by Beláxis Buil
7/21/2019
Rafael Vargas Bernard, Se voló la puerta / and everyone can see inside, 2018, Found wooden door, tactile transducer speakers, insulated wire, teensy 3.2 development board, accelerometer and x, y and z position sensor, and acrylic paint
Rafael Vargas Bernard, Analizando post-Maria Puerto Rico, 2018, Hot press cotton watercolor paper, acrylic aerosol paint, acrylic paint marker, acrylic medium, acrylic paint, wood, insulated wire, teensy 3.2 development board, and RGB color and light sensor
Rafael Vargas Bernard, Buscando en el escombro / for something better collectors edition audio single, 2018, Electrical conduit, wood, plastic, cement, usb drive, and insulated usb cable
Rafael Vargas Bernard, Buscando donde cargar / and my electricity withdrawl, 2018, EMT conduit, EMT junction box, wood, copper wires, micro-controller board, controllable multi-outlet, speaker, servo motor, HC-SR04 ultrasonic ranging distance sensor, 2.8 watt amp, epoxy, enamel paint and programming, 60 x 45 x 30 approximately
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Rafael Vargas Bernard is a young, humorous, creative residing in Miami, Florida. His work integrates performance, installation, sculpture and technology in ways that invites the viewer to both work with technology and listen into a mechanism that may provide some fresh answers to the present and future. His mannerisms are swift and direct and his intentions include the environment, all types of people and probabilities of success and failures into his work.
BB: By investigating your work, I found that your work examines the collapse and regeneration of a system/s. When I mean by that is by the structure or infrastructure collapses or destroys our reality, yet the destruction provides an opportunity for us to re-create something newer, and in your work, you do that. You create these sculptures with these robotic mechanisms that provide a new way of working. That creates a whole new language of work-ability, functionality, and structure. Do we want governmental and socioeconomic structures to collapse? Look at Venezuela, Cuba, and even Italy. These countries are facing comic strife and are in debt billions of dollars. The structure of leadership is a culprit to the corruption that exists in the economy and segregation that exists between communities. We live in a democracy that dismisses our constitutional rights and voting power. The question comes down to: will the people have the capacity to enforce their infrastructure to build the skeleton needed for the broader structure? Will "we the people" really do for the people? Is your work a metaphor to teach the viewer how to work with a new system? Is this the only window we have to prove that something new is waiting on the other side? RVB: I consider my interactive work a call to action challenging the passive participant (viewer) to become an active participant; not only to work with a new system, but to question it and become an integral influential part of a system. My automated work has a similar approach but focuses on participation through analysis and reaction. BB: When I look at Air Guitar synth stick, you built a sculpture that replaced an iPhone, an old record player, and cassette player. This Devo-sculpture (as I term it) is pure garbage delightfully reinvented and an example of seizing a moment of chaos and destruction to showcase humanity's intelligence by presenting how to reinvent the wheel. I enjoy that you allow the public to participate in your work. More specifically, in your works where there is robotics. Now I know that some produce sounds and those sounds maybe something that we are familiar with or unfamiliar with. So you provide a space for the public to hear this. Moreover, within those sounds, I am sure that messages are emitted but do you think the audience is fit and ready to receive? Are we all on the same level and have the capacity to perceive those unconscious sound-waves that can give us more information and data on things that we need to do for ourselves as humanity? I am very critical on this topic. People's behaviors and social tendencies have destroyed my reality and sense of hope. I think that it is wise to psychologically challenge the viewer/opponent by informing them we are not competent enough to come out the other side, smarter, better, and wiser. I think society flaunts a self-righteous and empty attitude of "positive vibes" and evolution. RVB: The sounds emitted by my works are directly related to and produced by the systems they are a part of and often directly affected by the participant's actions. Although the generative process and aesthetic of the sounds in my works are constructed from an intellectual and conceptual perspective, the intention is that the effect of these on the participant be abstract and emotive. BB: Although I love the participatory opportunities, you extend to the public, my concern is; if we know our systems fail because humans err inequity, why continue giving them chances-even at play? What I critically mean by this is that not everyone has the structure within themselves to recreate or regenerate systems that benefits others too. What I see is the omission of expected or required action. The collapse of systems is a chance for others to make it better for themselves. Societies live in the constant state of Ouroboros. Through the process of collapse or devouring ourselves, a new wholeness is found, well, at least we would like to believe this idea. On May 19th you posted the image of a sculpture. The sculpture has a yellow hue, a few cables and suspended in midair. When looking at the piece, I found a few things. One, that it resembles a chair, and a chair is an object that is designed to be practical for the user. The second thing I found about the sculpture is that it omits sound (is this correct)? The third feature I noticed is how the sculpture seems right about to fold into itself. The fourth and fifth characteristics are the sculpture serves as a shelter, a home of protection nd solace or as an object to cowardly shield oneself from outside elements- too afraid to confront. It resembles the roof of a house. One can either protect themselves from outside elements or utilize it hide underneath itTherefore I concluded that: we sit back to receive accurate or inaccurate information that may be practical for our comfort or the poison to the demise of the structure. Am I analyzing your work on a whole other level, or is my analysis somewhat correct? RVB: Close enough to be correct BB: Culture is learned behaviors and ways of being because we are "born into it." Systems are cultures. Many of us are accustomed to these ways, and there is a behavioral tendency or rather a "culture of comfort" as anthropologist Sarah Mahler explains that we do things based on patterns, things we know or are born into. One of those patterns is failure. The other is a success. It is the human species that has the mental capacity to reason, but we selfishly make our immediate environments, comfortable systems for ourselves because it what we inherit and know. When I examine your work, it is apparent that you are allowing a mechanical device to explore a collaborative effort with the human race. An effort that benefits both entities.I do not think that artificial intelligence is comfortable for any of us (except for those of us born into it: which is the true meaning of “culture”). We are forced to face a culture of technology we have to slowly adapted to and have done so since the 80’s (publicly). Should AI (artificial intelligence) or robotics be given a chance to change our perception to collaborations and how that can benefit us in the present to the future? After all, humans seem handicap in many areas of labor and community. RVB: AI, AR, and robotics can help us be more productive and achieve tasks impossible without their help, but they can also make us comfortable to the point of slothfulness. We should be actively conscious of our changing systems and perceptions and take an active part in how we evolve and change as a society. BB: In History class and the media, we are reminded of humanity's horrifically violent failures. Do your mechanisms provide the viewer to an opportunity to acquaint themselves to a mechanical future- a future where the structures tend to industrialize our ability to repair and function properly? Why give the public the power to work with such an idea of empowerment when perhaps the audience is comfortably numb and seeking a sense of entertainment in art? Do you think they take the message seriously once they have participated with your work? RVB: I have learned to not expect. Humans are humans and will do whatever meaningless random thing satisfies their whims. My intention is to give an opportunity for direct influence over a system as a method for engaging and empowering. A person may or may not take advantage of this opportunity. The work can still be appreciated by experiencing it in use by someone else or inactive/dormant. As in "real" life, one can be present and passive and be satisfied with an incomplete or superficial experience. The viewer has the option to be as active and experience as much as they want to. No matter what, it's still Art and it's still entertainment. BB: Some of your work reminds me of prosthetics. There is a photo on your Instagram page uploaded on May 4th where you state "Got some new helping hands." It is funny. Your assistant is only temporary and quite practical at the moment. Many of your pieces brilliantly portray the temporal environment and material (found in the fleeting moment of despair and debris) into probable, sophisticated arrangements that serve to function. I know that a large part of your creative interventions stemmed from the disaster following hurricane Maria. Although it was a dark moment and a far cry from the Emerald City, your sense of humor quenched all thoughts despair into one of finding solutions to the problem. Have you always seen the rainbow and the pots of gold in your life, or did that particular incident in your life transform you into your better version? RVB: I have always used humor to deal with difficult subjects. But, after living through the aftermath of Hurricane Maria plus other things that were going on in my life during that time: I was better able to see the solutions, opportunities, and positive aspects of this shit-storm called life. BB: Rafa, you are funny. |
