Back to the Drawing Board Podcast Upsetting the Festival Status Quo, Pushing the Comfort Zone with Denise Kowal

Emilija: I’m so excited for today’s episode with Denise Kowal. When we met for the first time in Florida last year she gave me a big hug and I actually still remember that. And I had never talked to her before. Anyways, Denise is the founder of the Sarasota International Chalk Festival in Florida and she has been an integral part of bringing artists from all around the world to invigorate the city since 2007. I was able to participate last year in my first ever chalk festival. I wanted to bring Denise on the podcast to talk about her motivation behind creating the festival and its power to alter the paradigm in fine art. D: Thank you for having me. E: Just last week or two weeks ago, I had a chat with Shawn McCann. I’m pretty sure you know him. D: Absolutely. E: We talked a little bit about chalk art and his work with Driscoll’s berry company. But we didn’t really touch on the history of chalk art. So I was hoping you could cover a little bit of that. D: I can certainly speak to what I’ve learned over the past 10 or 11 years that I’ve been in it. E: It’s a test. D: One thing that I know as I get older, is that the more you learn the less you seem to know. I also can only speak to what I know, I think one’s knowledge of history should only pop in. I think everybody should have an open mind to whatever they hear or learn about history and think. E: Definitely. How did chalk art make its way from Italy into the US? D: It was probably always in the US in some sense. But the most notable person was Sidewalk Sam. There were multiple people that had participated in a festival that started in Italy and people would come back. He seemed to be the most prominent person. He just recently passed away in 2015, actually where I am right now, in Boston, which is where I grew up. It’s kind of this is probably the area when people think of when they think of the US. Where it kind saw first people on the streets using chalk they would probably think of the Boston area. But the art form as we know it today in America was because of the incredible discipline and determination of an artist named Kurt Wenner, who’s an American artist. He had sold everything as a young man. He was attending college. He was even working for NASA before they had all the CAD drawings and all the computerization that they had now. He left all of that behind. He wanted to further his abilities as an artist, in the early 1980s he traveled to Rome. He self-trained in Renaissance classicalism drawings studying Masters throughout Europe. When he started the in 1982, he started it to earn money. It was something that he had kind of just stumbled on, he had never really seen it before and he had stumbled on it. And he wanted to further his classical studies and he needed to make money, he was starving. Typical starving artist. And so, the first year that he started learning the pavement arts, he actually brought it to the United States. He introduced to the Santa Barbara Museum of Art. By 1986 he started the first pavement art festival, I Modonnari. So that’s the first one that was really a true modennari that had started. He

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Back to the Drawing Board Podcast Upsetting the Festival Status Quo, Pushing the Comfort Zone with Denise Kowal really is the sole person responsible for the quick spread of this ephemeral art form throughout the US soil. E: That’s really cool. So, from what I know, chalk art in Italy was centered on religious imagery and it was all rendered very classically. D: Classically might not be. A lot of these artists were novice. A lot of them were not trained classically. There were a lot of people that would win competitions that were starting to be trained in classical. When you think of Italian artists you tend to think of their classical style. That would be true. E: I know especially at the chalk festival in Florida and from images that I’ve seen on social media. Chalk art has kind of taken a different direction in the US. There is all of a sudden, the 3- dimensional aspect of it. How did that get started?

