20210707 Guy Campbell interview

Guy Campbell currently lives and works in San Francisco. Since 2019 he has managed a small, community-based gallery (Anälog gallery) in San Francisco’s MIssion District. He also produces assemblage artworks, shoots experimental photography, produces, and edits short videos. Several of his video works are in SFmoma’s website and/or archives. Formally, he worked at SFmoma as a photographer and digital media specialist.

Guy has a digital media degree from UC Berkeley, where as a student, he worked his way through the university graduating in 2006 with a major in Digital Media Theory. He has taught media production and editing as an intern both at UC Berkeley’s School of Information and Media department at City College of San Francisco.

In his spare time, he enjoys visiting with his family, including 5 grandchildren, who live on both coasts of the US.

Anälog gallery is an underground community exhibition space established April 2019 by owner Guy Campbell and curator Don Ross. The gallery was constructed by Campbell in the ground floor of his 19th century victorian town house, created to exhibit art and performance from local artists in the Bay Area.

Kacy (K): Hi Guy! Thank you so much for being here and sharing some of your stories with us. Can you start by telling me your name? And what kind of art do you do?

Guy (G): My name is Guy Campbell. I work primarily in imagery, and I also have a house and a gallery. The house has kind of been my work of art. I've pretty much spent all my creative energy there in the last 10 years or so. But I've gotten more back into photography, especially since the pandemic. I've had more time to work on experiments that I've wanted to do.

K: Can you tell me more about your house, and how would you describe your house/ gallery as an art project?

G: Okay. Sure. I bought the house in 2011 with the plan of having it for self-supporting. It is 130 years old, had high higher ceilings, and was kind of a combination of industrial and Victorian aesthetics. I used a lot of industrial equipment to fix it up. I fixed it up with the idea of making it look like sharing the layers but wouldn't be close to original as possible.

At that point, I've also been volunteering at the Museum from about 2012 to about 2018. And a friend of mine who's an artist who wanted to show in the garage and since I've been studying at the Museum, it all just fell into place.

A lot of the theory that I learned that the Museum I was able to incorporate into the gallery. For example, how to make people feel comfortable in a gallery or how to make them feel like they belong there. Not like some people get into a gallery, they feel nervous. They'd rather just go to someplace like McDonald's where there's no pressure to understand what they learned from the Museum.

Also, the problem with museums is that they didn't have enough diversity on the staff or in the participation that they wanted. This was a big problem. A lot of museums in the USA, they just get their own people attending the museums. People with a lot of education, middle class, or high income.

And the people that are low income, or don't have education, feel uncomfortable in the Museum. Not only as attended attendees but also as staff members.

Some people would say things like, well, just lowering the cost of getting into the Museum. But lowering the cost for certain economic people also makes them feel singled out as inferior. So that wasn't helpful.

And the things that were helpful was that the Museum should have a place where it's comfortable for people to relax, like a lounge area, and the Museum should actively engage in the community and get community members to help plan events and have a voice in it and then bring the members of the community in to see those events. So those are the most effective ways. It wasn't rocket science to bring diversity in.

But yet the Museum wouldn't do any real changes. Instead, they would read something like this and then pay hundreds of thousand of dollars to hire consultants that override these.

The gallery view-1

K: Is that why you want to open your own gallery and how you approach your own gallery, like doing the opposite of what the current museums do? Like are you trying to find artists more local and more emerging with a more diverse background?

G: I think I took a lot of theory and experience from Museum into the gallery. So when I put it together, I wanted it to be inclusive as much as possible. I want to widen the demographic to make sure that people with different cultures and backgrounds from different areas of the world can come in and feel comfortable here.

It isn't easy because, you know, people tend not to have a lot of time. First of all, Don, who's been doing a lot of the curatorial work, has a full-time job. And I still have been kind of semi-retired, so I have to pace myself.

But I think we've come on a good opportunity when these nonprofits that we're working with bringing people from the community. And I'm really proud of how that's working out. We're not selling $1,000 pieces of artwork. It's $150 framed photographs. But it will bring in a whole different group of people to see the opening this Saturday. It's been really the first time since we opened the gallery that we've had a community-oriented event.

Also, Museum is criticized a lot because they want, they want a blockbuster show. They want a lot of people coming in to see the show. They want to have a lot of attendance. They make money off the people paying to come into the museums, which is the fundamental difference between a gallery and Museum. In museums, works aren't for sale, necessarily, and people coming in are paying an entry fee. Whereas in galleries, the works are for sale. People can come in for free, basically. A museum is on a much larger scale as well. So it's hard to compare to, of course. And most of their donors are interested in a larger scale, artworks that are worth millions and millions. And many of those artists are no longer living, and not from very diverse backgrounds. And that's what the trustees want and why the trustees are donating the money.

