Linda Matson interview by SFWA intern, Joyce Wang
Do you have a favorite animal that could have inspired some of your artworks?
I have many favorite animals and they are birds, cats, and wolves. Some of these animals have inspired my work like the U-birds. The story behind the U-birds is that several years ago I went to a workshop to learn a technique that would make a U-shape in the clay. The reason why I made birds have a unique U-shape is because of how it would remind me of the birds from the Pacific Northwest.
Since I grew up in the Northwest, I would see mostly totem poles and I enjoyed their abstract painted carvings of animal and bird images. These cultural monuments inspired me to make the U-birds. The cat vessels were inspired by my two cats and the Egyptian canopic jar because of its unique shape. Also, the tuxedo cat lidded-jar in the SFWA gallery was inspired by my cat’s name Loki.
Do you enjoy traveling and what are your favorite places? Also, do your travels impact the art that you make?
I really enjoyed traveling when I was an insurance executive. I needed to go to different places all the time, so my job allowed me to travel around the world. I liked going to London every year. What has impacted me most in my travels was a cruise to see the Chilean coastline and to see the glaciers and how beautiful they are. I can’t say that traveling has impacted my art, but I feel like I’ve been inspired to go along with the flow of it.
Do you have other activities you enjoy doing that aren’t art related?
I have joined a drama group to do theater with kindergartners to 3rd graders and disabled kids. Every week we do a performance with different schools and it’s been going really well. I also like gardening and knitting.
Do you have new artistic directions you want to take in the near future?
Well that’s a good question but I don’t think about the future in this way; rather, I do something that I want to do and see what happens when I do it.
