We had the good fortune of connecting with Michael Shaw and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
My brand is housing…but I’m not a real estate broker. I document single-family homes and apartment buildings through the arcs of their construction, focusing on the Westside of Los Angeles, where development is racing along at warp speed. How is this development affecting our neighborhoods and our city as a whole? We are in a housing crisis, and the homes I depict – using a bespoke process involving either varying layers of painter’s tape assembled into a temporary mask, or through handmade ‘photo’ negatives – are Rorschach tests for how people perceive our landscape is changing. I make these images, either on canvas or on paper, using cyanotypes, a pre-photographic process that creates a white and cyan-to-indigo spectrum; you’ve probably seen a cyanotype somewhere before, but nothing like these. My hybrid approach to making images merges drawing and a little painting with photography. I arrived at the processes through a mix of synchronicity, experimentation and persistence. The initial impetus was relatively simple: I was making paintings on large sheets of paper, using an airbrush and cut-out stencils to make the silhouettes of various objects, and my studio mate at the time asked me: ‘have you ever thought about cyanotypes?,’ which he been exposed to (no pun intended) in grad school. Long story short, I’ve been working with the process for nearly 10 years now, though I recently ducked away to make a painting, which I will implement more when the occasion, or spirit, calls.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
It’s interesting how friends-in-from-out-of-town itineraries have changed since the pandemic- now it’s like they’re mini-vacations. Here’s where I’d take them: the Huntington Gardens…then on another day the Self-Realization Fellowship gardens in the Palisades; Venice Beach on a weekday; and a drive up the PCH, as far as they’re up for going, where we might stop at Matador beach, or lounge the afternoon away with tropical drinks at the Paradise Cove Beach Cafe.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
The cultural critic Max Haiven’s book ‘Art after Money, Money after Art,’ which is about how the financialization of art has evolved over the decades, made a big impression on me, and led me down the path towards activism. Activism, in turn has been a distinct and symbiotic sibling to my art making.

Website: https://www.michaelshawstudio.com

Instagram: @michaelshawstudio

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-shaw-0b30a3a/

Facebook: https://touch.facebook.com/michael.shaw.3994

Other: theconversationpod.com howigetbypodcast.com

Image Credits
all work copyright Michael Shaw

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