What is success for you in the arts?

I think for me it is a two part answer.. Actually it is probably more fluid and complex than even that but lets just say two parts. The first is the pleasure and clarity it gives me to be a maker of things. I always feel calmer and better able to deal with my world after I have made something..anything!! The second part for me is to be able to make a living and to have respect for my work by my peers. Peer respect is very important I think for me. I think this means that I am reaching that tenuous balance in my work between materials and ideas both conceptual and poetic. I want to make work that penetrates through the body first, followed by the privileged eye. I want the whole body to be involved.. to take in and understand the work at both a corporeal and intellectual level. So this is my goal.. It is not that I think that Peer respect is the be all and end all but it is a gage that I think is part of my desire for success. Also just to clarify I am not making my work to satisfy some external peer assessment but that is the beauty of respect it comes from in a way exposing your values and having them affirmed.

Why do we pursue our MFA’s?

For me pursuing an MFA was a chance to engage in a more rigorous discourse and to learn some new skills that I had always wanted to learn.. (mold making!) So the benefits of facilities were part of it but also the discourse, the engagement and on some level the teaching was the draws for me. The teaching component was a sort of insurance policy.. If I need to I have the credentials to teach.. But first I am going to focus on making work in both the commercial and non commercial platforms.
I think one could be very cynical and think that the University MFA is a pyramid scheme and that might be true but in the end it is what you take from it. It is an institution and by its very definition is here to recreate itself… so be it.. Let me take what I want from the smorgasbord and leave behind what I think is not to my liking.. From my perspective an MFA is a degree that opens doors to possibilities both practical and intellectual.. There are no promises with any degree in any discipline… and as for the institution my advice is pick your battles..it is a slow to change creature.