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Melissa Alford
159 Plays4 years ago
Ever since she was a little kid drawing ghosts and graveyards at her desk in her parents’ basement, MELISSA ALFORD wanted to be an artist. Always a fan of the weird and the macabre, she discovered her love of sequential art through artists like Gary Larson and Charles Addams.
Melissa went on to get her BFA in sequential art from the Savannah College of Art and Design, and has worked as a freelance illustrator and comic artist ever since. Working primarily in pen and ink, her work focuses on themes of finding beauty in the darkness, of working through challenging emotions with art, and of course, not forgetting her artistic roots, the occasional homage to vintage horror.
Melissa was born and raised in Portland, Oregon, and after having lived away for several years, has once again settled in The City of Roses.
https://www.melliferaarts.com/
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Transcript
Introduction and Inspirations
00:00:01
Speaker
This is Good in Theory, a deep but not heavy podcast about political theory, philosophy, and the history of ideas. My name is Cliff Mark, and the reason I find political theory so interesting is that it's given me perspectives to look at the world that I could never have thought of myself. And it's not just about politics. The thinkers that I'll be talking about in this podcast pop into my head all the time.
00:00:31
Speaker
When someone gets banned on Twitter, I think of Socrates' trial. When I see children playing, I think of Jean-Jacques Rousseau's kind of unhinged ideas about education. And Thomas Hobbes, the guy who said that life is nasty, brutish and short, I think about him almost all the time. Believe it or not, putting a bunch of old theories about how politics works into my head has changed the way that I see almost everything.
00:01:01
Speaker
And I made this podcast because I want to share that with you. I want to put these theories into your head. And I'm going to do it by telling you about my favorite books in enough detail that you'll feel like you read them yourself. You are listening to something rather than nothing. Creator and host Ken Volante.
00:01:27
Speaker
Editor and producer, Peter Bauer. This is Ken Volante with the Something Rather Than Nothing podcast, and I have Portland artist Melissa Alford here this episode. I encountered her work at a wonderful art store with local artisans made in Milwaukee.
00:01:54
Speaker
in Milwaukee, Oregon and really excited to introduce you to Melissa Alford. Welcome to the show. Hi, thank you for having me.
Melissa Alford's Artistic Journey
00:02:07
Speaker
It's like I said, Melissa, I encountered your work and it was a beautiful postcard of a
00:02:15
Speaker
Of a girl in a window and it's kind of a dark kind of haunted house just just beautiful work and Really drew me and then I encountered you know a lot of your other work on your Instagram and website, but So so so let's go back to the beginning. What what were you like? We're younger were you we're an artist were you interested in creepy things? What were you like?
00:02:40
Speaker
I was, I was always an artist. My mom is a mathematician and my dad is a computer programmer, so they had no idea what was happening. But when I was about, you know, really as far back as I can remember, probably three or four, my mom bought me like a little text art desk so that I could just sit there all day and create art.
00:03:04
Speaker
And I was definitely always like a spooky kid. Like whenever she would take me to, you know, the bookstore or the video store, I was always like straight to the horror section. Yeah. And I was always drawing like ghosts and like haunted things even, you know, when I was that age. So it's definitely been like an ongoing theme, like art and horror.
00:03:32
Speaker
Yeah. And did, did you, everybody, I mean, if folks like horror, there's always this like relationship I think that horror fans have with it, right? Because some of it is like super crazy, extreme or, or violent or just, it draws us. Did you find when you were younger that you kind of had to hide it or was it just like, this is what I draw and it's cool. And that's what you did.
00:03:56
Speaker
You know, when I was very young, I didn't really feel like there was anything to hide. I just felt like that was what I was really fascinated by. And as I got a little bit older, I kind of got a little more self-conscious about it. Like, I definitely could tell, like, my dad was a little bit concerned. And mostly, you know, him and my mom were who I was showing my art to. So there was kind of a
00:04:22
Speaker
There's kind of a turning point where I was like maybe this isn't just like not everybody's gonna appreciate this or even understand. Sure. I'm like so interested in these themes.