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by Leigh Lemay 10/1/2019 “From her very flesh and blood and from the constant cycles of filling and emptying the red vase in her belly, a woman understands physically, emotionally and spiritually that zeniths fade and expire, and what is left is reborn in unexpected ways and by inspired means, only to fall back to nothing, and yet be reconceived again in fully glory.” - Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Ph.D. 'Women Who Run With the Wolves'. Initially drawn to Catherine’s recent work via Instagram which includes both her commercial and artistic photography, I discovered amid her impressive contemporary portraiture, some of the images from her last two art exhibitions; HER – a collaborative exhibition “showing the psychological interior and external physicality of women” (m2 Gallery, Sydney, Australia) and THE SILENT THOUGHTS OF STATUES – a solo exhibition that “investigates perceptions surrounding the sensuality of the body, aging and mortality.” (Disorder Gallery, Sydney, Australia). All the portraits were visually absorbent (enough to draw me in). They were the pictures of veteran modern dancer, Anca Frankenhaeuser from the Statues exhibition and the self-portrait, The Last Rose from HER. Social media is now thankfully brimming with inspirational accounts advocating female body-positivity, though it is decidedly more rare to come across older women who are being celebrated with the same tenacity. I have not seen them represented with as much finesse as Catherine achieves. Anca, a septuagenarian, defies everything we are conditioned to believe about the aging female form—that it is weak, ugly, and unsophisticated. 'A process of transformation whereby women in particular become socially invisible' (Featherstone and Hepworth, 1993). Catherine's portraits of Anca are a testament to the beauty and wisdom gained throughout a life lived, and the undeniable strength women find as they age which is so often disregarded in older women. Influenced by a white, marble Brancusi sculpture of a face that was barely there, Catherine's ethereal photographs tell a story that you are invited to be a part of but never fully grasp. Not merely a snapshot of a brief moment in time, but a performance, they are as mysterious as they are alluring. Catherine: “At first, I was coming from a visual place where I was interested in experimenting with creating extreme high-key (light) and very low-key (dark) imagery. Conceptually, this was to highlight the contrast of woman as the archetype of purity, with the opposing archetype of woman as Salome the temptress, or as Freud described; 'the dark continent'. Instigated by religion, perpetuated by the patriarchy and still persisting today, the low-key images in the HER exhibition were an inquiry into the fear of erotic female power and sexuality, while the lightness of the imagery in the Statues series evolved from the notion of purity, and instead developed into a sensual exploration and celebration of womanhood, particularly in the realms of fertility and maturity. The roses that occur throughout both bodies of work originated in the self- portrait, The Last Rose, as a motif. A representation of the last of the 'potential little lives', which served as impetus for further contemplation as I found myself transitioning into menopause. A natural process that is still largely shrouded in unspoken grief and shame.” When you meet Catherine in person, it is difficult to reconcile that she is experiencing her own grief and shame that arrives with the climacteric. She possesses a quiet poise indicative of her background in dance. A smooth, confident grace imbues all of her movements and even her speech. She exudes an elegance and ease that show up quite spectacularly in both the performative poses in her imagery and her models of choice. In Catherine's work I detect a sensitive negotiation of her current state. I feel privy to a tribute. A deeply relatable, tender-hearted celebration of the meaningful journey preceding this phase of her life, and a courageous welcoming of the important journey to come. It is a call to honor my own passage, and an important reminder that we as women do not share in its intricacies enough. |
With Dawn Chan at MBUS (Miami Beach Urban Studios/Florida International University) after a talk, in 2015. Photo courtesy, Dr. Patel
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by Beláxis Buil Edited by Dr. Alpesh Kantilal Patel 4/10/2020 Art historian and scholar Dr. Alpesh Kantilal Patel's recently published book, Productive failure: writing queer transnational South Asian art histories (Manchester University Press, 2017 provides original commentary on how queer theory can deconstruct and provide new approaches for writing art history. He sets out to write new transnational South Asian art histories - to make visible histories of artworks that remain marginalized within the discipline of art history. However, this is done through a deliberate “productive failure” - specifically, by not upholding the strictly genealogical approach that is regularly assumed for South Asian art histories. His book also examines “whiteness,” the invisible ground upon which racialized art histories often pivot, as a fraught yet productive site for writing art history. Dr. Patel has contributed to seven anthologies and is the editor of five exhibition catalogs. Research for his book projects have been supported by grants and fellowships from (among others) the National Endowment of Humanities, Cranbrook Academy of Art, the Fulbright Foundation, Arts Council England, and New York University’s Asian/Pacific/American Institute and Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality. An advocate for gender + LGBTQI equality, Dr. Patel dedicates his voice to many art magazines including Art in America, Hyperallergic, frieze, and Artforum. His scholarship, curatorial work, and art criticism have earned him a prestigious spot as an Associate Professor of Contemporary Art and Theory at Florida International University in Miami. In a recent interview we sat down to discuss a new book on which he is working as well as an anthology he is coediting, what his research means to him, and to his audience BB: Dr. Patel, I am really excited to learn about the book you are currently working on. Can you explain what you are researching for your new book? Does the book have a title? If so, can you disclose the title, or should the reader wait until the book is officially published? How is it different or similar to your last book, Productive Failure? What topics are you dissecting, arguing or investigating? Why? AP:The working title for the book is provisionally titled “Transregional Entanglements: Sexual Artistic Geographies.” It conceptually started to come together for me when I realized there was a fascinating connection between two artworks I really loved: California-based Tina Takemoto’s video Looking for Jiro (2011) and Tallinn, Estonia-based Jaanus Samma’s installation Not Suitable for Work: A Chairman’s Tale (2016). Takemoto explores the homoerotica and material connected to WWII incarceration camps that are part of gay Japanese American Jiro Onuma’s (1904–1990) archive, housed in the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender Historical Society in San Francisco, California, whereas Samma considers documents that are culled from official Estonia historical archives regarding Juhan Ojaste’s (1921–1990) sodomy trial during the early post-war era. Both works dealt with LGBTQI (lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans*, queer, intersex) erasures in archives yet the likelihood these artworks would be “read” together by an art historian is slight. That is, LGBTQI Asian American subjects are positioned against an unmarked heterosexual, white American populace, while LGBTQI subjects from Estonia are situated against heterosexual Estonians. What model allows for a discussion beyond vertical relationships of power within nations and for the specter of homosexuality and communism to be seen across Asian America and Estonia, rather than only within them as closed systems? “Transregional Entanglements” attempts to explore different models to think about sexual differences that are both elastic and yet always already contextualized. It will focus on artworks examining Asian American, African American, and Latino LGBTQI subjectivities as well as artworks outside of Euro-America that are often marginalized (such as those from eastern Europe and Asia, in particular.) My first book, Productive Failure: Writing Transnational South Asian Art Histories was about thinking about new ways of writing specifically queer and transnational South Asian art histories. “Transregional Entanglements” focuses on the entire planet. To be clear, this monograph is not about “inclusion” or ensuring “diversity” in a conventional sense. It is intent on creating new relations between and among artworks concerned with LGBTQI issues in regions often seen as bound spaces. Each chapter deliberately stages collisions and encounters between aesthetic practices that may appear unrelated at first glance. It does so to enact, perform, and instantiate cross-cultural contexts for sexual artistic geographies and thereby to bring into being a new world of intimacy and relationality across multiple times and spaces. BB: Aside from the robust cohort of scholars such as Marsha Mekimmon, Roland Barthes, or artists Cy Twombly or Navar Bhavsar in your last book, who can the reader find in your latest endeavor of research? I know that you draw on important figures or scholars within the arts, but what about outside the field of art? I am aware of your strong, interdisciplinary background whilst studying in London. I also enjoyed how you intersect various subject matter in Productive Failure. Quite frankly, I am anticipating that again. AP: I will draw a lot on writings on creolization, particularly those of Martinican-born poet and theoretician Édouard Glissant. Creolization references the process of cultural mixings in the Caribbean that come as a result of slavery, plantation culture, and colonialism. However, Glissant believed that creolization could refer to a broader set of sociocultural processes not only in the Caribbean but also “all the world” (Tout-monde). Moreover, art historian Irit Rogoff has gestured towards the usefulness of creolization as a theory in constructing global art histories, too. With the exception of Rogoff’s work, there surprisingly has been little engagement in the art world with creolization since the three-day workshop “Créolité and Creolization” took place in St Lucia as one of the platforms of Documenta 11 in 2002. As such, my project can make a real contribution to the consideration of creolization as useful in writing art histories. AP: I started working on my first book in 2006. It wasn’t until 2015, though, that I began to write the final manuscript which I’d submit a year later. I’m expecting this next book to take less time to get out in the world, especially since I already have published three chapters in various anthologies--Global Encyclopedia of LGBTQ History: A-F, edited by Howard Chiang, 2019; Globalizing East European Art Histories: Past and Present, coedited by Beáta Hock and Anu Allas, 2018; and Otherwise: Imagining Queer Feminist Art Histories, edited by Amelia Jones and Erin Silver, 2016—that I will re-work for the new book. All of my chapters beyond these are clearly mapped out at this point, too. They will be broken up into five thematic sections, each one organized around a concept from the aforementioned scholar Édouard Glissant’s rich lexicon, which adds texture to his conceptualization of creolization. The concepts I have chosen are “archipelago,” chaotic “root,” “opacity,” “errantry,” and “Tout-monde.” These terms provide a loose but important optic through which to examine a broad array of artists' works (paintings, video, installations, drawing, performance and photography) and to a lesser degree, events and exhibitions. I am hoping to start completing strong drafts of various chapters by the end of summer. If I can do that, then that bodes well for the book being published sooner rather than later. At the same time, I’m trying to be patient. You can’t rush research and you have to be open to the unexpected. BB: As the reader situates into the new book, will she/he find past research integrated within the chapters, or perhaps woven into the new research? How about past sources and scholars? For example, in Productive Failure you draw in the reader’s attention by expressing your interest in Cy Twombly’s artworks and Roland Barthes’s writing suggesting a queer