Meet Eric Zuccola of Uncannyimages. He is a collage and mixed media artist from Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Eric Zuccola is not just an educator; he’s a creative force transforming mixed media art. Teaching International Baccalaureate (IB) Language and Literature, IB Theory of Knowledge, Journalism, and Film Study at Robbinsdale Cooper High School in Minnesota, Eric’s journey began with childhood sketches. It evolved through pivotal moments and eclectic inspirations. His unique approach to collage and mixed media has earned him accolades and a spot in prestigious exhibitions. Uncover the world of Eric Zuccola and discover how he seamlessly blends the past with the present, creating art that captivates and inspires.
“Eric Zuccola’s collages are realistic depictions of uncanny things.” Eric
Artistic Origins:
Vicki: “Can you share a story of what drew you to your chosen medium and how your artistic journey began?”
Eric: My artistic journey began in childhood with parents who encouraged my early love of drawing. What I lacked in skill at that age I certainly made up for with sheer volume, as I inundated my mother and father with stacks of illustrations of objects in my room, the family Old English Sheepdog, and a universe of Star Wars characters. Mind you, “illustrations” is a charitable term for what were actually clumsily rendered sketches made on old-school computer printer paper, the kind with perforations and equidistant holes along the sides to allow the paper to pass through the printer. I may still have one or two of these drawings in storage, but no one is allowed to see them. My first introduction to my main medium, collage and mixed media, stemmed from a single project during an eighth-grade art class. The young teacher at the helm of that class was someone I always felt a need to impress with my work, so when she placed an empty piece of paper in front of me along with a stack of magazines and instructed me to make a collage, I was baffled. It was the first time I specifically had been asked in an art class to transform pre-existing images and materials into something new. I recall starting with a National Geographic image of a boy close to my age looking out of a windowsill and then surrounding that boy with a scattershot collection of people and objects that shared little in common with each other beyond their proximity on the page. Much like my childhood drawings, I believe I still have this clunky collage in an old portfolio somewhere, but it will never again see the light of day.
Pivotal Moments:
Vicki: “Is there a pivotal moment or experience in your life that influenced your art?”
Eric: There is a quartet of images that were seemingly seared into my adolescent brain that were provocative enough that I sometimes think of them when I am working on a piece.
- The first involves a metallic titan peering into a green-grey sky as it offers a pair of mangled bodies in its outstretched right hand to some unseen master above.
- The second is a pair of ghostly white lane lines pushing forward toward a distant horizon where an unearthly glow radiates from between two hills in a night full of stars.
- The third consists of a swarm of pale pink creatures with coiled tails, webbed feet, and ivory smiles cavorting around a block of text promising “Instant Pets” if one simply submerges them in water.
- The final one features a woman reclining on a concrete floor, the contours of her clothing-free body barely covered by a python draped strategically along her left side. Acolytes of late-20th century popular culture may recognize that the first image is the cover of the Queen album News of the World, the second is the poster for the Steven Spielberg film Close Encounters of the Third Kind, the third is a Marvel comic book ad for Super Sea Monkeys, and the fourth is the iconic Richard Avedon poster Nastassja Kinski and the Serpent.
In addition to providing some clues about how old I am, these four items from my childhood also served as seminal images that guide a lot of my work and the sometimes surreal juxtapositions I insert into my pieces.
Creative Process:
Vicki: “Could you walk us through your creative process? How did you transform your initial idea into a finished piece?”
Eric: One element of my collage and mixed media work that I have enjoyed is the various pathways I am able to take on the journey to a finished piece. The most obvious starting point with a lot of my works is finding a central image. Although I have yet to appear on an episode of Hoarders, I am always collecting old and new magazines, catalogues, and advertisements in hopes of stumbling upon that one image that will launch me into a piece. If I am in the mood for starting a piece in this way, I usually make a visit to one of the many publication stacks I have tucked away around the house and go from there.
Another starting point for my work is more conceptual in nature. I may have a general theme or message in mind—“How are women commodified in our consumer culture?” or “How long should I keep plugging away at my day job to pay for my art supplies?”—and then try to locate images that help communicate that theme or message. What is rewarding about this approach is that it is not always the case that the eventual viewer will walk away from the finished piece with the same theme or message in mind as the one I intended.
