British artist and philosopher Shantell Martin may call New Jersey home, but her new Los Angeles studio is having a profound effect on her work. After a furniture collection with Hoek and candles with Joya, she is creating music-driven performance work while readying myriad design launches.
What are you liking about L.A.? It’s a bright, open and playful city. I feel more relaxed here and it’s taken me in new directions, like working with sound. In my new performances, I invite guests, do an introduction and create a landscape of music with words from the audience—a spoken piece.
Yours is an especially collaborative studio. Yes, my work can be solitary, but with collaborations I get to show up, and that’s exciting. The point of being an artist is to make things and share them. Design is a nice way to bring art into people’s homes, too.
What’s ahead? A font named Shantell Sans. I’m dyslexic and reading and writing were hard, but I remember the typefaces that were more friendly. I’ve created one from my handwriting which will be free via Google Fonts. I’m also self-producing a line of mirrors that will be available on my online store, and later in the year will come blankets and towels for Rumpl.
