E.E. Kono, Beautiful Bizarre Artist Directory member provides some fascinating insights into her practice and experience as a surrealist painter utilizing egg tempera, as she responds to the questions below:
- What type of art do you create and what motivates you to make it?
- What is your biggest pain point as an artist?
- Tell us about an important life moment that influenced the direction of your work, and how.
- How has social media changed your practice?
What type of art do you create and what motivates you to make it?
I paint in egg tempera, a medium made by mixing egg yolk with ground pigments. Recently, I’ve been creating floral paintings, a genre historically linked to Dutch works of memento mori, symbolizing commerce, colonialism, nature, life, and decay. I’ve focused on earth pigments sourced from historically significant locations. For instance, Ercolano red is derived from volcanic deposits on the slopes of Mount Vesuvius, forever tied to the power of nature over mankind. I’ve also been creating pigments from deteriorating 19th-century local buildings, specifically bricks produced in a rare, woman-owned factory that utilized local clay deposits.
What is your biggest pain point as an artist?
I’m not a super consistent person so I find the business side of art to be the most challenging. I’ll begin one method bookkeeping or organizing files with the intention to keep it regularly updated, but that never happens. I waste a lot of time restarting and reorganizing.
Tell us about an important life moment that influenced the direction of your work, and how.
In 2022, I moved back to my hometown of Dubuque, Iowa. I have a background in art history and a lifelong interest in how cultures connect through trade, but for much of my adult life I’ve avoided studying U.S. history. Like many Americans, I grew up with the familiar narratives of westward expansion and Manifest Destiny—stories that always seemed one-sided and overly simplistic. So, when I moved back, I made a conscious effort to uncover a more well-rounded narrative—one that acknowledges the stories left out of the conventional U.S. narrative.
How has social media changed your practice?
Social media has allowed me to make and maintain relationships with artists and curators around the world. I’m not sure if I could live as remotely as I do without it.
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