A third entryway into a piece is to establish intentional obstacles for myself as I begin the process of finding materials. I might restrict myself to using only black and white images or I may choose to find five images from five different magazines published in five different decades. These restrictions provide a not-always-welcome challenge that forces me to think about my work and my process in a different way.
The final means of starting a piece comes from my love of language. I may come up with a catchy title, think of a bad pun, overhear a fragment of a random conversation, or locate a passage I find interesting in a book and then use that as inspiration to design a visual work. On a related note, I also have experience as a songwriter and have used my own lyrics as the starting point for collages and mixed media works. Along with the other three catalysts for my creative process, the allure of language helps me stay creative on a consistent basis.
Meaningful Creations:
Vicki: “Is there a piece you’ve created that is particularly meaningful to you? What’s the story behind it?”
Eric: I produced a pair of collages in 2022, Figure 1, “At One with the Mechanisms” and Figure 2, “Fixed Positions,” that have a great deal of meaning to me. Prior to making these two collages, my pieces would usually consist of a large, pre-existing background image from a print publication that I would then build on top of using additional, unrelated found images. In contrast, for that pair of 2022 works, I started with a blank sheet of colored paper as my background and then constructed an image from scratch on top of it. For someone who typically enjoys organization, planning, and control, it was a challenge to start a collage in such an unrestricted fashion. Thanks to my satisfaction with the finished works, this is a process I have continued to use to this day.
The other reason why this pair of works was meaningful to me was more public in nature. After years of producing art for my own satisfaction and for the occasional amusement of my immediate family members, I decided to submit “At One with the Mechanisms” and “Fixed Positions” to an annual juried show sponsored by the National Collage Society. Having not participated in many exhibitions, I was shocked and flattered when both works were accepted. Moreover, I soon learned that both pieces sold on opening night of the show and that “At One with the Mechanisms” won the show’s Fergus Ursprung Award for Excellence in Collage or Assemblage. Needless to say, this successful first step into participating in exhibitions helped quell some of my fears of putting art out into the world. From that point until the present, I have maintained a steady pace of submitting works to and participating in a variety of regional shows.
Future Aspirations:
Vicki: “Looking forward, what are your aspirations or dreams for your future as a multi-media artist?
Eric: I have several future aspirations that are both artistic and professional in nature. From the artistic side, I want to continue to push my collage work into new directions by experimenting with different sources for my images, different materials for constructing each piece, and different means of assembling the final work, even branching into three-dimensional collage pieces. Additionally, I am intrigued by exploring some related mixed-media approaches, particularly encaustic, a medium in which my wife, Jennifer Zuccola, is quite skilled.
Another long-range goal is to return to some areas of artistic strength from my high school and college years. In that time period, my primary tools were pencil, ink, charcoal, and conte crayon. I typically used these instruments to create photorealistic drawings of people, landscapes, and found objects. What is more, I also, on occasion, used pencil, ink, charcoal, and conte crayon to dabble in pointillism, an approach I often found both meditative and anxiety-producing. It would be fun to revive these long-dormant skills and see the extent to which I can merge them with the processes I currently use to create collages.
On the professional end of things, I want to continue being proactive about taking part in regional shows in addition to exploring the opportunity of displaying my work on a more national stage. I also hope to merge my background as a classroom teacher with my skills as an artist to facilitate workshops for child, teen, and adult artists. Finally, I am interested in pursuing advanced education in the fine arts in order to continue exploring other disciplines of art in which I have limited experience.
If you are in the Minnesota area, Eric has his art in the Harguth Gallery. The exhibit runs until June 8th, 2024. Link below for more information.
https://www.newsbreak.com/waseca-mn/3443263886002-waseca-art-center-exhibits-art-by-art-appreciation-group-and-eric-zuccola
Find You:
Vicki: “How can someone contact you to purchase your art?“
Eric:
Vicki: “Do you offer online or in-person workshops/classes?”
Eric: Not at this time.
This is my uncle