The Good Artist: Laurie Kang

Who are you? My name is Laurie Kang, I’m a visual artist. I work mostly in film photography and collage. See more here. My brain thinks sculpturally so I hope to see that manifest itself in more sculptural/installation work soon.

What is on your ipod / bookshelf? Half-finished/abandoned crosswords, Susan Sontag’s On Photography, Julio Cortazar’s Blow Up. Ipod/record player as of late: Destroyer, The Kinks, Wings, John Cale, John Lennon, Ike & Tina, James Blake, other great bands/artists that I can’t seem to think of right now. You can ask my husband.

Where do you find inspiration? It usually produces itself pretty organically based on who and what is around me and the experiences I have. Everything I look at and encounter throughout the day is seen as a possible source of inspiration. When I feel like I’m in a drought I’ll go browse magazines for an afternoon, or take a walk and hope to find abandoned books on the street.

When did you start creating? I’ve been “creating” for as long as I can remember. Art was always my favourite subject and doing crafts was my favourite activity: papier mache, colouring, glueing, etc. I’ve always been a visual communicator. As far as creating conceptual work goes, I started doing angsty stuff as a teenager…and then went to art school…and continued on in my practice…I really can’t see my life without it.

Why Toronto? I was born and raised in the GTA, so I’ve been here by default. Then I studied in Montreal for four years. Afterwards, I came back to live in the actual city of Toronto and loved it. It’s big but not overwhelmingly so, (fairly) accessible and bike friendly, has delicious ethnic foods, an active art and music community, the OAC and TAC. It’s unique in its cultural diversity and I appreciate that it’s commonplace to have five or more different ethnicities in a corner store or bar at any given time.