Artist Profile: Theda Sandiford

Get Out of My Own Way

Artist: Theda Sandiford
Business name: Theda Dotcom LLC
Location: Union City, NJ

Website & Blog:
Miss Theda
Bondgyrl flicker album

Inner Beauty

Theda, how do you describe your work?
My work is a collection of feelings and emotions that have made me suffer in the past. However, through the process of creating the work, it turns my pain into beauty to release its hold on me thereby creating a feeling of freedom in its wake.

What is your creative process like?
I start by reading my journal for the week and see if there was a recurring theme that repeated itself that week. Throughout the week, I take photographs and pick up scraps of paper, newspapers, magazines, advertisements that speak to me. I compare these items to my journal entries looking for the commonalities and select this theme to work on. I flip through my source materials looking for images that evoke the overarching emotion of my subject matter. This dictates the images color, texture, tone of each piece.

Once my images are selected I think about a narrative that tells the story of the emotion and start to cut, tear and arrange images on the board. It can take me from 1 to 5 hours to create one collage depending on its size and the complexity of the images. Usually while I am working I jot down a poem about each piece as I am creating it.

Unite In Art

What kind of training did you have which helped you achieve your current level of artistry?
I started making the collages for myself and posted a few on my Myspace page. I got such a positive response that I started to take the work more seriously and enrolled in a collage class at Parsons. The instructor opened my eyes to a variety of archival materials to elevate my work. I haven’t looked back since.

Is there a tool or material that you can’t imagine living without?
My glue spreader, matte medium and my digital camera.

Self Portrait 2

What inspires you to create?
I am inspired by the matrix of life all around me. Everything, especially things that most people discount as ugly are an inspiration to me. I see beauty in all things. This ability to see the possiblility in anything drives my world view.

What inspires you to keep going when the work gets frustrating or tough?
Honestly this never happens to me. I have so many things I want to express through my creative self expression perhaps the most frustrating thing I face is not having enough hours in the day to create all the pieces I see in my head.

Corner Office

What is your best piece of advice for those who would like to rise in their level of artistry?
Start with a glue stick and some paper and just glue some images down. You can always cut up the page and re-glue. Also, it is helpful to make scans of all source materials so you can print out additional copies if you make a mistake or want to repeat an image.

What takes up the majority of your time besides your art?
I run an internet marketing business, Theda Dotcom LLC and I am an avid blogger.

Financial Freedom

What’s your favorite comfort food?
I’m on a diet, but my favorite guilty pleasures are Star Wars, James Bond movies, wine tasting and street art.