understanding in sexuality’? Will the reader find Twombly and Barthes in the new book? If so, how are you integrating both subjects this time around? AP: “Transregional Entanglements” has a similar sensibility to Productive Failure in that it is interested in the philosophy of how one puts together an “art history.” The new book interrogates the limitations both of LGBTQI art histories and global art histories, both of which are constructed as mutually exclusive to a large degree. Beyond that, though, the book will have a whole new set of artists whose works I will explore including those of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, based in San Francisco, California and of Pakistani and Lebanese descent; DJ Arshia Haq, based in Los Angeles, California and of Pakistani descent; Jaanus Samma, based in Tallinn, Estonia; Pepe Mar, based in Miami, Florida and of Mexican descent; Karol Radziszewski, based in Warsaw, Poland; Salman Toor, based in New York City and of Pakistani descent; New York artist Chitra Ganesh based in Brooklyn, New York and of Indian descent; Thanh “Nu” Mai and Aiden Nguyễn, based in Saigon; LatinX artist Xandra Ibarra, based in Oakland, California; Cassils, based in Los Angeles, California; and Ebony C. Patterson, based in Kingston, Jamaica and Louisville, Kentucky. BB: You had an amazing book signing last year at Books & Books in Coral Gables, Florida. Have you considered a book signing in the UK or touring a few cities within the US? AP: In November of 2017, Atif F. Sheik and Neha Ghosh kindly hosted the launch of the book at the non-profit Twelve Gates Arts (PA) of which they are co-directors/founders. It included a discussion with queer South Asian art historian Natasha P. Bissonauth. Twelve Gates Arts’ programming overlaps with many aspects of my book so it was an ideal place. Beyond that, I’ve had an opportunity to present parts of my book in universities in the US and Western Europe. I would really love to do a book tour in England given two chapters of the book deal specifically with the city of Manchester in the Mid-lands. On another note, I’ve been so honored that the monograph has been an inspiration for artists. For instance, artists Chitra Ganesh and Sung Hwan Kim highlighted the book in their artwork/text piece “Between You and Me: Chitra Ganesh and Sung Hwan Kim,” in Artpractical.com (August 2018) and Shelly McMahon and Katrina Wu used the book as a point of departure for their exhibition, Full Disclosure, during Munich Jewelry Week (March 2019). BB: What about broadcasting live readings from your book? I mean, Podcasts and Radio are such a fantastic way to share your work to a broader audience. You could even open up the reading via a phone line for the readers/audience to call in and ask questions. People love engaging with the original creator, writer or a specialist for some one-on-one time. It also allows the individual to become more acquainted with you. Furthermore, it is also such a great way to ‘workshop’ your research with other minds: whether like-minded or not. Geez, I wonder where I learned about work-shopping with others from (Dr. Patel copyright-all the way!). LOL. I recently did an interview with performance art historian and curator RoseLee Goldberg. We spoke for about 90 minutes about her life for this anthology Storytellers of Art History I am co-editing with Yasmeen Siddiqui. The monograph is part of Sharon Louden’s book series, Living and Sustaining a Creative Life, which is based on her best-selling eponymously titled anthology focusing on artists. I sent off the audio to get transcribed. When I got the transcription, it felt like something was lost. It underscored to me how important someone’s voice can be to how we experience his/her/their words. Oral and written language aren’t the same. So, I think you are right—podcasts and oral interviews seem so important. BB: Work-shopping one’s work is something you have professed in your classroom to students. It is definitely a marvelous skill, or let’s call it a ‘healthy habit’ to acquire for any professional practice and research. Did one of your mentors teach you this healthy habit-or, did you just naturally perform this skill without anyone having to teach you? AP: I would receive copious comments on my writing from my PhD advisor (and now a dear friend) the brilliant feminist art historian Amelia Jones. Her informed and regular feedback every few months was such a gift. She was tough, but I’ve never had anyone take my writing so seriously. I also knew that my experience was exceptional: most of my peers did not have supervisors who engaged as deeply as Amelia did with my writing. So, when I started teaching, I wanted to give the kind of feedback she did. Students deserve it. Of course, a PhD thesis is completed over 3-5 years, so I’ve had to adapt what work-shopping might mean for those writing MFA theses, which is completed over one semester. BB:Dr. Patel, do you have any words of advice for young and old writers who would like to publish? AP: Find a group with whom you can workshop your writing before you submit your manuscript to a publisher. A group will keep you motivated, too. BB: After this book can we expect another one- or would you rather take a long vacation, somewhere far, far away? AP: Well, writing at its best can be like being on a vacation. LOL. Seriously though, I should elaborate on the anthology Storytellers of Art History (Intellect, expected 2021) I referenced above. The writing of histories is effectively about storytelling, which by its very nature is incredibly subjective and often fictional. Yet, histories are usually taught and presented as inviolable truths. The 32 contributors to this anthology all emphasize that art history is always already multiple. The make-up of our contributors reflects that in addition to art historians, archivists as well as curators and artists have always played a central role in the writing of art histories. Each individual has provided short, often very personal contributions indicating how they began to become passionate about their practices. Indeed, another way in which histories function more honestly as stories is if the authors become visible. The contributors responded to the same prompt in a multitude of surprising ways. The stories take various forms--a letter written to a friend, the pastiche of image and text, a children’s fable, interviews, co-authored narrative, memoir, and apology. This anthology includes not only the voices of those who have been shaping histories for decades—such as the aforementioned RoseLee Goldberg, critic Lucy Lippard, and artist Juana Quick-To-See Smith but also those who are mid-career or just beginning to make contributions to the field—such as the co-founder of Hong Kong-based Asia Art Archive, art historian Gloria Sutton, archivist Joshua Franco, and artist Viet Le. Overall, we have twice as many women than men given our strong interest in amplifying the voices of women so that they cease to be erased. More than half of the contributors focus on gender as well as sexuality, both long ignored and often censored in dominant art histories. BB: :) Super. |
Un Interview in Spanglish con Carla Forté
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by Beláxis Buil 6/10/2020 Carla Forte (Caracas - Venezuela) lives and work in Miami- Florida. After training as a dancer, Forte established herself as an inter-disciplinary artist incorporating dance, film and performance through different media. Forte is the co-founder and film director of Bistoury Physical Theatre and Film. Her feature film “Conejo”, “Ann”, and her feature documentary “The Holders” have been selected at numerous high-caliber film festivals such as Atlanta International Film Festival, Miami International Film Festival, St. Louise Film Festival among others. Forte has directed internationally featured video-dance pieces including “Nostalgia di Domicella”, “Hurricane”, and “Interrupta”, screened at prominent galleries an festivals, such as Rochester International Film Festival, Cannes Film Festival, OGA VideoArt Exhibitions, Festival Les Instants Vidéo and South Florida PBS. Forte has won artistic residencies from prestigious programs such as Knight Arts Challenge Miami (2019); En Residencia Koubek Center (2019); Kulturscio'k Live Art Collective, Domicella- Italy (2019- 2018); FONLAD Residency Program Coimbra- Portugal (2018), Berlinale Talent Berlin (2017) and other illustrious awards. BB: Carla, did you begin your formal training as a dancer in Venezuela, or in the United States? CF: Luego de cuatro años intensos de estudios me gradué como Interprete de Danza Contemporánea en el Instituto Universitario de Danza en Caracas- Venezuela. Debido a mi alto rendimiento académico recibí por parte de la universidad una beca de intercambio para asistir al Instituto Universitario Nacional del Arte en Argentina. Después de entrenar como bailarina y experimentar dentro de algunas disciplinas del arte me establecí como artista de medios con una práctica que incorporaba danza, cine y performance. BB: While you trained as a dancer were you consciously thinking of how the body’s movement shifted from a 3-dimensional plane to a 2-dimensional plane? When we dance in real time, in the present space, we as dancers get to experience the magnitude of space and movement is such a way that could be difficult to present on film, or video. Being a dancer and/or choreographer gives one an extra edge or understanding of the body's spatial relationship to time and space. When you shift from dancer/choreographer to director/filmmaker you have to think of strategies that can bring those moments to the viewer. How do you plan that in your work? CF: Al momento de crear una obra, mi mente unifica automáticamente las distintas disciplinas en las que trabajo. No puedo imaginar seccionarlas a la hora de crear, ni siquiera puedo imaginar en ese momento si es una es más importante que la otra. Trabajar la danza con el cine… O el cine con la danza, la simbiosis, la necesidad de explorar y expresarme libremente, incluso traspasando las etiquetas dentro del mundo del arte. BB: There are such vast differences between the choreographed and the improvised. Explain to me how a dance/director/choreographer who appreciates improvisation works with the reality of an over lived experience when a work is over rehearsed. Although I was not able to see Conejo at the Coral Gables Cinema during the 37th Miami Film Festival, I read a summary that describes the story about two characters intensely immersed in the creative process. The two characters completely isolate themselves from the rest of society to ‘develop and intertwine; the creation of a character’. This sounds very similar to the life of a dancer. The life of a dancer becomes quite isolated, living for days and hours in a studio incessantly rehearsing parts. Is there any part of Conejo that becomes biographical? CF: Nuestro largometraje Conejo fue creado bajo pautas de improvisación a partir de una escaleta clara que contaba una historia. Decidimos crear este espacio de creación porque la historia lo pedía a gritos, ya que como equipo teníamos mucho mas libertad creativa. Este proyecto fue basado en una obra teatral escrita por mi hermano Vicente Forte. Mis obras no son literalmente autobiográficas, pero definitivamente muestran un mundo muy personal. En el caso de Conejo muestra un mundo interior de los hermanos Forte. BB: Where do you feel most authentic: in the studio dancing, choreographing, or directing, or even acting in one of your films? It’s such an unfair question