Brett Douglas Hunter has been haunted by a sleep demon. And though he doesn’t talk about it much, his creature-forward work—in galleries, homes, yards, and at Bonnaroo, a yearly art and music festival in Manchester, TN—conveys that he is no stranger to the otherworldly. Hunter’s most recent work Cryptids and Crinoids, a 200-piece show at Elephant Gallery in Nashville, is a menagerie of wooden figures from the artist’s subconscious—some spectral, some whimsical, all wild and wonderful. I caught up with Hunter in his studio to talk about his return to smaller work, the role of artistic exercise in exorcising the mind, and the benefits of daily practice for creative longevity.
Sarah Carter: I know you’ve been working on really large-scale sculptural work for a while—like your Big Pink (2023) barn at Bonnaroo or your stand-alone creatures at The Grove. What made you want to work smaller again?
Brett Douglas Hunter: I went to make some little gifts last Christmas, and I was like, “I’ve got one day to make like fourteen things.” And I just made a bunch of these little guys, and one of them was this little squiggly figure. It reminded me of the weird experience I had as a teenager, and I kind of ran with that once I realized the thought was there.
SC: Tell me about this monster.
BDH: When I was a teenager, I would have sleep paralysis hallucinations. It’s pretty common—sort of? People talk about the sleep paralysis demon. A lot of times there’s a figure—a being.
I would be falling asleep, and I would hear this awful demonic sound. And it was like droning, groaning, and this horrible feeling. And then I couldn’t move or scream or really see very well, of course—because I was falling asleep. This blurry being would come into the room and make its way to me and then start attacking me. And I would have to concentrate really, really, really hard to make it go away. And I would, then I would just wake up gasping.
SC: That is so scary. What was it about this way of making work that made you want to keep doing it?
BDH: I was trying to get into a routine. I was like, “I’m gonna make twenty-five things and sell them at the end of the week.” And it felt really good to do that. The instant gratification of making this smaller stuff in a short amount of time, getting it out there in the world, getting a little bit of money for it, and starting over felt awesome.
Then, I just tried to keep up with that, but it didn’t end up working. I would finish twenty things in a week, and then I would be back at the beginning—and it started not feeling good. And I was having to clean up to paint, and then clean up all my paint stuff to switch back to saw-mode. And so, for the last half…I did all the cutting first and all the painting after that.
SC: Were you drawing every day?
BDH: I was when I was working like that. I’d just start doodling and fill up a page or two in my sketchbook. I try to not think while I’m doing that, and then pick from those doodles. There will be some dumb fart joke or some distant past experience or some inside joke from years ago. I was trying to develop some kind of routine and discipline, also part of regulating my work life and my life.
SC: How is your larger-scale work different from this daily practice of working from your sketchbook?
BDH: There’s just a lot more logistics involved. The idea part is usually one day. Then the rest is just making it happen, which could be months of my existence when I’m not really being creative at all. When I’m making one of these small things, I’m not thinking about how much it costs, how am I going to lift it, how big the truck is going to be, or how many people I will have to get to help me…so it’s just a lot more fun.
I felt like I lost touch with being impulsive about stuff [while working large-scale]. I feel like this is my first time trying to find that balance between the two and keep up this small work to inform and make better, larger work.
SC: How did you decide to turn this practice into Cryptids and Crinoids?
BDH: I’d been wanting to do a show for a while. I haven’t done one since February 2018, but it just like wasn’t making sense to me to do sculptural work for a gallery show. I was feeling a little burnt out on that stuff. Also, I have a hard time making that stuff very affordable. It bothers me when people come to art shows and are just like, “I love that thing, but I could never afford it.” When I made these little gifts or sales of these smaller pieces that just all clicked. I was like, “This is what I want to do. And I want to do it here [at Elephant].”
SC: Do you think you’ll keep working this way now that the show is open?
BDH: I’m going to make this a regular habit. It feels like momentum. In the past, since I moved here [from Illinois], I’ve experienced lulls, where I’m really not doing any work at all. I need to keep going, or it’s just gonna go away. And then when an opportunity comes along to do something bigger, I’ll have this cache of ideas to pull from—this energy that I’ve been steamrolling. When I moved here, I had been cranking out little stuff for years. And I want that process back.
