C o n t e m p o r a r y
Anemones, Installation a work Samuel Lee
A r t
R e v i e w
C o n t e m p o r a r y
Samuel Lee United Kingdom
Blazo Kovacevic
Allie Litherland
A r t
R e v i e w
Vilyana Milanova
Boris Beja
Dongwa Lee United Kingdom
Painting is something that can only destroy itself, which must destroy itself in order to be reinvented.” Since these days my works have been through burnt and cut the canvas, I am interested in space on the surface of the canvas.
USA / Montenegro
United Kingdom
Bulgaria
Slovenia
The project “Probe” is commentary on the issue of personal freedom and how it is abused today worldwide in the name of “war on terror”– The project raises questions whether taking away citizens’ rights to privacy is a legitimate tool in this fight; do we lose more than we gain by giving up so much? This project also refers to the issue of identity: true, assumed and hidden.
My practice is mainly digital with some works that incorporate performance and installation.
Art is personal. It makes me feel free and open-minded. I’m interested in all variety of ways an artist express feelings by art.
I always start the action of artistic practice with the perception of the environment in which, by thinking, I then put my own declaration through the artistic work. In it I try to find the beauty in connection with the symmetry. I create in the consciousness and awareness of the artistic work having to be correct to function and to collaborate with the chosen content. A work of art is correct and »beautiful« only when it appears as such.
I am passionately curious about human behaviour both as an individual and the patterns of group behaviour. The depths of the psyche are a mystery but what is clear is projected from our thoughts that that are founded in our interpretation of reality.
In my projects I am concentrating on the connection between people and the connection between viewer and an artwork. The most important I’ve learned from textile: materials I use are important. This is what builds the shape of the idea. But the main is the idea itself.
Before I came to London, my previous works was only acrylic, oil and mixed medium paintings. The reason why I first make a hole and burn canvas is that, white canvas is stereotype for me.
In this issue
Blazo Kovacevic
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Lives and works in Binghamton, NY, USA Mixed media, Installation
Boris Beja Lives and works in Slovenia Mixed media, Installation
Samuel Lee Lives and works in London, UK Mixed Media, Installation, Public art
Zahra Zavareh Lives and works in Teheran, Iran Sculpture, Mixed media
Allie Litherland
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Lives and works in Stroud, United Kingdom Video, Mixed media. Installation
Nikkita Morgan Nikkita Morgan
Zahra Zavareh
United Kingdom
Ireland
Iran
As an artist it is my aim to attempt to change people’s perspectives on their reality and their understanding of it. To show people how powerful we as humans really are, the interconnection of life and to become self empowered through this understanding. I aim to touch people on a personal and emotional level enabling them to be a catalyst for their own healing through the power of sequins, visual stimulus and communication.
My main area of interest is mixed media textile art & design, where I use a range of materials and processes, that enables me to produce unique contemporary artworks mainly using paper, steel, acetate, fabric and digital projections. My work is a response to political issues, specifically referring to the continuing conflict in the North of Ireland. It focuses on the historic, religious, political and contemporary outlook of the struggle.
I wish to bring the static object into a new dimension where the perception more easily can shift and change. With the dolls I explore the shift through time. What was once intended for children needed nothing more than a soft and inviting touch. But when its owner has grown up and out of innocence and naivety, beauty alone is no longer sufficient. Basically I ask the question of what will happen if a plaything or a doll is polluted with the mind of an adult.
Sequin Kay
Lives and works in London, UK VIdeo, Fine Art Photography, Mixed media
Vilyana Milanova Lives and works in Sofia, Bulgaria Installation, Mixed media
Sequin Kay Lives and works in London, UK Mixed media, Video, Installation
Donghwa Lee Lives and works in London, UK Mixed Media, Painting, Installation
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Special thanks to: Charlotte Seegers, Martin Gantman, Krzysztof Kaczmar, Tracey Snelling, Nicolas Vionnet, Genevieve Favre Petroff, Christopher Marsh, Adam Popli, Marilyn Wylder, Sequin Kay, Nikkita Morgan, Maria Osuna, Zahra Zavareh, Scarlett Bowman, Yelena York Tonoyan, Edgar Askelovic, Samuel Lee and Robert Gschwantner.
On the cover: A still from Nothing, 2012 a film by Tracey Snelling
Blazo Kovacevic Kovacevic The project “Probe” is a commentary on the issue of personal freedom and how it is abused today worldwide in the name of the “war on terror”– The project raises questions whether taking away citizens’ rights to privacy is a legitimate tool in this fight: do we lose more than we gain by giving up so much? This project also refers to the issue of identity: true, assumed, hidden, etc. and the image of distorted identity generated in media: TV reality shows, beauty magazines, and in popular visual culture, which terrorizes us with an unrealistic aesthetic and cultural norms, expectations, and illusions. The heroic images of this exhibition are our own bodies and concealed belongings, now revealed. Strangely enough, people are more accepting of their own image if it is “gentrified” through the artist process, elevated from its natural existence and immortalized as a work of art. This show is offering the redemption of the ordinary human existence, celebrating its honesty and uniqueness. Probe is envisioned as a project in three stages: Stage one
Live video stream from X-ray baggage scanners from an international airport was streamed to the gallery space for the exhibition reception. For one day and for 30 minutes only visitors in the galleries (several galleries were involved as well as online viewers) were able to peek into the privacy of random passengers, without knowing anything about their true identity. They had the opportunity to imagine persons and personalities based solely on their luggage content. On the remaining gallery walls selected im- ages of the passengers’ belongings were executed as digital prints. The Gallery floor had crowd control barriers deployed in at- tempt to control crowd flow and to restrict and direct their movement. Stage two
them home upon leaving the gallery. The visitors’ experience of anxiety and passivity as victimized objects of observation, is transformed into a unique creative activity, a voyeuristic feast for the eyes on the gallery walls.
A checkpoint equipped with an X-ray contraband scanner was placed at the gallery entrance. Gallery visitors had the opportunity to become subjects of security screening. Images generated this way and with visitors’ consent were immediately printed and displayed in the space. Visitors had the option to remove their prints and take
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Blazo Kovacevic
ART Habens
PROBE I, installation view Atelier Dado, National Museum of Montenegro, Cetinje, Montenegro, 2010 Stage Three (currently in planning)
Similar to stage two, the gallery entrance will be equipped with a body scanner (nowadays installed in mayor airports). Scanned images of visitors’ video,bodies 2013 will be transmited to the printing center on site. Digital prints will be made and imediatelly installed on the gallery walls. At the begging of the
show gallery walls are empty only to be populated with images created with the consent and help of the visitors. Gallery visitors will then be greeted with their own images.
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PROBE: recorded live streaming video of the airport screening at FULL SCREEN
03 4 Summer 2015 a selection of time-based works from Culturehall Artists, Big Screen Plaza, NYC 2011, projection view Summer 2015
Blazo Kovacevic
An interview with by Dario Rutigliano, curator and Katherine C. Wilson, curator arthabens@mail.com
Blazo Kovacevic accomplishes the difficult task of establishing an effective synergy between refined aesthetics and insightful socio-political criticism, to create an area in which perceptual dimension and an engaging abstract gaze on the reality we inhabit blends into a consistent unity. The multidisciplinary nature of his approach urges us to investigate the relationship between reality and the way we perceive it. One of the most convincing aspects of Kovacevic's practice is the way he establishes an area of intellectual interplay between memory and perception, inviting the viewers to explore the unstable relationship between human intervention and freedom in the contemporary age. We are very pleased to introduce our readers to his refined artistic production. Hello Blazo and welcome to ART Habens. To start this interview, would you like to tell us something about your background? You have a solid formal training and after your studies in Painting at the University of Montenegro in Cetinje, you moved to the United States and you joined the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts where you graduated with a MFA in Studio Arts. You later had the chance to travel a lot both in France and in Italy. How have these experiences influenced your evolution as an artist? And in particular, do you think that being exposed to a wide, international scene may have informed the way you conceive and produce your works today?
Blazo Kovacevic
Both Italy and France offered a tremendous impact on my art formation and for example allowed me to develop some specific projects as a result. This is the case with my body of work titled Maps and Cuts (http://blazokovacevic.com/MapsAndCuts/About .html). This exhibition was envisioned while I was staying in Paris. I was intrigued by how little changed throughout history in regards to visual representation of conflict and I thought my maps offered an interesting merger of new technology and timeless representation of space. For example in Spears Versus Rockets we see a difference (and advancement, if you
It is my pleasure to see my work featured in your magazine. I still think that formal art training is fundamental to an artist’s development. In some sense I believe it is necessary to curb the initial urge to explore everything that interests you, and to focus on building skills and proficiencies. I also think that at the same time the concept in everything that you do needs to be addressed and developed. These two approaches informed my early artist years. Traveling is another educational approach that I nurture.
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ART Habens
Naim El Hajj
PROBE: recorded 4 23 0 5 at FULL SCREEN Summer 2015 live streaming video of the airport screening a selection of time-based works from Culturehall Artists, Big Screen Plaza, NYC 2011, projection view
Blazo Kovacevic
ART Habens
I would start to focus on your artistic production beginning from PROBE: recorded live streaming video of airport screening, an interesting project featured in the introductory pages of this article. What most impressed me in this project is the way you have create a point of convergence between a functional analysis of the context you examine and autonomous aesthetics. Do you conceive this in an instinctive way or do you structure your process in order to reach the right balance?
will) in range and destruction power, but substantially no huge leap conceptually. Your approach is marked out with a deep multidisciplinary synergy between several practices, that are combined to provide your works with dynamic and autonomous life. I would suggest our readers to visit http://www.blazokovacevic.com/ in order to get a wider idea of your multifaceted artistic production. While superimposing concepts and images, crossing the borders of different artistic fields, have you ever happened to realize that a symbiosis between different viewpoints is the only way to achieve some results, to express specific concepts?
The project Probe I started with an exposure that grew to discomfort and disapproval, then to acceptance and finally to revelation. It began with my Montenegrin (Balkan) background, my being perceived as a potential threat or something like that, anytime I travelled. Coming from a conflict area of the world always granted me special treatment with visas and travel arrangements, but what was most annoying was the constant scrutiny I received from the security officers at border crossings. They would always put me to the side for their random check, where nothing was random. This time spent waiting for my turn at the side gave me a good view of security procedures that were dominated by X-ray images of passengers’ baggage. I noticed that the most interesting image is at the same time revealed (to security officer) and hidden to the rest of us. I appreciated the beautiful compositions and color coding filters that revealed very interesting and new views of common objects found in luggage. All of a sudden I felt privileged to be able to witness this voyeuristic feast. After this recurring experience I welcomed additional screening, and came up with the idea of revealing these drawings and pictures of our time and our transparency hidden from us. I am not sure if this is a matter of chance or instinctive reaction to the aesthetic stimuli but at first I felt provoked to do something about this and try to get access to the images of ourselves. Balance is probably never reached in my work. In the video piece PROBE: recorded live streaming video of airport screening I wanted to show what is a routine part of the job of somebody charged with security screening at the airport. I wanted for visitors in the gallery to
At the beginning of my art career I struggled to find an outlet to show that synergy is a way to express my multiple interests and different media. My agenda was not directed towards blatant contradiction that ultimately emerges from the mixtures of incompatibles but rather to allow for the truth of these different coexistences to emerge. I thought that provocation rather than inspiration was something that moves me and with that conflict was unavoidable. I was very careful to keep open and accepting of these different approaches and€to allow for common norms and rules to lead the way. For me this was the only way honest enough to deal with the complex dualities of things. For example conflict can be seen and understood not as something necessarily violent and negative, but a moment of truth and recognition that some opposing sides are present and the fight for dominating voice has begun. Sometimes I tried to show this without easy or concluding moment in which any of these sides in the conflict prevailed. This is the case with my latest body work Probe here I give access to the phenomena of disappearing privacy rather than declaring it negative or positive. I try to accept it as a trend and something that deserves our full attention. My creative activities here are more directed towards questioning and analyzing all the visual aspects of the privacy than pinpointing the culprit. Usually we all know very well who and why, but sometimes it is necessary to see how too.
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Blazo Kovacevic
have the best seats for the show that will reveal personal belongings of a person whose identity remains hidden. In particular, I like the way you create a point of convergence between an aseptic point of view on formalism and a severe gaze on today's reality. This combination reminds me of the idea behind Thomas Demand's works, when he states that "nowadays art can no longer rely so much on symbolic strategies and has to probe psychological, narrative elements within the medium instead". While the conception of Art could be considered an abstract activity, there is always a way of giving it a sense of permanence, going beyond the intrinsic ephemeral nature of those concepts you explore. So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion, personal experience is absolutely indispensable as part of the creative process? Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience? I do believe that personal experience is extremely important and most influential creative impulse. I am sure that the creative process could be seen also as something outside of the personal experience, but in my case it is not. I do see similarities with my and Demand’s work but unlike Thomas Demand’s efforts to replicate or reconstruct a special scene, my personal endeavor is always to involve spectators into the activity I am about to introduce. I want them to share this experience and claim it as their own. In this sense I invite people to experience firsthand something that they are already very familiar with such as going through the checkpoint. But this time everything is different. They are offered a completely different understanding of the process. Being scanned is not the end of it. They get to keep the copy of the exposure as a visual testament of something new about the ordinary. These images are product of creative process but also evocative of the unusual experience. As you have remarked, Probe is a commentary on the issue of personal freedom and how it is abused today worldwide in the name of “war on terror”, so at a first sight, it seems that the main message you would like
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Body Scan with hidden contraband 25”x63”, UV print on Illusion film, 2010
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Blazo Kovacevic
ART Habens
Body Scan with hidden contraband 25�x63�, UV print on Illusion film, 2010, detail
to convey in PROBE is a sharp position on pressing socio-political issues which - it goes without saying- are today a lively matter. At the same time, I recognize a suggestive attempt to go beyond a merely interpretative aspect of the context you refer to. As the late Franz West did in his installations, PROBE seems to reveal unconventional aesthetics in the way you deconstruct perceptual images in order to assemble them in a collective imagery, offering to the viewer such an Ariadne's thread that draws us into a process
of self-reflection. As you have remarked once, "artists are always interested in probing to see what is beneath the surface". Maybe one of the roles of an artist could be to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially of our inner Nature... What's your view about this?
You are very accurate in perceiving my PROBE interventions as something that is leading to self-discovery. As I mentioned before, my idea is to allow access to the security scanned image. But a scan itself, especially when we talk about
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ART Habens
Blazo Kovacevic
Scan of the lorry, 25”x52”, UV print on the Illusion film, 2010
a body-scan, is more than penetrating enough to offer some very painful revelations about our existence. In general people are drawn to various images representing them—from selfies to medical X-ray images. We are fascinated with the way they look or we look in them. But a security image is not giving us any justice or the justice is very brutal and we consider it an injustice. We do not like this version of
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ourselves. This image is not showing bones as medical imaging does (where nobody really cares about it unless it requires surgery) or skin as in regular photography. The body-scan is showing exactly the middle layer that we are probably not proud of it at all. On these scans we look as Michelangelo’s sculpture would after being tossed around many times and everything that is not significant body feature disappeared.
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Blazo Kovacevic
ART Habens
Many interesting contemporary artists, such as Thomas Hirschhorn and Michael Light, used to include socio-political criticism and sometimes even explicit messages in their works, that often goes beyond a mere descriptive point of view on the issues they face: it is not unusual that an artist, rather than urging the viewer to take a personal position on a subject, tries to convey his
It also reminds me of microscopic images of insects whereby observing them we have the illusion of experiencing something of alien origin. This micro-cosmos that exists in the middle level is exactly the exoskeleton that I am interested in.
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Blazo Kovacevic
Green Backpack, 25� x 32 �, UV print on Illusion film, 2010
personal take about the major issues that affect contemporary age. In such grey area, a particular care should be payed, since Art may even stop to be an independent tool to interpret and relate with and becomes a dedicated vehicle, which lies in the liminal area in which criticism blends with propaganda... Do you consider that your
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works are political in this way or do you seek to maintain a neutral approach?