to ask. An artist/creative who is adept, skilled, or multifaceted shouldn’t be asked what medium authenticates their work, or sense of artistic identity. CF: La disciplina o las disciplinas no me generan el sentimiento como tal, lo que genera la autenticidad es el momento de crear y para mí ese momento de libertad lo general el cine, la danza como un todo. BB: Why is that? CF: Porque crear nos hace libre y en mi caso no siento más o menos libertad a la hora de bailar o hacer una película. En ambas soy completamente libre. BB: I don’t know how your training as a dancer went, but for many of us training meant being loyal to dance- and nothing else. Most dancers dipping their toes in multiple creative processes were often scolded and told that too many distractions would take away from a successful career in dance. I disagreed with that. I thought it was a very dated way to approach the arts, especially when it came to theater, dance, and performance. When you create your films, are most of the actors/actresses dancers or individuals who work in physical theater multi-disciplinary practioneers? CF: Definitivamente es obsoleto pensar que podemos determinar en otro, incluso en nosotros mismos nuestra capacidad creativa. Como mujer y artista multidisciplinaria creo en las distintas maneras en que un artista o un ser humano puede expresarse. A la hora de abordar un proyecto me enfoco inicialmente en lo que estoy dispuesta y necesito expresar, luego, decido como hacerlo. Las posibilidades siempre serán infinitas aunque decida hacerlo a través del cine y la danza. He tenido la oportunidad de trabajar en colaboración con artistas de distintas disciplinas, así mismo con personas de la comunidad que no necesariamente han tenido formación dentro de las artes. BB: Speaking about physical Theater, tell me more Bistoury Physical Theatre and Film history. When did you formalize BPT? And Alexey Taran is your partner and co-director? What prompted your decision to start a company with Taran? CF: El coreógrafo Alexey Taran me invito a co-fundar y co-dirigir la compañía Bistoury Physical Theatre and Film en el 2005 (Caracas- Venezuela) un año después de graduarme. Los principios de Bistoury PTF se basan en la filosofía de respeto, admiración y curiosidad por el extraordinario movimiento creativo de la megalopolis latinoamericana, así como la diversidad etnocultural del continente. La decision de trabajar juntos ha sido siempre la misma y es la motivación y el compromiso de hacer arte. BB: The Havana & 305 International fest just took place. Normally what is the selection process? Do both of you announce a call for submissions, or do you invite the artist? CF:Tenemos un proceso de aplicaciones abiertas y también entre Alexey y yo trabajamos de forma curatorial. El Festival promueve el arte de la improvisación en las distintas disciplinas del arte aunque más específicamente en el cine y la danza. 305 & Havana International Improv Fest ofrece de manera gratuita clases magistrales de artistas internacionales, proyecciones y actuaciones que profundizan en el arte de la improvisación unificando artistas nacionales e internacionales y audiencia en dos ciudades Miami y Habana. Con las condiciones actuales se han creado eventos online con la intención de mantener activo el objetivo del festival. En un futuro cercano queremos sumar la ciudad de Napoli como tercera cede. BB: So now during COVID19, an era to reinvent creativity, what's next ? What are you doing to pivot during this time? How can we as artists stay currently engaged with our public? CF: During COVID19 he tomado el tiempo para hacer una pausa, para conocerme mas profundamente, entender a los otros, cuidar de mi familia y ser responsable con la comunidad, el mundo y nuestro planeta. Ha sido un tiempo de reflexion para leer muchos libros y compartir con la familia. Sin duda también ha sido un tiempo para organizar mis proyectos, hacer ensayos, post-post-production, escribir y trabajar en una serie de auto-retratos. |
Part 1 in a 2 part interview between cultural historian Petra Mason and artist Marilyn Minter
Image in header: Marilyn Minter, SCAD, Installation view.
Top image in column detail of work. |
by Petra Mason 7/21/2020 Marilyn Minter: Nasty Woman SCAD Museum of Art February 11 - August 2, 2020 When the phrase ‘Nasty woman’ went viral, Donald Trump accidentally launched a feminist movement. He also inadvertently re-ignited the already simmering fury of plenty of women worldwide, including artist Marilyn Minter. Minter, an artist and activist with a career that spans over five decades and as many shades of feminism and contemporary art making practices, is this year's SCAD deFINE ART honoree. Not surprisingly, at the dinner in her honor (in Savannah, Georgia, back in February 2020) Minter was also the recipient of the ‘Least likely to be invited to the White House’ award. The difference of opinion is historical: not only did Minter protest the US involvement in the Vietnam war (marrying a Vietnam vet against the war) at same the time 45 was feigning bone spurs, the artist views feminism as the ‘biggest change I’ve seen in my lifetime’. Using video, photography and painting to get her point across, simultaneously transgressive and glamorous, Minter, always a provocateur, has a smokey eye for wetness, glitter and glamour. Kicking off her heels to walk the several exhibitions at the SCAD deFINE ART 2020 showcase in Savannah, Georgia Petra Mason talked to curator Ariella Wolens about ‘Nasty Woman’ and with the artist in person about decades of art and activism, freckles, pubic hair and the Guerrilla Girls. ARIELLA WOLENS: Every aspect of this is hand painted, you can see in some of the areas where it is more blurry she has painted with her fingers. You can see fingerprints in some of the areas where the light is hitting strongly. And when Marilyn created these images, if she is happy with something, she will often print it as a photograph. As you can see from this piece, one of her largest paintings to date. She will skew the seductive aspects of advertising -- the close up range, ensuring to never leave out the microscopic details that make the body an uncomfortable thing to view: all of the taste buds of the tongue, body hairs, makeup smudges.The wetness that becomes incredibly sexual -- this is all something that she is very much celebrating, the reality of sex and femininity. We have chosen to highlight Marilyn’s video work. In 1990 she found out it was cheaper to advertise on late night television, to buy a spot on David Letterman or Arsenio Hall than to buy a page in Artforum. So she created an advertisement for her show that was at Simon Watson Gallery which was where she presented her ‘Food Porn’ paintings. It (the ad) became an artwork in itself in which she commented on and pointed out how the artist, and the artwork, are inextricably connected to capitalist consumerism. Marilyn Minter, SCAD, Installation view. PETRA MASON: What is your favourite New York decade? Marilyn Minter: Now. Except for Trump. I like the fact that now the doors are wide open for people that are not white males. It’s never been like this. Never been like this before. Look out for Tala Madani (video and painting) who recently showed at 303 Gallery. She is amazing. PM: Do you think it’s easier for women artists now? MM: If they are old! The world loves young bad boys and old ladies. Sometimes they love ‘bad girls’ but then only if you can sustain it. Those are the ones I emulate. If you think about Lorna Simpson or Barbara Kruger or Cindy Sherman. They manage to keep their game changing and they are still making work that is exciting. What I’ve learnt is it is easy to get a lot of attention, but to sustain it is difficult for every artist and the ones that don’t just repeat themselves, its difficult to listen to that inner voice and to just keep making something that’s interesting for other other people to have a dialogue with, I thought when I was really young I wrote off artist’s right and left, but now I think if you’re still showing after 30 years you’ve probably got something to say! (laughs) that’s how I’ve changed. |
Part 2: Marilyn Minter
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by Petra Mason 8/5/2020 Marilyn Minter: Nasty Woman SCAD Museum of Art Feb. 11 - Aug. 2, 2020 Kicking off her heels to walk several exhibitions at the 11th edition of SCAD deFINE ART annual program of exhibitions, lectures, performances, and public events highlighting artists and visionaries at university locations in Atlanta and Savannah, Georgia PETRA MASON talked to SCAD deFINE ART honoree Marilyn Minter about decades of making art, activism, pubic hair and porn. Part 2 in 2 part interview: PM: You’ve said how the artworld ‘beat you up’ in terms of how you identify women’s sexuality and sensuality. Personally, having authored books about vintage female pin-up photography I notice there is still resistance to women talking about women’s sexuality. MM: Have you noticed how pin-ups are now fine? Yesterday’s smut is today’s erotica. There is still a huge glass ceiling for women working in sexual imagery. And I’ve been asking questions since 1989 but I never had the answers. I was not condemning sexual imagery. I thought it was important for women to have images for their own amusement and their own pleasure. I want to change women owning the agency of sexuality. I believe nobody has politically correct fantasies. I am still asking those questions: why can’t women own sexual agency, why do other women attack them? What I’ve learned working with sexuality is there is no generalization. If there are any rules at all you will have to make an exception. If you make rules, rules will spit in your face. There is no universal anything when it comes to sexuality. I find if you try and put everyone and everything into categories and you think everything is black and white, nothing is black and white. Maybe death, And the sun rising (laughs). PM: Your first limited edition artist’s book ‘Plush’ celebrates pubic hair which is considered ‘shocking’ in this day and age as pubic hair barely exisits, particularly in contemporary pornography. MM: I did it for fun to remind people there is nothing wrong with it (pubic hair). I have students I teach -- and I knew these girls were lasering off their pubic hair. I am like, jeez! fashion is fleeting. I remember plucking my eyebrows and they never grew back. With ‘Plush’ my aim was to show that public hair is a beautiful thing, not a terrible thing. Dye it green but don’t laser it! Groom it or whatever you want to do but lasering it is forever! PM: What do you consider your defining moment (of visibility) in the art world? MM: Ultimately, artists have to make what they make and work for their own pleasure and vision. Sometimes the artword and the zeitgeist cross each other. So what you’d been saying you may have been saying all along but no one could see it. You’ll notice all of these artists who are dead or almost dead, usually they are female -- then they get ‘discovered’. I became the poster child for the ‘youth driven’ Whitney Biennale ‘Day for Night’ in 2006 while I’d been 'plumbing the depths of (al) chemical beauty (and its breakdowns) for a very long time'. |
A Conversation. Curatorial Gestures: A new system, a new curatorial language
Adler Guerrier, Untitled (don't be alarmed or afraid blck), 2009An example of my use of choreographed postures is found in Adler Guerrier’s Untitled (don’t be alarmed or afraid blck; 2009). I placed Guerrier’s tall, authoritative, black protest pole directly in front of a bench.
