INTERVIEW

Name: Bernard Pearce
Where are you from: New Orleans, Louisiana
Where do you live/work: I live and work on planet Earth
Your website (if any): www.onemanmachine.com

How do you normally come up with an idea or project for your artwork? Can you run us briefly through your thought process and work process?

In the past a lot of my ideas were lost due to the random nature in which the ideas would present themselves: dreams, fragments of a song pop into my head while I am driving, in the middle of a practice session. Now after years of frustration I have several tools that have helped me...my laptop computer helps me capture ideas quickly and easily and I can email the ideas to myself so I have a safe record of the initial idea...this includes song lyrics, poems, outlines for books, plays, and other musical ideas beyond the simple song form....the second tool is a recording device called a Loop Station.  This machine allows me to record my music on the spot...it is a great, simple machine. I actually used it to record most of my first record....It is one of the greatest tools. It can record instruments and vocals...so not only can I record music, but poetry, monologues, speeches, etc....

The third and most important tool is discipline...once I get an idea...once I write it down, or document the initial idea.... I must follow through...the first step is visualization, whether it's music, poetry, visual art, film...I have to visualize the final product...really see it in my mind’s eye...hear it in my mind’s ear.....feel it in my gut...internalize the essence of what I want to express into being.... Sometimes I let objects tell me what they are or I let sounds guide me...the feedback of a guitar or the humming of a drill....the rhythm of the seasons....they have a real influence on my work…and found objects put themselves together like boogiemen in the dark...

In short – I don't come up with ideas....ideas come to me....I just have to capture them and give them shape or the energy to manifest themselves.... Again the process is one in the same with the initial idea....pieces of art, music, sculpture, math and sciences are not thought up but actually captured, and when they are captured they usually come with instructions and a blueprint....

Just ask the people who discovered the double-helix in DNA, or countless other scientists, artists, or writers they will all say something similar....that the ideas came to them...

How has the LMCC Residency affected your work?

The LMCC has been a great resource and the support they have given me in my time of great need has been wonderful. The LMCC has done a great job and made me feel at home in NYC. They helped me get back to work faster than I could have on my own.

Do you have an unrealized dream project? (no matter how improbable, absurd, costly, etc. it might seem)

My dream project would be to bring peace to the World....I would like to bring starving Men, Women, and Children to a Whole Foods Market in the United States and give them shelter forever.... I would like to bring people in positions of power to places where people are powerless and let them live among the powerless for a week or two...