00:04:38
Speaker
And one of the things I noticed about your background is that you grew up in Portland and reside in Portland most of your life, but you did go to Savannah to study art. Can you talk about that experience and what it was like going to Savannah? A city I've been to once and I love and I find it to be just maybe a haunted place or a creepy place. Can you tell us about that?
00:05:06
Speaker
Absolutely. Yeah, I loved living in Savannah. It was a beautiful city. It just has so much history. And it has a lot of the pre-war southern architecture that a lot of that had been destroyed in many parts of Georgia. But Savannah had been spared because they decided they would rather save their city and surrender.
00:05:29
Speaker
So, in a way, it's almost like a time capsule of what the streets would have looked like, you know, pre-1860s. And it was really interesting getting to see all of that, all of that influence. Like, there's so much, like, wrought iron, and it's just, it's stunning to look at.
00:05:49
Speaker
And of course, because there's so many old buildings, there's just it's rife with ghost stories, like everywhere is haunted. Everywhere has a ghost story. My own building at SCAD, I was in the sequential arts program and it had been it was like this big old pink building and it had been a spinster's home before it became the sequential art department. And so, of course, a spinster's home is definitely. Well, yeah, right.
00:06:15
Speaker
So we were always on the lookout. Are there going to be some ghosts here? Like where are we going to see it? When are we going to finally be able to say I've had that Savannah experience? Like all of our professors too, you know, they would talk about being there late at night and being like, you know, I thought I heard voices and it turned out it was just a homeless person in the back alley. But I was hoping it was a ghost this time.
00:06:39
Speaker
Right. And as far as your experience, having spent a lot of time in your life up in the Pacific Northwest, did you run into some kind of stark differences or discover different things about the region?
Cultural and Artistic Reflections
00:06:53
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I felt like there was a really big difference living in Savannah just because it was so, I mean, like the Southern hospitality, like everybody would just say hi to you. You know, like here in Portland, people are friendly, but they're a little more reserved. And in the South, you know, we met one of our friends just in a coffee shop. She asked us for help with her computer. And the next time we saw her, she invited us over for barbecue, you know. And so that was definitely kind of a different cultural experience that we
00:07:22
Speaker
Me and my roommate were living there at the time. We were like, whoa, like, you don't just do that. Like, who is this person? So I think that is so, so different with the hospitality or more pronounced. Yeah. I am as simple enough for that. When you go out to eat, everybody calls you honey and that just feels nice.
00:07:44
Speaker
I got called so many versions of honey baby doll, sweetie, you know, honey pie. I do miss that. That was very nice. Um, I wanted to, uh, we got one to get into some of your thoughts about, about art and some of the larger conceptual questions. I want to start with, with the big one that I love to ask all artists, uh, most anybody is what is art? You're an artist, but what is it that you're doing?
00:08:14
Speaker
Well, I think as a larger concept, when I think about art, I always think of things that are created with an intention. People do things that have either, sometimes it has a practical purpose as well, but there's some kind of intentional development of skills. And that's what to me seems like an art. And for my art,
00:08:41
Speaker
you know, my skills are gonna be mostly like illustration and storytelling and how I can get better and better at delving into these topics, you know, that I like to explore. And I think that's kind of like where I think of the crux of art is like having this intentional desire to like improve your skills, whatever they are.
00:09:08
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, that's a bit of the kind of expertise and craft within it, what you're choosing to explore. What? Exactly. Given your conception of art, what do you feel is the role of art? And the reason why I ask this, I ask it a lot, is
00:09:32
Speaker
you know, in a pandemic, in a politically volatile time, probably the most politically volatile time in half a century in the United States of America, art wasn't celebrated during the time of Trump, to put it mildly. So, yeah, what's the role of art right now? Is it the same as it's supposed to inspire critique? What's it supposed to do?
00:09:59
Speaker
You know, I think it's supposed to do all of the above. I think that art right now is actually, I think, a really interesting time to examine art because of the fact that we're in the middle of this pandemic. And there's been so much uncertainty politically and also socially, like what's going to happen if we're not really able to go back to normal life.