Curatorial Gestures, #CityofWalls, 2018, Collaboration with Mohamed Soliman Labat, In Close Proximity group exhibition at FATVillage, Fort Lauderdale, Florida. In the background, Wissam Nassar, Beit Hanun, in the Gaza Strip, 2015
Archival Feedback, Delimiting Site No. 1b, 2016
Another function of a curatorial gestures is the insertion of performance & choreography throughout the space.
A performer taking the installation #CityofWalls apart. (Buil archives)
Curatorial Gestures, Those savages and their savage ways, 2018, Plastic, foam, toy guns, house paint
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interview by Dr. Alpesh Kanital Patel 8/10/2020 Dr. Alpesh Patel: You first showed me objects that you were making that you referred to as curatorial gestures—because they weren't really artworks, and yet they weren't necessarily part of the typical curatorial process either—around 2016. How did you begin doing, or creating, these objects? Belaxis Buil: I guess what propelled me into creating these objects was that I found myself thinking about how I would contextualize an idea into an object that would then respond to the environment, or to an artist's work through the use of a particular medium. Because I’m a visual artist, it's my natural inclination, anyway, to materialize something from nothing. And I found that by creating an object art-piece, it allowed me to expand my own knowledge about a topic that I was researching, or that I was mentally massaging in my brain because it was something that I was really interested in. Or perhaps in a very peculiar way, I was converting anxieties about a topic into something that I could physically manage. The process became an interactive session, as though I were chiseling out the idea, or carving out the space for the piece to live in. If I invited a colleague over to take a look at it, I’d noticed that they too would interact with it—investigating its surface, its textures. The person’s behavior seemed to be more of a conversation with the piece(s) than merely looking at it. This behavior then excited my curiosity, and I realized that my goal was to continue developing these gestures as a type of language, or a form of communication, or a system—a communicative system with myself, between the artist’s works, and for the viewer’s use as well. Dr. Alpesh Patel: Did the project first begin, then, outside of the normal curatorial process? Belaxis Buil: Yes, it did. I knew I was curating something into a space, and at that moment I realized that it was gestural. I knew it was artistic, because again, I'm a visual artist and I create objects. I was aware that I was creating something that was either in a space where we normally would view a piece of work or artwork, or else in an alternative space that normally wouldn't be used for viewing an artwork, and it just started happening from there. Dr. Alpesh Patel: This reminds me of how a curator, when they're researching, might start reading or writing as a creative practice. It seems as though what you're doing is very much an extension of that. You're thinking through the making of these objects, getting a chance to really reflect on these ideas that you said were maybe creating some level of anxiety, right, that you were able to channel in a material way? Belaxis Buil: Absolutely. It was definitely research. It was research, and I was really asking myself—I always ask myself—questions such as “What does this look like?” or “What did that experience look like to me?” Sometimes I'm thinking of something, like, let's say, a social issue that we read about in the newspaper every single day. We often read about certain topics that are trends, because these sorts of things are happening every day for an extended period of time. I begin to wonder if people are paying attention to these conversations in the way they should, or, rather, if they are tuning out, because it doesn't affect their insular lives. So the process of creating an object that will allow people to revisit a topic they are probably tuning out is the motivation behind the gesture. How else can I invite the public to engage with a topic of this kind? I noticed that we are visually offered moments such as this when looking at photojournalistic works. The photographers working in this genre are documenting what's really happening. But then I ask myself, “Okay, but what does that look like conceptually? How can I create an object that can provide enough information but yet isn’t loaded with interpretation? What does that look like in a visual form that would allow people to understand this issue on a deeper level, but without my being intrusive or really imposing any type of opinion based on my personal views? Can I accomplish this in such a way that viewers, as they digest it, can still understand what it is that I'm trying to say?” Dr. Alpesh Patel: Okay. Wall text is often used to help the viewer understand what they're seeing. Perhaps the gestures are there in the same way, helping the viewer to feel, maybe more deeply, what's being shown in the gallery. Does that sound about right? Belaxis Buil: Yes, this is correct. It's as though the curatorial gesture starts to intersect an idea with art, with the way it's going to mobilize an individual within the space, whether the mobilization is through conversation or the way the viewer interacts physically with the piece. It initiates or invites people to think of questions that maybe they didn't consider before. So, yes, it's an operating system. I wrote about this in my thesis. With the gesture I activate a point in space where two (or more) things are happening; I create an object that eventually allows others to interact with it. Thus, the object gets people to interface with one another, or with the gestures, and finally it swings the conversation around to all the other pieces that are surrounding that particular area. I think that people are used to programs, and have even become conditioned to be programmed. Most folks function in systems. Now whether or not those systems or programs are a positive/negative for the individual or society is another conversation. I think that I was trying to find a way to create a program that people could be a part of such that the exhibition doesn't become divisive. In other words, I tried to eliminate the perception that the exhibition is divided between the artist/art and the public. I was consciously aware that the curatorial gestures could provide form, forum, function, and an opportunity for the public to collaborate with the artworks being exhibited. Dr. Alpesh Patel: In a gallery setting, these gestures could be construed as an actual artwork, when they're not being presented in the manner you’ve described. As you’ve detailed them here, they're something different from that. How do you begin to make that clear to a viewer? Or how have you, in some of the exhibitions that you've done, begun to think about that? Belaxis Buil: Well, when I've written my curatorial statements and explained what the theme is about, I'll engage in a traditional type of writing where I give examples by using the artists' works, contextualizing the theme in light of their works, and then I'll insert one of my gestures within the statement itself. Then I provide a brief explanation. I plug in a gesture to discuss what it's doing, why it's there, so that when the viewer reads the statement he or she will have a clear understanding that the gestures are created by myself, by the curator, and that each gesture is acting as a piece within the exhibition space: a piece that will add to the conversation, compliment the artists’ work, and provide visual support. For the first time, though, in the online group exhibition #CANCELLED, I did not include an explanation about the gesture(s). I wanted viewers to scratch their heads that first time around. But I do or at least try to make it clear to the audience that this is something that I'm deliberately doing. I don't give any further explanations about my own personal history as a visual artist, because I think that upon viewing one of the gestures, the audience will realize that the piece is created by an artist’s hand. I think that it's important for me to explain the gestures to the viewer in a way that will not confuse them. I don't think it would be fair either to the visual artists that I'm exhibiting or to the viewer not to explain what a particular piece is about, or what all the pieces are about. However, in time, this intention may change, because I enjoy the idea of placing the curatorial gestures anonymously throughout the space. Dr. Alpesh Patel: Let's say somebody doesn't read the wall text, which, of course, often happens. I know that when I myself go into a gallery or exhibition space, I sometimes don't want to read the wall text, at least not right away, so that I can form my own opinion. Does that work as well, do you think? Belaxis Buil: Yeah. It's worked in the past. I think it really has worked well. I've had guests approach me during exhibitions to ask a bit more about the curatorial gestures. Many times these are individuals whom I don't know. They are perfect strangers. They'll come up to me during the course of the opening and say things like "Wow, tell me more about your piece," or “How long did it take you to create the piece while organizing the exhibition”? So, these conversations have always been framed along the lines of "Tell me more about your piece." Viewers understand that it's an artwork. Then the next series of questions takes the form of “What led you to start doing this?” At that point, I share a little bit more about how my process works, and how it happens. But it's also really important for me to state that a curatorial gesture is not a piece that's solely created from or inspired by another artist's work of art, because at the end of the day, I do regulate my own thoughts. I have my own ideas, which reflect my personal aesthetics. I have a particular flair in the way that I think and work. That's why I think that the curatorial gesture is a kind of marriage between what I'm producing and what the visual artist(s) are exhibiting in the space. It’s important to make this point clearly. If a guest asks whether my work was inspired by another artist’s work, I respond by stating, "No, I had already begun investigating material and literature about this issue, and then I sought out artists that fit into this conversation." Of course, at that point I'm also looking at the formal aspects of curating. I am considering color, form, material, depth, dimension. I’m asking, “Is the work a moving object, or does it involve moving images”? I formally analyze the artists' works to figure out how the puzzle is going to fit together—how their works will function with my piece, and also in the environment. Dr. Alpesh Patel: I'm surprised, actually, that you discuss the gestures as artworks. I think I understand why they can be that; but you've come up with a new kind of frame to refer to the gestures. Because of this frame, for me, if they are artworks, they are artworks plus something else. I'm curious what you think about this idea: that the gestures need not be considered as artworks, but that if they are so considered, they are not only that. It's something beyond—something that explains why you've even created these curatorial gestures. Belaxis Buil: Right. Well, all this makes me think about Marcel Duchamp’s installation--the Mile of String. He organized the work within an exhibition space shared by other artists. His gesture indicates, as John Vick writes in his essay on Duchamp and the 1942 Papers of Surrealism Exhibition, an attempt to “reorder the gallery”. That installation, clearly, although it was an artwork, it was also a curatorial gesture. These objects that I'm creating are literally gestural: they're these little comments that spread throughout the space where, at that moment, I am operating as a curator. And similarly to Duchamp, I am reordering the definite structures, roles and functions