, shorts, collaborate on work, all kinds of things. I've got a ton of ideas brewing I just need an outlet to get them made.
I'm even organizing and curating a group show called "Futureshock" in NYC with a bunch of awesomely amazing artists I deeply respect, including JAW Cooper, Julian Callos, Mylan Nguyen, Mel Stringer, Nomi Chi, Natali Martinez, Lauren Albert and Inès Estrada just to name a few, or most... These kids are so amazing and I really want more people to be able to enjoy their work as much as I do. But really I just want any excuse to make artsy crap.

Bonus Questions:
OA: If you could sit down to coffee with anyone (alive or dead) who would it be?
AE: Tim Shafer would be cool to talk with because he's produced some of my favorite videogames ever.

OA: What type of music do you enjoy and who are a few of your favorites?
AE: I really like anything that's either well made, something that tells a story or made with lots of feeling or orchestrating.
I listen to a lot of classical/opera music, folk, or whatever really. I love composers, and virtuoso instrumentalists, and I can put Arcade Fire on loop all day and never get tired. Some of my Favorites are Islands, Beirut, Ben Folds, Sigur Ros, Philip Glass, Final Fantasy, Radiohead, Stravinsky, Yann Tiersen, Buck65, Daedalus, Neutral Milk Hotel, Busdriver, Deer Tick, and I can really just keep going, I love music.

For more information on Alessandro Echevarria please check out his website.