Each month we spotlight a different artist and artwork. These in-depth interviews with the artist provide an insight into the making of art and artists' relationships with their creation.

Which artistic media do you prefer to work in and why?

Currently, my preferred media is digital imagery. In the past, I worked in many mediums, most recently in watercolour. As I move through the transition from watercolour to digital imagery, many elements of the watercolour process incorporate themselves into my digital process. Why the transition to digital imagery? Digital processes in the last ten years have been going though a renaissance and the possibilities are vast.

With which past or contemporary artists or artworks do you, as an artist, feel a connection?

My influences come from both the fine Arts and Literature. The evolution of the modern novel and the experimentations of James Joyce, Virginia Woof, Thomas Hardy and D H Lawrence are as rich in imagery as today’s South American Magic Realists. Their intense works mirror what emerged in impressionists, fauvist, cubist, and non objective art. Recently photographer imagists like Jeff Wall and Scott McFarland, who are moving digital imagery in a new direction. have fired me up. I studied locally with Tony Onley, Gordon Smith and Dornacilla Drysdale, and their influence inspired what I synthesized into my painterly style

What is it that draws you to them?

I am drawn to their fearlessness in pursuing their art, their technically proficiency and innovation. Their direction leaves room for my own creativity.

Which particular processes or techniques of art-making interest you now?

My digital photography may be painterly in its approach, but I think this medium is in the midst of a revolution. The techniques that can be used in digital image capture, image processing, and image presentation are in their infancy. So this means the media is highly experimental, limitless in its expression and truly in the vanguard. Some photographers use ink drawings to reproduce their images, others use the images to compose music; the vast majority of possibilities are unexplored.

What particular technical challenges in art-making do you face at this time?

Capturing light the way it captured me in the moment: preserving the rapture is difficult as the camera’s digitizing process is a series of algorithms that do not always accurately reproduce the moment. In between looking at the raw data and deciding on how it should be corrected to bring out the rapture that drew me to press the shutter’s button lies an infinite set of tools, techniques and processes to choose from. Navigating these options is both a technical and artistic challenge.

What in your artistic training do you value most?

The extensive exposure to conceptual art and art events that exists only within a given time frame has given me a valuable perspective to approach my practice. Art can be both timeless and limited by time depending on how it is conceptualized

How much of a role do accident and control play in your work?

It is a balance. I often rely on my eye to put me in a position to respond to serendipity opportunity. Making art is in many ways a dance between the technical and the sudden emergence of content from what at first appeared mundane.

What are some of your artistic challenges at present?

Currently I am experimenting with presentational techniques, and this has been challenging. There are so many possibilities, if you look at just the technology of signage production, as Jeff Wall has done, there are so many possibilities: backlighting (LED, tungsten, florescent, etc), printing on metal, printing on glass, etching on glass, billboard digitalization, etc.

What are some of your artistic accomplishments at present?

Working large, large enough for the viewers to sense they are in the landscape. One only has to spend some time with the digital image Stables on Dr. Young’s Property by Scott McFarland a 3 x 10 foot image to see why.

Can you share 3 things you’ve learned as an artist through your own art?

The importance of narrative.  My artist practice is enhanced when I work with or have a dialogue with other artists. Trust my intuition.

When you need inspiration, how to do you get it?

Read, write, listen to podcasts and share my work with other artists.

When you need to learn more as an artist, how do you do it?

Talk to other artists, go to art galleries, research, investigate by digging deeper into technical/formal issues.

What is exciting on your artistic horizon?

For the past year, I have been working with a group of seven photographers who happen to be AIOM members. We meet regularly, share/critique our work, and go to a location and work together. This year, five of us will show our work together in the 2010 AIOM event, and we are planning a publication to go with this venture.

What is it about this artwork (self-selected work shown) that led you to choose it for this feature? What specific challenges did you face in making this artwork?

While working on other photographs, I discovered a way to manipulate the colour values so that the location would appear timeless and universal. As Ansel Adams spent hours in the darkroom manipulating the image until it was just perfect, so I find that there are hours invested before an image emerges that captures the moment.

http://www.sassamatt.com