we have applied to oursleves within the viewing space. Again, it's just that my background, my history, is that of a visual artist, and for me it's easier to work with material in this way than to sit down and write something. I do conduct research, of course. But in doing this research, I always wonder if curators are getting enough information just by reading and looking up relevant material. Why not give a curator an opportunity to try to brainstorm about a topic of interest, whereby he/she can approach that topic from a different perspective by experiencing the topic directly. Give him/her a haptic opportunity, or a new tool to create something. In short, why not converse on a whole new level with the artists’ works? I think that such an approach creates an even stronger bond with the visual artist or artists who are included in the exhibition, because now you have two individuals who are speaking the same material language, visual imagery. They are both speaking through/with objects. To my mind, the conversation becomes really interesting at that point, both before and during the exhibition itself. I haven't curated anything at a museum yet, but I'm wondering what's going to happen when I finally do have that opportunity, and I have to inform the museum that my methodology includes these curatorial gestures, which constitute a specific material practice. At that point, they may question my practice and ask, “Well, what exactly does this involve?” I'm thinking that if this means preparing the institution beforehand by sending them a copy of a book, or my thesis, or a description of my research to help the administrators understand more what it is that I'm doing, then the institution will likely see it as some type of reformist or even revolutionary approach. Dr. Alpesh Patel: You bring up a really important point here: namely, that what you’re doing is fairly unusual. That’s why you have to give it a name, I suppose, because it isn't something everyone is already used to seeing. You probably need to name your practice for it to be recognized as such. I know many artists that curate; it's not unusual anymore. But most of the artists who curate don't see their curating as part of their artistic practice proper. They often divide these things up, and don’t even discuss their curating with their artwork. So, I find what you're doing interesting because you’re highlighting the importance of curating as part of your overall thinking and practice. Working with materials, for you, is just another way of approaching research. Belaxis Buil: Right, right. I believe in being uncategorical, or anti-categorical. I've always had an issue with categories! It's ironic because that's one of the things that we fight about most within the artist community. I want to be non-binary--I'm flexible, I'm fluid. I don't want to be placed in this or that category. But we're the first ones to categorize everything. I know that in my personal history as a visual artist, since way back, even when I was at New World School of the Arts, I already had issues with people not understanding what I was doing because everything I did was very blurry—that is, my work was a blend of categories. That doesn't mean that I was messy. It just means that I instinctively knew that I did not want to be categorized as one thing only, because I felt that this sort of pigeonholing would jeopardize the direction that I wanted to take as a visual artist. I see my practices as all being intertwined with one another. For example, even with the curatorial gestures, one of the functions that they serve is to choreograph postures for individuals. Basically what that means is that, as a choreographer, I am paying attention to how people move within a space, and after observing them there I take note. So, when I go back to work on my curatorial gestures, I'm always thinking about choreography, asking myself how would I want to see people moving throughout the space. Dr. Alpesh Patel: That's interesting. Belaxis Buil: I want them to waltz through. I want them to have to bend, jump up, or reach over to grab something, to sit down or stand up. I'm playing with them in space without being physically involved, as such, in their movements. Along these lines, I think that for a curator to say that she’s just a curator, or just an art historian, is a little dated. I think that if we really want to move towards a more fluid, openly communicative and non-binary role in the artistic community, it means erasing these boundaries that separate us from "other" pratices, such as choreography, movement, dance. It's very crippling to the development of a language, whether one is referring to a traditional, written language or a visual language. I think that insisting on these distinctions can actually be destructive to the institution, because then we're always going to be stuck in these systems that exist within binaries—it's just not going to get us anywhere. Dr. Alpesh Patel: I like how you’ve described your practice as non-binary, emphasizing that it doesn't have to be one thing or another, but rather can be both at the same time. What you’re doing is art-making and curating together, and, in being combined like this, they both become something else. To play devil's advocate for a moment, though, I'm interested in what you do when you're working with people who have a fairly traditional track record of using their exhibition spaces. How do you pitch your approach to them? How do you get them to be on your side? Belaxis Buil: When it comes to someone who's that dated in their approach, I don't modify what I do. But I do explain my own approach to them along the lines of "I'm going to exhibit certain pieces that were made specifically for this exhibition." I think that's the best way to negotiate these issues because it’s straightforward. It's important to speak to colleagues in this way because dated minds understand things in terms of categories. I have to be flexible and speak that same language to help them understand what I’m doing. What’s more, I make it a point to explain my approach because I don't want them to think that I'm like other artists who, when curating, just go “plop,” inserting one of their already-made artworks in the exhibition because it has something to do with the overall theme. I’m against that. When I’m considering this kind of hybrid practice, I’m always asking, "Did you create this piece specifically for the exhibition? What is the reason for having it live in the exhibition, aside from just wanting to show a piece?" Dr. Alpesh Patel: Yes, that's an important point. Your curatorial gestures aren’t the same as an artist simply inserting his or her work into an exhibition. Rather, what you're putting into the exhibition didn't exist before the exhibition was realized, strictly speaking. Belaxis Buil: Exactly. Dr. Alpesh Patel: That’s a really key point, because there can be a lot of suspicion directed against curators who are also artists and who include their own work. Again, in your situation, it's not really a pre-existing work that you're putting into the exhibition; rather, it’s a work that emerges from, or is actually part of, the research. Am I describing that right? Does that make sense? Belaxis Buil: Yes. I never include pre-existing works. And some people have resisted my approach. One time, for example, I brought in soil as one of my gestures. I had explained in my proposal that there would be a few gestures alongside the (solo) artist’s work. Additionally I explained that most of the gestures would consist of natural elements such as flowers and/or dirt. There was a bit of pushback. I was approached by one of the administrators who was asking why I didn't let them know that dirt was going to be involved. I was like, "That's not true. I did, and, as I mentioned previously, this is part of the curatorial gesture." There were questions surrounding the participating artist’s knowledge on the gestures. The administrators doubted my curatorial intention and speculated that I had never infromed the other artist of my gestures (as I later found out through the artist). And finally there were issues with logistics; the exhibition space required I turn in a map with exact measurements and placements of the gestures. Although I had turned in the proposal, I was still mapping out the placement of the installations in my mind. This was due to considering formal properties found in the other artist’s work, lighting in the space and taking dimensions of the works into account. So, I’ve experienced back and forth of this sort in the past. I feel that I'm constantly taking a risk in my artistic, curatorial practice and even my career, because I am doing things that are not the norm or the standard approach. I have to fight for it to happen. Doing so can be really uncomfortable for me, because I'm trying to introduce new things—new things that are solutions, possibilities, new approaches—and in the process I receive a lot of pushback and little support. I always wonder, what am I doing? Over the longer term, is it going to be worth it? Because if I'm not going to have support and be a part of a real conversation, then what's the point? When situations such as these arise and colleagues find out, I become an "inspiration.” People tell me they love what I'm doing, and say, "You're so badass. Your work is so cool.” But then they run off to copy what I'm doing, saying, “I was inspired by you." But then they'll get the accolades and I don't. Again, I am aware that I am introducing a new school of thought, and I truly believe in these new methods that I'm introducing. I think that they can create a whole new way of thinking for curators and research. But I just don't know if it's worth fighting for. More importantly, I don't want other researchers snatching my ideas without crediting, or citing, my research. Dr. Alpesh Patel: Yes, you should receive credit for your ideas. I see them as very interesting from a scholarly point of view. Again, when I first discussed the gestures with you, I found them to be really fascinating, because they didn't fit neatly into the boxes—just as you were saying before. They make possible a different kind of experience for the viewer. On that point, I want to go back to what you said about choreography, because that's another crucial part of these gestures, right? Belaxis Buil: Right. Dr. Alpesh Patel: You position your gestures within a particular space, thinking about the viewer and his or her entanglement with it. This is, in other words, a very embodied situation that you're thinking about. Can you talk a little bit more about that? Belaxis Buil: Yes, I do choreograph. I mobilize viewers/participants by assigning to them what I think of as choreographed postures throughout the space. This is a generator that activates one of the many functions of the “operating system” of curatorial gestures. For example, I aimed for this effect when I curated In Close Proximity, which you actually had the opportunity to visit at FATVillage in Fort Lauderdale. Dr. Alpesh Patel: Yes. Belaxis Buil: Remember that huge installation of wonderful works? One of the pieces that I was presenting—that I used to mobilize the choreographed postures—was a piece by Adler Guerrier. Let me describe it. It was like a long black post, and then it had this really big rectangular face. It resembled a large, protest sign with text and shapes. The piece was really large, and it had a stunning and authoritative presence to it. But when viewing that piece, most people have seen it either propped up against a wall or placed on the wall somewhere. Adler actually asked if I could prop the face without the post against the wall. But I insisted that the pole be included. I knew his piece needed to stand at one of the main entry points of the space. Yet I wanted the piece to be free-floating, to appear as though it were standing on its own. I decided to bring in a bench, which was placed maybe six feet away from where Adler’s pole was standing. It was