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KUKULALAND: THE WORLD OF AMAZING CHARACTERS BY NATALY (KUKULA) ABRAMOVITCH
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Kukula (Nataly Abramovitch) was born in a relatively isolated village about an hour north of Tel Aviv.
After receiving her degree in illustration in 2003 from Vital-Shenkar, Kukula moved to the U.S., where she lives now.
Her works are amazing and unique. They combine beauty and a certain gloominess, innocence and eroticism, and each character seems to have its own story, which is read sometimes in the image itself, and sometimes in the details surrounding it.
Kukula’s works are always very recognizable and leave no one indifferent who has seen them at least once.
You were born and grew up near Tel Aviv and since childhood you have heard many stories about the Holocaust and World War II, not from books and television, but from living participants in these terrible events. How did it affect you as a person and what imprint did it leave on your art?
I wasn’t born in Tel Aviv and only moved there for art school. I grew up in a small and more isolated town and went to an agricultural high school where we had to milk cows once a week.
Many of the elders in my town were holocaust survivors. I had a step grandfather whom I loved and my mom explained to me when I was around 5 that he lost his wife and two daughters in the Treblinka Nazi camp. That gave me a lot of nightmares, alongside with all the dreams and naivety of a 5 year old. Next door to us we also had Carola, “the crazy neighbor.” She used to throw chairs at random people who walked down our street.
My mom explained that she was like that because she had been a part of the Mengele experiments. I know some more about it but won’t get into the grim details. So the fact of horror was apparent to me from a very young age, if only from stories, and it mixed itself into my views about people. It didn’t make me dark, but it made me a little sad and a little strange maybe.
Art was a form of escapism but for a better world, not a dark one, but sadness always found a way to sneak in.
The protagonists in your works are almost always dolls, surrounded by well-considered symbolic content. Why did you decide to focus on such a theme and how do you approach symbolism in your images?
I honestly don’t think they are dolls, they are just creatures of imagination, coming more from Manga and Anime than anything else. I do like dolls. Dolls are representations of humans, same as my “girls” which I guess its the common ground, including the babyface and bisque-like skin texture. I can understand why they seem like dolls.
Sometimes there is a certain duality in your works. Your heroines are both dark and beautiful, innocent and erotic, open physically and at the same time locked. How do you find the golden mean when you work on an image?
I’m a fan of the romantic era, which for me means that I believe in art that represents what words cannot, which often involves emotional contradictions. I love art that records feelings and passes them to the viewer to experience. By choosing objects, poses, backgrounds, lighting and palette, a lot can be passed on to the viewer, including that kind of emotional contradiction or tension. For me the process is intuitive mostly and done with the help of historical and contemporary research about imagery that affects me. When I see an image that touches me somehow, I ask what is it about it that evokes so much feeling and from this exercise I try to learn to communicate in a clearer voice in my own work.
Nude is often present in your works. But today's trends in social media often impose certain restrictions on this kind of content. How do you feel about it and what do you think should be censored in art and what shouldn't?
I accepted these rules after a long fight, mostly because collectors themselves prefer to buy work without exposed nipples. I found restrictions to have value because they forced me to create the same emotional effect in my work with less provocation, which can lead to much more effective, more interesting and more thoughtful work.
When you're working on an artwork, are there any central themes that you tend to revisit, or concepts that you like to base your projects on?
I try not to revisit too much my own ideas. I get very bored. I like to create little booklets of inspirations for every piece. These can include photos, paintings, fashion, etc. However, working with deadlines and sales expectations can be exhausting so I’m teaching myself to look at my own back work and see if there is anything I’d like to revisit. Recently I talked about this with my gallery, Haven, and told the owner Erica Berkwitz that I feel like my effort to reinvent the wheel for every piece is a little ridiculous and makes me a very slow painter. There are a few themes I work with, such as garden pieces, bedroom pieces, forest pieces or just portrait with or without background. It’s just a part of the system a working artist should have in order to be productive.
The years of the pandemic have left their mark on the work of many talented people. How has this difficult period affected your work? Do you feel that your work has been transformed, something has gone and something new has appeared?
The first few months I was actually really happy to stay at home with my then two-year old daughter. I noticed I missed a lot of her development and realized art and work is far less interesting than just existing and receiving life simply for what it is. When deadlines came back after a few months thanks to the workaholics of the world, I was feeling very lazy and had a hard time starting to move again. I had lost interest in creating. I wanted to chill with my little one and do yoga. I still do, actually. My pace has never been the same.
You had very interesting collaborations: with a jewelry brand, furniture and clothing makers. You even had a limited collection of tea pairs. Could you tell us about some of your most memorable projects? And what other collaborations would you like to do in the future?
To be completely honest most of my collabs were disappointing to me and the first problem with these is that no one wants to pay. It’s insulting. The results are almost always a little disappointing but the one I had with Scwarz Berlin fine jewelry is just my most favorite one. And the payment was jewelry so I’m definitely happy about it. It’s the one I’m most proud of.
There is an opinion that artists decide to collaborate when they become cramped within their own creativity. Have you ever had a desire to try yourself in new directions, for example, to create outfits for fashion shows, create characters for video games or anything else?
I started my career producing a clothing line of ready mades with my illustrations. I called it Kukula and it sold well and it led to an offer to do a little art show in one of the shops I was selling with. That show was the end of clothing for a few years because I only wanted to paint. But then I got the urge to design again and started many projects and products that I sometime added to my online shop. I had found this effort to take too much time and energy away from creating paintings and I love seeing results faster. I lost interest in mass production. The world anyway has too much crap and I just don’t feel any urge to take part in it anymore. Things can change, so maybe one day I’ll get bored of paintings.
You are not only a wonderful artist, but also a wonderful mother. Do you feel that motherhood has influenced the development of your creativity? What new things did the birth of a child bring to your art and what restrictions did it impose?
Thank you for saying I’m a wonderful mom. I’m actually kind of tough on myself regarding motherhood. As I said, I maybe sometimes prefer to just be with my kid than work but I realized it makes me a boring mom, and that my daughter loves my art and it’s a good example for her (anyway one I want to pass on to my child). I think it inspires her: when she does crafts she says “I’m working” and I like that. She inspired me to do better and to be a good artist and an interesting one so she would want to be an interesting individual herself.
On Instagram you even have a separate hashtag for those who get tattoos based on your images. It's a great recognition for an artist when fans of your talent are so in tune with your work that they are willing to have your characters permanently imprinted on their bodies. How do you feel about this and what would you like to say to all the fans of your talent?
I love it, I think it’s an amazing compliment. However I see less of that lately. I think my work is less tattooable in recent years.
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