HOARD: What inspires you? What compels you to create? What does your art give you? What do you give your art? RADKE: I think inspiration can come from anywhere at anytime. Simple things, exciting things, love, anger, confusion, solutions. I would say Califone / Red Red Meat music is and has been the most reliable inspiring thing for me. Music gives me a rhythm at which to create. It's never literal or graphic, it's not like I'm hanging on every word. I don’t know how to explain it. What I create does not posses the same feelings as the music feels to me. The music just opens me up.
RADKE: My work gives me the satisfaction that I’m not letting it sit inside, that I’m letting it live. It’s also been about the only thing that gives me any social significance. People are not that interested in me without it. It was a real surprise when people started having a little respect for me. I used to be and still am a bit introverted. My work allowed me to have conversations with people. People connect with the energy, they tell you all kinds of personal things about themselves. Sometimes I feel like a therapist. I never would have met my wife without it. My work gives me confidence that it can get me through anything I may have trouble with emotionally.
RADKE: The name "artist" has always felt weird to me. Andy Warhol was an "artists". I don’t feel like one. I don’t like to walk the walk and talk the talk. I just like to do what I do, call it what you will. I guess what I gain most is the fact that I can inspire people to do what they do. I worked in a factory for nine years, I didn’t go to the best schools, I don’t have big degrees. If I can do it anyone can do it. HOARD: Do you have any heroes? If so, who are they?
HOARD: Please pick one of the following: (a) Vespa (b) horse and carriage (c) Toyota (d) left foot, right foot RADKE: Left foot, right foot.
HOARD: Did you ever play cops and robbers as a kid? If so, what side were you on?
HOARD: Again, please pick one of the following: (a) truth (b) dreams (c) money (d) love (e) something else not listed here. RADKE: truth. HOARD: Who or what is God? RADKE: God to me is a very real THING, not a person or image of a person. God is that ever weaving connecting substance as big as an atom and as small as the sun. The thing that connects them and us as one.
HOARD: Do you have anything to declare about sex?
HOARD: Describe a perfect Saturday afternoon.
HOARD: Is there anything you would like to say about yourself, your art or the world at large, that we didn’t get a chance to cover?
--- Scott Radke is also a painter, sculptor and puppet craftsman. View an extensive collection of his work HERE --- Other HOARD interviews: --- |