00:10:23
Speaker
I think art has really been something that's kind of come to the forefront as far as keeping people connected, keeping them feeling comfortable, like keeping people from feeling isolated. I also think that it's been giving people something to kind of just like it can help them feel a sense of community to have
00:10:47
Speaker
have their art that they either enjoy consuming or that they enjoy making and I think that like I think that politically also you know art has been used as political critique for
00:11:04
Speaker
You know, hundreds of years, like one of my favorite artists of all times, Hieronymus Bosch. He was like a 14th century, I think he's from the Netherlands. You know, his art was a political critique.
00:11:19
Speaker
Of the church at the time. So it's it's really I think art right now still you can see an especially sequential art Which was what I studied in college like it has been used as a way of critiquing culture of critiquing politics and of bringing issues to the forefront For you know forever really Yeah, melissa.
Artistic Influences and Themes
00:11:43
Speaker
I wanted to ask you something. Um, it was probably for the listeners as well just so you could uh
00:11:48
Speaker
delve into it a little bit more. When you're referring to sequential art, can you tell us about how do you study that in particular? Yeah, of course. I'm sorry. I should have defined it right away because that's the term they use at SCAD, but everybody's like, what the heck is that?
00:12:05
Speaker
Sequential art is the art that is used for comic books, comic pages, storytelling, I'm sorry, storyboarding, graphic novels. Really anytime there's like story and art together, usually literally like pictures with speech bubbles, you know, that is sequential art. And
00:12:33
Speaker
I decided to go pursue sequential art because I've always really loved stories. I think anything that can tell a story is really powerful. Sequential art had this unique niche of combining the beauty of art and illustration with telling stories and sending messages.
00:12:58
Speaker
Yeah, and thanks for that description, too. And actually connected to, I was just reading about you in some description of sequential art in comic books. I saw the individual images that you do, which I think are beautiful and compelling.
00:13:20
Speaker
But I also saw within those individual images that there was like this emotion and energy and vitality which makes a ton of sense to me now with hearing about the sequential art because it seems to start to move towards a story. I saw your images very much in a horror fantasy kind of beautiful storytelling mode. Yeah, thank you. Yeah, that's that's definitely
00:13:46
Speaker
I think it's cool that you got that impression because even though I don't do as much of the actual panel panel panel sequential art work anymore, I do really try to infuse all of my work with story, with significance. All the choices that I make as far as costume design or background, I do have some kind of meaning that's usually thought out more than just, oh, this will look nice.
00:14:16
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, and I saw that. I'm a huge comic book graphic novel fan for forever. Awesome. Yeah, I just, the art form itself is one of my great joys in life. Absolutely. Yeah, good, good. So big question here. Who or what made you who you are? Oh man, that is definitely a big question.
00:14:45
Speaker
You know, it's I think it's kind of a combination of things, of course, like with most people, I think with many artists or like many artists had kind of a difficult upbringing. Like I my little brother has a severe disability. And I think that there was just a lot of tension in our household. And of course, I always loved art just on my own. And I think really,
00:15:17
Speaker
It kind of made me grow up a little bit sooner than a lot of my friends, a lot of my peers. And I think that it made me feel a little bit isolated. And so I actually think a lot of my art comes from that sense of kind of trying to be seen, trying to be understood in ways that are accessible to people.
00:15:45
Speaker
after having big, after having come from such a, a place of, of feeling like I just wasn't on the same page as everybody else. And I was very alone in the world. That's definitely had a big impact. I think that's why so many of my themes are a little bit edgy, a little bit of a taboo.
