CACTUS IN BLOOM

interview  JORGE PEREZCHICA

Zachary James Fleming-Boyles aka Zach J.F. Boyles was born and raised in the Coachella Valley and is a self-described “desert rat.” But “the cactus” may be a better analogy for the artist — since it’s known to adapt to harsh environment and thrive in the desert.  Growing up in a town that caters to the tourist industry, Zach created his own fun with a natural proclivity towards music and art to express his burgeoning creativity. In college, Art History opened Zach’s eyes to realizing a career in the visual arts. After earning a B.A. in Art Practice from the University of California, Berkeley, Zach was living a comfortable life as a full-time educator until COVID-19 surged in 2020 and was laid-off work.

Like many impacted by the pandemic, it upend our world and forced us to start fresh again. Not knowing where the next stepping stone would be, Zach searched for new inspiration: “I took a lot of walks around my neighborhood to deal with anxiety and noticed all the cacti were in bloom, so I started adding flowers to my cactus paintings. Felt like the world needed more color in a time of darkness,” said Zach.

In Zach’s art, the cactus aptly serves as an overriding motif projected across landscapes brimming with bright neon orange and psychedelic colors. Look deeper and each canvas tells its own unique story existing beyond the traditional still life. His latest, “The Green Painting” indicates a stepping stone into new directions. Just as cacti flourish in the desert, Zach is showing no signs of slowing down. From new artworks to teaching again — this is one of the most productive periods in Zach’s career.

Tell us about yourself — from growing up to your journey into the art world.

I’m a “desert rat” born and raised in the Coachella Valley. There wasn’t much for kids to do growing up in a community that predominantly caters to tourists and retirees with expendable income, so we had to make our own fun. Art and music were the means to do so. Drawing and painting were just inexpensive ways to pass the time when it was too hot to go outside. So in that sense, I’ve always been an artist, it just took me a while to recognize it. For a long time, music was the primary mode through which I expressed my creativity, but college opened my eyes to Art History and I found myself wanting to be part of it. Sure, it might be an uphill battle, but pursuing my interests in visual art felt like the path of least resistance.

You earned a B.A. in Art Practice from the University of California, Berkeley. How do you divide your time between artist and art educator?

I try not to think of them as being separate from each other. Teaching is part of my artistic practice. Teaching makes me a better artist, and creating art makes me a better teacher. Of course, finding the right balance between the two is a constant challenge, and it often feels like I am being pulled in two different directions, but I figure it’s a good problem to have, like a puzzle I have yet to figure out.

How has COVID-19 impacted you as an artist?  

Prior to the pandemic, I had a full-time job as an Art Educator that ate up most of my time and energy. Painting was just something I did to relax after work, because I thought it was important to practice what I preached in the classroom, so as not to feel like a hypocrite while teaching.

I was living a pretty comfortable life until I was labeled a “non-essential worker” and laid-off, which kind of sucked. But to be completely honest, I was also kind of relieved. At risk of sounding crass, COVID has been kind of great for my artistic career. I received grants from organizations like the California Desert Arts Council and Desert X. I was given studio space at my buddy Cris Cichocki’s gallery while it was being renovated. I was teaching online classes at CREATE. I was selling paintings, prints, and commissions on top of getting paid to make public art. In retrospect, life was pretty good, but I found it hard to celebrate with everything happening in the world.

Let’s talk about “the cactus” as a recurring motif in your artwork. How did it start and what inspires you? 

For close to a decade, I’ve tried to paint everyday. The problem with that is, I ran out of ideas real quick and kind of fell into this rut making a bunch of crappy abstract paintings. Unsatisfied with my work and abstract art in general, I decided to challenge myself with a more traditional still life painting inspired by the work of Wayne Thiebaud. I was also taking up an interest in gardening at the time, but as it turns out, I’m a terrible gardener. When I went looking for something to paint, the only plants left alive were cactuses. So I grabbed the smallest one I had, set it up next to my easel and started painting. I was also working for an art museum at the time and had to constantly remind people not to touch the art, and I wonder if that somehow subconsciously influenced my choice of subject matter.

With the cactus, I have no shortage of subjects to choose from. I don’t have to worry about what I am going to paint next because I can find inspiration anywhere, if I just take the time to look for it.

We have corresponded a few times this past year. Once, you sent me this message regarding the “Green Painting” — ‘That was a painting I made at the beginning of the pandemic. I took a lot of walks around my neighborhood to deal with anxiety and noticed all the cacti were in bloom, so I started adding flowers to my cactus paintings. Felt like the world needed more color in a time of darkness.’ Did the “Green Painting” signify a shift or turning point in your art, and what anxiety were you experiencing?

