Seeing Color

On this episode, I headed over to John Peña’s house in Wilkinsburg to chat. I met John when I first arrived in Pittsburgh for graduate school and always found him to be warm and kind. John also received his MFA from Carnegie Mellon, but in 2008, well before I had even considered art as a possible career. John went to Columbia for a year before returning to Pittsburgh. From time to time, John teaches classes at Carnegie Mellon, so I always saw him running into the faculty lounge between classes. Over the four years, I slowly got to know John, from studio visits, grabbing a beer at the bar, or reading John’s comic, Daily Geology. John’s practice is vast and wide ranging, from racing clouds, sending letters to the Pacific Ocean, and constructing large-scale plaster word balloons. This conversation touches upon many topics, from trying to have control over things you have no control over, to forgetting one’s language to escape the past, and residing in a space of discomfort and disappointment. Some of the topics