This is excellent question. I do think my work is political -- maybe more than I would like it to be or is possible for somebody who wants to be neutral. I think every work is political in some sense. Neutrality is impossible to maintain
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PROBE I, 2010, installation view
Atelier Dado, National Museum of Montenegro, Cetinje, Montenegro
PROBE I, 2010, installation view Atelier Dado, National Museum of Montenegro, Cetinje, Montenegro
ART Habens
Blazo Kovacecic
especially today when any position that you take, even a neutral one, is nevertheless a position also, and therefore cannot be just neutral. A neutral position inherently benefits some side(s) as it pulls energy from another side, therefore weakening it. Regardless, I think it is important to allow enough room for all interpretations. Of course, I do not wish for just one reading of my work. I think it fails in its mission if perceived as one-sided. I am dealing with security inspections in my work by pointing to its negative sides, but I also would never board a plane if we didn’t all go through security inspection. I am notendorsing the security inspection as it is conducted presently, but not having one is not a solution either. I have enjoyed the way you "probe" the evocative potential of the medium, involving the crucial role of modern technologies to provide the viewer with an extension of usual perceptual parameters that allows you to go beyond any dichotomy between Tradition and Contemporariness, as in the interesting Inextricable, establishing a stimulating osmosis between materials and techniques from a contingent era and an absolute approach to Art. Do you recognize any contrast between Tradition and Contemporariness?
I do see this connection very clearly. It took me many years to evolve and be free of constrains and labels such as those. We all build on tradition and I think as a result it is still visible in the contemporary work. Somehow it finds its voice through new media. Over your career you have exhibited internationally, showcasing your work on several occasions. So before leaving this conversation I would like to pose a question about the nature of the relationship between your art and your audience. Do you consider the issue of audience reception as being a crucial component of your decision-making process, in terms of what type of language is used in a particular context?
Green purse, 25”x32”, UV print on Illusion film, 2014
gallery in Binghamton, US in August 2015. In order to share my point of view with the audience I am asking them to be integral part of the whole process. More recently, my process requires audience’s participation first, and only then, can I plan the exhibition. For the exhibition
I am trying to build an intimate relationship with my audience. For example, I am preparing my next solo show in the Anthony Brunelli Fine Arts
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Blazo Kovacevic
in the Brunelli space I am asking the gallery audience to trust me and lend me their personal possessions that they carry with them every day (this includes purses, backpacks, suitcases, etc.) for a day so I can scan them and produce artwork. The idea is to build a relevant exhibition
ART Habens
for this particular audience and, for that purpose, I think it is fair to follow the contemporary trends in personalization (where, for example, your music is streamed based on your interests in a few songs and an algorithm knows your taste better then you do). An
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ART ART Habens Habens
Blazo Kovacevic
Orange Purse, 25” x 27”, UV print on Illusion film, 2010
exhibition featuring images that represent the visitors’ belongings has to provoke interest.
Unfortunately I am too stubborn to give up on this idea and my chances of getting access to this carefully guarded piece of the equipment are slim. I am stuck. Pushing forward with this plan will probably get me in trouble. The concept is so simple: the exhibition is created only as the audience passes through the checkpoint equipped with the body scanner. These scans will be printed on the spot and placed in the gallery to greet visitors as they enter. This should be my next project.
Thanks a lot for your time and for sharing your thoughts, Blazo. Finally, would you like to tell our readers something about your future projects? How do you see your work evolving?
For many years now, but with no success yet, I have been trying to get a hold of a body scanner for an exhibition and for one day only.
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My work evolves in a cyclical pattern, and the
ending of the project refers to the very
beginning of the thought process, bringing
closure and offering a full circle of experience,
for me and the audience alike.
PROBE: recorded live streaming video of the airport screening at FULL SCREEN 21 06 4 a selection of time-based works from Culturehall Artists Big Screen Plaza, NYC 2011, projection view
Boris Beja I always start the action of artistic practice with the perception of the environ- ment in which, by thinking, I then put my own declaration through the artistic work. In it I try to find the beauty in connection with the symmetry. I create in the consciousness and awareness of the artistic work having to be correct to function and to collaborate with the chosen content. In other words, I believe that a work of art is correct and beautiful only when it appears as such. It takes effect on the observer, me and other works. When creating, I build the content or the form as a collage. I link the content with subtitles of the working title, which is followed by formalization which combines various artistic media. By thickening or adding on, I wish to cre- ate a comment or a piece of art that could think and would be able to inspire thinking in others as well. I always avoid art being a therapy but I wish it to be a part of the thinking process. Therefore I am present in the field of art also when I think, read or speak of it. Various resource and communication channels through which I receive different information are the matter with which I create or supplement and change the project, which I adjust to a certain level to my own ambitions and to the society in which I create. The spectrum of working and interest is broad. For attaining better goals I simultaneously follow various discourses and mostly choose none. By reflection, I take usefulness and neces- sity from everyone. Reflexive experience is shown in architectonic constructions, objects and installations, all through to documentation projecting of an art work. I try to create works that to the public would not be selective as art is for everyone. This is also where I speak in favour of the comprehension – an artist. I wish that not only the connoisseurs but also the wider public would see art as a profession comparable to all other professions. Because art is real, there is no place for jokes.
Menuet for him 2014 Spatial installation, mixed media, various sizes
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video, 2013
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Boris Beja
Siliconato Bianco – Anallergico 2014 Spatial installation, mixed media, various sizes
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An interview with
Boris Beja
An interview by Josh Ryder with the collaboration of Dario Rutigliano arthabens@mail.com
Through a refined multidisciplinary approach, Boris Beja accomplishes the difficult task of creating an area of intellectual interplay between perception and memory: manipulating images and objects and recontextualizing their nature, he urges us to explore the crossroad between significance and apparence. What mostly impresses of Beja's work is the way his analitical gaze on contemporary age unveils the messages that are hidden behind the world we perceive, discovering unsuspected but ubiquitous connections. I'm particularly pleased to introduce our readers to his artistic production. Hello Boris, and a warm welcome to ART Habens: to start this interview, would you like to tell our readers something about your background? You have a solid formal training and after your studies of Graphic Communications, you graduated from Sculpture at the Academy of Fine Arts. moreover, you are also a critic and a curator. How have these different experiences influenced your evolution as an artists and how do they impact on the way you currently conceive and produce your works?
Boris Beja
From an early age I was interested in art. Luckily I was always, also in nowadays, supported by my father and mother, they helped me to discover unknown worlds. As well in the field of art. After the artistic high school I have not passed the entrance examinations to the painting departure at art academy. I enrolled in the graphic technique. Today I am happy that I can work in the field of art scene. Engineering faculty has been in the program imbued also with artistic lectures which gave me new knowledge concerning artistic design of the product. Already during my first studies at the college I started writing about the arts and to publish my contributions in different media. In addition to write, learn about new artists, their work, I could also be financially independent.
At the end of my studies in graphic technique I decided to entrance exams at the Academy of Fine Arts, where I passed them and began to study art at the Department of Sculpture. Writing about art seems to me a very important part of my practice. My work is built on the concepts and deep contemplation. Ideas which I have, I write and read them several times, during the process of making art. Writing allows me also to learn about other artistic practices. By seeing and focusing on the practice of another artist I can make a displacement also from my work. When work on the paper is produced, the formalization in the material can happen quickly. I believe that
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ART Habens
Boris Beja
Menuet for him 2014 Spatial installation, mixed media, various sizes
would start from your Menuet for Him, an interesting project that our readers have already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article: When I
variances, critical and in-depth reflection can achieve better results. Now let's focus on your artistic production: I
Spring 2015
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ART Habens
that would have established such an order in the intrinsic fragmentary nature of this interesting work . But I soon realized that I had to fit into the visual unity suggested by your work, forgetting my need for a univocal understanding of its symbolic content: in your work, rather that a conceptual interiority, I can recognize the desire to enabling us to establish direct relations... Would you say that it's more of an intuitive or a systematic process?
As a worker in different art media, I always involve to my art the body of the viewer. The viewer with the movement and detecting hidden images completes my work. Sculptural installation follows the commandments of minimalism and modernism, under its surface hides additional content. I'm starting projects always with intuition. With more serious and deeper reflection in the working progress I involve systematic examining of the chosen problem. With the uncovering we make connections. The work is assemblage. Consisting of readymade object and images which we want to hide in our culture. Therefore, from the reality life, I did not want to show them on the prima facie, through problem of vojarizm I wanted to present to the public “hidden� things. I definitively love the way you combine an apparently emotional gaze on voyeurism with a subtle but effective sociopolitical criticism. Many contemporary artists as Michael Light have some form of political message in their works. Do you consider that your works are political in this way or do you seek to maintain a neutral approach?
I think that today any artistic practice is political. We are part of sistem and every sistem has political instructions, rools. We have to follow the system. Thus, when we are in the stream system we can best recognize his weaknesses and opportunities for improvements. My purpose is not to change the world. My intention is to draw attention to this world in which we live, to discover and show problems, from our archetype to the political engaged art. Detection brings me into functioning.
first happened to admire it I tried to relate all the visual information and symbolic elements to a single meaning, filling the gaps and searching for an Ariadne's thread
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Boris Beja
The collective reappropriation process of an images has suggested me the idea that environment acts as cornerstones for a fullfilment process that has reminds me of German photographer Thomas Demand, when he stated that "nowadays art can no longer rely much on symbolic strategies and has to probe psychological narrative elements within the medium instead": what's your point about this? And in particular, how much do you explicitly think of a narrative for your works?
I agree with Thomas Demand. Art today appears a different role than has performed in the past. Rapidly changing images certainly force us to look through the images. Not just produce art objects, but rethink about what we are doing, what we want to say, how to show our ideas, what we accept from an artistic environment. And here thought step into art. Reality begins and take place by the discourse. Speaking, reading, writing about the art is very important for me. The object of art itself has no meaning, if we do not put it in the context, also context of speaking. I think I make art also when I From "Gaol" 2013that Photography write, think, talk about it. True language comes narrative and it is a tool for starting, building and explaining art. Your aesthetic style is heavily influenced by a straight, realistic approach: the way you have developed the idea of ready-made in Siliconato Bianco — Anallergico has particularly impacted on me and I have appreciated your exploration of the ephemeral nature of perception which confers an aesthetic value and that, like Edward Burtynsky's works, raises a question on the role of the viewer, forcing us to going beyond the common way we perceive not only the outside world, but our inner dimension... I'm personally convinced that some information are hidden, or even "encrypted" in the environment we live in, so we need to decipher them. Maybe that one of the roles of an artist could be to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially
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of our inner Nature... what's your point about this?
Certainly the role of art today represents things
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Boris Beja
ART Habens
Siliconato Bianco – Anallergico 2014 Spatial installation, mixed media, various sizes
in a different way than we otherwise tend to live in our time and space. As I said earlier I draw attention to routines. I recall and deal with our patterns and habits. Sleeping seems so simple
action but hides many other things that the experts also examined. It seems to me that the artist on the one hand reveals a fact but by the aesthetic objects mask
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Siliconato Bianco – Anallergico 2014 Spatial installation, mixed media, various sizes
ART Habens
Boris Beja
From From "Gaol" "Gaol" 2013 2013 Photography Photography
From "Gaol" 2013 Photography
Between the Lines 2014 Spatial installation, pencil, paper, various sizes, sound 60’
idea of sleeping back to reality. Therefore, it seems to me important that the parts of my work is also talking. This type of artwork which, substantially or qualitatively, emphasizes the differences
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between art and non-art. It is the fruit of entirely uninhibited decision-making, be it by the artist or by certain social or artistic establishments. Your approach seems to be marked out with
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Boris Beja
ART Habens
Between the Lines- seem speak us about contingent reality, at the same time you remove any historic gaze from the situation you refer to. In this sense, I daresay that the semantic juxtaposition between sign and matter that marks out your art, allows you to go beyond any track of contingency... in particular, how much do you explicitly think of a narrative for your works?
In my work I do not want to be a dramaturge who will build the story, which would be easy to read and too quickly forgotten. The viewer has to develop itself, sometimes needs to work with his mind. It is true that the project is created in the environment of my reality. I was also interested in the pattern, which I recorded on the basis of my musical flatmate. It is difficult to measure spatial sound. Sound spreads throughout the apartment. I can move away my art, she can not. This displacement I wanted to check with black squares, which according to Malevich is not nothing but everything what can be coated on a surface. And my black squares are diary of part of my daily life at home, where I also do art. My projects are build by many layers, not only in materialistic way but also in the conceptualization onetwo, from the series inside/out way. Often, of course, I have to put some things away, because there is always part of the development of an artistic product, which it does not belong to the final version of presentation of idea. Sublimating a construction tool to a subject of thought, Sisyphean task establishes a symbiosis between the personal but abstract idea of effort and such a tactile feature suggested by the structural concreteness of the objects your show. While referring to a "fruible" set of symbols that comes from common imagery, you seem to urge the viewers the chance to perceive in a more absolute form, so I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion personal experience is an absolutely indespensable part of a creative process... Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?
an organic symbiosis between several viewpoints: while references to living matters as today's neoliberal capitalism -and its intrinsic conflictual relationship with Art production that you have highlighted in
No, we can not. We need a real experience that could be translated on the new algorithms. If you
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Between the Lines 2014 Spatial installation, pencil, paper, various sizes, sound 60’
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Boris Beja
do not know Chinese characters, you can not write or understand their language. So direct experience is very important for me and its part of my discovering production. As a student, I worked in a call center for the largest mobile operator in Slovenia. My voice, my answers, was my tool, to make money. There I had a chance to see what means capitalism, how to react to the capitalistic mind, where quantity can replace quality. During the study at the art academy the global financial crisis began. It had its consequences and we all feel them. We feel it all the time on every place here in Slovenia. It has become part of our everyday lives and it is part of our experience. We live a crisis. This is of course aware that we need as soon as possible exchanged crisis for something else. During these years your works have been exhibited in several occasions, including ten solo exhibitions: so, before taking leave from this interesting conversation I would like to pose a a question about the nature of the relation with your audience: in particular, do you consider the issue of audience reception as being a crucial component of your From From "Gaol" "Gaol" 2013 2013 Photography Photography decision-making process in terms of what type of language for a particular context?
I chose a profession which always includes the audience. I want to be honest with the viewer, honest with myself and do not want to be dependent of the audience. I do not ignore its existence in my work, I need them for developing. I'm interested in the reactions. With discussions I can see what someone has seen in my work. Language I adapt to the contents. I hope that everyone can read my language. This is the charm of art, that can be understood, if it wants, on entire world. Thanks a lot for sharing your thoughts, Boris. Finally, would you like to tell us readers something about your future projects? How do you see your work evolving?
installation, which will be shown in Ĺ kuc Gallery from mid of June to mid of July. The focus of this project is fear. Fear is currently a part of my everyday life. In
I just finished a project that I prepared for a nomination for the prize OHO in Ljubljana. Currently, I am in the process of new
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onetwo, from the series inside/out
fact I collect the courage to move to Berlin. In Berlin I want to continue the study and my artistic work. There is a need to replace the environment and learn about new worlds. I
often ask myself if my art production has a meaning. Your invitation to introduce myself in your magazine is a big confirmation, for which I am very grateful.
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Samuel Lee Although I have often used paint since moving back to France in 2002 I have also produced and exhibited sculptures, installations, site-specific art work, photographs, books and prints in galleries and outside in a rural context both in France, Belguim and the UK. Much of my inspiration comes from the landscape and the observations of light and form evident in the place I live and work. I often search out simple everyday materials which not only reflect my interest in ordinary things but also can equally influence or suggest the direction that I may take. Sometimes the art work begins from a simple visual or tactile interest in the material itself (even the availability of materials such as found objects). Installations have been made of cling film, aluminium foil, plastic, wood, wax, found objects and wire and the camera lens has captured and added too many of these art works, allowing me to more fully explore ideas in a way that painting could not. Fleeting moments of light and form have taken me in unexpected directions and even fed back into my installations and sculptures. I have also begun to make more of my own prints again in recent years which allows me to draw, making lines and marks which is perhaps the very heart of everything I do. Above all I seek to always surprise myself looking to discover an authentic creativity of my human experience and emotion. Samuel Lee
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An interview with An interview by Dario Rutigliano, curator and Amanda J. Nilsson, curator arthabens@mail.com
Ranging in a wide range of media, Samuel Lee captures a variety of unexpected relationships between a representative exploration of reality and an insightful process of abstraction. In his installation entitled Feast, that we'll be discussing in the following pages, he has captured the ephemeral quality of nature, materializing it into a coherent unity and accomplishing the difficult task of providing the viewers of a multilayered experience in the liminal area in which experience and imagination converge into an unexpected point. We are very pleased to introduce our readers to his multifaceted artistic production. Hello Samuel, and welcome to ART Habens: to start this interview, would you like to tell our readers something about your background? You have a solid formal training and you hold a BA (Hons) of Fine Art that you received from the Nottingham Trent University: how has formal training impacted on your evolution as an artist and in particular, how does it inform the way you currently conceive and produce your works?