K: If making people feel more comfortable is one of the most effective ways to increase the attendee with different backgrounds, how do you make people feel comfortable in the gallery? What are you trying to do that is different from the Museum?

G: That's a good question. I created three parts of the gallery. One is the main gallery where all the artwork is, the lighting and the white walls, all the formal stuff. And then in the back, there is the cafe area, stuffed chairs, and a table which is also kind of a lounge and a little library of some machines and football. So when you go back there, it's homier. Like a home, like being in your living room. We also have a coffee service; people love food and coffee. If you're giving people doughnuts or cookies, that will cause them to want to come back to relax. The third part is the outdoor area. And that's got beautiful seating. You can talk and drink back there. You don't have to worry about spilling it. And also, the artists will invite their friends, family, and fans to come to the gallery. And if the artist is here more, and if you know the artist, that usually makes you feel more comfortable. So we encourage the artists to come to the openings and our common Saturdays. A lot of it is trial and error; you know, find out what makes people feel comfortable and what doesn't make sense.

The gallery view -2

K: So now I want to ask you more about your background before you switch to art. What did you do before you become an artist?

G: Well, let's see. I went to school basically in the Navy for technical school and learned how to work with equipment for detecting submarines and so on. And then I went to work in another technology company in New York. That was in about 1969 or so. Then I worked for a media work in New York called Cerebro. And it was a very wild kind of place, sort of an Andy Warhol type concept, and only carried out much further into farther than anything you could imagine. I was involved in setting that up and making a viable control network for all these projectors they had in there. And it made a big impression on me, you know, things you do in your 20s. I think that's where I got my fundamental love of art and culture and from the influence that I experienced with those people who were starting this event. I then moved to Philadelphia, where I met my ex-wife.

I also met this old Italian man who would make custom shoes for people there in Philadelphia. I apprenticed with him, and he taught me how to make beautiful shoes. When he passed away at some point, I took over the business. The business grew bigger and bigger, and at some point, I just got restless. I decided that I need to move on. I need to do something else, so I sold my shoe business, but I still kept my mail order business. In the mail-order business, we published catalogs and mailed them out. This was in the late 70s and early 80s. The business also kept getting bigger and bigger. We ended up being able to computerize the business. This was in the mid-80s. And computers were just starting to become a viable way of running a business. We started out; we had a friend who was an accountant. She had just gone to school and got her CPA. I was the Secretary and the Vice-President, and my wife basically started the business as the president and the treasurer.

K: Can you tell me more about your experience working at the media company Cerebro? I am curious about how working there informs you of your love of art?

G: Okay, well, let me describe the place to you. It was a little storefront in lower Manhattan, and the back was big, really big. So when you walked in, you'd be in a place where all these carpeted platforms are right all around you. And images would be projected all around you. My job was to get the projectors up there and wire them up so they could be controlled.

It made a big impression on me how more satisfying it was to see people actually do their own thing and what they had to change in their lifestyle to make that happened. They had to tone down live in cheap places and lived together. Rents were cheaper at that point, so it was a little easier to do those kinds of things. The contrast really hit me pretty hard.

So eventually, I quit my job, and I worked at the theater, the venue I was explaining about and had this hippie lifestyle that experienced a lot of freedom from the idea. When I grew up, I was under a rigid culture -- you have to have a job, you have to work, and you have to have a career. There were no choices on doing other things. And then, all of a sudden, I saw all these people who were making different choices. Choices of lifestyle, being young and impressionable. I've never really liked working for big corporations, and I never saw anybody get any satisfaction from it other than their paycheck.

K: You mentioned that you grew up under a rigid culture that you have to have a job. Did you have any pressure from your family when you decide to quit your day job?

G: Well, I think I am fortunate. There was definitely a kind of unsure about what I was doing from my parents. But they didn't attempt to interfere with me or tried to persuade me to adopt a different lifestyle even nobody else in my family was doing this like I was. My brother was an engineer, my other brother was working in a technical field full time, and my sister was a therapist. I think part of the reason why is because they were experiencing the same kind of transition but in a different manner. My mother had gone back to school.

The garden

K: How about the school? Do you have any art classes when you were a kid? I am curious if you were exposed to art when you were at a young age and if that also influences your love of art subconsciously.

G: Yes, I did. And I have actually still had some paintings that I made from my high school years. It's funny that I remember my art teacher in high school saying: "There will be very few of you becoming artists." So I don't expect to go out and be an artist. And though, I can remember those words very distinctly.

