MD: For the record, state your name, age and occupation:
LM: Lindsey Meyers, 33, Photographer & Mixed Media artist
MD: Tell us about your work.
LM: I make photographs because it puts me at ease- makes me feel connected to the world and its secrets without completely exposing my own self. I never intended to become a photographer. Taking pictures began as something just for me. I hope one photo of one moment can move one person-even shake them to their core. I like that….
I shoot only 35 mm pictures. I shoot on a Canon, and it is my most important possession and my closest friend. I don't retouch my photos and so many of them are happy accidents. I shoot according to my mood, which ranges from solemn, vulnerable and contemplative to politically charged and emotionally and externally confrontational. I shoot at will, and rarely stage an image or execute an idea with extreme rigidness and/or structure.
My mixed media work is a result of a random trip to the art supply store and years and years of writing in journals, on the backs of parking tickets, gas receipts, leftover strips of canvas or whatever else I can find. The pieces are large format photographs on layered canvas- which are submerged in gels, glitter and acrylic paints to achieve a glazed appearance. The words are intended to have a poetic/scroll-like feeling, and can be read and interpreted in multiple ways.
MD: What is your background? How did you get involved with art?
LM: I was born in the Northeast suburbs of Chicago and always felt like an outsider there… in my heart of hearts I knew that it was simply not the place for me. I studied theatre at Steppenwolf in Chicago and Choate Rosemary Hall in Connecticut as part of their classical theatre program. I then attended The Chicago Academy for the Arts and graduated with a degree in Theater and a minor in Music. I had finally found my place….
After participating in an intensive dance scholarship program at Joel Hall Dance Center in Chicago, I studied Liberal Arts and Art Psychology at Columbia College in Chicago for a few years. I then transferred to The University of Southern California where I obtained an honors Psychology degree, and taught Literature and Drama to middle school students and preschool back home in Chicago.
MD: Do you have any upcoming (or past) exhibitions/ shows you'd like to discuss?
LM: I have had the pleasure of showing my work at the Agora Gallery in SoHo, New York, as well as participating in grass roots shows in rural Swainsboro, Georgia where the small town community there is desperately trying to expose its young people to art, photography and overall creative expression. I am also thrilled to have been part of shows in Los Angeles and down South at The University of Mobile in Alabama, where I was honored to have won the "Southern Humor Award" for my mixed media piece called "America's Sweetheart."
I recently participated in the Ravenswood Art Walk in Chicago, and have a rather steady gig going with the Flat Iron Associations "First Friday" and "smART Show" series.
I began working on "Post Partum" after the birth of my second daughter in May of 2008. The series deals with the myriad emotions that I have encountered as a repeat "new mother", a wife, a woman, an artist, an active community member, and moreover, as a solitary being trying to exist in a time and place that I am having difficulty connecting to at the root level and beyond. "Post Partum" is an ongoing series of photographs using my friends as my muses, and as not only reflections of, but as literal forms and facets of myself. The images in this series were all shot in Chicago over the last year, and many of them were taken in an industrial area on the West Side- an area that is often desolate, raw and full of odd crevices and characters.
MD: Is any of your work political?
LM: My work always seems to have a political edge to it- and that is not always welcomed in the art world. I touch on gentrification, socio-economic and culturally diverse relationships and race and prejudice currently plaguing this country on every level, be it overtly or subconsciously. I often do much of my photography work comparing the country both above and below the Mason-Dixon Line. I try to focus on the commonalities that bind us as people, regardless of race, class, background or status, and have found that current ideologies in the city of Chicago are not such a far cry from those that people like to believe are the only ways of thinking and being in the American South.
Yet I also enjoy the simple beauty in comparing rural and urban settings, and have a true affinity for shooting the random and the run-down…the street tags and urban poetry littering the streets of Chicago and abound- seemingly the lost images and in between moments of life which occur every day, yet typically, in front of eyes no one knows are even watching.
I derive so much of my inspiration from the underground music and graffiti movement I was immersed in throughout my teenage years and early twenties, and the text in my mixed media pieces often contain a rhythm and/or flow similar to spoken work or street poetry. Those formative years were spent in a scene that promoted artistic expression, street-style beats and rhymes, and people coming together to dance and flex and spin records as part of a movement to connect young people-one which showed them that art is everywhere and that "beauty" in art does not need to be labeled by a gallery owner as being "good" or of the now, nor even taught … it can come from within and from one's own guttural sense of artistic awareness, attraction and sensibility.
Hurricane Katrina changed my life forever, and I think about that storm each and every day of my life: the aftermath of chaos, the helplessness, the lawlessness, the desolation and despair, the utter destruction, the upheaval, and the poor politics and shameless political gain that is still on the rise in the Gulf Coast region. I have made it point not only to never forget what I consider to be the greatest tragedy in American history, but to continue to make art about what this event does mean and has meant to me and to my family.
MD: Have you held any jobs/ careers that you'd like to discuss?
LM: I have done everything you can think of: dishwasher, waitress, coat check girl, nanny, school teacher, paralegal… the list goes on. I am a terrible, terrible waitress, yet always knew that I should stick with all of the little jobs in order to get home and create art on the dining room floor in the middle of the night. That is what feeds and sustains me. I feel lost and completely out of sorts if I am not creating something, and have finally found that taking photographs is my own way of seeing and processing a world that is often difficult for me to comprehend on a logical and intellectual level. Being self taught, I throw technique out the window and shoot at will."
MD: Any amusing anecdotes regarding your work?
LM: Be prepared to be caught off guard and to walk away with something damn good to think about. To me, good art keeps one questioning everything- pondering the unknown and exploring the depths of our own soul and psyche. I can be moved by a small photo I find at the thrift store or walk out of a movie feeling as if my life has just been encapsulated by someone's script and immense vision and will ruminate about the film for days on end.
What are you currently reading? Matzo ball Gumbo, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, French Quarter Fiction, Coastal Living Magazine (it keeps me dreaming).
Favorite movies? Harold & Maude, Paris, Zoolander, Away We Go, Ma Vie En Rose, Revolutionary Road
Music you like: Twilight Singers, Ed Harcourt, Kings of Leon, Explosions in the Sky, Nina Simone, Ray Lamontagne, and Patti Griffin.
MD: What are some of your interests?
LM: Traveling, baking, dancing, hanging out with my children and my family, throwing parties and surrounding myself with good friends, good eats and good drink and lingering well into the night. Also, I truly enjoy working with charitable organizations such as the Tipitina's Foundation in New Orleans, mainly the Instruments 'A Comin' Program which helps to raise money to provide children in NOLA schools with new instruments and opportunities to succeed in the musical and creative world.
Favorite visual artists? Banksy, Sally Mann, Mackenzie Thorpe and Mary Ellen Mark
MD: If someone were to come to your town/ city (Chicago) to visit, what places/ bars/ parks/ events etc should they be sure to check out?
LM: 3rd Coast Café in the Gold Coast, the Lakefront and Lake Shore Drive, Logan Square, Blues Fest, Country Music Festival, Rosa's Blues Bar in Logan Square and Café Spiaggia for the best wine and gnocchi on the planet.
Your website(s): http://www.lindseymeyers.com/
MD: What is your background? How did you get involved with art?
MD: Favorite visual artists? 
MD: If someone were to come to your town/ city to visit, what places/ bars/ parks/ events etc should they be sure to check out? 