D: There is two things going on. The first thing we talked a little bit about, did it start kind of in Italy and was it all around the religious imagery. In reality, while pavement art was all around the world and images were created by everyone. Because of course it’s very natural for people to draw wherever they could. So, through history people have probably always been drawing on the ground. E: That’s very true. D: There’s examples of many artists in other countries. Yes, Italy was the most significant and most of the images were a homage to the Madonna, the Saint Mary. It was all around the rich history of Italian religious art. Hence the name, these artists were called the I modonnaris. It’s also where the most significant pavement art festival started. That started because after World War II a lot of these artists were, they just were not being seen out in the street so much. This festival started to continue this art forma and bring it back to Italy. Kurt Wenner was involved quite a lot in that. What’s changed so much over time is probably the mediums, the surface, the subject matter and the techniques and the advancements over time. Most significantly as this art has flourished it was particularly the invention of anamorphic or 3d pavement art that Kurt Wenner did in 1984 and of course that was documented by National Geographic. His distortion, what he has invented is actually known as the Wenner geometry. He was inspired by the perspective format that was used by great European masters, anamorphicism, that gave ceilings the illusion of floating figures or endless skies and architectural elements. The Wenner geometry makes images appear to rise above and fall into the ground. This was on the surface. This was the first time that this has been known to appear anywhere in history, was by Kurt Wenner. It’s a very complex art form. It’s an outward projection of the curvilinear geometry of the back of your eye, is the Wenner geometry. Today of course there are many artists, you came to the festival and you saw that there were many artists that like to try pavement art and there’s a tremendous amount of very good artists that are out there creating the 3d art form today. But, and this is a very big but. Most teaching by others and videos and tutorials, and the works of artists, a lot of them are not necessarily correctly done or in the right technical sense. Although they can still be fun and beautiful and they are creating a beautiful work of art, other 3d pavement artists have

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Back to the Drawing Board Podcast Upsetting the Festival Status Quo, Pushing the Comfort Zone with Denise Kowal simplified the geometry by using kind of traditional 17-century approaches. Which calls for the creation of an interface between two perspective planes. One that uses the surface of the pavement as a reference plane, and another one that corresponds on a film plane of a camera or optical device. The cleverness and significance of the use of the geometry and by extension mathematics kind of lies in the artist’s ability to conceptualize and execute works by juxtaposing these two forms of pictorial representations. This art form is of course still relatively new, it’s really only been around for 25 years. It’s still blossoming. It’s in high demand. Lots of artists are practicing it and learning stuff, which is the reason why we still as our festival we continue to have Kurt Wenner keep coming back to our festival to keep working with artists so that he can keep helping them understand perspective and advance their knowledge of this art form which will continue to help their artwork grow over time. E: Right. I knew it was complicated but I didn’t realize there was all of this science and math involved in it. D: Yeah. It’s, we see lots of people that try to explain it in books, or they try to explain it in videos, and they just of kind of jumble up a bunch of stuff. It really doesn’t do the art form justice. It’s very complicated. It can be simplified of course. You know, but then of course the dimension, and what your eye will see, will be more simplified as well. E: So, I know I stumbled upon chalk art when I was googling and art festivals last year after graduating. How did you get involved with ? D: Well I come from a family of artists. My parents are artists. My father is also a college professor. He taught sculpting. We lived on college art campuses during the school year. I’ve just been raising around artists my whole life. I also have two sons that grew up in the city of Sarasota. They were very interested in street art, being two young kids around lots of buildings. In fact, both of my sons were sticker artists. Whereas they would take labels from various companies, sticker labels, and they would create these elaborate works of art on them and stick them around the city. And even when they would travel they would stick around the country and around other countries. So, is quite popular and it’s quite an impressive act of letting go. It’s similar to the ephemeral nature of pavement art but kind of incognito. They would create these works of art, they wouldn’t sign their real name, and it would just be in the recognition of a similar image throughout different areas, that they have some recognition. It’s less destructive than tagging and the more permanent type of . In fact, my older son was accused of being a tagger annoy, who was super annoying and causing hundreds of thousands of dollars of damage in Sarasota. He even had to take a lie detector test to clear his name and prove he is not this tagger. E: That’s funny. D: I was a little bit frustrated around street art and the art form when it was such an amazing, it was blossoming, and it was just there was some much going on that was so exciting about the art form. I wanted our city to grow up a little bit and I think that’s what interested me in street art.