Samuel Lee
I spent three years at Nottingham Trent University studying BA Hons Fine Art. In the 1980s art students were expected to be very self-sufficient with limited tutorial supervision in the background. After I left in 1988 this changed and BA Hons became much more structured, more like an art foundation course. The need to be self-sufficient was, in many ways, an advantage but could leave some people adrift. I think it instilled the idea of creative direction and I also thought it a place to experiment rather than to find a rigid style. Perhaps for me my art foundation course experience from 1983 to 1984 in Bath (Sydney Place) was more impactful. It is here I really saw, for the first time, the different possibilities and started making simple installations and painted sculptures. I also met the master printer Jack Shirreff of 107 Workshop who taught a few days a week on the foundation course at this point.
His insightful approach and highly creative work with British artists such as Howard Hodgkin, among many others helped to give me a sense of discipline and possibility. In some ways, art college seemed a little mundane after I spent a year out in the professional printmaking world. I went on to work with Jack on many other projects and editions at different periods of time, culminating with Howard Hodgkin’s monumental print ‘As Time Goes By’ in 2009. There is no doubt that direct contact with the artists Jack worked with and particularly the carborundum technique used in much European printmaking has a huge influence on my printmaking output. Multidisciplinarity is a crucial feature of your work, that reveals an incessant search of an organic, almost intimate symbiosis between
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aspects of my production so they tend to be separated by the natural process of exhibiting. To an extent, this is due to how the art world is organised and its expectations. It is, however, common now for artists to use a wide range of media. I usually have many ideas that all exist in my head but only some make it out into the open and then they are transformed by the physical process. When I first started working on Anemones, it took me a while to understand how to actually construct it properly. It involves making twisted tendrils from aluminium foil. This takes a very long time and it has been in progress since 2010. Many of the recent installations are constructed sculptures which involve many parts and are suspended or placed. World Disco, a mobile based on chrysalises and disco balls, which turns in the wind, was the starting point from which I made Light Catcher, involving plastic film, and from these came Feast. My use of photography stemmed from a wax sculpture based on stained-glass windows called Light Works which demanded to be photographed as their fragility was limiting, but I also photographed Feast in the Lavoir, and I have exhibited and sold the photographs so it seems natural to me to move between these differing aspects without finding any conflict. From there, I followed on with various site-specific ideas, for example Awakenings, which involved found objects and a local river. In the Deep was made from an old bed that had become caught in a growing tree and tangled up permanently. Slow News was a photographic-based work, an antiwar relief sculpture/installation climbing the gallery wall, commissioned and exhibited in 2006, and perhaps represents the most photographic large-scale work I have made. I am not sure it is a conscious decision, but each new work takes me in different directions and opens up new possibilities. The directions I take are also dictated by how people respond to my work, which aspect they like, and that lies out of my control.
Feast (installation in the Lavoir) Le Petit Pressigny, 2009
installation, sculpture, printmaking, painting and photography, and I would suggest to our readers to visit http://www.axisweb.org/p/samuellee/ in order to get a wider idea of your multifaceted artistic production: before starting to elaborate about your production, would you like to tell to our readers something about your process and set up for producing your works? In particular, have you ever happened to realize that a symbiosis between different disciplines is the only way to achieve some results, to express some concepts?
The basis of my art production starts with drawing and painting. This is always a firm place from which to express something; it is immediate and raw, I think. Recent exhibitions of my work rarely include all the differing
I have to admit that the sensations I have received from Feast are the same I have experienced with Boltanski's EXIT, that I had the chance to admire years ago: I have
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appreciate the mix between ephemerality and dynamism suggested by your composition. At first, I tried to relate all the visual information and the sense of ephemerality communicated me by the dynamism of the composition to a single meaning. But I soon realized that I had to fit into the visual rhythm that pervades this stimulating work, forgetting my need for a univocal understanding of its content: in your videos, rather that a allegorical, I can recognize the desire to enabling us to establish direct relations... Would you say that it's more of an intuitive or a systematic process?
Boltanki’s theatrical installations are on a very large scale but I can relate to his use of space. The first time I showed Feast was in a Lavoir in a very quiet rural Touraine village, which is a very interesting and beautiful space. It also has the sound of running water as it is a traditional washing place. It is long redundant and usually adorned with flowers but Feast worked well in the context. I wanted to fill it as much as I could, reflecting how nature can invade or overwhelm a space. Some people find this installation difficult to cope with and I have had many strong reactions. Perhaps it is a primeval fear driven by dark imagination. What type of creature has left these forms. For the following exhibition, I was invited to install the installation outdoors in a small but artistically adventurous village just outside of Tours. It was there for 2 months and I made larger new parts for it actually on site. This time it was spread across the village along with the World Disco installation. My process is intuitive and expressive but depends on something happening that is beyond my own initial idea or feeling. I used cling-film to wrap wood and branches as a physical action copied from spiders. Insects are extraordinary to observe and my response is a poor second to them but somehow the layers of film did something unexpected and, both opaque and translucent in a sense producing random forms, it was impossible to predict the compressed and wrapped final form. I also found I could make relatively strong flexible forms for very little cost.
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Feast (installation) summer exhibition, Veuil, 2010
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Ocean Bloom
Summer 2015 Poitiers 2014 Arcuterie Galerie,
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The use of plastic and natural material was obviously a deliberate choice and stems from the modern dilemma of how technology affects the world around us. I had been seeing plastic litter on roadsides and caught in trees for years so wanted to use this as a visual statement but seeking some beauty or symbiosis if you like. It grew from my conflicting feelings between indifference and revulsion, and the pressing need to protect diversity and the natural world.
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image essentially. It has a new life in the river painted gold, but has no rider and can only be seen in the photograph. I would never exhibit it as an object. Symbolism is difficult and can be misinterpreted. However, like Picasso’s Guernica, it can be used well but these days we are flooded with imagery of every type and nature and the internet is transforming the way we perceive symbols and our own psychological makeup. As a result, we must fight even harder to find our personal expression which in turn needs to become outward and universal through being exhibited.
Your approach is hallmarked with an hybrid combination between abstraction and explicit reminders to everyday life's objects, especially found materials: this mix triggers unexpected reactions in the viewers, that are walked into an area of intellectual interplay in which are urged to question their usual relationships with a variety of objects that you recontextualize, and bring to a new level of significance. This aspect of your approach reminds me of the ideas behind Thomas Demand's works, when he stated that "nowadays art can no longer rely much on symbolic strategies and has to probe psychological narrative elements within the medium instead". While conceiving Art could be considered an abstract activity, there is always a way of giving it a permanence that goes beyond the intrinsic ephemeral nature of the concepts you explore. So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion personal experience is an absolutely indespensable part of a creative process... Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?
As you have remarked once much of your inspiration comes from the landscape and I recognize your successful attempt to go beyond the dichotomy between a conceptualism and a descriptive dimension: in particular, I like the way Starry Night Over the Ocean Skin and Spring Tide invite us to challenge the common way we perceive not only the outside world, but our inner dimension... I'm personally convinced that some information are hidden, or even "encrypted" in the society we inhabit, so we need to decipher them. Maybe that one of the roles of an artist could be to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially of our inner Nature: what is your opinion about this?
I have no doubt that artists reveal all sorts of ideas they have unconsciously described or felt. I feel uncomfortable writing about my work because firstly I find it difficult to express myself through words and, secondly, I am probably expressing something else that is entirely different to what I conceive to be my ideas. This is a good thing I think and people should be free to find their own interpretations in my work because we are all connected to each other. This is why art exists; it reminds us of the reality that we are not alone and we share a common direction.
I think I can only make work which comes from my personal experience or else it is more like graphic art which can be disconnected. The British painter Howard Hodgkin’s work appears to be very abstract in form but he says they are figurative, memories of friends, portraits, places and events or landscapes. I find his stance very interesting and although I love the abstract (I regularly paint in this way) I decided not to ignore the figurative elements that appear and am always interested in found objects. I think they can evoke memories and other lives. The bicycle from the Awakenings installation often receives a lot of attention. It is a resurrection
Over the Ocean Skin (Starry Night) is made through an abstract drawing process that throws up figurative elements, and my technique is to work in multi-layered drawing. Although this is a straightforward version, some of the unique versions have a lot of underlying form and mark-
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Over The Ocean Skin (Starry Night)
Liquid Ocean, woodcut and carborundum print
woodcut print, unique version. 57 x 77cm 2015
unique version, 29 x 40 cm 2015
making. I am interested in the very complex nature of life and its prolific diversity, combined with a search for the unseen spiritual world and how this works in ordinary everyday life. I try to claw below the surface to see what lies underneath, at the same time trying to be childlike and see the simple beauty of things. In this process, however, you can perhaps discover things about yourself you probably do not like or wish to visualise. We carry with us not only genes but possibly also family memories and feelings. Perhaps these encryptions pop out when we least expect.
draw inspiration from envirnomental elemens and to re-contextualize the functionality of forms, inviting the viewer to elaborate personal interpretations: at the same time, you do not reject a gaze on aesthetics, creating a lively combination between a formal aspect and a spontaneous sense of beauty. How important is the aesthetic problem for you when you conceive a work?
My own personal printmaking has remained limited to various opportunities, with a brief period in Paris when I was working for the master printer Michael Woolworth in 1993-95, and recent commissions at the print rooms of the Ecole d’arts plastiques in Châtellerault,
Printmaking is an extremely relevant element of your artistic production and it allows you
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The Beginning of Something
Spring Tide, 2015
woodcut with hand painting, print, 26 x 38 cm 2015
woodcut with carborundum emboss print, 50 x 75 cm
France, in 2010 and a 3-month print residency there this year. Making my own prints allows me to draw. I do not consciously choose to make any deliberate aesthetic choices, but I use colour or rhythmical drawing intuitively.
captured such an epiphanic fragility. I would dwell on a particular aspect: you seem to remove any historic gaze from the reality you refer to, offering to the viewers the chance to perceive in a more atemporal form. In this sense, you succeed in establishing a stimulating osmosis between a contemporary gaze on art with an absolute perception of the images and the symbols you convey into your works: do you recognize any contrast between Tradition and Contemporariness?
I tend to search for colour combinations as a composer does with music. I look at other artists’ work a lot and also textile designers, but mostly at nature itself with its endless tones and colours. These can be very simple or complex and I am never happy with the result, which is probably why I keep making art in the first place.
Anemones (Ocean Bloom) has been exhibited four times in various stages of making (it is part of the Burghley Sculpture Gardens 2015 exhibition ‘Funny Ha Ha’). This is because each
Another interesting project from you recent production that I would like to mention is Anemones (Ocean Bloom), in which you have
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part is hand-made, even the tiniest part of the floor section. In some ways, this has been driven by figurative form. I have made this work in the spirit of abstraction with the idea of complex life which I am trying in vain to imitate but in a very contemporary and banal material, aluminium foil. Traditional sculpture is made from certain established materials, but Duchamp and Picasso paved the way for all sorts of choices, as seen in the work of Claes Oldenburg, Barry Flanagan and Jeff Koons for example. We are free to use any type of material and this is liberating, so I have chosen materials found in the kitchen, very ordinary everyday products. In my opinion there is always a free-flowing interchange between tradition and modernity in the art world. The shock of the new always becomes tradition, and from tradition we find the seeds of future ideas. For example, William Turner and Monet were making extremely abstracted images in many ways at certain moments in their work, particularly Turner who offered the art world some extraordinary images. The dialogue established by the straight nuances of tones you combine is a crucial aspect of your style, that is capable of conveying a variety of thoughts and emotions: in particular, I have really enjoyed the tones of The Red Earth that have provided me of sucha a tactile sensation. How much does your own psychological make-up determine the perspective composition and the nuances of tones you decide to use in a piece? In particular, how do you develop your composition?
In many ways, my compositions are fed by everything I see. I am constantly looking, sketching and drawing. My lines evolve and change, eventually finding their way from the sketchbook into concrete form, as a sculpture, print or photograph.
Ocean Current, woodcut with carborundum print, 32.5 x 5
Henri Moore described his job as ‘Seeing’ and this is the role of artists: to communicate ways of seeing. In this sense, I am trying to unlearn and to see things without a social or political context.
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Over your long career your works have been exhibited in several occasions, including ten solo exhibitions: so before taking leave from this interesting conversation I would like to
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pose a a question about the nature of the
decision-making process in terms of what type of language for a particular context?
relation with your audience: in particular, do you consider the issue of audience reception
I suppose I have a range of ways of expressing or making art work and what always surprises
as being a crucial component of your
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me is how people are always drawn to completely differing parts of my output. Feast is an installation which really divides people. Anemones similarly produces strong reactions between fragile beauty and a sense of something more sinister, viral or Medusa-like. In the Burghley House Sculpture Gardens, it is suspended in an old ice house which goes 6 metres into the earth and is about 5 metres wide at ground level. Because of the dark atmosphere and barred safety door, it has naturally taken on a more sinister feel, something trying to escape; something that needs to be contained. I do not really consider audience reaction when conceiving art work as I could perhaps make contrived imagery. I have to take a risk and hope for a mixture of reactions which is usually the case. As an intuitive artist working in series, I do not know what the end result will be myself, and this is what excites me about making art work. Thanks a lot for sharing your thoughts, Samuel. Finally, would you like to tell us readers something about your future projects? How do you see your work evolving?
I have been concentrating on printmaking since 2014, apart from working on Anemones which requires a very long fabrication time. I will be making a new sculpture through the summer to be exhibited in the autumn based on my wax stained-glass series which will be highly challenging due to the fragile nature of the material. My aim is to strive for the extraordinary in the ordinary.
An interview by Dario Rutigliano, curator and Amanda J. Nilsson, curator arthabens@mail.com
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Zahra Zavareh Zavareh Whether a path is chosen or given may be a discussion for philosophers, but it was trough a reorientation that I found my way. I suffer no delusions of grandeur when it comes to what I want to achieve with my work, I merely a wish to participate in communication on a level where I will be able to evoke some kind of new feeling in the onlooker. To me my art helps me confront the things that frustrates me, or conceptions and ideas I can’t let go of and to shed light on these. Coming from Iran I can’t help being affect by its duality. A country filled with beauty, a history of lovely literature, art and architecture that could only come from the most beautiful of minds. But now it seems that these facets are hidden amongst the many layers of modern Iran. On a personal level it helps me cope with changes in my own self and accepting the childishness as only ironic memories. The media in which I try to communicate can take different shapes, whether it be sculptures or, like my most recent work, video. The expression-form closest to my heart would be the sculptures. These are often interactive and consists partly of soft fabric, leather or silicone. In this manner I wish to bring the static object into a new dimension where the perception more easily can shift and change. With the dolls I explore the shift through time. What was once intended for children needed nothing more than a soft and inviting touch. But when its owner has grown up and out of innocence and naivety, beauty alone is no longer sufficient. Basically I ask the question of what will happen if a plaything or a doll is polluted with the mind of an adult. Zahra Zavareh
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An interview with An interview by Dario Rutigliano, curator and Katherine C. Wilson, curator arthabens@mail.com
Zahra Zavareh's work poses us questions: but unlike artists from contemporary Hermetism, she does not leave the viewers alone into an indefinite limbo. Rather, she accomplishes the difficult task to provide us of an extension of ordinary perception parameters, that offers us an Ariadne's thread capable of walking us through the exploration of the liminal area in which meaning has to be extracted rather than just reached. What has at soon convinced us of Zavareh's approach is the way she unveils a point of convergence in which a rigorous gaze on art production and emotive aesthetics convey into a consistent unity. We are very pleased to introduce our readers to her refined artistic production. Hello Zahra and welcome to ART Habens: your work is hallmarked with an incessant search of an organic symbiosis between Sculpture and Video and a variety of different viewpoints which you effectively convey into a kaledoiscopic but at the same time coherent unity. Before starting to elaborate about your production, would you like to tell to our readers something about your process and set up for producing your works? In particular, have you ever happened to realize that such synergy is the only way to achieve some results, to express some concepts?