intentionally positioned to stop the viewer at this point. However, the bench provided just the right amount of space to anchor the viewer’s gaze from a distance. That bench acted as a divider between the post and themselves, causing the viewer to pace back and forth from behind the bench. The person had no choice but to acknowledge the authority the post was silently screaming for. It was commanding. Then all of a sudden there was this dance that began happening in counts of three, a loose waltz behind the bench, a pacing back and forth, along with side steps. That was my intention. Eventually some of the guests became submissive as their backs bent, and they quietly hunched down toward the bench. It almost seemed like they were intimidated, but in actuality they were trying to find their way down to the bench, as though they were curious to listen to the pole’s protest. The participants' physicality became a choreographic phrase, set as a series of postures. Finally they’d sit there in awe, quiet, in what appeared to be a meditative state in a noisy room. This is one of many examples I could cite with respect to choreographing a number/phrase/posture for the viewer to embody. Another example would be the installation titled #CityofWalls that I likewise created as a curatorial gesture. I strategically placed this installation forty feet northwest of Mohamed Labat's Untitled (Refugee Camp), images projected on a thirty-foot screen. Forty feet away from the screen stood #CityofWalls, an installation fabricated from cinder blocks and text written in Conté crayons. #CityofWalls responded to Labat’s pseudo cinder-mud-block home found in the refugee camps of the Sahara, as well as the broken walls exposing cinder blocks in Nissam Wassar’s photograph twenty feet away from the installation. The house evoked the feeling of ruins and gave the impression of a broken square figuration. It also had specific openings to it, where the individual could walk in to face the projection of Mohamed's photograph. By walking in and standing at the northwesternmost point of the configuration, the viewer would echo the subject’s position in Labat’s image. Hence there was a kind of postural dance happening between the viewer in the present moment, and the person that was in the projection. Viewers had to maneuver themselves a certain way even to get inside the configuration, plus they had to move really carefully because if they actually touched the walls, the cinder blocks would come down because they weren't secured. There was another dance happening that actually guided the person to live in or through a space, and become aware that his or her environment was temporary and unsecured. Thus I offered participants an opportunity to live/dance an unstable space. While they were exploring it, they were moving a certain way. They had to locate, or try to locate, their own safety. This feeling of unsafety is a truth with which, or in which, many of the artists themselves must live. My sense is that most curators really don't think about this particular element or experience when they're curating. I don't think that they're consciously wondering, “How can I enable the viewer/ audience to embody an unfamiliar feeling, or state of mind? How can I engage them to participate in a social dance, an interactive dance that wouldn’t require too much thought on their end, but would be, instead, felt, intuitive?” Dr. Alpesh Patel: I remember those gestures at FATVillage. As you describe them now, I feel as though I understand them more, having had a chance to experience them. Going back to this idea of embodiment, my sense is that the whole idea of the gestures actually isn't even very object-based. There might be objects that are associated with the gestures, but in the end it's more a type or mode of embodiment that you're trying to go after through the creation of each gesture, and that positions the viewers accordingly, directing them toward a work or accentuating a theme in that work. The bench you described is another kind of gesture, isn’t it? Belaxis Buil: Yes, the bench became a gesture, absolutely. It was not part of the exhibition, per se; but by incorporating it, I used something that was already there within the space itself and that I integrated into the exhibition, and curated, so that it became a gesture. With that bench being placed in front of the piece, viewers were not obligated but rather encouraged, slightly pushed to dance around this piece. Dr. Alpesh Patel: Just now, as you described how you used the bench, I was thinking how, though it’s not a perfect analogy, that the bench gesture might be compared to Dan Flavin's barrier pieces that essentially prevent viewers from actually experiencing the entire space. You yourself are not necessarily preventing anybody from experiencing the space; but the commonality here is that the artist is controlling the positionality of the viewer in a way that's very different than with typical exhibitions, where works are put into a space and it's not quite clear how viewers are meant to interact with them. Your gesture is perhaps not as aggressive or as pointed as these barrier pieces but like his works your gestures really demarcate space and make you feel your own body a bit more, I think, in the space. A lot of curating in museums is still very much about staging things in a particular order. It seems as though you're taking the conversation to the next by asking: “Can we do a little bit more with the spaces within which the objects are installed?” Belaxis Buil: Right. But I must point out that Flavin's peices are super streamlined, polished works. My pieces are raw, gritty, dirty and unpolished, but equally well thought out and executed. Dr. Alpesh Patel: It’s as if you are getting more mileage out of a particular situation that's already there. Belaxis Buil: Absolutely. Well, there are two things to keep in mind in this connection. First, you mentioned embodiment, and that’s definitely what I’m aiming for here. This is quite different from saying, "I'm trying to capture the essence of something." It has nothing to do with essence. It's always about embodiment. How can I help the individual possess this feeling, or possess this message? How can I get the viewer more involved with the piece? Which takes me to point number two, and it's a critique. I love making art. I'm a visual artist, and I'm pretty prolific because I'm constantly creating works; but I've stayed away from art gatherings or events, because they involve too much of the wrong kind of socializing. I've paid attention to conversations while I've been at these social gatherings, and they always seem to be about one-upping each other. You know what I mean? In these gatherings, creating art gets turned into a party, or a game. I wanted to bring people back to the art itself, bring their attention back to the artwork and to the art piece—and have them to engage with it a little bit longer, have a conversation about it. The conversation could be along the lines of "But I'm not understanding the color choice," or "This is offensive. What is she doing?" But in any case, I wanted to bring people’s attention back to the actual work of art and get everyone more involved and invested in the piece itself, to appreciate it, because we know that it requires a lot of time, labor, and resources to create a body of work. I think that people need to appreciate what art is about because it's gotten so trendy. Everybody does it now, so it's just like buying another pair of Levi jeans. Dr. Alpesh Patel: I like what you're saying, and it's such a challenging aspect of art—of art creation and art consumption. It’s true: the art world is very market-driven, and we know money plays a key role. It’s all so transparent that we can't ignore it, in a way, and you're trying to bring the focus back to the art itself. I think that your efforts are so commendable. I'm curious: how many years have you been doing these gestures? Belaxis Buil: I've been doing these gestures for a while now. I think it was 2004 or 2005 when I was asked to curate a few video works at the Miami Beach Cinematheque during a Miami Art Week or Basel Week function. I was asked to do this as an opener to one of Lars von Trier's films. In the end, I curated four works. It was called Four Parts of a Room, conceived as a series of video works, and I created a piece for it, too. So that was like a gesture. It was part of a conversation with the other artists. So, I'm thinking that I’ve been doing this since 2003, 2004. Dr. Alpesh Patel: Wow, you’ve been doing these curatorial gestures for much longer than I realized. What you just described was what you would retrospectively call your first gesture? Belaxis Buil: Yes, at the Miami Beach Cinematheque. I asked three video art makers if they would be interested in exhibiting some work. I told them that the exhibition was going to be called Four Parts to a Room, with the basic idea being that each of us has a “room,” i.e., a video work. What was happening in that room? What was taking place? I told the artists, "You can't talk about it with each other. I don't even want to know what it's about. Just go make it, and create a video no less than five minutes and no more than eight. Once it's done, send it to me and I'll splice it all together." That's what happened. The gesture, in this case, was spilicing the works into one long thread of visual storytelling without compromising anyone’s work. Each video was in its original format and aesthetic. It was great. It was a wonderful piece—visually stunning, very poetic. That was really my first curatorial gesture. I remember I told Dana Keith, who was the director at the Miami Beach Cinematheque at the time, what my idea was, and he responded: "That's fabulous. Go for it." It’s wonderful when you can work with open-minded individuals who like what you're trying to do, and they just give you the green light. They say, in effect, "Take the ball and run with it." Then I started to ask myself, “What else can I do with this?" So, I would say that that, technically speaking, this was my first curatorial gesture. Dr. Alpesh Patel: I didn't realize your curatorial gestures actually went back that far, because what I'm now thinking is that I want to see them all, in the form of documents, uploads, and images: perhaps you could create a book of these gestures. In any case, it does seem that, if you've been doing this for about seventeen years or so, there is going to be a broad range of gestures, each of which is doing something different. To be able to teach these gestures would be wonderful. Belaxis Buil: Absolutely. Dr. Alpesh Patel: I would love to have a toolkit of curatorial gestures as a pedagogical tool. On another note, you work with a lot of living artists, and when you're doing your gestures, you remain in contact with them. So, they're well aware of what you're doing, and they seem very supportive. In other words, they don't seem to have an issue with your work. How do you make a case for your projects when you're working with artists and you're doing these gestures? Belaxis Buil: Yes, I have to say that the artists whom I have worked with so far have been a blessing. Seriously. I'm really open about what I'm doing with them, and some of the gestures actually become collaborations. For example, during my exhibition Bad Rep(utation) (2019), I was working with three visual artists. One of them had this really cool graphic art image of what appears to be an Arab man, who is wearing traditional clothes. He’s handing over a bottle of Coke to a woman who's also wearing traditional Arab clothes, and she's sitting behind a door, gazing at this man—as if she were wondering, “Who is he?” When I saw this image, I immediately thought, “These should be postcards." I said to the artist, Lyes, Karbourai who currently resides in Algeria, that these should be postcards, and that we should write “F*ck you, get to know me better” on the back. He's said, "I love it. Let's do it." So, as soon as I