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Back to the Drawing Board Podcast Upsetting the Festival Status Quo, Pushing the Comfort Zone with Denise Kowal

E: Instead of choosing to go down the street artist route, you went down the festival coordinator route. Why was it that you chose one over the other? D: I don’t know. I sometimes wonder that all the time. When I started the festival, it was a lot of around what my sons were going through. It was living downtown, wanting to create something downtown. This type of festival appealed to me because all the public could really do was show up. You know, you just show up and you are able to have a great experience. I admire the chalk artists and the role they play. I definitely fantasize about doing that one day, instead of organizing the festival around them. It’s certainly hard what the artists do and there’s a lot of accolades and praise for what they do as well. It’s definitely a feel good gift that they do for the public, and they reap that. By being the founder, CEO and director and creative director of the chalk festival, it’s personally very rewarding in a way that makes me question what is truly important in life and what really matters at the end of the day. It definitely takes a great toll on my business and personal life in different ways. I’m not so sure if I balance that so well. But overall, I feel that the impact I’ve had by being the organizer has affected a great number of people in very meaningful ways. That can’t be measured in dollars or sense. Not like dollars and cents, but it just doesn’t make sense sometimes. It’s a very demanding position, to host an event of this quality, particularly because it’s a gift that all the volunteers and artists are giving to others. I do it for free as a volunteer, it kind of reminds me of how people say sometimes when you raise children is a thankless job. Being a festival organizer sometimes feels like that. You do it because you wholeheartedly love something, not because you will get anything from it from anyone. I think it’s good sometimes to do things for something bigger than your own world. It’s kind of what this festival has become for me. It removes away from the things that have to do with me, and it’s always putting me in a place where I’m doing something solely for others. I think that’s important. That’s the route I took. Who knows, maybe down the road one day I’ll just say: “I’m going to go chalk, and enjoy myself and do that.” E: Yeah. I think it’s very commendable. I don’t think a lot of people realize how much works goes into putting a festival. Especially something the size of the one in Sarasota. Even I know myself, as an event coordinator in the past at different student run events at university, it’s not an easy job and it’s not something that a lot of people can do. So, I feel like if there are some unique people that have the ability and organizational skills and almost like the visioning skills to make it happen, I think that’s awesome. I think it’s a lot easier to be a chalk artist. D: I’ve learned everything by mistake. I can be a perfectionist and I definitely have a strong drive. I get calls from other organizers all the time and they say: “We want to do an event like yours.” I Say: “Well I hope you are paying them a lot of money, or a I hope you have somebody who’s willing to dedicate a ridiculous amount of time and has a lot of fortitude to carry something through.” It’s been definitely a very demanding and giving role. It’s not for everybody. You have to have a strong backbone. For sure. It’s rewarding too. You kind of have to have confidence in yourself. Something that I’ve learned from doing the festival, is how you are the only one that can define yourself and who you are and what you choose to do with your life. No one else can define you. And that’s something it took me a while to realize and stay true