Zahra Zavareh
Hi ART Habens.
the “room� to be prior to entering it. I guess it is just a way of saying that i try to stay open and not make too rigid decisions before I really know what it is I am aiming for. That is why for my work the type of material can be most anything. It is what the material is representing that is most important. I will be more than willing to change this in the process but it is often with the material, being some sort of fabric or silicone that I start my ideas and projects.
Yes, of course. If I were to say something about my process, I would say that I would use whatever technique available to achieve what I want. In the early stages of a project where I have no any specific border for me to stay within, it is all a bit uncontrolled. A lot of my work are based on sensing my next step. Sometimes it is like finding my way through a dark room and I will always try not to get caught up in what I imagined
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about the way your background has impacted on your current practice: First, I would ask you if there are any experiences, and especially related to formal training, that have particularly influenced your evolution as an artist. Moreover, I am very curious about the role that the cultural substratum dued to your Persian roots plays in the way you currently conceive and produce your works: how much living in a place extraordinarily rich on many aspect of culture affects the way you relate yourself to Art?
I was studying physics because I wanted to get to know the dominant rules of nature. I wanted to explore the unknown and the unseen. At the same time, I was nonacademically working with art. Maybe somewhat insubstantially but more and more the artistic work occupied a greater part of my mind. To be perfectly honest I do not have the mind-set for scientific work. For that, I think I am much too unorganized. After my studies, I found myself completely hands full in my workshop. I was working as an assistant at the First Symposium Sculpture of Tehran I 2007 and my first real experience with was participating with a sculpture in the fifth Tehran Sculpture Biennial the same year. After this, there has been a lot of group exhibitions and Workshops.
from For Adults Only series
Dead materials like steel or plastic will continue to be so, whereas skin or leather will give a sense of life. This is why I choose the elements I did when I was working on the Dolls. The mixture of these materials is not incidentally and it is often by putting them together that they combined will express some sort of idea. People judge by appearance and it is the shape and the look that will give the onlooker his first impression of what it is he or she is really looking at.
I have also had two video installations on exhibition. Being born and grown up in Iran has undoubtedly had an effect on my work, my attitude and my view of the world. As would have any place, a person has their roots. My Persian heritage is as you say an extraordinary rich one, its history filled to the brim with the most beautiful of art. However, said heritage is a two sided one. Recent history have also been a turbulent one. We have seen war and revolution and there are many restrictions on young
I would pose you a couple of questions
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from For Adults Only series
from For Adults Only series
engaging the way you subvert our common perceptual parameters and I have to confess that it suddenly forced me to relate myself to your work in a different way. Would you like to walk our readers through your process when you conceived this series and to its evolution?
Iranians today. That is when it is wonderful to have something like beautiful poetry to turn to, to help ridicule and trivialize what problems may be. I would start to focus on your artistic production beginning from For Adult Only, an interesting project that our readers have already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article. What mostly appeals to me of this series is the way you have accomplished a suggestive recontextualization of the common idea about a usual objects, going beyond a mere representative gaze: when merging a variety of viewpoints that involves parts of human body as well as mechanical tools as springs, you provide your pieces with an autonomous, dynamical life. I find truly
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As I always do when I start a new project, I will sit down and draw many sketches. It is quite aimless and chaotic at first, until I gain control. I am always seeking something new. I will draw a line and if that line is getting a familiar shape, I will try for another direction. The first that came to mind was “The Dog�. I was thinking of something like a household
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from For Adults Only series
pet on a leash. Initially I intended it being used in a video performance. I wanted to try to find out what reactions it could create walking this creature in the streets.
plaything. It is as you say; they have life. They need to be kept indoor and protected. They are also fragile, cursed with a limited lifespan, and have already entered in to their later years.
I later arrived at the present idea and this is how the other dolls followed. One by one, they took shape, like of something that could have or have had a function, a
The instrinsic evokative nature of your approach urges the viewers to play an active role in a process of biunivocal
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from For Adults Only series
communication, and that shows an attempt to exploit the notions of language itself. Thomas Demand once stated that "nowadays art can no longer rely much on symbolic strategies and has to probe psychological narrative elements within the medium instead". So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion personal experience and its related cultural substratum is an absolutely indespensable part of a creative process... Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?
and to analyse the future. This is also what the dolls represent; it is my way of asking “What if...?” “What if beauty alone is no longer sufficient? What if innocence is overrun by cynicisms?” When providing the onlookers of a set of "fruible" images marked with a juxtaposition from everyday imagery and a sublte but effective surrealistic touch, you remove a consistent part of the historic gaze from the reality you refer to, giving the viewers the chance to relate themselves to the topics in a more absolute form, inviting us to challenge the common way we perceive not only the outside world, but our inner dimension: as Gerhard Richter
No, I do not think so. Personal experience beyond doubt will be an absolute essential part of any artistic work. However not only, it needs more. An artist need to look further
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Naim El Hajj
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Zahra Zavareh
ART Habens
once remarked, "my concern is never art, but always what art can be used for": what is your opinion about the functional aspect of Art in the contemporary age?
When comparing classical art and Art of the contemporary age it is one thing that for me will stand out, Life has become a lot easier, at least for most people, but the pressure on the mind has also become a lot greater. I think that people turned to classical art for answers to great existential questions. However, contemporary art can work as a tool for many in completely other dimensions. From the rather trivial to the exploration of the depth of the mind. It is an awful clichĂŠ to use the highwaymetaphor, but when life wizzes by in a terrible speed, I feel as if it is the job of the contemporary art to maybe find other ways trough back alleys and small streets. It should also not come as a surprise to anybody the role contemporary art can play in the political scene and when battling the faceless oppression, depression and anxiety of the modern world. With “The Fingerâ€?, I am trying to express some feeling of hopelessness in political elections where the constituents are the ones doing the electing but at the same time pressed under the thumb of the elected.
from For Adults Only series
want to impose my thought on whoever it is viewing my work. This as well in projects when parameters are given. Even to the point where most of my sculptures do not have names other than most simple descriptive ones. I usually refer to them as The Dog, the Finger and so on, and in this way I will give the viewer his full freedom for further interpretation.
While exhibiting a captivating vibrancy, your works seem to reject an explicit explanatory strategy: rather, offer to the viewer a key to shed a light on the concepts your question, encouraging us to find personal interpretations: rather that a conceptual interiority, I can recognize the desire to enabling us to establish direct relations... Would you say that it's more of an intuitive or a systematic process?
I can also recognize a process of deconstruction and recontextualization of memories that conveys a vivid sense of consciousness in the way you materialize the ideas you explore, combining a marked Plasticity that doesn't suggest staticity but a sense of evolution. In particular, what progression or changes have you seen in your materials? Moreover, how important is the aesthetic problem for you when you
In general, my method is mostly an intuitive one. Nevertheless, at the same time I always have the idea with me that I do not
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Naim El Hajj
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Naim El Hajj
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Zahra Zavareh
choose the materials to be incorporated in your works?
Your approach is based on the chance of establishing a deep and multilayered involvement with the viewers, so before leaving this conversation I would like to pose a question about the nature of the relationship of your art with your audience. Do you consider the issue of audience reception as being a crucial component of your decision-making process, in terms of what type of language is used in a particular context?
I used to work a lot with woodcarving, which is a great shape-giving media, but I soon needed something that could help me express the uncertainties and the un-static. I than started to work a lot with material like silicone, leather and fiberglass. Like in the classical art where bronze or granite would assist the artist in making a 3D picture that would with its astonishing technique impress the viewer. However, my intent is to utilize the language of the material itself. Most of all I like the unsettledness, the possibility of change beyond control. I would not use materials for their beauty, but for what they are expressing.
I know that I at some point will have to show my work and I know the audience will produce an opinion for themselves about it. I always try to give that space so yes, it is an important part of my decision-making. Nevertheless, more exactly, about what language that I used I am not sure, I do not think so. There is nothing I would like more than for a relationship and a connection with the onlooker to be established. But first and foremost, the language I choose would be the one that comes more natural.
There's a line of your artist's statement that has particularly impacted on me: what will happen if a plaything or a doll is polluted with the mind of an adult? I have to admit that it has a bit unsettled me: I think it condenses a spontaneous approach dued to our alcyon days, that is mixed to kind of anguish that I find truly inexplicable and that pervades some of the anthropomorphic pieces of your production. It is scaring and charming at the same time... would you like to elaborate for our readers about this aspect of your approach?
Thanks a lot for your time and for sharing your thoughts, Zahra. Finally, would you like to tell us readers something about your future projects? How do you see your work evolving?
I work a lot with drawing. A new project is slowly taking shape, where I am using the human body in small sculptures. Bodies or body parts placed in unnatural places and illogical settings. It is very much in the beginning fazes. I am also expecting a move to Scandinavia and Norway. It will be very interesting to see what I will learn from the overall minimalistic style of the Scandinavian art.
These are playthings. But they are not to be played with because that is no longer in their nature. Still they are exuberating something that makes you relate to them. Why is it like this? It is because they awake a distant memory. There is something you see in these monstrous dolls that is not a reminder of your teddy bear or Raggedy Ann but rather a reminder of yourself in the present. The past sweet life of innocence feels like an estranged distant memory. Their or your existence was carefree, but now they, and you, have grown up and matured up with strange ideas.
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And lastly I would like to give out a hearty thank you to Dario and Katherine, to the fantastic ART Habens team and its readers An interview by Dario Rutigliano, curator and Katherine C. Wilson, curator arthabens@mail.com
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Allie Litherland Litherland Umbatu is a south African philosophy that means the only way to see my humanity is to have it reflected back at me. My practice is mainly digital with some works that incorporate performance and installation. I am passionately curious about human behaviour both as an individual and the patterns of group behaviour. The depths of the psyche are a mystery but what is clear is projected from our thoughts that that are founded in our interpretation of reality. I have used myself as a tool to try and understand the impact of debilitating emotion and how this manifests into thoughts and action. Throughout my research I have come to the conclusion that the source of everyday emotion is traced into two inevitable choices, love or fear. This work extends an invitation to “feel” and be part of attaining the artwork’s full meaning and true hope, but it is up to you, the viewer, to accept or reject this invitation. The connection between the audience and the art can expose a vulnerability and lead to a rippling effect into empathy, the antidote to shame Allie Litherland
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An interview with An interview by Josh Ryders, curator and Katherine C. Wilson, curator arthabens@mail.com
The very first feeling I received when I had the chance to get to know Allie Litherland's works, is that it's always possible to go beyond any artificial dichotomy that limits the intrinsic symbiosys between a rational, almost investigative, approach with an marked emotional sensibility. Her search of an organic dialogue between several viewpoints offers to the viewer a multilayered experience capable of establishing an area of deep interplay where we are invited to explore unexpected sides of reality and the way we perceive it. I'm very pleased to introduce our readers to her stimulating works. Hello Allie and welcome to ART Habens: to start this interview, would you like to tell us something about your background? You have a solid formal training and you hold a BA(hons) of Fine Art, that you have received from the Nottingham Trent University: how did this experience influence your evolution as an artist? In particular do you think that formal training did inform the way you currently conceive your works?
Hi, it's a pleasure to have this opportunity to answer these thought provoking questions about my practice. I have always had an issue with art and education, from GCSE to Foundation Diploma. The way that it is formulated and executed in education doesn't give much flexibility to expression, it always needs to meet a certain aesthetic, it puts a box over creativity and emphasizes too much attention to copying other artist’s way of expression and not enough time is given to understand the conceptual ideas behind the creativity, I feel this misses the point completely. The education authorities believe they are teaching creativity by encouraging copying artists but this is totally wrong. These activities are of value in themselves but they are not teaching creativity. It wasn't until I went to Nottingham Trent University I felt I really had the freedom to explore my interests and be challenged on them too. The way the Fine Art
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course is set up is different to most Universities, in that it is completely self-directed and I am deeply grateful for that structure. Reflecting back on my time there I can confidently say that there are a few things that have shaped my artistic practice for the better because of formal training, one of these areas is critical feedback. I found it changed my relationship to the work and this way of analysis forced me to be less stubborn with an idea and more flexible to change which I think is vital if you want to evolve as an artist and a person. Now let's focus on your artistic production: I would start from It's such a shame, an extremely interesting work that our readers
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have already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article: and I would suggest to visit https://vimeo.com/90951202 in order to get a wider idea of this interesting work. In the meanwhile, would you tell us something about the genesis of this project? What was your initial inspiration?
It's a difficult question to answer because everything had its place whether I knew it or not at the time. This enquiry about our selfconsciousness began with the amalgamation of our public lives and our private selves. This could only take me so far into how shame functions in our lives. So this was the starting point that led me to examine my own behaviour, as a way of dissecting shame and how it affects our relationships. I started to notice this pattern that correlates with Newton’s Third Law: that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. I wanted to use this statement as an explanation of emotion in social interaction. A defining point in this process was discovering what vulnerability meant, how it works in modern society and how we try to manage it personally and collectively. Vulnerability is often seen as a weakness – which is probably rooted from primal survival. However in the modern age it has changed its meaning and use, it is now more socially connected to fear of ego death of which the main manifestation is shame, the fear of disconnection. Is there something about me, that if other people know or see it, I won’t be worthy of connection. So I needed to make a work that caused an opposite reaction of that particular fear, which is empathy. I had to condition a connection so I could be “seen”. Connection is an after effect from authenticity; to give up who they thought I should be and show who I am, which I unquestionably needed to do in order for this to happen. I need to fully embrace and promote vulnerability and demonstrate that rather than being a weakness it may be among the most valiant, daring acts we can make. This forced transparency is a way of allowing the viewer into my head space; this is
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what I needed to do. The result of this means I have succeeded in abolishing the walls between art and audience, in a way that the outside "other" can metamorphose into another "self". I open windows into my life in a public space for people to peer in, generating an intimate
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When I first happened to get to know It's such a shame I tried to relate all the visual and sound information to a single meaning. But I soon realized that I had to fit into the visual rhythm suggested by the work, forgetting my need for a univocal
narrative where I am both the creator and focus, so the audience feels something and is not just observing. I permit myself for art’s sake to stare agonizingly into the corners of my own subconscious and allowing others to interact with that side of myself that is socially hidden.
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understanding of its content: in your videos,
There are so many layers that make up behaviour and so many roles that we play, that trying to harmonize different questions asked by the work without being too messy or understating the messiness of the subject was a challenge. There were three main aspects which
rather than a conceptual interiority, I can recognize the desire to enable us to establish direct relations... Would you say that it's more of an intuitive or a systematic process?
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triumph to which we can all relate. I start with the theoretical path to the subject, of how to have a connection with the audience, with the tautological acknowledgment that the emotions we experience while watching films or viewing art are first and foremost emotions, no matter if they were brought about from a fake stimulus or not. I create art that is constructed to extract a true emotional reaction from our already present emotional structure. It came quite fluidly to me that in order to show what I have learnt and pass that on I would need to get the audience to see what I felt by what I learnt. So I suppose it is a mix between the two, yes the ideas were intuitive but trying to put emotion into a physical state was systematic through trial and error. Your practice is intrinsically connected to the chance of creating an area of intellectual interplay with the viewers, that are urged to evolve from the condition of a merely passive audience. In particular, your process of semantic reflection has reminded me of the ideas behind Thomas Demand's works, when he stated that "nowadays art can no longer rely much on symbolic strategies and has to probe psychological narrative elements within the medium instead". While conceiving Art could be considered a purely abstract activity, there is always a way of giving it a permanence that goes beyond the intrinsic ephemeral nature of the concepts you explore. So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion personal experience is an absolutely indespensable part of a creative process... Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?
