All Seeing Lamp

Christopher Pedraza

Interview by L. Valena

November 18, 2022

Can you start by describing the prompt that you responded to? 

It was the artist’s video of an installation and I just loved everything about it. The colors, the weird imagery, and then as it was panning around to the other side, I saw these Moroccan-style lamps with these weird squiggly things with eyeballs. I immediately thought, “Yep! That’s what I’m doing.” The video was super awesome. That installation is phenomenal.

I agree! I was so excited to show it to you. And it immediately clicked that you wanted to pursue these lamps?

Exactly. My style works by having a central focal point and then weird things happening in the background. I knew I wanted to incorporate the Moroccan lamp, but I thought that would be too simple. And that's when I came along the lines of the squiggly lamps with the eyeballs at the end. I thought, “YES, it's like a weird lamp monster.” 

[laughs] I love a lamp monster! 

Who doesn't love a good lamp monster? 

Do you know why the lamp was the thing that called out to you? Why was there a special connection there?

Well, I have a Moroccan lamp myself. I've always been drawn to this Bohemian type of imagery and style. When you sent me the video, I thought, “What am I gonna do? What am I gonna do? What am I gonna do? Did I bite off more than I can chew?” So then, when I saw the lamp, I knew that's it. I just knew I needed to do it. 

What kind of materials did you use for this piece?

It's all digital. I use Procreate. I was just playing around with things. I had the basic idea of what I wanted to do for the majority of the two weeks, except for how I wanted to finish it. I knew what it was going to look like, just not how it was gonna look. My style differs between this really super-detailed, hyper-focused, realistic subject matter and 1950s comic book style. There's literally no in-between. I was talking to my sister-in-law about it. “Do I go comic book-esque like what I've currently been doing? I've been practicing Inktober and doing these tarot card things in that style. Or do I want to show off what my abilities can truly be?” She was like, “Uhhh, show off!” And she was right. 

I feel like whenever that question comes up, that's usually the right answer. I love that combination of styles, and that’s why I wasn't sure what material you used. It seems like a mixed media piece, and I think that's a really hard thing to achieve with digital. 

In most of my work, it can be hard to tell if it's digital or mixed media because I do mix media for paintings and things. I use spray paint, regular acrylic paints, and whatever else I can get my hands on. If I’m able to translate that into a digital sense, it lets me know I’m on the right path. 

I love that the eyes are different colors. That's a cool detail. Is this one individual monster or multiple monsters?

I didn't even think of that! Off the fly, it could be one monster and each eye color is a different one of its victims. We can just do that. 

Oh my God!! I love that! It takes on the eyes of its victims?

Yes, like souvenirs. I don’t know if you watch “Walking Dead,” but they take souvenirs from the zombies. There you go. Like that. The eyes are the souvenirs from the victims.

So tell me about your process. You saw the piece and you decided what you would do. How did you get from there to here? 

Multiple manic states. [laughs] Freak-out moments. Falling into this impostor syndrome, like “Do you do this really well? Do you not do this really well? Are you who you are? Is this what you really want to do?” And then I bully myself into doing something. I think, “All right, I'm gonna try this and if I like it, I'll continue. And if not, then I'll go back into another manic state and figure something else out. 

I relate to that so much. Sometimes that bully voice is really cruel, but sometimes it's the only thing that could get us through those moments of total self-doubt. 

Yes. My inner saboteur is named Brenda. I tell her, “Shut up, Brenda! Sit down!”

“I will call you when I need you!” 

You're not bringing anything of value, Brenda. Calm down. 

Maybe I should name mine, too. It seems like a good trick. 

RuPaul helped me figure that out from watching Drag Race. 

That’s awesome. So did you sit down and do this all in one sitting? How does that usually go? Do you start something and then walk away and come back? 

It varies. I took a lot of time with this piece in particular. I work a full-time desk job during the day and I'm going to school as well, so I've learned to juggle. I juggle really well until I don't. Luckily, school has ended. I've now been focusing more on personal projects and everything. With this particular piece, I took my time with it. I fully carved out an idea of what I wanted to do, and essentially just played around with it. “No, I don't like that. Okay yeah, I like that,” versus “Oh my God I gotta get this done!” and rushing through it. 

Do you think of this lamp as a functional lamp? 

Oh, it's absolutely a functional piece! I didn't really fully feel like it was functional until the very very end when I was adding like these light-colored oranges in the background to make it more like a three-dimensional space. It would totally be in that artist’s installation. I can totally see that happening, but it would be in someone's studio or maybe a mad scientist’s lab. Somewhere weird and super psychedelic. 