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Back to the Drawing Board Podcast Upsetting the Festival Status Quo, Pushing the Comfort Zone with Denise Kowal to yourself and follow what you feel is the right thing to do, even when everybody is telling you it’s the wrong thing to do. E: Definitely. I know you just mentioned that the festival is run by the volunteers. I wasn’t aware of the extent of this when I arrived in Florida in a couple of days before the festival began. And I was so surprised because there were a lot of the volunteers that had no previous connection with art. They were just local residents that wanted to get involved. I thought that was really cool. And I’m not sure how many other organizations get that. D: You know, I can’t say enough accolades to the team that comes together for this event. I just can’t. I was very fortunate that I had never been to another chalk festival when I had started this festival. I didn’t ever even see a chalk painting, I had never known chalk artists before I started this event. And you know, starting it without any reference points really, made me study a lot. I do like to study and I definitely like challenges. So, but I’m not good at following other people’s directions, or roles or systems. I definitely kind of follow my own path. When I started the festival it really upset the status quo of the festival world, because I was told I wasn’t doing it right. I had lots of input from artists, particularly Lori Escalera, who was the first artist I hired, to do the event with me. Lots of people wrote scripts, saying this is what you do. I just didn’t follow scripts. Also, other organizations and leaders and festivals they wouldn’t share any information. When I started the event, it was a very hush hush type of art form. People were very protective of the artists, they didn’t want to share any information. The events were structured around benefiting a cause, other than the pavement art. The pavement art was the means to the cause. It was either for the Ear, Nose and Throat Centre, or it was for the museum, or it was for the art centre. It was something to bring attention and promote a cause. What we did, the , by its third year became a 501c3 nonprofit and it was only to support the art form. This was a very new concept when we started it and we did lots of things that were not acceptable by the traditions of what was going on for the 15 years prior to this. We published a book on the artists by our third year and we created blogs and we had websites that had their information. Everybody was upset about that: “Wait a minute. You are giving away the information of all of these artists. Now anybody can find them.” To us, it was like: “But our event is about the artists and it’s about the art form.” If we are not promoting the artists and the art form we are not doing justice to what our concept was. You know, what our cause was. I also picked very random ranges of artists. I would support novice artists and expert artists from around the world. It didn’t’ matter to me if they were the best or they were the worst. Because there were certain countries where there might have been somebody that had just learned the art form, but they were the only one doing it. We felt it was important to bring those people in. which we have done over and over again every year. We’ll bring artists that are the only ones within their region within their country. You know, we bring them over so they can learn from us. That was something that was a little bit different. In 2010 we became the first international pavement art festival in the USA. We hosted then and we continue to host the largest number of pavement artists in the world. We give the largest opportunities to artists as well. We do a lot to help artists advance. We do teachings and we support any type of projects they want to do. We organize group projects. We’ve even debuted numerous inventions in the art form and playful interactions with the public. We’ve showcased the largest number of 3d paintings ever in one location.

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Back to the Drawing Board Podcast Upsetting the Festival Status Quo, Pushing the Comfort Zone with Denise Kowal

We’ve even created a few world records which we’re going to do again this year. Our theme every year, which you know, I didn’t struggle the first five years, but each year it’s interesting to come up with new things. But what that does is it affords additional artists that are in different disciplines to contribute to the atmosphere of the festival as well. We’ve kind of created a family, because we are all giving our time to making it a success together. And there is mutual respect for all those that definitely put their egos aside and who love art and sharing it with others unconditionally. It’s kind of the momentum that we’ve started and we try to build on all the time. E: I know when I was googling chalk festivals, the Sarasota Chalk Festival used to come up way more often than others. I was going to ask you why is that, what makes you guys so special? But I think you just covered it. It’s because you are a little rebel. D: You know, I don’t know. I always say to people we’ve really created this amazing family. It’s really artists from around the world. You were there. It’s like there’s so many people speaking different languages, everybody kind of puts everything aside to make the whole thing kind of work. It’s just kind of a magical thing. We are all volunteering. There are lots of other events that are doing great. But they are mostly lead by people that have a job to do. They work for an organization to make this happen or they work for a museum to make it happen. Or they own the business centre to make it happen. But this one has nothing to make it happen. The only thing that makes it happen, all the volunteers, all the artists deciding every year: “Let’s do this.” That’s it. It’s entirely focused on the art form. It’s one of the few festivals that does just that. And we consistently do it every year. It’s a beautiful thing. E: Yeah. I think that’s probably what makes you stand out as well. D: Yeah. Every year we have a lot of festival organizers that come over from all over. They come to meet the artists. Where else can you go in the world and meet hundreds of incredible artists. We attract a lot of organizers from around the world. E: I know personally especially since graduating I’ve become interested in the ability of to change the relationship between the public and art. You know, from the conventional, going to the gallery. Because I know a lot of people are intimated by that. I was wondering if you have seen this be the case with the festival? Have you seen Sarasota and the area becoming a little bit more art appreciating and loving? D: Pavement art affords the public an incredibly rare look into the artist’s heart, their joys, their struggles, their victories, their losses. As they perform in public. It’s obviously a very vulnerable space for themselves to put them in. and I think it’s a very noble act. Sarasota was very supportive of the chalk art festival. We’ve been there for 6 years, and now we’ve been in Venice for 4 years. Sarasota had some very vocal critics that cause a lot of hardships and heartaches for our non-profit. It was a very small group of people. But you know how that people that are determined can have a very loud voice. I think the festival at times, in a very minor way, has always pushed on people’s comfort zones and made them have to look at what they are uncomfortable with. We’ve always felt that was very important to do because we’ve always have said, how does one learn to critically think if they are not challenged with things that they like as much as they are challenged with things that they do not like. Nothing that we ever did would