I do not think it can ever be completely disconnected because we attach feelings to everything we come in contact or make relationship with, these associations are what the art is trying to engage with because of the way our mind is wired we attach feelings to objects or experiences which will then inform a response the next time we encounter said object or experience. If the intention is to associate empathy with shame and this will lead to a rippling effect because once we engage shame
are sound, projection and the cause of these two to equal the third which is direct relations. I wanted anyone who viewed it to 'get' and feel the intention because it speaks to our most basic and primal communication method, which is emotion. This is the universal struggle and
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with compassion and empathy the association is there for the next encounter. In that way the art is permanent. My work is all about the relationship to our emotions, which everyone has but it's the relationships within themselves that will manifest as they choose how they will express their emotion based on the initial impact, again, if they choose to. I wanted to challenge our perception of debilitating emotion and the role we let it play in our lives and that will always involve relationships, it's a set of needs we must have to live and thrive. Art is rehearsed and thought out so to an extent it is never the real emotion in the moment but a mimic but this shouldn’t make it any less real. The work is constructed but somehow the spectator, and in turn the audience of the art, are drawn into this paradox, it should evoke a response which is real, that then makes the work real because the experience and response to it are true, something that doesn’t exist at that moment can create true reactions. It is not what you see that is important but what takes place between people. Another interesting project of yours that has particularly impacted on me and on which I would like to spend some words is entitled "...the most accurate measure of courage we have": the ambience has reminded me the concept of Heterotopia elaborated by Michel Foucault and what has mostly impacted on me is the way you have been capable of bringing a new level of significance to the sign of absence, which is a recurrent feature of your approach, that provides the viewers of an Ariadne's Thread, inviting them to challenge the common way we perceive not only the outside world, but our inner dimension... By the way, I'm sort of convinced that some informations & ideas are hidden, or even "encrypted" in the environment we live in, so we need -in a way- to decipher them. Maybe that one of the roles of an artist could be to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially of our inner Nature... what's your point about this?
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idea. I'm sort of convinced that new media will definitely fill the apparent dichotomy between art and technology and I will dare to say that Art and Technology are going to assimilate one to each other... what's your point about this?
I work with the connotations of intimacy, whilst also querying the spectator’s role, with viewers often feeling a sense of awkwardness as they become the inadvertent participants in this introspective piece. The work invites the audience to contribute and thereby complete the artwork’s full meaning and intention, as I mentioned before I work intuitively up to a point and then the systemically and logical thread takes over to how to interpret this information like the Ariadne’s Thread you referenced. I think we have a tendency to think things happen to us not for us, we have a lot more control than we think, in fact we have all the control and this encrypted environment has veiled over the vastness of potential so we may not recognize and use what we are truly capable of. I heard a great quote that said art is the only way we can communicate in a decaying society, art, if it is truthful, must also reflect decay. And unless it wants to break faith with its social function, art must show the world as changeable, and help to change it. - Ernst Fischer.
New media is starting and will continue to be used to create art; my view is that it's creative evolution as use the materials around us. Some people have this notion that to be creative it must be crafted, so I think those who don’t consider themselves creative have now this new material of technology that doesn’t just associate itself with creativity, this platform is for anyone with an interest in technology. Technology is a tool that is more accessible to most people than clay or paints and can be manipulated or edited just like any other medium. For my relationship with technology, I start with a premise or an observation and I want to create an arena that acts as a symbolic representation of that aspect of the world in you and me.
Our identity is often deeply tied to how others see is, we are all part of each other, I have wondered if this is why we seek to have our selfworth gratified by others because it’s easier to believe others over ourselves. We are able to attribute mental states to other persons based on the observation of their physical behaviour and our direct experience of mental states from the first person perspective. My projections are the means of introspection and are contextualised more frequently and voraciously on myself. For me art is a way of taking distance, the pathological or therapeutic aspects exist, but just as catalysts. We should question reality and handed down truths, as Einstein quoted ‘Reality is nothing more than an illusion albeit a very persistent one.’
Using technology was a very organic process, it just seemed technology was the option for me to create these layers of dialogue without it being an overload of information because you can incorporate different layers and meanings as one coherent piece such as sound, placement, light, length etc. all these things are aspects to represent the message. Claude Debussy said, “Art is the greatest deception of all, art is a deception that creates real emotion. A lie that creates a truth” and what technology does is simulate emotion – music, film, social media, advertising. It can be set to certain vibrational levels that put us in a trance like state that is constructed so we are more susceptible to the message – this is very true in advertisement.
The impetuous way modern technology has nowadays came out on the top has dramatically revolutionized the idea of Art itself: in a certain sense, we are forced to rethink about the intimate aspect of constructed realities and especially about the materiality of an artwork itself, since just few years ago it was a tactile materialization of an
So whether we are conscious of it or not technology has been stirring our emotions since it’s conception. However I want to set out to use this medium to encourage empathy and compassion, these social reactions will cancel the counter reactions to negative technological effects. The consumer state that material things equal joy and if it doesn’t work it’s because you
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need more of said product – isn’t that the definition of insanity, doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different outcome? It speaks to our fears masked as desires and needs. So technology can be used and melded as the creator intends, if technology is just a set of constructed vibrational streams put together to form an image – then we the creator have our intention influenced into this stream. What I find fascinating about technology is that when I have used it for creation and exploration it questions the very thing we are observing. Is this real or a trick, thus questioning technology’s very nature, and in turn our own reality. Technology never allows things to be straightforward because it needs to translate your intention into its language of the binary code. Computers use a simple process of binary codes to create things within the hardware of computers to interpret the information; this is very similar to how creation creates our external reality or material world. The material world works in a very similar way to virtual reality. At its core, the material world is made of only light (energy) that flashes on and off to create energy codes. This fundamental process involves light flashing on and off. Everything is energy and that’s all there is to it, match the frequency of the reality you want and you cannot help but get that reality. It can be no other way, this is not philosophy, this is physics. Except as I said before, technology has a more powerful immersive effect because we are used to technology telling us how a thing is rather than asking if a thing is a way it is and what do you think? The relationship that can be created between the audience and work can be simulated to be closer to real situations and react, re-edit life. By definition video is rhythm and movement, gesture and continuity. The investigation about the human behaviour that you accomplish in your videos you create timebased works that induce the viewer to abandon himself to his associations, looking at time in spatial terms and I daresay, rethinking the concept of space in such a static way: this seems to remove any historic gaze from the reality you refer to, offering to the viewers the chance to perceive in a more
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atemporal form. How do you conceive the rhythm of your works?
rhythm, rather both together they create one rhythm. My projections refer to the coherence of the whole, the sense that all of the parts are working together to achieve a common result; a harmony of all the parts. So my rhythm, though
Space and time go hand in hand – both are limited by our ability to interpret them. I don’t see the differences in sound rhythm and visual
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the design. The ability to be in the present is being in the same rhythm and being in tune to what it is. There are so many factors that influence a rhythm; I guess the point of my work is that the rhythm it is and provides, is to be a spring board for conversation. This is exactly what the work is meant for, to change, to question, to reflect, and these are all things that affect the rhythm of life. So again it is down to the audience and how they perceive the work, that influences what they choose to do with the rhythm offered, a lot like how we discussed before, our perception of what reality is – in this case how we interpret the rhythm of a thing or experience, is what it will be in our reality, whether the rhythm set out to play that role or not. I realised that there will necessarily be individual dissimilarities in emotional responses, certified by the ways that the person’s experiences have assembled their particular emotional networks- their personal rhythm. Multidisciplinarity is a crucial aspect of your art practice and you seem to be in an incessant search of an organic, almost intimate symbiosis between Video and Performance: while crossing the borders of different artistic fields have you ever happened to realize that a symbiosis between different disciplines is the only way to achieve some results, to express some concepts?
For me, there was no other way; I needed something simple to hold a complex concept. I have tried just moving image and I found it could only take me so far and then when I combined performance, it was able to communicate more effectively to the audience. One of my concerns is that I want the viewer to be integrated in a deliberately constructed situation where they are the recipient of the emotional impact of the work. I want the viewer to interact on an empathic level and through that connection also enable them to relate to their own experiences and be a part of an intimacy created by a shared space. I think I got to a point where video just couldn't hold the concept or intention by its self, it needed a being to hold its whole intention, and
it is material, its intention is emotionally not aesthetically driven. Unity can also be a matter of concept. The elements and principles can be selected to support the intended function of the designed object; the purpose of the object unifies
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the nature of performance art is life. It is a living art form. if I could change the way they think about their life, even in the smallest way then maybe I could actually change the way of consciousness somehow.
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have any direct experience of how other people feel, either.) Can we create an idea of the manner in which they are influenced, except by envisaging what we would feel in the same situation? Language is much more than appropriate and sophisticated communication, it's the space between conversation and I am remembering an Einstein quote “If you can't explain something simply you don't understand it well enough” Therefore I don’t like to rely on language as the main communicator because it is limited, in different ways for each individual. Instead I try to communicate with feeling. So communication requires the presence of another and the act of observing is a great position because then you ask more “why” questions and release control of how you think you should be feeling and instead start to question the roles being played and why. This communication is based on the possibility of a dialogical relationship that breaks down the conventional distinction between artist, artwork and audience – a relationship that allows the viewer to “speak back” to the artist in certain ways, and in which this reply becomes in effect a part of the work itself. So I would answer yes the issue of audience reception is a crucial component of my decision-making process, in terms of what type of language for a particular context. In this situation, language meaning the interaction and communication of feeling and thought.
When we encounter an external object the phenomena triggers a mental process much like a reflection. We create a mental experience akin to the one understood from the object. I plan for the viewer to be inwardly focused on the work and encounter it, or project their experiences as present in the object. This transfer of energy gives the work life and potential for change. However, there is a concern, in that art struggles, because sometimes reality can be so overwhelming and there have been times when viewers have left the performance because their initial fear of the unknown and having their sense of sight taken away. Maybe: some people are not ready for the peculiarly personal, emotional response they will encounter, their journey is not at that place, yet. That's okay because they know they aren’t going to be receptors for what the work wants to say to them at this time and place. Before taking leave from this interesting conversation I would like to pose a question about the nature of the relation with your audience: in particular, do you consider the issue of audience reception as being a crucial component of your decision-making process in terms of what type of language for a particular context?
Thanks a lot for your time and for sharing your thoughts, Allie. Finally, would you like to tell us readers something about your future projects? How do you see your work evolving?
I try not to let the work be aimed at certain audiences, for those who choose to engage are my audience. Audience reception is important to me and my hope is that the audience can understand, question and challenge and so relate to the work. I would want everyone to be able to know what is being said and be able to respond in clarity and intuitively.
At the moment I am beginning to research group psychology and the herd mentality, in particular how this functions within religion. In this way I am still looking around fear as the main motivator in human behaviour. Although I have learnt that fear is the cornerstone of negativity and its many branches, in some cases it's the search for validation, value and self-worth. Fear can encapsulate and emphasise our self-worth by being compared to manmade ideas of perfection. A quote comes to mind “oh the gift that God could give us, to see ourselves as others see us” Robert Burns. I want to start
We often lie to ourselves and deceive ourselves, like experiencing emotion in films, it isn’t real, but we allow ourselves to believe it is real and we do this with a sense of empathy. (N.B. psychologist Edward Titchener brought this word into the English language as the translation from German which means “feeling into” as we can’t
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creating work that adopts similar propaganda to advertisement techniques without consumerism being an outcome. As I said before empathy seems to be a key in promoting compassion and if empathy can be learnt then it could be used as a powerful tool. I have created pyramid exampling empathy as a cognitive tool. Please see belowIn order to understand people’s emotions our imagination puts us in a position where we feel or desire. We visualize ourselves in the situation. Recent psychology calls this kind of simulation the paradigmatic empathic method. It may be open to dispute whether understanding our environment is in fact knowledge, if this is true, then experiencing empathy with a person’s feelings, we can know how an individual feels, which transcribes into new found knowledge that we didn’t have before. Thus empathy gives us information not only regarding the individual, but about how the individual was altered by something. Thus giving us facts about that “something,” changing the way we assess it. As a result, empathy is a cognitive instrument. We examine and calculate through others’ responses to objects, situations, and subjects. Since emotions endorse our judgements and assist us to gain knowledge, it is said that empathy has an epistemological function. For me, being an artist isn't about creating beautiful objects or being praised, it needs to have some kind of communication, a message. The Pink Cabbage in Stroud, Gloucester introduces Seek Redemption, Purge Now. A series of events using multi-sensory experiences to encourage communion with each other and to see where redemption fits in our lives today. There will be live performances and interactions on the evenings of Friday the 28th and Saturday the 29th August with an alternative Sunday communion starting at 10am. allie@allielitherland.co.uk http://www.allielitherland.co.uk
An interview by Josh Ryders, curator and Katherine C. Wilson, curator arthabens@mail.com
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Nikkita Morgan Morgan My main area of interest is mixed media textile art & design, where I use a range of materials and processes, that enables me to produce unique contemporary artworks mainly using paper, steel, acetate, fabric and digital projections. My work is a response to political issues, specifically referring to the continuing conflict in the North of Ireland. It focuses on the historic, religious, political and contemporary outlook of the struggle, which is viewed from my own personal perspective. My work looks at the North’s troubled landscape using original photographs from both the past and present conflict. Original photographs inspire and influence the imagery I produce (drawing/stitching/mono-print/painting stencils) and text is influenced from data/dates/information on the troubles. My work is large scale using a variety of materials, processes and techniques such as; moving imagery and projections, embroidery, screen printing, laser cutting, drawing, painting and mono-printing to produce 2D/3D mixed media artworks that would be interactive and engaging with an audience. These methods are also used to convey ideas relating to transience, fragility and damage; as a method of recording the emotions and reactions to the conflict. Imagery and text are key elements used within my work to represent different aspects of the conflict, referencing key historic/contemporary events, slogans, words and images relating to the part of the story I am telling. I am driven to confront what continues to be the on-going reality of life in the North of Ireland. My objective is to raise awareness of conflict issues to a wider audience and attract public attention to a public issue that is still thoroughly misunderstood.
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An interview with An interview by Josh Ryders, curator and by K. C. Wilson and D. Rutigliano, curator arthabens@mail.com
Nikkita Morgan explores the expressive potential of a wide variety of media, that she incorporate to provide her mixed media textile works of a multifaceted, kaleidoscopic nature. What at soon impressed us of her insightful investigation about the continuing conflict in the North of Ireland is the way she accomplishes the difficult task of establishing a balance between sociopolitical engagement and autonomous aesthetics, that gives life to a compelling narration capapble of condensing the permanent flow of the perception of the reality we inhabit in. We are really pleased to introduce our readers to Morgan's works. Hello Nikkita and welcome to ART Habens: I would start this interview, posing you a couple of questions about your background. You have a solid formal training and you hold a MA Degree in Textile Design, that you received from the Norwich University of the Arts: how has this experience influenced your evolution as an artist? Moreover, how does the on-going reality of life in the North of Ireland inform the way your relate yourself to art making?
Nikkita Morgan
The experience of the MA Degree has influenced my development as an artist through deeper critical thinking and research within my subject area. Through analysis of the impact of my work, I explored current, contemporary and diverse innovative and experimental textile concepts through to written and practical outcomes. This helped to develop my own creative thinking about my concept and showed me how to connect and combine research, text, art and design together.
Through my chosen colour palette, materials and processes, I express myself through my art making that is informed from the on-going reality of life in the North of Ireland.
The development of my creative practice and myself as an artist has enhanced greatly since the MA Degree through developing my own knowledge and understanding of my work which is a response to political issues, specifically referring to the North of Ireland conflict. I have gained a greater understanding of conceptual
Certain aspects of the North that I remember greatly, occurs repeatedly throughout my art making and practice. Repeated imagery, text and techniques are constantly used within my work as this relates to the recurring troubles in the North. Recurring images are very significant in my practice as they represent the people who
issues relevant to my concept and thought about contemporary issues and how my work fits within the contemporary art scene.
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per article or news on the tv, black and white sometimes with a hit of colour, so when I am mono-printing original photographs of the conflict it brings me into the zone, I feel like I am there in that moment, experiencing what is happening. I feel that from growing up in the North of Ireland, I have a personal and private relationship with the North, in that I have memories and experiences that the outside public would not know of shown only through my artwork. I make my artwork for the public, sharing private and personal emotions, a concept I use throughout my art making. I use my own experiences, memories and my imagination of how others would have felt. An hallmark of your approach is a strong cross-disciplinary feature and I would suggest our readers to visit http://nikkitamorgan.com, in order to get a wider idea of your artistic production: both in terms of formal aspect and as regards the way you combine mixed media textile art & design to pursue the kaleidoscopic nature that marks out your works. While superimposing such a wide variety of materials and crossing the borders of different artistic fields, have you ever happened to realize that such uncoventional symbiosis between different techniques is the only way to achieve some results, to express specific concepts? And in particular, how do you select the materials to be incorporated in a work?
