The first
time I had the honor to be introduced to Moira Cue, I was sent
one of her paintings through the internet, and a photograph of
herself from a fashion show. The first thing I thought was, what
a beautiful, great painting it was. I was also upset that some
one was trying to play a trick on me by having torn out and
scanned a masterpiece painting from Picasso from an art book, and
a photo of a pretty girl and told me the model was the
artist.
I racked my brain for some time thinking of where I had seen the
painting (pictured on next page). After some lengthy E-mails, and
finally a phone call with Moira Cue herself, I found out the
shocking truth. This beautiful woman was not only the actual
painter, she had also created over 1000 other works of art,
equally impressive. And she was an actress, writer, and singer. I
was blown away. With artwork in the collection of Madonna,
appearances on E! and Chicago Tonight, and songs that have been
praised by some of the biggest names in music, Moira Cue is
creating her mark in the world of entertainment as one of the
greatest prodigies of our time. The following is our exclusive
interview with her.
The Hollywood Sentinel: What advice do you
have for young girls that are seeking to move to Hollywood to
pursue a career in the entertainment industry?
Moira Cue: You can’t become famous on your
own. You also won’t become famous just by being really
interesting. (You may have some luck, but it takes professionals
with connections to parlay your good luck and exposure into a
career. The people who are going to help you are going to want
one of two things: money, or something else. You are better off
working with people who want money, but only if they understand
that you can make them money, not just give them money for the
services they offer. (I'm not saying you don't need services:
That goes without saying). To be a money maker, you have to sell
yourself as a professional – An attitude that won’t
keep you employed as a waitress isn’t going to fly when the
stakes are higher.
Before you get to L.A., save money. Get a car with a navigation
system. Understand the difference between confidence and
arrogance. Convince others to make money with you.
The Hollywood Sentinel: What are the biggest
themes you tend to explore in your artwork, and why?
Moira Cue: Much of my earliest visual art
references the rich tradition of women in art history, as visual
icons. These women tended to be the love objects of male artists;
yet, when we think of these men, the images that come to mind are
of their models. What we value visually and verbally are two
different things. A number of years back I heard a lecture at a
Chicago bookstore by the author of “The Goddess and the
Alphabet” who explained that this gap is due to left
brain/right brain differences. It made sense to me. I think of
these works as partnerships. That is in addition to appreciating
women’s ability to actively create art: Women such as Paula
Modersohn-Becker, Georgia O’ Keefe, etc.
More recently I have been interested in the formal essentialism
of picture making, simplistically: the division of a (typically)
four-sided picture plane, with vertical and horizontal lines. In
2004 I created 365 black and white pictures (one a day) of
non-Arabic fonts. The series has yet to be exhibited. What
interested me was how similar the history of calligraphy is to
art. On one hand, you have a flat picture where motion is
suggested through these diagonals and such. With letters the
implication of this division is to reference sound. Now you have
computers and the phenomenon of pixelation, where the organizing
principal is still a stacked box, but now it is a color tone that
fills the space to create meaning. I was interested in letters
that had no meaning to me, from my Western vantage point, because
I thought I could find a visual meaning in the representation of
sound when the traditional interpretation of those characters was
blocked.
The Hollywood Sentinel: In your music,
and why?
Moira CueMost of my songs start from something personal, but
then, the story changes from something real into a bit of
theatre. I create a character who is singing the song. Once the
character was me, but by the time the song is finished, it is a
fictional person something like me. Not everything that I sing
about really happened, or is convoluted. My songs are emotionally
true, but historically, not so much.
The Hollywood Sentinel: You have been described
as a feminist artist. Who is one feminist that you identify most
with, and why do you?
Moira Cue: I came of age in Madison, Wisconsin,
during the apex of the political correctedness. The theorists I
explored at that time were women such as Mary Daly, whose work
made a profound impact on me. Later I attended the School of the
Art Institute of Chicago. The majority of feminists on the
curriculum there were prostitutes and pornographers, the Annie
Sprinke types. Between these two extremes, I can only identify
with myself.
The Hollywood Sentinel: What makes you a
feminist?
Continued on next
page.
© 2009, The Hollywood Sentinel / Moira Cue MultiMedia, All
rights reserved.