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Back to the Drawing Board Podcast Upsetting the Festival Status Quo, Pushing the Comfort Zone with Denise Kowal have ever rose to a controversial level in more cosmopolitan areas, but Sarasota has some very provincial thinkers, and we tend to be more global in our approach, because we are international with many cultures and views coming from all different artists from different countries. But overall Sarasota is thought of as a very cultural city and I believe it is. It just has some growing up to do with the times. It accepts graffiti if the show is in the museum. But it doesn’t accept it as much if we are doing the going vertical program and we do the like in the parking garage. And even less so when we were doing the street art on private buildings. So, we’ve had some things that have come up but overall I think that Sarasota loved this festival. We have won 7 years in a row Best Event, Best Festival in Sarasota county. It’s definitely an incredible cherished event. And you know, I hope that people keep pushing that envelope. I hope public art keeps coming up to the forefront more and more because it does afford those people that don’t go into the museum and all that kind of stuff the opportunity to see things that are wonderful. If you can see the artist and what they are doing and then see the piece right there, is so much better than just seeing the piece and having no context to the artist that created it. E: I’m wondering if maybe a little bit of the struggle that some people have in Sarasota with public or street art, like you said, on the sides of buildings, maybe it takes away that sort of preciousness, or art as an object. It’s not an artwork that can be possessed or taken home. And I was actually really surprised because just last week I found out that some Indigenous people do not even have a word for art. It’s just their items that are found in Western museums, are just items that are a part of life. Do you think that’s what maybe happening? D: Well, art or whatever you want to call it or not call it, has obviously changed through time. It’s not very controlled by museums and galleries and auctions and valued or not. This market that has been created is neither good or bad. Art to me is a natural and necessary part of life. Everything that is being created is because of having that ability to think creatively, nothing happens without the creative aspect. The universe, everything has a creative aspect to it. I think one of the worst things for our society, in my opinion, is that art has been diminished to be valued monetarily and in ways more important than for the sheer joy of creating it. That to me I think is just the worst thing for society. A lot of my artists and my father is a sculptor, it’s how we were raised and how we fed ourselves, it was with my father’s art. So I get the whole importance of making a living and all that kind of stuff, but I think there is a more important thing about art, and I don’t’ think they should be meshed into one. I think artists, especially pavement artists are the kindest people because they are willing to create something that is a masterwork that as soon as it rains is going to be gone. I think that ephemeral aspect takes us a lot more back to our roots and what is important, and how important it is to consistently be doing art. I think art is the most important thing to build our brains and build everything. The most important thing of any aspect of any career or job is somebody has to be creative and be given that opportunity to play and discover. E: I think chalk artists cannot have an ego at all, like you said. Your artwork is going to be gone in two seconds. D: Yeah. They are just very generous. It’s such a magical thing for sure.

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Back to the Drawing Board Podcast Upsetting the Festival Status Quo, Pushing the Comfort Zone with Denise Kowal