An Embroidered Story 2
have been and still are involved in the struggle (IRA, British Soldiers, Victims). The symbolism of using the shape of a circle represents how the conflict keeps repeating, going round in circles with no end in sight. It also symbolises bullet holes both past and present and how they are still visible today both on the walls and in people’s minds.
Yes I have realized that using a variety of unconventional materials and techniques helps to achieve more precise artworks. I feel that by utilizing conventional art-making materials, processes and techniques not only helps to push the boundaries of textiles, it is also fundamental to the production of the work as paper, fabric, acetate, plastic and steel are key to conveying ideas relating to the fragile. People are left fragile after attacks and are afraid to leave their home; torn: families torn apart by violence; damaged: people, homes and cars are damaged by bombs, explosives and gunshots. Manipulation of the fabric also represents these ideas, where I mold and construct the materials the way I want them to be. This is also used as a method of recording the emotions and reactions
I put myself in my work, in that I place myself on the canvas, telling the story through my eyes, I am a visual author. I also use my first and second hand knowledge and experiences of the conflict within my artwork to make it meaningful and differential myself from other political artists works. I use techniques, processes and materials that communicates the North’s story: i.e. monoprinting is gritting and grainy, its like a newspa-
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to the conflict; this is also represented through my specific colour palette. The materials I use for my artwork are select by relevance, how they relate to my subject matter, their meaning and how it is symbolic to the message I want to portray in my work. For example I use stainless steel as this represents defense, attack, weapons and when this material is combined with certain techniques such as embroidery it can potentially refer to strength and fragility at the same time. The symbolic meanings attached to the materials and techniques I use also relate to aspects of the conflict. For example, during the troubles steel was used to create weapons (guns) and steel bin lids where used to signal when the British army where coming. Steel also links to the ship building industry at the start of the 19th century referencing a contemporary Ireland with the new Titanic building in Belfast, linking past and present. Steel also resembles defense, attack, protection which are common words relating to my subject matter. Fabric symbolizes an intimate item relating to the idea of personal, private and public emotions of the conflict being exposed to an audience. This also refers to my own feelings of exposing private and personal experiences to the public through my artwork. Key aspects of the making are the repetitive blanket and chain stitch used within my work, referencing different historic and contemporary issues and events within Ireland. For example the blanket stitch can represent the ‘1976 Blanket Protest’ and the chain stitch refers to the barbed wire and fencing. I would start to focus on your artistic production beginning from An Embroidered Story 2, an interesting projects that our readers have already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article. What most impressed me of these pieces is the way you have create a point of convergence between a functional analysis of the context you relate to and autonomous aesthetics. Did you conceive this equilibrium on an instinctive way or did you rather structure your process in order to reach the right balance?
An Embroidered Story 2
also instinctive in order to get the right balance. I start of with a structured idea, and begin with
It is a bit of both; my process is structured and
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materials that best represent my concept. Then during the making of this piece I started to add
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and change sections, adding more or less text, images, colour, thread, other material etc. I try
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to balance original facts with my own knowledge on my subject. I liked An Embroidered Story 2 to
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have a mix of stories, through the text and imagery I chose.
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conflict in the North of Ireland: Many interesting contemporary artists, such as Thomas Hirschhorn and Michael Light, use to include socio-political criticism and sometimes even explicit messages in their works, that often goes beyond a mere descriptive point of view on the issues they face: it is not unusual that an artist, rather than urging the viewer to take a personal position on a subject, tries to convey his personal take about the major issues that affect contemporary age. In such grey area, a particular care should be payed, since Art may even stop to be an independent tool to interpret and relate with and becomes a dedicated vehicle, which lies in the liminal area in which criticism blends with propaganda... Do you consider that your works are political in this way or do you seek to maintain a neutral approach?
I feel my work can be considered both of these; my work can be explicit with both personal and political hidden meanings and messages to make the work ambiguous. I use my art as a tool, a metaphor for promoting my concept to viewers who may or may not understand the depths of my work at first glance. I want to draw the viewer in, to unfold the information in front of them, then to start to piece it together. I want them to feel intrigued, perplexed and informed, and I feel that creating work that is both explicit and vague helps to achieve this. Because I make my work both ambiguous and explicit it is often the materials and techniques that tell the story of my work more clearly. For example the number two is very meaningful within my concept, working with the idea of double sided, to represent the two main rival groups (Catholics/Protestants), the two countries (Ireland/Britain) and the idea that there are at least two sides to every story. I use and see my art like a private language, that is used as a tool to teach others both art and non-art audiences about political issues that can be often too complicated to understand in any other form apart from art. Thus, making my work so that it is easier for both art and non-art audiences to grasp the more intricate aspects of the conflict.
The focus of An Embroidered Story 2 is an in depth exploration of the past and present
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I feel it is ultimately necessary to examine the interplay of identities of the groups involved in conflicts, past and present over lapping layers of identity showcasing this through art. I like the way A Troubled Landscape explores the liminal area between historic reality and the way we perceive it questions the concept of direct experience: in particular, your investigation about the intimate consequences of historical events gives a permanence that goes beyond the ephemeral nature of the moments you capture. So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion personal experience is an absolutely indispensable part of a creative process... Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience? And in particular, how much do you explicitly think of a narrative for your works?
In my opinion personal experience is an absolute indispensable part of a creative process for me. I feel that having grown up around sociopolitical issues, it has made me more aware of the true emotions of these issues, because I have first hand knowledge, personal memories and experiences of the struggle including information giving to me by family members and friends, which helps in my thought process and my creative development of my art. I feel that as an artist who has their own personal experience of their concept makes their work more personal, meaningful and more direct. I feel that I can relate to other political artists and countries due to lived experiences, which allows us to show an audience (internal to external audiences). I have an insight that makes my work unique because of the experiences and knowledge I have that not many others would ever know and experience. I don’t think a creative process could be disconnected from my direct experience because I feel that my knowledge allows me to explore arrange of creative processes, where I critically engage and reflect upon my concept and practice combing both theoretical and practical knowledge and skills.
A Troubled Landscape
It takes quite a while to think of different narratives for my work. This is due to the many pro-
cesses and steps taking in preparation some of which include; informed research based ap-
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proaches including primary research, questionnaires, articles, surveys and photographic
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research. These factors all help to develop and narrate an array of stories.
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A Troubled Landscape
I also research headline news stories based on the North’s troubles. I collect other information
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such as original photographs, data and facts to combine them together in order to arrange a
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The dialogue that the tones that you juxtapose and the apparently simple texture of your works are a crucial part of your style, which sum up a combination of thoughts, emotions as well as struggle. How much does your own psychological make-up determine the nuances of tones you decide to use in a piece and in particular, how do you develop a painting’s texture? Moreover, any comments on your choice of "palette" and how it has changed over time?
My own psychological makes up a lot of the tones I use within a piece. When developing and creating a new piece, I consider my own thoughts and reactions to what I am ‘drawing’. Whether it is regarding the people involved (IRA/British soldiers), I reflect upon my own experience and opinions of these matters and try to express ‘real felt’ emotions caused from the topic of interest. Although I do use my own reactions within my work, I do however try to consider both sides of the argument again this concept relates to the idea that there are at least two sides to every story although I believe that one tends to be more accessible and potential. How do I develop a ‘paintings texture’, it takes quite a few steps and processes in developing an image. First I piece together a story/image board including photographs and text. This is then drawn onto fabric in an abstract form. I use a range of embroidery yarns ranging in various sizes to embroider the image. I then use my mono-print drawings that have been printed onto acetate to add depth to the piece as this material is used in relation to the media (how the conflict has been seen/told through the media ‘news articles’). Once the image is laid out in basic embroidery form, I start to use other yarns for texture, most common is ribbon for the ‘looping stitch’ which is seen on most of my works. I also embroider plastic (sheets, soldiers) to make it more tactile. Since gradating from my MA Degree my palette has become more basic using four main colours. I use these pacific colours due to the meaning(s) they represent. Green’s are used to represent; the island of Ireland, landscape, peace, innocent and victim. Red represents; blood, danger, tormentor, socialism and anger. Black represents;
storyboard of ideas for a narrative for new artwork.
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death, fear, the idea of unknown, aggression and power. My colour palette has changed greatly where it used to consist of bright and flamboyant colours that looked ‘pretty’ using blue, red, green, orange, yellow and purple. I felt that these colours didn’t represent my concept whereas my knew palette of black, contrasts well with bright colours making them look very powerful whilst giving an aggressive like colour scheme. I would take this occasion to pose you a question about the relationship between conflict in the North of Ireland and its representation in popular imagery: many artists from actor and producer Vince Vaughn to musicians as Cranberries or U2 tried to shed a light about th never ending succession of events that has affected for decades this part of Europe. Neverthless, it seems that mainstream media are not so effective in order to communicate the complexity of the situation to a wide audience: although I'm aware that might sound a bit naive, I'm convinced that nowadays Art can play an active role not only in exposing and interpreting sociopolitical issues, but also and especially to offer us an unexpected way to solve them... what's your point about this? And in particular, how can an artist give a move to the contemporary unstable society?
I agree in terms that the mainstream media does not help to communicate real conflict and political issues that still affect many people in today’s society. I believe that these issues should be communicated to the widest audience as possible including all ages, nationalities and race to help educate and tell people that these issues are still rife and still happen even if the media suggests otherwise. Other artists and actors who have previously delved into showing the North of Ireland troubles have been able to promote it worldwide, although I feel that many people know what they are on about, but are still not that clear on the true meaning of what that artist is representing within their work. I consider this, as from my own personal research (questionnaires and live interviews/questions) with members of the
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A Troubled Landscape
public, that they don’t seem to know much about what is being said. For example the Cran-
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berries ‘Zombie’ (one of my favorite songs due to its meaning) when asking others (who are
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not from Ireland) they don’t seem to understand the real impact of their lyrics.
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I feel the artist’s role is important in continuing to raise awareness of conflicts, to bring them to
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the attention of a public, which is often overwhelmed and even anaesthetised by television
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in terms of what type of language for a particular context?
and internet images. I think new, innovative artwork is important in representing this subject matter. It has the potential of bringing about new perspectives and attract public attention to a public issue that is still thoroughly misunderstood.
The audience is a crucial factor for my work. My artistic work is created to be shown/used/exist in commercial galleries and public spaces. This idea relates to the relationship between private memories and public expression of the conflict, being exposed to both internal and external audiences in mind. This would increase a general awareness of the theme I am portraying and would enable me to communicate my artwork with different people including a non-art audience, some of whom would not usually go to galleries. I hope to provide the viewer with an aesthetic experience: my intention is that by interacting and engaging with the work I produce, the viewer will be challenged to consider their own personal reaction. These exhibitions also give me the chance to gain the public’s opinion of my work. My main aim for my artwork is to continue to raise awareness of this theme.
You provide the viewers of a "fruible" set of images with a marked evokative symbolism that comes from universal imagery: this way you remove a consistent part of the historic gaze from the reality you refer to, giving the viewers the chance to relate themselves to the topics in a more absolute form, inviting us to challenge the common way we perceive not only the outside world, but our inner dimension: as Gerhard Richter once remarked, "my concern is never art, but always what art can be used for": what is your opinion about the functional aspect of Art in the contemporary age?
My opinion is that art is very functional in the contemporary age, as it is used as a tool to teach and educate others about other cultures, issues etc. In todays society artists can create artwork that communicates with people worldwide, people can relate and resonate with the work. Art is metaphor and can used for anything and I use it in a way that is meaningful to me. I explain my subject matter in a visual way, so people can experience an important story that I feel I need to inform audiences worldwide. My concept is very important and relates with contemporary conflict issues, which fits into the contemporary art scene.
From exhibiting my artworks I hope to create an emotional involvement with the viewer to provoke them to feel intrigued, perplexed and informed. I hope to have raised awareness of conflict issues to a wider audience and attracted public attention to a public issue that is still thoroughly misunderstood. I feel it is important to involve the audience in my work as it will not only benefit them, but will enhance my work through the ability of gaining the publics opinion and feedback of my work and if my objective had succeeded from the work that was shown. From this I will then continue to create further artworks that I will exhibit both locally and nationally, again to raise awareness of conflict issues and to inform the public of issues that they might not understand or know of.
The multilayered experience you provide the spectatorship of seems to reveal the will of deleting any barrier between the viewers and the ideas behind your work, highlighting your effective communicaton strategy. Over these years you have exhibited your works in several occasions, including a recent show at the One year on – Stew Gallery, Norwich, an exhibition supported by Norfolk Country Council. So, before taking leave from this interesting conversation I would like to pose a a question about the nature of the relation with your audience: in particular, do you consider the issue of audience reception as being a crucial component of your decision-making process
I feel that my work is important and will give benefit as a tool to teach and tell the viewer about issues that may not be as well understood to an outside audience. I use and see my art like a private language, that is used as a tool to teach others both art and non-art audiences about political issues that can be often too
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heavy to understand in any other form apart from art.
plan to create artworks referring to religious conflict but also a one of piece to represent the 100 years commemoration of the 1916 Easter Rising in Ireland. This will be one of the most important artworks I will create so far in my career as the 100 years is widely commemorated and celebrated and with the opportunity to create and hopefully exhibit this piece in Ireland.
Thanks a lot for your time and for sharing your thoughts, Nikkita. Finally, would you like to tell us readers something about your future projects? How do you see your work with stainless steel evolving in the future?
With my new and future artworks I aim to be able to show my understanding of destructive and futile, yet incredibly human conflicts within the contexts of textiles bringing political questions and answers to an art and non-art audience.
Thank you for the opportunity in sharing my thoughts with your readers. My future projects will continue to focus on the North of Ireland political troubles, although focussing more in-depth on the religious aspect of the conflict, researching the boundaries/borderlines of division between the two rival groups (Catholic/Protestant) in the North. I will look at whether religion is the main cause of the conflict in the North, understanding and comparing the perception of social, national and geographical boundaries. I will also try to relate, represent and link other conflicting countries such as Palestine (Irish-Palestine connection). With this concept for future projects I intend to incorporate array of processes and techniques as well as materials to create largescale 2D/3D works. This will include further works using stainless steel, fabric and embroidery and using new materials such as wood, as I feel these materials best represent my concept as suggested beforehand.
Title: An Embroidered Story 2 Date: 2015 Size: 150 X 80 cm Format: Mixed-media: embroidery, fabric and acetate Details on the nature of the work: This piece is a collage of imagery relating to the past and present conflict in the North of Ireland. Imagery and text are key elements used within my work to represent different aspects of the conflict, referencing key historic/contemporary events, slogans, words and images relating to the part of the story I am telling. Fabric was used as the main material as this symbolises a personal item relating to the idea of personal, private and public emotions of the conflict being exposed to an audience. I used the cut through method as a representation of bullet holes (past and present) and how they are still visible today; seen in walls and still in people’s minds. This refers to the idea that the conflict has no end in sight and that it keeps occurring (by going round in circles). In this piece I also reference the idea that there are at least two sides to every story if not more by exposing both sides of the fabric to the audience. Title: A Troubled Landscape Date: 2015 Size: 200 X 130 cm Format: Mixed-media: embroidery, fabric, acetate and plastic (soldiers) Details on the nature of the work: This piece is a collage of imagery relating to the past and present conflict in the North of Ireland. Imagery and text are key elements used within my work to represent different aspects of the conflict, referencing key historic/contemporary events, slogans, words and images relating to the part of the story I am telling. This piece consists of four separate collages joined into one large image representing all aspects of the North’s Troubled Landscape.
