EMS Interveiw with Jim McNeill

QUESTIONS FOR JIM McNEILL FROM MIDDLE SCHOOL STUDENTS [Art Home] [Know the Artist: Jim McNeill] [Tessellations]
Middle School sixth grade art students and 8th grade Art Tech have been learning about graphic artist, Jim McNeill. After seeing his work on the Internet, they had the following questions for Mr. McNeill. Several email were exchanged between Mrs. Decker and Mr. McNeill - we enjoyed our "conversations".
STUDENT:	Did you go to school to learn computer graphics? or were you self-taught?
MR. McNEILL:	I was self-taught. We ended up getting a copy of Adobe Illustrator® at Big Apple Parents' Paper (BAPP) and I taught myself slowly but surely from then on. I bought my own computer about a year later (1993 or 1994), a used one, and started trying to figure out how to make illustrations with it instead of the headings and graphic design-type things I was doing with it at BAPP. I did 3 of my own pieces, sent copies to Metro Creative Graphics and Popular Science, and started working for both of them immediately. The art director I was working with at Pop Science ended up getting laid off, but Metro continues to be my main client
STUDENT:	When did you become interested in the work of M. C. Escher?
MR. McNEILL:	I became interested in Escher a couple of years after buying my own computer. I'd been aware of his work ever since junior high school but had never been particularly interested in it. At the time, I was a lot more interested in music. I was studying percussion pretty seriously and the only visual art I was making were cartoons for friends. When I was at SVA (School of Visual Arts, New York), the main medium I was using was oil paint, so Escher's prints still didn't hold much interest for me. I was too busy trying to learn how to paint! A few years after graduating, I got my first experience working with a computer and it really changed the way I thought about making art. I was working with a program called Adobe Illustrator®, which is really great for creating very crisp, precise drawings. The tools in Illustrator enable you to rotate, reflect and reproduce shapes very easily, and that led me to think of Escher's tessellations--I have a feeling Escher would've LOVED Adobe Illustrator! I bought a couple of books on Escher and went about trying to figure out how he made his tessellations (though I didn't even know what tessellations were called at that time--I just thought of them as "those cool things Escher does!")
MRS. DECKER:	What do you think students? Maybe Mr. NcNeill would have liked tessellations a whole lot sooner if he had a math teacher like Mrs. Sandy and an art teacher like Mrs. Decker when he was your age. Education sure has changed since Mr. McNeill was in school --and he is pretty young. They didn't use computers much then. Mr. McNeill graduated from high school in 1986.
STUDENT:	Were you always interested in mathematics? in geometry?
MR. McNEILL:	I was awful at math. I had a very hard time with every kind of math class in school. I'm living proof that you don't have to be a math wiz to create tessellation. I'm still using mathematical concepts like symmetry, area and congruency, but in a purely visual way. At first it may not seem that art and math can have that much in common, but they do relate to each other in a fascinating way.
MRS. DECKER:	I have never done much with tessellation, but I use math concepts when I create are, too. Understanding math concepts of ratio, proportion, balance, repetition and pattern are just a few of the connections to math. Geometry was a favorite class for me when I was in high school. I was always very good in math -- but creating art was so much more fun. I think understanding math makes me a better artist. To find out more connections between art and math see some of the links on the Math and Science Links page.
STUDENT:	What are you doing now with computer graphics?
MR. McNEILL:	Recently, I started doing animations in Flash and am in the beginning stages of an animated video series of artist biographies, another collaboration with Pam Stephens (of North Texas Institute for Educators of the Visual Arts)
MRS. DECKER:	See Mr. McNeill's Flash videos at JimPlex
The sixth grade art students and 8th grade Art Tech students are grateful to Mr. McNeill for the amount of time he was willing to share with us. As students continue to learn about tessellations and computer graphics, I am sure the students will have even more questions. [Art Home] [Know the Artist: Jim McNeill] [Tessellations]