E: Talking about museums, one thing that I love about public festivals is that they are more approachable, a person that might never set a foot in a gallery or a museum might feel welcome at a festival , like the one you have created. I was wondering, since the festival does charge for admission, how do you work around making sure you are not excluding certain groups. D: It’s been a huge struggle. We didn’t charge for 8 years. I personally value what everyone has to give to make the festival a success. There came a point where I felt that it was only appropriate that the 25 percent representing the public that they too need to share in our success. The cost for the festival fees, to put on the festival, is immense. The funds to be collected to put on the festival, we have to figure out ways on how to make it viable, to continue to be viable. Now that we are on private grounds that we pay for and has certain access, we have found the grants, sponsorships, everything, it does not bring enough to pay the bills. The fee that we decided to charge is incredibly nominal. We do give group discounts and we give away thousands of tickets to the underserved. We always have kept children free. We are always hopeful that someday we are going to meet that one million dollar donor, who is going to create a trust for us, so that all we need to focus on is what we do best, and not worry about money at all. It is a struggle. We really did just get to the point that we felt we are giving our time as volunteers value to make this happen, the artists are giving their skills and their time to show up to our community and that’s a value. We felt like it was time that we needed to know if it was of value to the public and the first year I charged. I’ll never forget standing on the scaffolding and a few of my artists were just like: “Wow, you really have balls. I hope you gave away thousands and thousands of tickets.” And the first year, I hadn’t given away thousands and thousands of tickets, asides from the sponsors and everybody. They were like: “We are not sure if anybody is going to show up.” I’ll tell you, it took a lot to just stand still and just let the process happen. It either was going to show us that it had value to people and they were willing to pay a very reasonable fee. If the value wasn’t there that would have told us too that what we were doing was not of value enough. We got our answer. We don’t make a lot of money, but we make enough to pay our bills. And that makes us happy. E: So if any of the listeners have millions dollars to donate to Denise, let her know. D: Yeah. It’s not even, it’s so justifiable. There is so much great that comes out of this festival. It’s something that’s an incredibly worthy cause. I’m busy organizing, sometimes I wish that if all I had to do is go and find money, I could probably do a very good job at that. I don’t have time to do that. I’m too busy being a creative director and organizing the artists and everything else that goes along with it. E: For sure. D: If I didn’t have to worry about money we’d be really happy. E: Where are you in the process of this year’s festival? D: Pulling our hair out. E: Crying in the bathroom.

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Back to the Drawing Board Podcast Upsetting the Festival Status Quo, Pushing the Comfort Zone with Denise Kowal

D: At this stage, we are organizing volunteers, we are getting our key directors in place, because each directors has a team of volunteers that they run so we are getting those directors in place. We’re just starting to put out the call to artists, where people can apply, or if they want to volunteer or sponsor. We started working on that. We’ve just finished writing our grants and renewing licenses. Every year we have to do an audit, so we’ve gone through out audit and done our taxes. All the stuff that I hate. E: Paperwork. D: All the technical stuff I can’t stand. I love the creative part, when we are in the go. Three months before the festival, when it’s all just working with the art supplies and artistic direction and the artists are coming in early to help put everything together, to paint things and carve things to get the festival going. We spend two weeks before the festival opens. There’s about 50- 75 artists that spend two weeks before it even opens, organizing it. In addition to all the volunteers. It becomes like a big art camp. I E: If people want to apply or find out more about the festival, where can they do that? D: Absolutely. They can go to our website, which is probably the best place to start form. Which is www.chalkfestival.org we also have a Facebook page which is just Chalk Festival. Anybody can sign up to volunteer, sponsor, or to visit our artists. Right now, we are selling tickets with a little bit of discount, the 4-day passes. To support us and get the unlimited pass. This year’s theme is going to be the Garden of Wonder, to contribute to the marvels of the natural world and the human imagination. It’s going to be held in Venice, Florida, November 9-12. E: Well I have loved picking your brain and getting all of the inside scoop. Is there anything final you’d like to add? D: Yes. Let love guide how you walk in this world with all creatures. It’s kind of the underlying of our theme. I hope everybody gets out and creates and has fun doing it. E: I was talking with Shawn about how I’ve used chalk but never on the pavement, and he was like: “You have to do it, you have to just go out and try it in the dark, next to your house.” So, I agree. D: Or come sign up to be an artist at the chalk festival. We invited novice as much as we do experts. There’s no better way to start that just signing up for one. Pick a square and we give you your chalk. We provide the chalk for all the artists, we provide everything to participate. All you had to do is show up and give it a go. E: Thank you for chatting with me, Denise. D: You are welcome. And good luck with everything you do and where life takes you.

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