In the future I see my work developing a lot with stainless steel. I plan to incorporate new techniques to create new and innovative sculptures. An idea I have so far is to create human figure stories/collages, plasma cutting imagery, text and designs into the steel. Steel has also been a material interest of mine, as it represents my concept due to the material but it also has many functions, whether it be to embroider, screenprint or plasma cut, there’s so much I can use it for. In September I will be starting a 12-month artist residency in the textiles department at the Edinburgh College of Art. Where I will have the opportunity to use the colleges art faculties, which I can develop my creative practice further using arrange of materials. During this residency I
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Vilyana Milanova Milanova Art is word I can’t give explanation of. If somebody asks me I won’t be able to answer what it is. Art is personal. It makes me feel free and open-minded. It forces me to think, explore and imagine. “Three meters of memories” is my first artwork I gave part of me in it. It is personal. You’ve got to love yourself first. In the moment I understood what the meaning of this sentence is I started to work on making myself a priority. I decided to build my own way of capture the present and to destroy the sad moments. I had to throw away all the ‘bad’ in me. It’s a symbolic destruction. This is what “Three meters of memories” is about. What inspired me to do this artwork was my own need to let all go and to appreciate what is now. I believe every human can do it somehow in own personal way. I’m interested in all variety of ways an artist express feelings by art. In my projects I am concentrating on the connection between people and the connection between viewer and an artwork. I’m finishing my Bachelor in Textiles this year. The most important I’ve learned from textile: materials I use are important. This is what builds the shape of the idea. But the main is the idea itself.
Vilyana Milanova
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Three meters of memories, installation
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video, 2013
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Three meters Summer 2015of memories, installation Summer 2015
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An interview with An interview by Dario Rutigliano, curator withthe collaboration of Katherine C. Wilson arthabens@mail.com
Vilyana Milanova accomplishes a suggestive investigation about the concepts of shape and form: in her recent project Three meters of memories we can appreciate how she conveys a careful analysis of the elusive nature of space and time, investigating about the the elusive nature of the connection between Art and the viewers. One of the most convincing aspect of Milanova's approach is the way she provides the viewers of an Ariadne's thread that reveals the existence of a convergence point between abstraction and experience: we are very pleased to introduce our readers to her refined artistic production. Hello Vilyana and welcome to ART Habens: I would start this interview, posing you some questions about your background. You are currently finishing your Bachelor in Textiles: are there any further experiences that have particularly influenced your evolution as an artist? Do they still inform the way you currently conceive and produce your works?
I would say everything that happen to me influences me: people I met, music I listen, pictures of the day that I see. Everything around me could be a driven force for my senses and thoughts. Furthermore, I travel a lot and I believe this is what keeps my brain being always on the alert. Spending time in different cultural environment and getting know so many interesting places are what I love. Overall, I think is what makes me happy thus being able to express myself.
Vilyana Milanova
Deep in my mind I know is something good and I could just not stop thinking about it. I start to consider the idea and to imagine different pictures of expressing it. Furthermore, I make a lot of sketches and also some research. For instance, nowadays I’m preparing a project for deaf-blind people and the impact of art over them. I needed to read a lot and also to find the exact people who can help me in order to be precise in so serious issue. I can’t define a certain time I need for the different works. It depends on the idea of the project, medium and technique I use.
Before starting to elaborate about your production, would you like to tell to our readers something about your process and set up for making your artworks? In particular, what technical aspects do you mainly focus on your work? And how much preparation and time do you put in before and during the process of creating a piece?
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Now let's focus on your artistic production: I would start from Three meters of memories, an extremely interesting project that our readers have already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article: would you tell us something about the genesis of this stimulating work? What was your initial inspiration?
I lost a member of my family who I loved so much and I took it too hard. I wanted to feel better but I didn’t do anything about it on purpose. It wasn’t like figured it out for a day. It was a process of assumption the fact that I need to let out all of the emotions. Not to make reserve of thoughts and memories that makes me sad. It was like I need to be sufferer all the time. This is stupid, isn’t it? I just found a way to overcome my ego of a person who needs to feel sad. Have you ever felt like that: hoping that if you close your eyes long enough, everything is going to disappear and you can start your life over from scratch? A crucial feature of your work that has impacted on me and that I would like to highligh is the way your question the connection between viewer and an artwork: you seem to invite the viewers to a fullfilment process that involves the viewer's personal memories. This is a recurrent feature of your approach and you seem to deconstruct and assembly memories in order to suggest a process of investigation: maybe that one of the roles of an artist could be to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially of our inner Nature... what's your point about this?
I wanted to open a discussion in viewer’s brain. An inner and intimate talk with their life, their beliefs, dreams, future and present. In order to „live for the moment” people need to set free what is now already passed away. I loved working on Three meters of memories. Not only because it helped me so much. I love how it made me feel, how exhilarated and bemused I was. I am emotional person and making the ‘three meters’ felt so right. I remember I was so curious how my teachers are going to react on this idea. I explained it to my family and friends and I felt so good about myself, so full of good
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vibe. This is not a sad project. It is actually really happy one. I was sure everybody who sees it will find his/her own way in searching the inner balance. It is personal. Therefore, it becomes personal to audience. Let’s say I suggest myself a process of investigation and show it in an artwork to everybody who wants to see it. It is now viewer’s decision what to do with it. There is nothing wrong if somebody wants to steal the idea. I promise I will be happy about it. Try it, it feels good. Some people box, some run, I am using resin. When I first happened to get to know the interesting installation entitled Three meters of memories, I tried to relate all the visual information and the presence of a primary environmental elements to a single meaning. But I soon realized that I had to fit into the visual unity suggested by the work, forgetting my need for a univocal understanding of its symbolic content: in your work, rather than a conceptual interiority, I can recognize the desire to enabling us to establish direct relations... Would you say that it's more of an intuitive or a systematic process?
If I look at the whole process, it is totally sure we can call it a step-wise structured solving approach. I had all the steps including memories gathering and observation and action as a final step. But when I think about me being angry and just in the middle of the process, when I was cutting and destroying. Well, it is at some point an intuitively. I could say that the raw idea was totally an intuitive problem solving. Thus three meters of memories happens to be multidimensional work. I would say that one of the aim of your work is provide the viewer of a sense of freedom: as you have remarked once, what once inspired to create Three meters of memories was to let all go and to appreciate what is now The conceptual lines that marks out your approach is intrinsically connected to an investigation about the intimate consequences of constructed realities: while conceiving Art could be considered a purely abstract activity, there is always a way of giving it a permanence that goes beyond the
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ephemeral nature of the concepts you capture. So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion personal experience is an absolutely indispensable part of a creative process... Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?
your thoughts and let yourself free-minded are try for mental disconnection. A sense of subtle but pervading narrative is an hallmark of your approach: although each of your project has an autonmous life, there's always seem to be such a channel of communication between your works, that springs from the way you juxtapose ideas and media: German Photographer and Sculptor Thomas Demand once stated that "nowadays art can no longer rely much on symbolic strategies and has to probe psychological narrative elements within the medium instead". What's your point about this? And
I believe, every artwork brings the spirit of its creator. Of course, personal experience plays important role in creative process. Some artists don’t show obvious their emotions by the objects they create. However, the created work always has an inner part where you can see its author’s intimacy. On the other hand, to release
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in particular, how much do you explicitly think of a narrative for your works?
qualities. I wanted to create an object that could really be seen by blind people. I like evoking questions and let people answer their own questions. Not to show it but to feel it. The feeling is really important. A piece that awakes emotions – this is an artwork.
The inner ‘beauty’ of an artwork is what I work on. It’s the idea that you can see with no eyes. What is really important to say – it is not compulsory to be like this. I don’t do the most of the thing because they need to have these narrative elements but because this is what I feel I want to do. I feel good about myself when there is good result. The work I am currently working on is about the communication between viewer and artwork. How we actually “see” an object? Who can’t see it? How important is to be pretty, colorful and amazing – these are external
You seem to be in an incessant search of an organic, almost intimate symbiosis between several viewpoint out of temporal synchronization: moreover, the reference to the universal imagery of childhood that recurs in your works seems to remove any historic gaze from the reality you refer to, offering to the viewers the chance to perceive
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Three meters of memories, installation
Three meters of memories, installation
in a more a temporal form. In this sense, I daresay that the semantic juxtaposition between sign and matter that marks out your art, allows you to go beyond any track of contingency …
can send you in a place you are feeling good and that is enough. The ”destroying “ was symbolic, of course, I can’t not just delete my memories. By “Three meters of memories” I only proved to myself that I am over what my weight was and I was ready to carry on my now and not the past. This symbolic searching for happiness has nothing to do with forgetfulness and obliteration. It is overcoming and purification. I believe we all learn from our own history. We are what we are because all what we have been through. That’s why I used resin
Thinking of what time is was part of my research from the very beginning. Imagine there is no clocks, no calendars…you have only now. It sounds maybe a lot like a fairytale or a romantic movie. But this is not about that but a simple way of feeling when working over something
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Vilyana Milanova
ART Habens
Artist and his/hers art have nothing to do with borders. What I mean is the decisions should be something that comes out freely and naturally. When not talking about complying but a particular context, yes, I do think is really important how I express my idea. I would like to give for an example a project I am currently worked on. It is pointed at specific problem – do we appreciate our senses? Do we take care about what we already have? More precisely said, it is about deaf-blindness. I decided to weave a wool piece and to write over it using these in-ear earphones we all use nowadays. It is actually about all that we do with our bodies and we could change but we prefer being “blind”. The impact of human’s actions on our health and the nature is pretty broad topic. However, I don’t want just to denounce a social problem. It is more about make people think about appreciation, abilities, being thankful, being health. Are we thankful? Do we protect our mental and physical health? Thanks a lot for your time and for sharing your thoughts, Vilyana. Finally, would you like to tell us readers something about your future projects? How do you see your work evolving?
I still have a lot to see and learn. I am interesting in variety of areas and not only art. Right now, I’m finishing my diploma work. It is a project that presents the idea of fullness and emptiness. It appeared in my head when I was in Austria to see a friend who studies in Vienna. I started to consider on the issue about missing people who study or work abroad. In my country a lot people are in this situation in pursuit of better opportunities. No matter how empty it feels at home for their families and friends, hearts are full of love for them. The impact of my own feelings can be seen in my projects. I work every day on developing the way I express myself and hope to create touchable artworks.
Three meters of memories, installation
to cover the pieces – keep all these memories safe. We need to know very well the value of ourselves. Before taking leave from this interesting conversation I would like to pose a a question about the nature of the relation with your audience: in particular, do you consider the issue of audience reception as being a crucial component of your decisionmaking process in terms of what type of language for a particular context?
Thank you, Dario.
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Sequin Kay Sequin Kay is an artist who uses sequins to create meticulously ornate and decorative works on canvas and objects. Kay attended Camberwell college of Arts and Goldsmiths University. Her works have been exhibited across London, including on the London Underground, through public art agency Art Below, Sequin has exhibited internationally showcasing works and collaborations in Miami, Canada, Berlin, Ireland and Malta. Kay draws inspiration from ancient cultures and their connection to light and spirituality. Her work intends to communicate a subconscious meaning concerning the aesthetic experience. She is currently facilitating Sequinification and Sequin Empowerment workshops throughout London and Europe. Sequin Kay's work is charged with meaning perpetuated in the meticulous detail, which is central to the meditative process involved in the making of the works. Kay combines the complexities and layers of emotional reflections with the use of an unconventional material such as sequins, as a means to explore and analyse the transience of the human experience. Captivating aesthetics in the face of adversity, her work is often a response to the emotional chaos experienced in life and an attempt to understand personal problems, there is sensitivity to internal journeys through a delicate and thoughtful approach to various materials. The pieces offer a window into personal struggles and life experiences. A majority of Kay’s work comes from an obsession with repetitive action, monotony is the easiest way to tap into the self. Something about an obsessive process and the occupation of body and mind allows for freer introspection. 'A lot of struggle as an artist lies in maintaining that cathartic aspect of creation while creating a visually and conceptually interesting piece of engaging work.' Disruptive and fluid patterns guide the pieces and are associated with the reflection of light. The forms and patterns are used to allow the viewer to uncover something about themselves, through the process of looking, seeking and searching. As an artist it is my aim to attempt to change people’s perspectives on their reality and their understanding of it. To show people how powerful we as humans really are, the interconnection of life and to become self empowered through this understanding. I aim to touch people on a personal and emotional level enabling them to be a catalyst for their own healing through the power of sequins, visual stimulus and communication.
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video, 2013
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Gemma Pepper
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Sequin Kay
An interview with An interview by Katherine Williams
The work of Sequin Kay accomplishes the difficult task to communicate a subconscious meaning concerning the aesthetic experience: her incessant search of an organic symbiosis between several viewpoints and her insightful gaze to nature in its infinite structures established offers to the viewers a multilayered experience. One of the most convincing aspect of Sequin's practice is the way she invites the viewers to explore the liminal area in which Unconscious and Perception find an unexpected point of convergence: I'm very pleased to introduce our readers to her refined artistic production. Hello Sequin and welcome to ART Habens: to start this interview, would you like to tell us something about your background? You have a solid training and after your studies at the Camberwell College of Arts, where you earned a PGCE in Art and Design from the Goldsmiths University of London: how has formal training impacted on your evolution as an artist? In particular, how does it inform the way you currently conceive and produce your works?
Hello ART Habens, thank you it is a pleasure to be interviewed by you and your team. I am an artist from South London and have been on this creative journey for over ten years. Yes, I studied Painting at Camberwell College of Arts and completed a PGCE at Goldsmiths. Studying a PGCE opened me up to the intricacies of creative education and how artistic growth can be nurtured through critical questioning. At Camberwell I really learnt how to look, and see on a deeper level. It is key to train your eyes and visual memory, as looking is a discipline and having an element of discipline present when making work can allow an artist to work more efficiently. It was here I started to gain an interest in abstract art and how within abstraction you can create your own visual language. This gave me a huge amount of indulgence, the thought of you creating your own language through your hands and creations really resonated with me and I went on an abstract sculptural , photographic, installation based practice which
Sequin Kay
pushed boundaries and challenged me on many levels. It often seemed natural to create in an erratic and sporadic way jumping from one piece to the next without really honing in and reflecting on what you have just crafted. There was reflective time present during the dreaded ‘crits’ at Camberwell and you really had to bare your soul to your tutors and peers. I realised that other people’s critical vision of my own work was an education in itself. These discussions frequently challenged me but showed me new perspectives that I had only barley begun to understand my-
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self, alternate viewpoints are so useful for creative growth as they give you a renewed approach to creating and presenting. I still today never underestimate the power and importance of the observer who can often give you a deeper understanding of your own work and process. The hallmark of your approach is a multidisciplinary symbiosis between several visual disciplines, wisely combined together in a way that gives a dynamic life to your pieces, and I would suggest our readers to visit directly at http://www.sequinkay.co.uk in order to get a wider idea of your multifaceted artistic production. While crossing the borders of different artistic fields have you ever happened to realize that a synergy between different viewpoints is the only way to achieve some results, to express some concepts?
Synergy in all forms is powerful and influential. As an artist you are always putting things together and creating something new out of it, which reminds me of a magician, fusing and combining medias and mediums together always concocting something magical and new. My work has always been fuelled by the desire for an"Gaol" elusive2013 something that’s just beyond the From Photography work. One successful synergy and collaboration was with Phillip Levine who is a performance artist and uses his head as a canvas. You can see more at http://www.philsays.com/ Levine is an on-going inspiration to me, he opened my creative visions up on how to work with sequins directly on the body and develop the notion of working in a performance context. By working with this performance element I began I see how powerful, fun and inspiring working with Philip and as a team became. Sequinning Philips head as a performance piece during a private view launch was thrilling and exciting for the audience and us, gallery visitors wanted to partake and be involved resulting in a magnificent sequin head piece and a lot of interesting conversations and idea swapping’s.
your creative process through discussion and action thus leading you to new work and outcomes.
Discussing ideas with Phillip led to new avenues of thought and I believe it is so important to challenge and develop your own conceptions of
This was a very strong piece of work to develop and work on together and this idea is evolving and growing as we speak.
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Now let's focus on your artistic production: I would start from Isometric Dreaming that our readers have already started to get to know in the introductory pages of this article: since this, as most of the pieces that we are going to review are drawn from your travels, it is critical to document the work in
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a way to best narrate your own story. Would you tell us something about the genesis of this interesting project? What was your initial inspiration?