get the okay from an artist, we brainstorm about it, and then I send the person an agreement letting them know what we're doing, that I have permission to publish the work, that it's a collaboration, and so forth. So far, the visual artists I’ve worked with have been okay with it. I haven't had any issues at all. I had another visual artist show one of his photographs as a work on fabric, which he ended up loving. He, too, asked about continuing to work together with me. So I’ve engaged in a number of collaborations with visual artists that, up to this point, haven’t been problematic. That said, a lot of these artists whom I’ve worked with have a really great attitude about art; they want to exhibit, and to be a part of something. Their thought is, “I'd rather have my work doing this than to sit here at home not doing anything." That’s where the gestures become magical: I feel that I'm making the artists more visible and they're helping me become more visible, and we're supporting each other's work, in a cool, blurry way. With Adler [Guerrier], who is a very prominent figure in the arts community in Miami, and who shows his work abroad, I didn’t exactly collaborate. The only extension or collaboration came from my decision to choreograph something around his piece using the bench. And Adler was okay with it. I find myself testing the artists out, getting a feel for their attitude. If I see that there’s going to be pushback of some sort, then I ask myself whether I want to have this artist in my exhibition. I ask, “Is this going to be someone that could potentially turn this into a bigger problem than it should be?” So, I'm really careful about the type of artists whom I curate as part of my exhibitions. Dr. Alpesh Patel: Understood. I wanted to bring this up again, because it’s not as though you're simply putting things into spaces and there's no discussion beforehand with the artists whose works are linked to your gestures. Rather, they are part of this conversation, that being an important part of your project, too. I wanted to ask a little bit about the idea of “curatorial practice,” because you just completed an MFA in Visual Arts: Curatorial Practice from Florida International University (FIU). One of the key aspects of your work for me as an administrator, and here we go back to your point about the non-binary, is that a practice like yours presents both conceptual and logistical challenges. It doesn’t fit cleanly either into the studio program or the curatorial practice program; rather, it has elements of both—it’s hybrid. From the point of view of curating--rather than that of collaborating with these artists whom we've been discussing,--what has been your experience when it comes to talking with other curators? Have you had discussions with them about your gestures, and have you felt that they're interested in these kinds of approaches? Do they feel that this is something that you in particular are doing, something that can’t necessarily be replicated in other contexts? Belaxis Buil: Well, during Art Basel, as part of Miami Art Week last year, I did run into a prominent figure in Miami, who has done extensive curatorial work. I actually had the pleasure of working with her many years ago. So, this particular curator saw me and we said hello to each other, and she said how excited she was to see all the projects that I had been doing. She wanted to hear more about them. I remember her saying specifically, "I want to know more about your curatorial gestures." There seemed to be a bit of excitement in her tone. I was excited about it too, but at this point I'm a bit protective about the curatorial gestures. I’m being protective because, as I mentioned before, I've had a couple of issues in my artistic career where people have basically snagged something of mine. For example, a curator took prints of mine to China and never returned them, and there have been other super shady incidents of that sort. In all honesty, I'm really proud of myself for not getting an attorney and taking legal action. With the curatorial gestures, I'm at the point where I'm careful not to speak to too many curators about the project, because I’m worried that someone will like the idea. I’m concerned that they'll sit down over some coffee with me to talk, get the information that they need, and then run off and do something with it. Unfortunately, that's been my experience. So, that's why I feel that the correct process for me to pursue with these curatorial gestures is to create a website along the lines of what you suggested previously, and also to publish my thesis, which is extensive enough to be a small book. And then I need to find other ways to legitimize this practice—for example, through articles, and conversations with the right people—so that it gets enough traction and attention, and so that I can become aligned with it as the creator and original founder. Because after that, the world's unlimited. I would imagine that I could go to schools and give workshops or a master class, teaching students how to do this. I wouldn't have a problem with that. But at this point, I'm being really careful about sharing too much information with people. I also realize that perhaps curatorial gestures will be a tag for my curatorial practice and my name. My name isn’t priviledged within the exhibition space, as the curator. I mean I do include my name in the exhibition list as Curatorial Gestures/Beláxis Buil but I have been doing this just to get people used to my practice as this thing I do. Eventually I’ll remove my name altogether. It’s quite funny to think of another curator utilizing my practice as their own. It’s a highly conceptual practice, as you point out. Despite my idealolgy being that the curator should be visible within the exhibition space, I come back and remove myself by inserting the phrase Curatorial Gestures on the wall label, in replacement of my name. I don’t think another curator would want to use my tag. Patrons could assume that the exhibition was curated by the original founder of the curatorial gestures. Dr. Alpesh Patel: I guess it's a double-edged sword, right? Even though I'm suggesting that you do this website, that makes your material more visible and available to people. That’s great, but there can be a darker side to such access, too. Nonetheless, I do think that doing the website, publishing books, and pursuing the other routes you mentioned are essential to connecting your name to the gestures. Because then you create a genealogy or timeline that established how long you have been doing the gestures. Belaxis Buil: Exactly. Dr. Alpesh Patel: I just wanted to go back to something of a less practical or pragmatic nature. As a result of this conversation—and I don't think I had come to the conclusion before—it's become really clear to me now that these gestures are very much you. What I mean is that they’re not something that others could be replicate. They develop from a research process that you do, and are not something someone else could do in the same way. The gestures really have your unique signature, like your artwork would. Yet the way you're researching and thinking could be inspirational to other people. They could perhaps take it in different directions. Sometimes that can be a positive thing, when people acknowledge what you're doing and move it forward. Belaxis Buil: That's right. Last year, I won a scholarship to attend the IKT Congress, the curatorial convention that took place here in Miami. Well, we had to introduce ourselves on the first day, and during that introduction, I took the opportunity to just talk a little bit about my practice. I definitely inserted the curatorial gestures at that point, bringing them in. One of our students at FIU, a visual artist, came up to me and said that she wanted to do a curatorial gesture. I said, "That's fine, as long as you acknowledge me." That's exactly what it is. I really feel that I deserve to be acknowledged. You hear a lot of us artists in the art world complain about visibility these days. A lot of us have been invisible for so long. It's hard for me even to say this, because I know that my work has gained some degree of attention, and I've received some great reviews and had articles published about the work. But at the same time, I’m not where I want to be in my career. Not yet. A lot of that has to do with visibility. These curatorial gestures to me are gold. I see that there's so much that I can do with them. I'm not going to just give them to anyone, not without proper credit. I don't know if that's the wrong thing to do. I don't know if that's the wrong attitude to have. It's just where I'm at. Dr. Alpesh Patel: I'll just reiterate that, with respect to academic writing, we have an unfortunate problem where people don't cite properly. They don't indicate that they're getting certain ideas from X person. I was trained very early on in my career to do that, and I see the importance of it. In fact, I over-cite. I will cite more than is strictly required, because the way I see it, you can never give enough information. Doing so doesn't take away from what you’re doing, and you can only hope that others will do the same. But it's still not a practice that many people think is important. Appropriation, in many different forms, still happens way too easily. Belaxis Buil: Absolutely. Well, appropriation is something else that I definitely discuss in the thesis. I really start digging deep into the conversation about appropriation. That’s why I’ll say to colleagues, "Hey, don't take my idea without giving me credit." But as I also said, I'm pretty generous. As I told our FIU student, "Yes, you can use it, but just acknowledge me, credit me." But I do believe that in order for us to move forward, there has to be some respectful appropriation, because it's the only way that we're going to learn from each other. Respectful borrowing or exchange can wipe out some of the divides that exist between us . Dr. Alpesh Patel: I think you’ve made a very important point here, in emphasizing that respectful appropriation is needed. It's not even that you're saying that you want to keep these things to yourself; rather, you just want to be sure that when the practice is mentioned, your name, too, is mentioned, as should be the case with your artwork or anything else that you've done. When there's respectful appropriation, that could be wonderful for what you do, because it can magnify your presence in different contexts. Belaxis Buil: Right. Dr. Alpesh Patel: If it's done respectfully. Belaxis Buil: Absolutely. That's a really strong, powerful tool. With such respectful appropriation, you can gravitate toward so many other people whom you wouldn't have been able to reach before. It can be like an exchange between individuals. Dr. Alpesh Patel: Yes, exactly. I wanted to ask if there is anything we didn't cover in our conversation so far that we should talk about? Belaxis Buil: No, I don’t think so. Regarding the curatorial gestures, we have really covered a lot of it. For example, the idea that the gestures have more than one function. Dr. Alpesh Patel: Yes, I think we covered a lot of territory. We discussed how you work with artists, how you work with administrators, how these gestures are embodiments in a choreography, as much as they are sort of materiality. We also talked about the need for respectful appropriation, and also that these gestures are, at the end of the day, not a replicable practice that you're selling. Belaxis Buil: Right. Dr. Alpesh Patel: I also really like the new term that you’ve used here—namely, choreographed postures—because it really clarifies an aspect of the gestures that's so important. I think that this term will help any remaining confusion about your gestures. Belaxis Buil: I'm so glad that we were able to talk more about this. It's nice to be able to let someone know in-depth what it's all about and why I'm doing it. I don't want to keep these gestures hidden from the rest of the world all the time. |