Artist Interview Series | David Miller|Artistic Portrait Photography

Linus Galleries, Fine Art Gallery

2014 Artist Interview Series

David Miller

Linus Galleries, a fine art gallery based out of Los Angeles, presents The Artist Interview Series. This series is a new blog featuring Linus artists from a variety of different practices and backgrounds. The blog aims to be an enjoyable read, sharing insight into the artist’s creative process and workspace, as well as their view of the world around us. This week we feature David Miller and his artistic portrait photography

1) Please tell us your name, artistic practice of choice, and location in the world.

My name is David Miller and I work in photographic mixed media. I live in Chandler, Arizona near Phoenix.

2) Are you self taught or did you formally study art?

I received my BFA in Photography from ASU in 2006.

A view into the artist's workspace — A view into the artist’s workspace

3) What subject matter appears most in your artwork? What do you love about that subject? What do you dislike?

I photograph a lot of models in goddess or scifi/retro roles. I love working with talented interpreters who can make my ideas much better in an image, but there’s a lot of difficulty setting up shoots. The models who communicate professionally, show up on time, have magnificent skills are rare enough, but also most of them live in LA or NYC and I don’t.

A portrait of David's dog — A portrait of David’s dog

4) What is difficult for you about your chosen medium?

I think photography is very undervalued, people consume hundreds of images in a day and don’t apply a lot of critical thinking to either the creation of or appreciation of photographs. An example would be newspapers laying off their entire photographic staff, the presumption that everyone is a photographer because everyone has a phone camera.

5) Which describes you: Beach, Forest, Desert, Field, or City?

I wish it were beach but I live in the desert.
6) What musical artist/band are you currently listening to when you are creating?

Usually some combination of Meat Beat Manifesto, Future Sound of London, Phil Ochs, the Eels.

7) Any parting advice for budding artists?

The main factor to any artist’s success is perseverance. It has nothing to do with the amount of “likes” you accumulate- that doesn’t translate into money, and there is no particular value to those opinions, so you’re better served by avoiding social media and focusing on the work.