Carol Civre
With her glossy 3D art, Carol Civre never dissapoints the eye. This New York based tech artist creates a bridge between fashion and 3D art, while putting a big focus on women. Get into the world of Carol and see for yourself how her gleaming and colorful visuals are pushing the boundaries of 3D art.
Hi Carol, tell us a little bit about yourself:
Hy!! I’m a 3D designer or creative tech artist.. depending on the day. That’s what I do professionally but I’m also a pretty good cook (I’ve been promising to start a dinner club and not really following through) and I love to play dress up (I have a collection of gloves, masks, and gowns that I’m pretty proud of).
How did you get into art? Have you always been into (3D) design?
I actually went to school for fine art where I learned all the fundamentals from art history and criticism to wood-working, metal-working, plaster casting, textiles, oil painting, live drawing… I even took a SFX makeup class. In my last year of university I decided to take some classes in the digital media major in the engineering department and that’s where my interest in digital work started to grow.Ever since I got out of school I’ve basically been teaching myself 3D and constantly trying to improve through watching very boring YouTube tutorials made by men with non-descript European accents (in fact one of the longer term projects I want to undertake is to create a YouTube channel for 3D tutorials that is not boring, taught by women, well-edited, and comprehensive (and cute).
I see a lot of fashion in your work. Aesthetically but also labels you've work with. Is that something you aim for?
Absolutely! In art school I often felt pressured to specialize in one medium and I actually have many different interests so I always found this limiting. I think that artistic mediums can exist together and that in fact that’s when art is most successful/interesting. I love 3D but what I really love is being able to apply it to other visual mediums.
I’m especially focused on fashion because I see a huge potential there due to things like avatar creation and trans-humanism as an aesthetic being really “trendy” right now. However, beyond trends, I think that the coming together of mediums that traditionally have no reason to interact opens the playing field for creating content that feels fresh. This is important to me because we are in a time where we feel like we’ve “seen it all” because of the speed and quantity at which we consume content.
Where do you find inspiration?
My day one inspo is The Sims. I have an LLC called Motherlode, which is the cheat in The Sims that gets you 50,000 simoleons (Sims money). I love video games in general (not so much playing them but more watching other people play them). Games like Animal Crossing, the new Shadow of the Colossus, David O’Reily’s Everything, the Final Fantasy Series, Dishonored + more are visually stunning and super inspirational when it comes to CGI.
Apart from this I get a lot of inspiration from the style and decor I grew up around. I grew up in Italy and I love how gaudy Italian style can be. Italy is hyper focused on style, arts, and visual language (as well as food) because these are the things that keep the country afloat and this has certainly inspired me both consciously and unconsciously.
What has been your favorite project until now?
Actually the project that is nearest and dearest to my heart also happened to be one of the most stressful things I’ve ever taken on. About a year ago I was taking part in an artist residency where two friends and I decided to make a virtual reality application about different facets of sex education we felt lacked from traditional sex ed. curriculums. It was supposed to be comprised of three parts covering the topics of consent, gender identity & sexual orientation, and sex toys & masturbation. Turns out we were in way over our heads because we were a team of three (none of which was an experienced developer), and we had no funding and didn’t consider the difficulty in getting funding for virtual reality, let alone virtual reality about sex that wasn’t porn-related (oh no!), let alone virtual reality about non porn-related sex created by three women. Ha- ha!
Anyway, we pushed through one part of it and it was an incredibly challenging yet valuable experience. What came of it is an experience called Lube River, which may not be everything I hoped it would but nothing has ever felt so much like a child to me because of all the thought and care me and its other two moms put into it.
In the future I hope to be able to revisit these ideas and bring them to life. For now you can watch a trailer for Lube River here: https://www.motherlodelab.com/luberiver/
What would be your dream collaboration?
There’s a lot of incredible creatives I drool over every day but for the sake of avoiding another rant I’ll say that my ultimate collab would be with Fecal Matter. Also if they can adopt me.
If you were a food, what would it be?
No brainer – pasta. More specifically I would be either penne but ribbed ones (smooth penne are a disgrace) or bucatini (the thick spaghetti with a hole in the middle). My sauce would have to be amatriciana (tomato and bacon). I’m pasta queen…
Any current obsessions?
Fish slippers, Barbies wearing dresses made of charcuterie, themed toilet paper holders.
Anything you’d like to add?
Hmmm. I’d like to say that it’s really special for me to see a diverse range or artists working in 3D. 3D art is really experiencing a growth spur at the moment and I’m pleased to see that some of the people reaping benefits from this are not the types of people who would traditionally be involved in art and tech. Sooooo.. support diversity in 3D! Because that will make for a much more interesting range of visuals than if you keep hiring the same old white guy - snore! <3
courtesy CAROL CIVRE
interview NIKKI VEKEMANS
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