00:16:08
Speaker
I really connect to what you say. I talk to a lot of artists and I create art myself. There's this kind of vein that I find myself tapping into of whether it's isolation, feeling of difference, and then processing that experience of
00:16:30
Speaker
of difference. I think it's one of the most challenging things for a human to become fully comfortable in their expression in themselves, particularly when the wavelength or the material that you're interested in or the intensity in which you pursue material
00:16:49
Speaker
It's a bit intimidating, right? Absolutely. And I actually think that that's a really interesting point because I think that a lot of the times people who create art, that's a little bit more that has that kind of
00:17:06
Speaker
I guess edginess or has that dark side. I think a lot of us have experienced times in our lives where we felt like we were too intense for people. We felt like we kind of came on and were just very big presences and maybe people were put off or overwhelmed by how much personality we had. And I think that
00:17:35
Speaker
that's like one of the reasons that I make art is because I feel like it's a way to be accessible, to be seen, but not to just have to like overwhelm people, you know? Right. Do you, do you, just out of curiosity for you as, as, as an artist and us talking about maybe a little bit more popular cultural pieces like graphic novels, as far as your consumption in the art that you enjoy, do you find yourself
00:18:05
Speaker
looking at classics primarily or influenced by movies and in culture or comic book geek culture. What when you are consuming art of others, what are you consuming? I mean, I really love I love everything. You know, I love horror movies. I've always been a big horror fan. So, of course, my husband and I are always watching some horror thing I've put on.
00:18:34
Speaker
I, of course, love comics. I've definitely been a comic book geek in my life. There have been times when I've been much more of a comic book geek. I've read tons of dark horse comics such as Hellboy.
00:18:53
Speaker
you know, lobster Johnson, those kinds of comics. I grew up reading Gary Larson, like the far side was a big influence. And I also loved the comics by Charles Adams, who was the creator of the Adams family. He like also did comic panels for the New Yorker and they all were just like so beautifully spooky. So I think that those types of things
00:19:21
Speaker
I've been mostly, or mostly what I consume. You know, I'm always listening to, um, I love audio books, so I listen to audio books a lot while I draw as well. And I like things that are like, um, a little high fantasy, a little horror, um, you know, anything that has a good mystery. It's all kind of what I prefer.
00:19:46
Speaker
Yeah, I love a lot of the stuff you're interested in. About the far side with Gary Larson, is that coming back? I heard it was coming back, do you know? I heard something about that too, but I have not heard any updates. He was vehemently like, I'm never doing this again for so many years that I'm kind of like, is this really going to happen? But I'm hoping so. I definitely loved reading the far sides when I was a kid.
00:20:15
Speaker
I just thought they were just brilliant, both in execution and in the words. There's such a beautiful intersection of like weird nerdy humor and just like completely off the wall. He must have created some territory. Yeah, he created some territory for all of us, I think, to exist in.
00:20:37
Speaker
Absolutely. I think a lot of us really just found that, you know, his particular humor spoke to us and especially just with how like strange it is, like so much of it is just so weird.
00:20:54
Speaker
And we were talking with Melissa Alford. And Melissa, I got a couple more big questions for you. And was wondering in the background of discussing art and some of the things we talked about, a lot of the show gets into the act of creation.
00:21:16
Speaker
Do you ever wonder why you create? I mean, is this something that you just compelled to do? You have no choice or do you have to push yourself to do what you do? What's your experience? I think for most of the time, it's really a compulsion. Like it's just.
00:21:35
Speaker
I feel like art has kind of this dual purpose of, I mean, partly, yes, I just, I feel the need to create, when I see something that is inspiring, you know, a beautiful costume design or something else, like it's interesting. I always think about how I would draw that in like, it just kind of sits in the back of my mind. And then those are the things that kind of eventually wind up manifesting in my art.
00:22:03
Speaker
um like there's sometimes just these pictures that I feel like sometimes they just I feel like they draw they they created themselves um you know I I sat there and and I was there their medium almost um but then there are times also where the desire to create art is there but the
The Philosophy of Creation
00:22:25
Speaker
the actual creation just doesn't want to happen. You just can't get it. You can't get it right. And sometimes that can even seem
00:22:36
Speaker
like it's an intangible quality of like yes technically this is a perfectly fine drawing but I feel no emotional connection to it therefore I'm giving up and I hate it. So I think that it's definitely kind of both. I think that for a lot of artists like we're you know we just kind of had we heard the call you know at some point in our lives and just
00:23:02
Speaker
were never really able to stop creating either, you know, drawing or writing or whatever it is. I know when I was younger, I was always like writing a story and there was always some story in my head I had to get out. And I think that now I just, I do that like with visual medium instead.
00:23:26
Speaker
I got another big question for you, Melissa, and it's the big question of the show is why is there something rather than nothing? Yeah, I'm not actually sure quite how to answer that.
