To bring in new voices to the PHLOG and share the words of a talented individual, I interviewed Dana Ollestad who is a contemporary artist based in Richmond Virginia. In addition to being a co-curator and Virginia Museum of Fine Arts Grant winner, he teaches an online photography class for Western Students! In our interview, he shared some of his methods for keeping up with members of the community during a time of isolation and described a recent piece of his involving projections on the interior of his 1971, VW bug.
He told me how the culmination of sounds and visuals were inspired by his Cuban roots and set to rhythms reminiscent of his grandfather in Habana. Dana expressed his familial and cultural ties having a profound influence on his art and life that speaks to a deeper motivation and drive.
In a time where everyone is encouraged to stay home, Zoom has been a staple replacement for in-person meetings. Students everywhere, myself included, have struggled to adjust to remote learning. The online class that Dana teaches was built with an asynchronous structure with no mandatory class meetings, but instead, lectures and material available whenever a student chooses to access it within a set timeline. This streamlined the transition, though Dana shared some of his strategies for making his remote class real and engaging.
Would like to briefly introduce yourself and tell me a little about your online class at Western?
My name is Dana, I’m a Cuban American artist currently based in Richmond, VA. The online Beginning Photo and Image Culture class was actually designed as an async remote class before Covid hit. It was built to be a good fit for Western students who were living far from campus, or just had schedules that conflicted with usual class times. The pandemic didn’t change the format or the structure of the class, but it certainly changed its context— the less-usual circumstances this course was designed to accommodate became the norm, and the design proved very successful. I like to place a beginning photography class in the context of looking at how images are made and operate in culture so that students will not only leave the course with a stronger understanding of how to operate their camera, but also an understanding of, and a critical eye on, how their images, and other images around them, operate in contemporary society.
As classes continue to be conducted remotely, a lot of teachers struggle with that transition particularly in areas like Art. What are some ways that you connect with your students in an online format?
For starters, I have a lot of video content for my students. All my feedback is in video form, where not only I can address them directly, but I also pull up their images and discuss their work while it’s on-screen,
and face-to-face conversations are always just a message away. I’ve arranged a little production studio in my office so that when students do meet with me in realtime, it’s the exact setting of all my video content, so interacting with me feels cohesive and builds a sense of real context and consistent normalcy, much like classrooms feel more and more comfortable as the quarter goes on. Perhaps the most positive feedback I get on my content is about my cat Mildred, who makes occasional short appearances in my class videos, hahaha. It seems that having her “guest star” really makes me come across as a real person, who the students can relate to, and more importantly reach out to, and feel comfortable and receptive with.
How has your life changed since social distancing became a requisite of interaction? How do you continue to find ways to specifically engage with other artists, audiences, or community members?
Before the pandemic, I did make a habit of “checking in” with other artists, and recent graduates, this was most often over drinks or coffee. Much like Bellingham, Richmond has an excellent local beer and coffee scene! Obviously, that’s not currently a safe option, and while in-person interactions have dropped off, just like everyone else in the world these days, I keep in touch with people via video chat.
Collaborations continue in the same way, sending files to each other, playing with the slippage the distance and digital connection provide; as my work is centered on reaffirming social bonds, this is actually a very fertile time for exploration. It is tough though because I, like everyone else again, am getting very tired of being behind a screen, mediated by the lens. To that end, I live near an almost 200-year-old cemetery that looks out over the James River here in Virginia, and I’ve found long walks through that space of history, loss, and pain, but also resolute peace, helps me unplug.
You have made serious strides in curation and flourished with the VMFA Professional Fellowship award; my last question is what are you up to recently? Any involvements or productions you would care to share with us?
Over the last couple of years I’ve lost most of the family members I was close to in Cuba, on top of that are the literal eroding effects of climate change on Cuba; the pandemic’s health dangers and economic impact, and the Trump administration’s increased economic sanctions… so as my family is weighing on my heart,
I’ve been working on an immersive sound and video piece, part mourning for family, and part monument to the resilient resourcefulness of their spirit. So far, it’s taking the form of a piece viewed from inside my ’71 VW bug, with projections on the windows, and rhythms I’ve found on home movies of my now-passed uncle hand-drumming on his workbench in his home in Habana, translated to the frame of the car with midi-controlled actuators. Haha, that’s a mouthful, but mostly I’ve been thinking about ways the translation of energy can make something/someone lives on. Haha, I can never escape my roots of lens and time-based mediation.
