NAVA ARTIST FILE: VERNON AH KEE   

My name's Vernon Ah Kee.
I live in Brisbane.
I'm from North Queensland and I've been a full-time practicing
artist for, I don't know, about 15 years, I guess.
I think of myself as a conceptual artist.
In that, I think I have a -
I think my job is to make my ideas real
but, I think the core of my practice is drawing.
And if you pin me down, I will describe myself as a drawer.

WHAT WAS YOUR FIRST EXPERIENCE OF ART?
I would say my first experience of art that I can recall is
just being in my grandmother's house and sitting on the floor, drawing
on pieces of paper when I was about three or four.
And it correlates with stories from my mother and my grandmother
that say that I was easy to look after when I was a little fella
because they would just give me things to draw with.
And so, I have to say that's my first recollection anyway.

WHAT HAPPENS WHAT PEOPLE SEE YOUR WORK?
Well, I think when people encounter my work,
because it's designed to have -
it's designed to kind of come at you from different angles, I think.
But, certainly, I like the idea that I produce fairly beautiful work
and it's always well-designed and finished.
And it's because over the years, I've found that if you can produce
something, if you can present something that is beautiful,
people will very readily forgive the content
if it's too much or too heavy or too dark or too deep
or contrary to what their own personal beliefs are.
I think ultimately, it's about kind of stimulating a process and a
like a bit of an ides of themselves
that they hadn't thought about, hopefully.

WHAT DOES GROWTH LOOK LIKE FOR YOU?
I think, growth for me would be running headlong
into places I've never been in terms of my practice.
And so, I'm at a stage in my career where I get to kind of
just jump in feet first in things.
If someone presents me with something I haven't done before
or something just very different, I think I can -
you can be reasonably assured I'll stick my hand up and say,
"Let's try that."
And if doesn't work, it doesn't work
but it won't be because I didn't jump in feet first.
And I think, yeah -
I mean, not everything works, either
and ultimately, I think, you know, that's surely a sign of growth.

CAN ARTISTS LEARN FROM FAILURE?
Ideally, artist learn from failure in every way,
absolutely every way.
The first lesson to learn from failure is not to be afraid of it.
I won't say that I love it.
In fact, I hate it.
It's a huge inconvenience but, you know, you have to get used to it
and you breathe it in because it makes you stronger
and that is all there is to it.
You have to fail all the time.
Not, you have to, you should be.
If you're really trying, you should be failing all the time.
You have to produce a lot, a lot of work
and most of that should be absolute rubbish.
It's not any good at all because you're trying things
and you're figuring out what doesn't work.
And you run things through your head
and then, you test these ideas and when they don't work,
you just go, "Well, now we know that doesn't work."
The worst thing you can do is think that you're making
stuff that is worthy every time you go out
and that should never be happening.
You should never be thinking that so,
failure is the most important thing.
And absolute failures and big stuff-ups and catastrophic things
where you - as long as you're not burning things down
and, you know, lopping off limbs,
everything short of that, is good for your practice, believe me.