00:23:44
Speaker
That's OK. I was thinking about it a lot, though. I had been talking with my roommate about it. And I actually thought it was really interesting because her interpretation of that question was completely different than mine. And so it really got me thinking about, you know, she assumed it meant, why do I create art rather than not create art? And I assumed that it was more of a broader philosophical question
00:24:14
Speaker
of why is there something more to what we create? Is it more than the sum of its parts? And I think yes. I think the answer is yes. I think art has its own brand of magic that it can create for people. And I also think that for some people,
00:24:44
Speaker
You know, they have to create things like they just feel that that's kind of their purpose. That's what gives them purpose in life is to make art of some kind.
00:24:59
Speaker
Yeah, and well and the thing is too is it's it's I thanks for relaying the conversation you have with with your roommate because I I have asked it in In general, I mean the question historically is you know, like basically why is there god? Why is there something? Why why do why is there any existence? So that's the most abstract part of it But um, i've always tried to focus the show on those larger philosophical questions, but also
00:25:27
Speaker
you know, how are things made, you know, like, or does something come from nothing and created, connected directly to the artistic process? Because I know some folks would be like, you know, I created this thing entirely on my own. It was in my head and there was nothing there before and now there's something. And so it's definitely been connected a lot to the process of creation. I find that artists have
00:25:56
Speaker
god-like power to create, right? So that's why I've kind of let that question remain ambiguous. Melissa, I was just wondering if you could relay to the listeners how to encounter your art via website or physical art.
Where to Find Melissa's Art
00:26:16
Speaker
What did they do?
00:26:17
Speaker
Sure. So my website is melliferaarts.com. It does have a lot of my work posted there. I would say to see my most up-to-date work, definitely check out my Instagram, which is mellifera underscore arts. And if you're looking
00:26:36
Speaker
For where you can buy my art, I do have an Etsy. It's Malifer Arts. And I actually do have it for sale in a couple of places around Portland, if you're local to the area. I have it for sale at both Spring Creek Coffee House in Milwaukee and at the Mecca of Culture, made in Milwaukee, which is also in Milwaukee, of course.
00:27:01
Speaker
And if conventions ever resume, I regularly do Crypticon up in SeaTac every May. I also do the West Coast Haunters Convention here in Portland. I've been doing Rose City Comic Con for the last few years.
00:27:18
Speaker
And the Audities and Curiosities Expo, when it comes to town, I usually get a table there as well. So assuming we're allowed to have conventions again, I would say that's definitely the best place to come find me. I will have the biggest selection of prints and jewelry and candles and everything I make at the shows. Or you can always reach out to me. If there's something you're looking for or if you just want to talk about art,
00:27:48
Speaker
send me a message on Instagram and I check that all the time. So it's a really good way to get in touch with me.
00:27:54
Speaker
Yeah, thank you. Oh my gosh, Melissa, you may be so excited talking about all those conventions. I miss them so much. Oh man, it's like the, for some of us, it's like church closing, you know? Yes, exactly. I definitely like, I have all these people that I see at the conventions every year and they haven't seen them since 2019 and I'm like, oh, all of my convention buddies, like,
00:28:24
Speaker
How are they doing? It will think about it in the future. And I know our conventions in society, those pieces will continue in some form. But Melissa, I just wanted to really thank you for your time, reaching out to you after I saw your art and learning a bit more about
00:28:52
Speaker
You're thinking behind art and I'm going to be looking for a lot of great art from you, but thanks for joining the program. It's been a great pleasure. Yeah. Thank you for having me. It was really, it was actually really awesome to get to talk about art. It's been like, you know, with conventions and everything being off, it's been a long time since I've really gotten to delve into it with, and it's been really cool.
00:29:19
Speaker
Yeah, thanks. And like I said, trying to create the space nowadays to have a conversation about fun things, exciting things, confusing things, what have you. And thank you so much for joining us. And I hope we get to chat again soon, Melissa. Yeah, me too. That'd be awesome. Take care now. All right, US Wells. All right, bye-bye. Bye.
00:29:51
Speaker
This is something rather than nothing.