I think younger people today are less concerned about their careers. Like my granddaughter, she's 13. What she wants to do is to get a van and live in it. She's already had a novel published, and she'd been the book signing and everything. That's her dream, so I tried to encourage her to do what she wants.

K: If you are gonna choose one of the businesses and tell me more about your daily routine?

G: So in the mail-order business, I was the secretary, and the Vice President, and my wife basically started the business as the president and the treasurer.

We would have meetings and oftentimes, we would have CPA, consultants, and other people in the meeting. Small meetings, but would be where we discuss the policies, management, business direction and things like that. And then we go off and get buried in our work. You have to have meetings to look into financials and profit-loss statements, all the balance sheets, the forecasting that involves running a business. And those were the kind of things we did day to day.

To make the catalog, initially, we had only little liner drawings. Then we'd have to paste them in by hand. I also got my first camera for the catalog. I then got a Polaroid camera in a large format. I would take pictures and then scan it. So if we found the product, we could have it ready in the catalog the next day. And then have the catalog off to the printer so that we could really made everything fast. And later after that, I got a digital camera and that even made it faster. In the catalog business, we had to not only keep up with the expansion of the business, we also had to constantly change the technological skills. Recently, since the pandemic, I am experimenting with a lot of alternative photography methods. I want to experiment with things and it's not that I'm gonna make money off it. Photography now is not a business but is supposed to be something therapeutic for me.

K: What's the most important thing about making the art and photography to you now?

G: I think that's, I think that's kind of a subconscious thing.

You can see I have all these weird, wacky cameras. For some reason, I just like the mechanical eyes. I think this part of me is still very much into old mechanical process of engineering, especially older cameras, the metal parts, and no batteries.

There are also things about the imagery that I think just really moved me, and I find it really rewarding when I produce an image. And I've had people actually cry over my images. It really gives you a dopamine rush or something. The photograph touches your emotions in a way that can't be done with language.

The camera collection

K: Regarding the art teacher you just mentioned when you were a kid, he said something like; there will be only a few of you guys will be artists? Do you think if he didn't say something like that, you would consider being an artist more seriously or more early on in your life?

G: Good question. No. I don't know how much it actually affected me behaviorally. I just remembered it. I felt like, Oh, that sounds artists are fairly unique people.

Also a lot of times, you duplicate what your parents did, or oppositely, you live out the things that your parents didn't get to live out. I think in my father's case, he liked to paint but eventually, as kids grew up, he didn't have time to do it. But when he retired, he took it up again and actually painted quite a bit, even sold paintings and everything.

So I think a lot of ways I'm just kind of duplicating what my father went through.

He had his creative side, and he had his mechanical side. If he had been a full-time artist, a professional artist, I think maybe I would have taken up and been that way.

I had a close friend in terms of struggled with making a living and making art, you know. She was a teacher, and she mentioned that she felt like she was dying inside because she couldn't get enough to go do art. But when she quit her job, then she struggled with trying to sell paintings and make a living off of it. If I would give advice to young artists, go get a part-time job, a regular job. If you know you're really good at it, and you're good at networking, and then eventually you'll be able to quit your part-time job. But I feel like at this point in my life, I don't really need to worry too much about money. I'm worried more about, you know, my views.

K: I completely agree. I think I've finished all my questions here. Yeah. And do you have anything you wanna add about before we finish off?

G: Is it okay if I talk about your project here? What ultimately will happen with your project? And why are you doing this? Is there any personal reason behind it?

K: All the interviews would be included in the blog I sent to you. And wow that's a good question. I guess I want to figure out why although I have had this dream and strong desire about being an artist since I was a kid, how come I never thought it would be an option. And why were my parents so mad when I tell them that I want to be an artist rather than a scientist by talking with people who have similar transitions like me.

G: What you just said reminds me about my wife's family. They were much different than mine. And they had all these preconceived notions about what a person should do with their life. Both my brother-in-law and his sister went to Stanford. But my brother-in-law rebelled by taking all art courses and majoring in art. And this infuriated my father-in-law, because he felt like, you're cheating. Of course, he eventually got into the business. I don't think he was really serious about art. He just wanted to rebel against the oppression of his family. My wife would always tell me that I am lucky to have parents that don't oppress me. Guess that's true. I think many parents, especially children who commit suicide, for instance, in retrospect, probably are much more concerned about their children's success than their children's happiness.

K: I finished all my questions here. Thank you so much for being here Guy.

G: Thank you so much!