The “Green Painting” was a scene I had wanted to paint for a long time, but always found excuses not to. It was originally supposed to be monochromatic, consisting only of varying shades of green, hence the uninspired name. I had no intention of including flowers in the painting. In fact, until the pandemic, I avoided including flowers in my paintings altogether because it felt too obvious. It’s cliche. Flowers are pretty, and I’m not really interested in painting pretty pictures. At least, that was the excuse I told myself. Besides, it’s time consuming enough just painting the spines of a cactus. Why make more work for myself by adding flowers? There was a point where I was ready to declare the painting “done,” but the composition was telling me something was missing. It needed a splash of color and flowers were the answer. I wouldn’t necessarily call it a “major shift,” rather it’s more of a stepping stone towards bigger, more ambitious paintings.

With regards to the anxiety, I think it came from not knowing where the next stepping stone will be. It felt like having a swarm of cicadas buzzing around in my head. I found it hard to focus. Days blurred together and I lost all sense of time. The only way I was able to silence the noise and ground myself in the moment was by taking walks around my neighborhood. It was spring, the weather was great, everything was in bloom. The external world seemed so serene and peaceful compared to the inner turmoil I was experiencing, and I wanted that tension between order and chaos to be expressed in my art.

Are you feeling less anxiety and more hope compared to a year ago?

No, but I don’t necessarily consider that to be a bad thing. I’ve grown weary of hope, since I believe it can lead to passivity while you wait for someone or something to come along and rescue you. Likewise, if one can overcome the paralysis that accompanies anxiety, it can be a great motivating force for change. This has been one of the most productive periods of my artistic career, and I think the discomfort I felt was the catalyst I needed to make it happen.

What do you enjoy most about painting the cactus as a over-arching theme in your artwork?

The way I see it, the cactus is a living sculpture formed by time, water and light and it’s a subject that allows me to formally investigate the concepts of balance, repetition, and rhythm to build complex structures out of simple shapes and patterns. For example, consider the spines of a cactus. In my paintings, a single spine is nothing more than a brushstroke, but when viewed as a whole they work together to add a lot of depth and dimensionality to the composition.

By contrast, what do you enjoy most about teaching?

Teaching keeps me on my toes and really challenges me to know my material. It’s one thing to know how something works, but effectively communicating your knowledge to someone else requires an entirely different set of skills. There’s also an element of improvisation that I find enjoyable. Every class is different. Every student brings with them experiences and knowledge that inform their unique worldview, and when dealing with the creativity and imagination of others, you never know where the conversation will go.

Walk us through some of the projects you worked on this past year from Palm Springs Public Arts to your new gig at CREATE Center for the Arts — and anything else you’d like to mention.

The Palm Springs Public Arts Commission put out a call to artists for their Mainstreet Bench Project in the Spring of 2020. I submitted a design because I thought it would be funny to see people to sit on a cactus. I didn’t think anything would come of it and was a little overwhelmed when my design was selected because I severely underestimated the size and surface area of those benches. Likewise, I wasn’t too excited about getting started in July with the heat, but ultimately found I didn’t mind it so much because I was happy to be out of the house after quarantining at home for three months. I ended up painting three benches and a traffic signal box on Indian Canyon and San Rafael thanks to the help and encouragement from Tysen Knight, Russell Pritchard, Joy Meredith and Shawnda Thomas Faveau.

While all that was happening, Deb Mumm (founder) from CREATE Center for the Arts reached out to me about helping put together a virtual gallery for their annual student show, the Gui Ignon Memorial Exhibition, as well as design and facilitate their distance learning program, the Art of Science, which consisted of eight interactive 3-hour virtual classes that investigated various scientific concepts through hands-on art projects. Now, I’m in charge of managing CREATE’s printmaking studio, hence the sudden interest in making prints.

I currently have some art hanging at Las Palmas Brewery as part of a group show curated by Kylie Knight and I’ve been invited to create an altar installation at the Coachella Valley History Museum for their upcoming Dia de Muertos annual event.

How are classes going at CREATE Center for the Arts? 

Things are great, but they are only just getting started. We are planning for a very busy season this coming Fall. In addition to the printmaking classes, I will also be teaching a series of animation classes for students ages 8-12 funded by the Anderson Children’s Foundation that will run through the spring of 2022. For anyone reading this who hasn’t yet seen CREATE’s new 20,000 sq ft home, you definitely need to check it out because words don’t do it justice. It’s something you really have to see in person.

Do you see a silver lining in the age of COVID?

Not to get all “Kumbaya,” but I genuinely believe artistic expression is the means through which we can bridge ideological gaps and heal from this collective trauma we all have been experiencing. Good art inspires awe and reminds us of our humanity, something which I think we’ve lost sight of in our frantic, fast paced contemporary society that seems hellbent on drowning us with feelings of FOMO, despair and apathy blasting out of the “firehose of information” we voluntarily aim at our faces. The pandemic and social unrest of 2020 exposed the cracks in the foundation of our democracy and laid bare the economic stratification that is tearing us apart as a country. We can debate endlessly about who or what is to blame for these problems, but regardless of where you fall on the political spectrum, I think we can all agree that something is fundamentally broken. Fortunately, more and more people seem to be waking up to the fact that we can no longer ignore the inequity that plagues our society and are willing to have the uncomfortable conversations necessary to fix it.

WEB: zachjfboyles.com