A Pixel Paints a Thousand Words: Donna Ikkanda's Digital Evolution

Published in Asia the Journal of Culture and Commerce, March 21, 2008.

For Donna Ikkanda, art isn't to be taken too seriously, but taking control of her creative identity is.

Donna Ikkanda

by Patricia Lamkin

Painter, graphic artist, and illustrator Donna Ikkanda has long struggled with her artistic identity.  Her ethnic heritage, her role as American woman, her sense of wonder and humor, and her love of clean, graphical images, all have informed her work – though not always to her advantage. But now Ikkanda has found a means of unifying and controlling these seemingly fractured aspects of her self, through digital technology. 

Her creative journey began in Santa Monica, California, where Ikkanda was born a Sansei Japanese-American. Her maternal grandfather in Pasadena had books and Japanese wood block prints introducing her to 18^th and 19^th century ukiyoe artists like Utamaro, Hokusai, and Eisen.  Their powerful blending of line and color fascinated her.

Ikkanda went on to study pictorial arts at UCLA, where she found herself drawn to artists who incorporated humor in their work. Visiting professor Ed Ruscha introduced her to the art of Ken Price, who became a lifelong inspiration. “His work is very graphic and whimsical,” she said.

Masami Teraoka, whom Ikkanda calls “a wild and crazy Japanese artist,” was another big influence. Teraoka utilized classic ukiyoe juxtaposed with contemporary western themes, such as his satiric cycle, “McDonalds Hamburgers Invade Japan.” Ikkanda began to explore east meets west motifs in a series of clever paintings depicting Japanese geishas, goddesses and ordinary women. One example, "Blossoms Quiver with too Much Bass," shows a traditional kimonoed woman under mei blossoms listening to a boom box. The paintings let Ikkanda, “explore personal themes of growing up female in two distinctly different cultures,” she said.

Koi by Donna Ikkanda

With the Japanese women paintings, came the challenge of being classified as an ethnic artist, a label that represented an ongoing struggle for Ikkanda.  “I spent a great deal of my childhood wishing I could blend in with the great white American majority,” she said. It wasn't until she studied the rich artistic traditions of Japan in college that she embraced her ancestral pride. But Ikkanda always felt more individual than part of a group. “I think this way of thinking is very American,” she said. "My ancestry versus my nationality - I can see these two traditions pushing and pulling within most of my work. Both are equally strong and important to me."

Well into the Japanese women series, Ikkanda, “yearned to create images which dealt less directly with my heritage,” she said.  But the gallery she was working with at the time resisted.  "They said ‘this is what’s selling, our clients know you as this, and you need to continue in this direction,’" she said.

Ikkanda's uncertain artistic identity also revolved around her graphical style.  “Galleries would say, ‘it’s beautiful, but it’s too commercial,’ and design studios would say ‘it’s not commercial enough, it looks like fine art,’” she said. They told her that she was somewhere on the fence. "I began to think my work resided between two opposite worlds and would never be accepted by either," she said. So she took a hiatus from painting, to raise her son and work in graphic design.

While working in design, Ikkanda was introduced to Artville, a royalty-free market company for illustration that sold images on cds. Design studios could buy the cd, use the images as often they wanted, and Artville would pay contributors per images sold. Ikkanda created two sets of images for Artville, “Animal Icons” and “Japanese Musings,” which included her Japanese women. But when Artville was bought out by Kodak, and then acquired by Getty Images, the arrangement changed. “When it was just Artville, there were limitations to how people could use the images,” Ikkanda said. But now the end user can legally use her images in ethically dubious ways with no added compensation to her.

Her experience with the royalty-free market taught her above all that her images are very popular. “I’ve seen my work appear on posters, tea tins, greeting cards, menus and an entire line of commercially sold sauces and dressings,” she said. "People are responding and I think I need to embrace the opportunity.” 

Using Illustrator and Photoshop which she learned on her "day job" as Senior Designer and Office Manager for her brother's company, Ikkanda Design Group, Ikkanda started creating digital animal icons for Chinese zodiac shirts. In 2006, armed with a Year of the Dog design, a friend suggested she contact Maria Kwong, the Director of Retail Sales at the Japanese American National Museum.  Kwong loved the designs, and now JANM features Ikkanda on their website, and her zodiac shirts are a regular item in the museum store.

Ikkanda began using Illustrator to create fine art, to take control of her work before someone made, “unauthorized prints using the royalty-free files,” she said. The process inspired five intriguing images. When showing her portfolio to the small Laguna gallery Endangered Planet, interestingly, it was the five new digital prints that stood out for them. They required 18 pieces to consider an exhibit. Ikkanda created the images she had yearned to make years before: "landscapes from without and within,” which bear no reference to Asian women or culture, save for a flying kitsch pincushion, and what Ikkanda calls her “mochi clouds."

Shoot the Moon by Donna Ikkanda

She learned from a digital printmaker that not only could several images be done at once, it was less costly than other forms of printmaking. And digital files require no physical storage. “I thought it was good news for artists who have limited capital and space,” she said.

Though her impetus to create digital fine art was self-protection, her main objective became, “to create works of quality and integrity I’d be proud to sign and sell,” she said. And she is very happy with the results. “The prints are so vivid, done on archive-quality paper with a watercolor paper-like texture,” she said.  To her each print has genuine integrity.  “They’re beautiful.  I want to see people reacting to my art the way I react to it,” she said.

Despite what might seem cold or mechanical, Ikkanda finds herself emotionally connected to the digital creative process. "Though I am less physically involved, I am more involved mentally," she said. "The main thing I miss is the ability to create textures in paint, by dabbing or wiping with a variety of materials," she said.  Yet even the computer programs allow her to be, “adventurous, play around and experiment.” And painting still plays a part. "I've yet to figure out how to digitally create washes which totally satisfy me. My current solution is to paint textures and washes and scan them.” The digital process can be can be slow, but also brings her, "great moments of serendipity."

After years at the mercy of the royalty-free market or pigeonholing gallery owners, now Ikkanda, along with her husband John Beilock, has embarked on the creation of a website for their company, Eat Cake Productions, to show and market her art her way. "It is now possible to approach galleries and other retailers through the Internet," she said. The company's new site, eatcake.biz, will open Ikkanda to the global market and give her control over inventory and sales. “Technology has given me the tools to greater creative expression, and has shown me what is possible by opening the door to the world,” she said.

And already Ikkanda’s digital prints are generating interest.  She recently learned she has been accepted in this year's Venice Art Walk on Sunday, May 18, with an exhibit at Bulldog Realtors, 1209 Abbot Kinney Boulevard.

As for her creative identity, “I still see myself on that little fence,” she said, "but now I feel I’m able to compartmentalize the fine art pursuits and the commercial pursuits.”  Ikkanda draws inspiration from singer Joni Mitchell.  "She has reinvented herself many times in order to remain true to herself," she said.

Like Joni Mitchell's music, Ikkanda's art has evolved, as much as in the way she sees and accepts herself.  Now she finds herself exploring a new technical frontier, reinventing herself digitally, and creating inner landscapes she once only dreamed of making.

For more information on Donna Ikkanda, visit eatcake.biz or http://www.janmstore.com/ikkanda.html.  For more on the Venice Art Walk visit, www.venicefamilyclinic.org.