In Conversation With: Wil Salcedo
BY EMILY WIGHAM
With the announcement of Lockdown number 3 in the UK and across the world, the creative scene continues its downward decent into madness. Artists of all kinds continue to suffer in forced silence as governments remain unrelentless in their efforts to repress and disregard the arts as an essential mode of business, yet many continue to fight for their right to create.
One such person is mixed-media visual artist Wil Salcedo, a nineteen-year-old from London whose work has recently been picked up by DAZED Magazine. We sat down, virtually of course, to chat about his life, his art and all things pandemic.
When did you first start exploring art, can you share a bit about your journey?
I’ve been exploring art for as long as I can remember, from drawing my favourite anime characters to creating analogue mixed media collages. From the beginning, I thought I really couldn’t create a life from making art so I tried my best in subjects in maths and science but I knew it would never fulfil my happiness. I realised that creating is what I want to do but I hate doing one medium. I want to do it all, in the future I want to go into cinematography and help create short films.
What has influenced you most throughout your life, has it changed?
I would say my parents. Fortunately enough I was able to do what I want and have control of my life. My parents immigrated from the Philippines to the UK when I was quite young so for them to take their chances for a better life for me and my siblings is really a blessing so I do everything I can for them to not regret that decision.
You say that your parents have been a huge influence on you, in what way? Are they also artists?
They aren’t artists themselves, they both work for the NHS. I mean I feel like they expected me to go down that route but at the same time they gave me a lot of freedom with what I wanted to do. So, it was a real blessing. My mum posts all my work on her Facebook which is so cute!
What’s the one piece of advice you would give to young artists trying to discover themselves?
There’s this quote from a book about Buddhism by Geshe Kelsang Gyasto:
“A human life has almost limitless potential, but we will be able to realize this potential only if we first learn to appreciate it. Therefore, we need to reflect again and again on the special opportunity we now have.”
Ultimately, understand how important it is to experience everything in the now and not take everything for granted. Live all your experiences to the fullest.
I see, so life experience also influences your art. Do you find that positive or negative experiences inspire your art more?
I would say it is a mix of both, especially during 2020, I was in dark space and tried to feed that into my work as much as possible because I thought it could distract me, but I couldn't run away from it. I still had to face it myself. I guess it's just forcing myself to realise I do have to face it, and if I can channel into my work that’s great but if not that’s OK.
In your interview with DAZED you talk about Nihilism and art, and how you had to learn who you are to love what you do. How did you learn who you are?
By looking back from my past experiences and being able to let go the things that were holding me back. It took a lot for me to finally understand that this is my path, for now. I know I have the potential to do what I want but it was just hard finding that push to do it.
What did you learn through this reflection on the past?
I learnt that the main person you can depend on is yourself. You're in control of your own life and it’s on you how you navigate through it.
On that profound note, according to Nihilism one can find a lack of life’s intrinsic value meaningful and liberating in itself. Since coronavirus has caused a breakdown in life’s intrinsic meaning, where that which gave our lives value has been taken away from us, do you think that the pandemic has in some ways liberated your art, or has it instead limited you?
I would say both, in varying ways. I use the time to spend on perfecting my work and finding different ways I could present my work yet, a lot of the time, I’m unable to convey what I want because I’m experiencing so much of this time by myself. This turns into this thing of how meaningful the work I put out is or is it just work in order to stay ‘relevant’?
I understand now though that everything is a process, this pandemic has taken so much from people everywhere losing that intrinsic value. But we also have to see that through this pandemic we can still create value and meaning in our lives whenever we want to.
Why did you find it so difficult to express yourself through art in being alone?
Because I was stuck in my own thoughts 24/7. Especially being in another lockdown again, I feel like it's going to be another cycle of having to think about the work I put out and seeing if it's right. But at the same time it's just a battle with yourself, seeing if your work is relevant, if you’re keeping up with the trends and seeing if people still like your work basically.
How has your art and your perspective on art changed in the last year? How has COVID impacted that change?
During the first lockdown back in 2020, I began doing these stop-animations films that became my new love which resulted in me experimenting a lot on the different compositions I could do. I found influences mainly from foreign films like Fallen Angels (1995) by Wong Kar Wai and Memories of Matsuko (2006) by Tetsuya Nakashima.
The main thing that changed for me is only putting out work that I’m 100% happy with alongside continuously trying new things and how I can interpret that within my work.
Do you ever find that kind of perfectionism limiting?
Very much so. I literally can’t stop doing my work until I know it's perfect. It's really bad. Sometimes I’ll do a composition and think, oh this is fine, but then keep on going because I think “I can do better than this', but then I just keep on going and keep on going until it's 100% what I want.
Do you think your change in perspective will evolve once lockdown and the pressures of the pandemic have eased, or do you think the shift will remain?
I do see it evolving in a positive way, there’s no way of telling whether it will work out but at the end of the day it’ll help me develop my identity with my style and narrative as a visual artist.
Speaking of your style and artistic narrative, what is your process when beginning a new project?
Usually I use music. Listening to different genres, tempos and beats helps me to get into the flow, and compose images perfectly. The compositions just come to me as I go along and I can see different shapes. Adding different layers is the most important part of my work, then adding shapes and creating different compositions from different angles and perspectives. I see the background first, and then I visualise the rest.
That’s very interesting, one might think the central image would come first, with a background to match, so this backwards way of working is very unique! My last question for you Wil, is do you find satisfaction in the recognition you’ve received from outlets such as DAZED?
I hate to admit it but I do!
I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing! If we had no one to tell us how we are doing we’d have no unit of measurement for our growth.
That’s it for the interview. If you liked the images throughout, check out Wil’s Instagram @wil.salcedo and keep up to date with all of his projects, including his upcoming collaboration with Lava La Rue as he works on their music video!
This year’s FUZE is in aid of two charities: ArtRefuge and Black South West Network.