How would one style this, in a foxy, interior décor-sort of way? How do you pair this with a really cool, vintage couch or something? Where does this lamp monster fully come into its own?

It floats there above the coffee table/couch. It just, like, looks around. [both laugh]

Maybe it focuses on whoever's talking.

Makes them super uncomfortable. The lamp just stares at you with all eight eyes just to make you really really uncomfortable and then you just self-implode. 

Is there anything you’d like to talk about that I haven’t asked?

I always like to touch upon the Queer community because that’s a big part of who I am and my journey. The way that the media portrays the Queer community is through stereotypes, and there's more to us than that. If someone can find inspiration from what I do, if my work can essentially inspire the next generation of artists and noisemakers, and “Fuck the patriarchy” (so to speak)… I don't know if I can say that, but sorry if I can't. 

No no, that's encouraged. 

Fuck the patriarchy, man! I'm so down with changing everything up. I've gone on my long, personal journey with accepting who I am. I was kidding about Brenda earlier, but Brenda has played a huge, detrimental part in who I am and I let her get in the way of everything. I’m a huge advocate for therapy, getting on the correct medication, and not listening to your inner saboteur. Just say, “There's only one of me. I'm gonna do what I want to do as long as I'm not hurting anyone or myself.” If I am providing some type of inspiration and hope for the future, then hey, let's do it. 

I think that's really important stuff to talk about. Especially when we're on our gender discovery journeys, that stuff comes out in our artwork no matter what kind of art we’re making. It's part of who we are.

Absolutely! And art’s always been at the forefront of pushing the boundary, not only in traditional artforms like painting, but also in forms such as drag. People have come before me to push the boundaries, essentially poking the bear. “No no no, hey, I'm going to change things up here.” As I'm getting into my 30s, I feel like I'm poking the bear a little bit. “No no no, this is how I do things.” I feel like I'm also making my stamp in the history of how things will change for the better. 

I had a dream one time and I'm sure that my subconscious just pulled this from some quote somewhere, but I haven’t found it so far. In my dream, an elegant older woman dressed in black turned to me and said, “Every single piece of art is a small attempt to change the world,” which I think is gorgeous. 

It’s true! Every piece of artwork, whatever reason, whatever you stand for, will create change. Someone will view it and their mindset will change from it or be inspired to change. 

Is there anything in particular about that or your Queer identity in this particular piece? That's manifested in my art in all sorts of ways that don't seem obvious, you know? 

I guess subconsciously, yeah. Especially with the tentacles with the eyes at the end. I've had eyes on me my entire life for whatever reason, from family that don't get along with me, friends, whatever the case may be. It’s like I’m throwing the middle finger up in the air, saying “Ha! I'm doing this, whether you’re looking at me or not. I'm here, I'm Queer, get fucking used to it.”

Yes. Yes. I identify as non-binary and I do think that that ‘societal surveillance’ feeling can be a real challenge.

Absolutely. I recently came out as non-binary and I’ve felt like I have to look and act and dress a certain way because non-binary people are supposed to be androgynous or whatever. No! I am a 250 lb gay man with a beard, and I love to just not give a shit about labels or who which clothes are for. If I like it and it looks good on my body, hell yeah I'm gonna wear it.

Hell yeah. Yeah. When I came out, I suddenly became really inspired to make all sorts of art about flowers. It was as if I had permission! Having grown up as a woman and never feeling good about that, naming the issue gave me more permission to just make beautiful paintings of flowers because they're gorgeous. I don't give a shit what “they” say I'm supposed to be making art about or how I'm supposed to look. It just resonates.

That is a beautiful thing. 

Hell yeah.

Hell yeah!

Well, do you have any advice for another artist approaching this project for the first time? 

Have fun with it. Just have fun. You're not reinventing the wheel. Just have fun. If you’re stressing out about it, what's the point of doing it? It's supposed to be fun. Whatever happens will happen. 

The last thing we want is to be another source of stress. There's enough of that. 

Call Number: M60VA | M62VA.peAll

Christopher Pedraza is a queer artist living in Western Ma. Not bound to any mediums or styles, Pedraza’s work draws from a few inspirations like Da Vinci and Van Gogh, and can be classified mainly as pseudo-realistic or abstract. He mostly uses acrylic paint on canvas though he thrives in many other mediums, like oil and spray paint and digital.