AOTCE: What do you think about artist who used the system to advance their work.  For example, Basquiat vs artist who embrace who they are i.e. Kerry J. Marshall, Kara Walker etc.?

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PW: That’s why I read Richard Wright, James Baldwin and others.  I think Basquiat is in the minds of many, not because he used the system but because he got used up by the system.  Again, Marshall and Walker are artists of immense talent and you don’t get to be them, by being naïve.  I also think that those three BIG artists whose work defies convention and expectations.  I read Siddhartha when I was in high school and it had a huge impact on my beliefs.  Life is this remarkable journey and it has been for me.  I have few regrets but not so much.

 

AOTCE: Do you think that there will always be a few that break through to keep others reaching for the impossible?

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PW: The tenacity of the art world never seems to amaze me.  I think we’ve got to move beyond the idea of a marketplace that involves untold riches.  I have never had so much satisfaction as I’ve had with this recent work, granted I don’t make a lot of money but I feel the value is in the conversations such as this.

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AOTCE: As Kimberly Camp states “you can aspire to do the six figure sales, or you can focus on selling art to everyday people”.  What goal do you have for your art?

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PW: I think the most difficult thing is finding the audience that gets my meaning and intent.  There is not enough diversity.  I would like more people of color in my corner to see if the meaning still carries.  Money I’ve got enough to live.  Survival is another matter, but yes, I would love to have a big sale now and then.

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AOTCE: Do you think that including more black voices will give a wider audience a chance to see and understand the value of your work?

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PW: I just did a show out here with Joyce Scott and you’d think she would be rolling in money but she survives.  Joyce recently got a MacArthur genius award and the museums are only now catching on to her work.  Content has been huge in her work.

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AOTCE: Who would you say influenced your early work and now your current work?  Do you have a favorite artist?

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PW: I wouldn’t say that content is all my work is about.  My work is about the history of painting as well as a risk-taking pursuit of form and content.  I have been a captive of many arts from African sculpture and architecture to East Indian and Persian manuscripts, to orientalism, as well as the usual European artists.  The modernists.