By Jenni Steltenpohl
As a fellow artist and graduating senior, I felt great ease and enjoyment interviewing my classmate Hilman Alexander Walden. During our interview, we had a long and interesting conversation about himself, his artwork, and his experience as an art student. Walden is a local art student at Valdosta State University who will be graduating with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Art. Walden’s senior exhibition “Living in Color” is the Spring 2021 graduating seniors’ final show as students at Valdosta State University.
Before he started at Valdosta State University, Walden did not have much experience with art classes. He was mostly self-taught and encouraged to grow his creativity by his grandmother who is an artist and aunts who are retired art teachers. He was pushed by some of the men in his family towards more “masculine” roles that traditionally involve either suits or uniforms, but Walden chose the path of art. This path also aligned with his interests that he explored before becoming an art student such as English, history, mass media, and storytelling. History and storytelling are evident in Walden’s artwork as he uses imagery to narrate stories, be it through his ceramics, graphic design work, or photography. He views his art as having an element of escapism that takes the viewer away from reality for a few moments, letting them explore an alternative reality or perspective.
Ceramic, Sgraffito, 9 x 9 x 3½ inches, 2019
He enjoys using almost every media that he has come across and has tried to expand his skill and experience while in his art classes. One of his favorite media to work in is ceramics and access to a kiln and wheel is one of the aspects of being in an art program that Walden will miss when he graduates. One of the methods he uses when decorating his ceramics is sgraffito, which is carving through a dark layer of black slip to show the base layer of clay to create imagery. In his senior show, he has three ceramic pieces Dionysus Bowl, Dionysus Cup, and Norse-Inspired Urn using sgraffito. Dionysus Bowl is a bowl with the image of a bearded man, which represents Dionysus who is the ancient Greek god of wine, fertility, ritual madness, theater, and religious ecstasy. He is wearing a red wreath staring down at another image of a black and white shape that could be a cup, probably holding wine. The background of the images is the base color of the clay and there are vines sprouting from the edge of the bowl as simple birds fly above the man and cup. The red and white portions of the piece are most likely created with after glaze, which can be used to give parts of a piece color after the initial firing in the kiln. Dionysus Cup differs from the bowl because instead of using the clay’s coloring as the background he makes use of the black slip and scratched away the positive areas to display the man depicted. Around the rim of the cup and the bottom base is clay white while the inside of the cup is black.
Norse-Inspired Urn differs in meaning and purpose from the other two ceramic pieces. This urn is the resting place of a “friend of a friend’s girlfriend;” Walden was commissioned to make this piece and another for the woman’s family. Walden created these urns with a heavy heart for a man named Joe whose girlfriend had passed away. Walden did not know the deceased or Joe who had commissioned the piece. He felt the weight of the significance as he created the urns. It was a hard experience, and he hoped throughout the whole process that he would be able to create something worthy of being a resting place.
Walden’s other interests such as graphic design and photography are both present in his senior exhibition. His photographs give the viewer a small glimpse of a story that they can give their own narration to, leaving the door open for imagination and interpretation. Witch’s Bog and Bullywug Marsh are both photographs of cypress trees in a swamp area, but the names give the viewer a chance to imagine there is more than what meets the eye. His other photographs include people in them, such as The Waiting Game, Walking All Day, and It’s There, In The Dark Corners and give the viewer a sense of adventure and an implied journey that the people in the photographs are taking. The Waiting Game shows a side view of a young woman sitting on a bridge, staring ahead of herself as you see past her an empty road. Walking All Day shows a person in the distance walking through tall grass in an uneven clearing with trees in the distance. In It’s There, In The Dark Corners, you see a lone figure looking out a door he is holding, the room is dark, and the only light is coming from the open door. Walden’s photography, like his other works, connects to his love of storytelling even if he is not telling the viewer where they are at in the story or what is really going on at the place and time. He allows the viewer to create their own narratives by giving snapshots of the story.
Walden uses his graphic design skills to create a brand and packaging design for his cards and dice for the role playing game Dungeons and Dragons. The brand name is McGuffins, and he used graphic textures and windows in the packaging to create interesting designs. The card packaging is a golden color with a cave-like window on the front, while the dice packaging is a light beige with a window that looks like a flag, a long neck bottle, and a warrior helmet. While this type of graphic design work is about something that Walden enjoys greatly in his life, he also created an animation that is about subject matter that is far more serious. His animation Beneath the Skin is a social commentary on the harsh reality of intentionally versus blindly following dangerous ideologies. When we discussed this animation, this is what Walden had to say about it:
It’s not skin deep it’s beneath that, you know some people, myself I use to be very, very right-leaning and there is nothing wrong, I don’t think with just inherently believing in conservative ideologies. But if you are following them and don’t realize where those come from and what those are being held upon, you’re inadvertently, potentially continuing the issues that have arisen from that. And so that is where the image in my mind came from for the figure in that image is sort of like hunched over like the depictions of the sphinx in the Greek story… but it’s them kind of perched up on their arms and legs on the stack of bodies.
Hilman Alexander Walden
Though Walden’s artworks differ in subject matter, they are tied together by his love of telling stories and giving his audience something to spark their own creativity.
Walden believes that being an art major is more difficult than other majors because art is not about memorization of terms and formulas instead about reaching a certain mindset as art students where they are willing to share and take criticism, and they do not really reach it at the same time as their peers. Walden believes that receiving criticism is also a big part of what helped him grow and expand as an artist. He feels that not being able to take criticism can become a glass ceiling waiting to stop an artist from reaching their potential. Being an art student requires accepting and listening to criticism so that they can learn and become better at what they like to do. Learning, Walden says is something that artists never stop doing: “…I think if any artist was done learning they’d be just perpetually depressed. Because it’s like well that’s it you’ve reached the end. Congratulations you’ve finally found the other bookend of just click the world’s done.” He believes that no matter what stage you are as an artist that you are never done, learning even if your art is great or even if you are the one teaching how to make art.
Walden is keeping things like residencies, or in-house artists as options, so that he can keep artistic avenues open to him. He is thinking about getting a “mainstream” job that may not have anything to do with art. He wants to take the time to learn how to fuel his own art without the help of the structure of classes that he has been relying on during his time in college. So even after finishing his journey at Valdosta State University, he will continue to learn and explore his art.
Jenni Steltenpohl is a senior in the Valdosta State University Art program. After graduating in the summer of 2021 she plans on pursuing teaching K-12 art and working on a masters degree in Edcuation.