As you hopefully know, next week The Huffington Post will start its HuffPost Detroit page. Every morning I read the HuffPost Arts page.  Its content ranges from witty to insightful to inspirational.  Professor John Seed is a regular contributor to the HuffPost Arts page (click here for his column). He provides intelligent art reviews and meaningful spotlights on various artists.  (He inspired our re-occurring Artist Spotlight series.)  The more I get to know Professor Seed, the more I find him to be an earnest and inspirational art enthusiast.  He is a professor of art and art history at Mt. San Jacinto College in Southern California, and he won the 2002 Society of Professional Journalist’s award in art and entertainment writing.  I recommend that you read his columns, and I recommend that you read the rest of this interview.

Thedetroiter.com: What is your background?

Professor Seed:I had a “Leave it to Beaver” childhood, growing up on the west side of Los Angeles near the beach. Growing up I drew, made an animated cartoon with my grandfather, made puppets and put on puppet shows and worked on Volkswagen Baja bugs. So, I was very “hands on.”

When I got to college, I took a painting class, and that was it. Since then I have worked for galleries, for a museum (MOCA in Los Angeles) and been a Professor of Art and Art History at a community college for 25 years.

Thedetroiter.com: Do you still paint?
 

Professor Seed:Yes, but I don’t sell my paintings. I just made a painting of Santorini, Greece as a present for my wife, and I am doing some small paintings for my own enjoyment.

Thedetroiter.com: Why write about artists?

Professor Seed:I began to write about 10 years ago, and at about the same time I was getting started I was hit by testicular cancer. While taking chemo and recovering I was very motivated to write down my memories of art and artists for my daughters, and that led to more and more writing about all kinds of artists.

Every work of art is a human product, and I want to get to know the person who made it. I like stories and anecdotes that help me and my readers understand the human being standing behind the art.

Another motivation is that as I have matured, I came to realize that I have met some very interesting people along the way. A prime example is Jean-Michel Basquiat, who I assisted in his studio. He was one of the first artists I wrote about.

Thedetroiter.com: What is the biggest challenge in teaching art history?

Professor Seed:I think the challenge is to make the art speak to the student’s lives. You are doing a good job if you can take a work of art that is hundreds or thousands of years old, put it in front of a student, and get them to feel like it offers feelings or ideas that speak directly to them.

Art history shouldn’t be a course for memorizing names of dead artists: it should be treated as living discipline that connects people and ideas across time.

Thedetroiter.com: What are some misconceptions about the study of art history?

Professor Seed:Anyone who thinks history is dull should take art history for an engaged, well informed instructor and they will be shocked into the way that they will fall in love with the material.

I found out in college that I was a visual learner. I didn’t like standard history courses, which I found dry, but when I got into art history and had the images in front of me I was suddenly woken up.

Thedetroiter.com: What do you believe are the greatest attributes of successful artists?

Professor Seed:There are all kinds of artists, so I hate to generalize. I will say, some of the artists who fascinate me, like Picasso, had great “inner monsters.” My mentor Nathan Oliveira once said to me “The great ones are often the angry ones.”

Thedetroiter.com: How do you think Detroit can capitalize on its recent positive press about its creative culture?

Professor Seed:The stories I see about Detroit have tended to be about the economy and the problems Detroit is facing, so I would say that the positive stories need to be sent out more broadly.

The photos that showed up in Time, “Detroit’s Beautiful, Horrible Decline” by Marchand and Meffre are the ones that linger in my mind. (Click here to see those photos)Thedetroiter.com: How do you define success?

Professor Seed: If you like yourself you are successful.

Thedetroiter.com: Do you have any mentors? If so who and how have they helped your career?

Professor Seed: This is my favorite question. I would not have the wonderful life or career that I have now without Nathan Oliveira, my professor at Stanford. I have written about him quite a bit, and am providing a few links here. What he did was take an interest in me, introduce me to people who could help and support me, and make me feel that my future was important. He died last November, and I am so glad that I had a great final visit with him a year before he passed.

Click here and here to read Professor Seeds reflections on his mentor.
Thedetroiter.com: What is the best piece advice you have been given?

Professor Seed:  It came from Robert De Niro Senior, a fine painter I met after college. He told me, in regards to my painting, not to worry about who my influences were or about my subject matter or style. “Just worry about whether or not it is any good,” he told me.
So, to this day, I struggle and struggle to define what is “good” in painting, and the struggle is what I think he wanted me to get involved in. Each artist has to decide for themselves what “good” means and it changes over your lifespan, even daily.