Isometric Dreaming came from the need to let go and move forward. This piece is about my
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obsession with keeping past memories and objects in my personal orbit and energetically I realised they were tying me to the past, not allowing me to move forward. I have always been inspired by the teachings, from Ancient Egypt, and their philosophies on the afterlife and mummification. I have taken an element of their rituals and practice and integrated them into my work. The actuality of mummifying a physical object and or memory I feel transforms it into another state of existence, one of positivity. Your practice is intrinsically connected to the chance of creating an area of deep interplay with the viewers, that are urged to evolve from the condition of a merely passive audience. In particular, the nature your investigation about spirituality has reminded me of the idea behind Thomas Demand's works, when he stated that "nowadays art can no longer rely much on symbolic strategies and has to probe psychological narrative elements within the medium instead". While conceiving Art could be considered an abstract activity, there is always a way of giving it a permanence that goes beyond the intrinsic ephemeral nature of the concepts you explore. So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion personal experience is an absolutely indespensable part of a creative process... Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?
In my opinion personal experience is a huge factor in the creative process as I relate and draw upon personal experiences to guide and teach me ways of moving forward. Personal experiences leave an imprint in our being one way of another and the creative outlet is a way of processing these feelings and experiences. I take a huge amount of inspiration from the world around me, especially symbols or repeated pattern I see cropping up in my journeys. Instead of drawing from within I am now looking outwards how to inspire people how to move people and direct their attention and give them a more direct understanding of their own inherent power and knowledge. I think personal experience is important within the creative process as it guides in your decision making when you choose materials and your way of working.
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For these reasons I don’t think creative process can be completely disconnected from direct experience, in my opinion there would be some link or overlap in creative process and direct experience. I think personal experience becomes entwined organically into the process and the work unintentionally sometimes and this is always an interesting enigma to unravel. I do not think personal experience is indispensable as there are many other things which inspire and allow creativity to take hold. I think from observing and researching into other artists such as Monir Shoudry and Bridget Riley, two artists I admire, their stimulus and driving force was concerned with deeply looking and seeing which instigates interesting, dynamic and engaging work. Their approach and driving force is mainly looking and seeing deeply into the outside world, their are prime motivations for their work is this visual connection, I find this fascinating and rousing for me. For Bridget Riley it is rhythm and movement and for Monir it is the actuality of the pattern and the understanding and creative use of geometry, so to answer the question, direct experience is not the only part of the creative process. I think it often fuels the start of a creative force and then other From "Gaol" 2013 interests take holdPhotography which in combination create inspiring work.
Often the pieces will be based around a simple pattern, which resonates with me, and I feel it strongly so that it begins to evolve into a piece of physical work. There is an interconnection and play between the pieces and I feel the narrative travels its way through the art-work once they are completed and presented together. I find that the viewer is often able to interpret the narrative also from the application of materials to the use of colour and the style of work. There is often an unspoken understanding of the works, which adds to their mystery.
Although each of your project has an autonomous life, there's always seem to be such a channel of communication between your works, that springs from the way you combine ideas and media: in particular, how much do you explicitly think of a narrative for your works?
While referring to a "fruible" set of symbols that comes from common imagery, you seem to urge the viewers the chance to perceive in a more absolute form and Your works encapsulate a freedom of form with abstract features that reminds an oniric dimension and what mostly matters, they do not play as a mere background. Do you conceive these composition on an instinctive way or do you rather structure your process in order to reach the right balance?
For me it is a combination, the narrative is often preconceived and sometimes the narrative occurs gradually over a period of time and realization (what the pieces is communicating) can set in about a piece often months after creation. A narrative flows from each piece of work to the other and a channel of communication happens naturally when the works are displayed in a space together. Some of my pieces such as 1000 tears have a strong personal narrative and there is a intimate story entwined in the making of the piece.
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When I make works I am often in a state of automation, where a freedom of form takes hold. I am very inspired by the surrealist movement especially automatic drawing where hands are
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allowed to move freely in the creation of work and no planned pattern or outcome is foreseen. This notion of chance and accident to creating pattern-based work for me reveals something of the subconscious process.
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A sense of fluidity and flow take over and a lot of the structure comes with a sense of knowing where to place certain colors and forms, your mind knows where colours are to be placed and
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tion. The materials know, and they often show you the way you just need to trust in them. The recurrent reference to an emotional but at the same time universal imagery suggested by the fruitful synergy between the reference to ancient cultures and a lively, modern approach seems to remove any historic gaze from the reality you refer to, offering to the viewers the chance to perceive in a more atemporal form. In this sense, I daresay that the semantic juxtaposition between sign and matter that marks out your art, allows you to go beyond any dichotomy between Tradition and Contemporariness, as in the interesting Inextricable, establishing a stimulating osmosis between materials from contingent era and an absolute approach to Art: do you recognize any contrast between Tradition and Contemporariness?
A temporal form I like that, Yes I recognize a connection and a contrast between the traditional and contemporary aspect within my practice. I love and enjoy this fusion, it transpired progressively over a period of time. I feel that the sequins breathe a new life into these traditional symbols and teachings, bringing them into the new realm of existence and understanding for the modern day mind and eye. We have a lot to learn form our ancestors and I can bring that ancient knowledge in through contemporary materials, that really excites me. I definitively love the way urges the viewers' perception in order to challenge the common way to perceive not only the outside world, but our inner dimension as well ... you seem to deconstruct and assembly memories in order to suggest a process of investigation establishing a cathartic process: maybe that one of the roles of an artist could be to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially of our inner Nature... what's your point about this?
My belief is that as artists we have an ability to draw on and express our inner compass and display that inner world to the outside world through our work. how to carry a pattern forward. I think it is es-
I feel some artists reveal the side we never show anyone and through that expression we expose truths and knowledge. Often the communication is that we are in a state of constant learning and discovering of ourselves in a deep
sential at some point to free ones sight and formalist way of viewing work and allowing form and colour to guide an artist through a composi-
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However I also see that the universal role of an artist is to use his or her tools in order to describe and illuminate various aspects of life. In todays turbulent times there is a lot of shifting and movement on many levels, personal, emotional and environmental. I sense that we need that more than ever, an appreciation of unity and compassionate understanding of others and I feel that art and creativity has the ability to connect people from all aspects of the globe, from various cultures and tribes. Visual language gives space for a deeper connection to form and a bond to grow through the unspoken and personal interpretation. I believe that interdisciplinary collaboration, as the one that you have established with Lauren Baker for Utopian Visions, is today an ever growing force in Art and that most exciting things happen when creative minds from different fields of practice meet and collaborate on a project: the artist Peter Tabor once said that "collaboration is working together with another to create something as a synthesis of two practices, that alone one could not": what's your point about this? Can you explain how your work demonstrates communication between two artists?
I enjoy and am passionate about collaboration with other artists, there is nothing I enjoy more than the company of another artists as well. That connection allows new visions, concepts, and happenings to be born and breathed into the physical. My work demonstrates the communication between two artists primarily though the use of materials, and the way they connect. There is often a visual and verbal dialogue between the artists and then we leave a lot up to magic and the materials to do the work. Consistently considering the others creative viewpoint.
and personal way. When I make work there is a cathartic element in the expression and often I am creating something I am not able to express in any other way it has to come out in a physical manifestation, no words just communication through colour and form. I feel that the artist often takes on a role of educator and facilitator allowing the viewer to uncover something about their own feelings, life and experiences, bringing it out of them through the power of the visual. I feel that people look to artists for the truth and often for answers, art and the creation of art has a vital role in society to show others what they may be afraid to say or express themselves.
During these you have exhibited internationally showcasing works and collaborations both in Europe and in the United States, including a show at the London Underground. So before taking leave from this interesting conversation I would like to pose a a question about the nature of the relation with your audience: in particular, do you consider the issue of audience reception as being a crucial component of your decision-making process
Our inner dimension and nature is important for us to recognize and celebrate through the expression of the self. I am always going deeper into myself through meditation and inner exploratory work this gives me a gateway to personal learning and growth.
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onetwo, from the series inside/out
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in terms of what type of language for a particular context?
The Audience is a vital and integral part of the work. My main aim is to uplift, enlighten and bring a positive energy into other people’s spaces, eyes and vision. I enjoy talking to observers about how my work has impacted their eyes, hearts and thought processes. To gain feedback and another insight other than your own is a valuable thing to undergo. The London Underground piece with Phillip Levine, was well thought out in terms of audience relationship, as we aimed to convey a sense of peace and stillness in such a busy hectic environment such as the underground. I wanted the audience who in this sense was the busy public using the underground to have a calm image to gaze at. I wanted to instill in the audience a sense of introspection and harmony inbetween in their transient moment of travelling on the underground. Phillip and I felt most of the images on the London Underground can take people out of themselves demanding attention and a response to a product or a new idea. The main aim was to give people a sense of belonging in themselves, so the intention of the final image was nothing to direct, no eye contact, a bowed head and a still, serene image eluding to an aura of peace within. Feedback from the public was interesting and positive I felt we achieved the issue of audience reception and it is something I wish to consider more in the future when placing work in the From From "Gaol" "Gaol" 2013 2013 Photography public context andPhotography how art can positively effects others, when spreading a positive message it has a snowball effect. It is surprising that a lot can register with the public, especially with the right people, which is what it is all about – that the work can resonate with someone else, that is powerful and really satisfying. Thanks a lot for your time and for sharing your thoughts, Sequin. Finally, would you like to tell us readers something about your future projects? How do you see your work evolving?
Wow art habens, this has been a really stimulating interview, thank you. Currently I am working towards a solo show of my work the theme is loosely based around mythological and sacred symbols. I cannot give you the title just yet, I am developing some new work in the studio with mirrors, lace and sequins and it is all very electrifying. I see my work being shown in public spaces where there is a diverse audience to work, interact and inspire. I also have some new collaborations with fellow up and coming artists which will be very fruitful and thought-provoking. http://www.sequinkay.co.uk/
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onetwo, from the series inside/out
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Donghwa Lee
"Painting is something that can only destroy itself, which must destroy itself in order to be reinvented.� Since these days my works have been through burnt and cut the canvas, I am interested in space on the surface of the canvas. Before I came to London, my previous works was only acrylic, oil and mixed medium paintings. The reason why I first make a hole and burn canvas is that, white canvas is stereotype for me. Therefore I wanted to remove space in order to change and it becomes to expand in various ways and I have kept doing this. Those destroying the canvas mean breaking the rule and specific shape means a limit and a boundary. Summer 2015
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From "Forgotten Spaces" 2012 Photography No 1
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An interview with
An interview by Catherine C, Walker, curator and Dario Rutigliano, curator arthabens@mail.com
An insightful process of deconstruction and assembly leads Donghwa Lee to convey unexpected viewpoints about the way we relate to reality into a consistent and fascinating unity. Her burnt canvas urges the viewers to subvert the concept of destruction and while playing with unpredictability she questions the semantic of creation in the contemporaray age: one of the most engaging aspect of Lee's approach is the way her unconventional take to artistic production creates an intense participatory line. We are really pleased to introduce our readers to her stimulating works. Hello Donghwa and a warm welcome to ART Habens: to start this interview, would you like to tell us something about your background? Are there any particular experiences that influenced your evolution as an artist and that informed the way you currently conceive and produce your works?
When I dig into my memory, ever since I can recall I wanted to be a painter. I was just a plain girl who loved to draw. When I finished my Education of Fine Art degree from South Korea, I decided that I wanted to learn more about fine art. London was a perfect choice for me as it was regarded as the centre of fine art. The starting point of my destroying art was early session of my MA course. Brian, my then MA advisor asked only one thing from students. That was to try new material we have never tried before. In Korea where I am from, since people often put more value on the “skill” of art, painting “well” to certain standard is thought to be important. So Brian’s request to me was quite challenging for me. It was like asking me to become a freshman again and exhibit my works to people. On the contrary to what I was used to, at Chelsea concept was much more important than the skills. Technicians were always ready behind us to help out in work shops. This is a big difference of
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curriculum between Korea and UK. In my first show, to challenge myself I got rid of what most painters start with every day: the canvas. As a result, The Forest becomes my first destroying work, and since then I have been trying to expand the concept of it and to apply in diverse ways. Your works appeal to my eyes because it challenges the concept of Space in such a compelling way. One of the feature of Mind the gap that I find so thought provoking is concerned with your investigation about the ambiguous relation with Perception and Experience in the contemporary unstabilty: you seem to question the intimate consequences of constructed realities: while conceiving Art could be considered a purely abstract activity, there is always a way of giving it a permanence that goes beyond the intrinsic ephemeral nature of the concepts you capture. So I would take this occasion to ask you if in your opinion personal experience is an absolutely indespensable part of a creative process... Do you think that a creative process could be disconnected from direct experience?
Mind The Gap is the title of my first exhibition in Korea after I left Chelsea College of Arts. Some of my colleagues from Chelsea and ‘A project’ gathered with me and we planned and directed this project all by ourselves without help from art gallaries. For me and my colleagues, cultural conflict was something we had experienced in common while living in UK. So we settled with that theme, and each artist worked to show their own idea of gap. My idea of gap was the difference in values, and the conflict that arises as a result. People in the older generation try to dictate to younger generations the mandatory conditions of happiness. But often, this value is not matched with the younger generations. There is a certain road young people are expected to follow at certain age, and if they don’t follow on to this road, conflicts usually spark. In my work each tree log and branch represent the older generations’ expectations and idea of happiness. When these branches are put to the original log, it is no longer a proper
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tree. Even though each branch has its own merit when they are put on a log of a different kind this tree dies because a tree is supposed to be of one identity, like human. I wanted to express through this tree that by living according to the expectations of the people, I could lose my identity. The painting surrounding this work shows implicit horizon and fake leaves made of
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careful attention you conveyed to the sign of absence to a single meaning. I later realized I had to fit into the visual unity of the works, forgetting my need for a univocal understanding of its symbolic content. Your approach seems to stimulates the viewer’s psyche and consequently works on both a subconscious and a conscious level. How did
smoke stains. These are artificial background to match with the dead, artificial tree. Your burnt canvas suggest me a journey in the the psychological nature of the image: in particular, when I first happened to get to know the Forest and the Hole I tried to relate all the missing visual information and the
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the Hole
you decide to focus on this form of expression?
norm in painting world. It is convenient to display in the organised, comfortable presentation. Almost all artworks have been influenced by these spatial and linear limitations associated with white canvas. Destroying the canvas means breaking the rules and the boundaries of the limitations associated with this traditional material. By
As i mentioned before, The Forest is my first ever destructive art. The reason that I began by cutting and burning canvas is because white canvas represent stereotype to me. Using a flat white canvas has traditionally been the
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a Tree branch, dypthic
reference to standard juxtaposition of delicate tones, to the regenerative act of burning... as a Phoenix, the meaning that you convey in your works is born again under different aspects. This is a recurrent feature of your art that urges us to challenge the common way relate ourselves to the ephemeral nature of the reality we inhabit... By the way, I'm sort of convinced that some informations & ideas are hidden, or even "encrypted" in the environment we live in, so we need -in a way- to decipher them. Maybe that one of the roles of an artist could be to reveal unexpected sides of Nature, especially of our inner Nature... what's your point about this?
cutting the canvas, i could work from twodimensional surface to three- dimension. In The Forest , matches which destroyed the canvas themselves were put between the two canvas to make trees. The Hole is an expanded version from The Forest’. In The Forest, I put four canvas together and made a hole on each canvas. These holes get smaller from the first one to the next. When this work is put on the wall, the hole becomes five altogether making the wall part of this art work. I was exploring and experimenting with different kind of space inside canvas In your artist's statement you have remarked that disappearing from past is not the same as being gone: in the dipthyc Tree branch you seem to snap a photo of the process of disappearing from a semantic aspect, capturing the instant of evolution from a
The making process of The branch was directly searing the branch onto the canvas as it was. I
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wanted to capture the exact moments of it disappearing. After all the searing process is done, it appears that the branch is gone but in fact it remains right here on the canvas, just in a different form. The branch left a distinct trail, though it ceased to exist in its original form. Disappearance and reappearance occur simultaneously; this is true of all life. Birth, death and re-birth interact with each other every second throughout the world, thus completing the circle of life. I believe that a great artist should be able to express the compressed primitive side of human-beings in diverse ways. All humans are from nature and by instinct we want to feel closely with the nature. If a piece of artwork can satisfy that need I think it is the best role art can play in everyday lives of people. The act of destroying a canvas highlights a performative aspect, marked out with a physical feature: I daresay more physical than the brushstrokes of traitional painting. In your work, rather that a conceptual interiority, I can recognize the desire to enabling us to establish direct relations... Would you say that it's more of an intuitive or a systematic process? And in particular, what is it specifically about destruction which fascinates you and make you want to center your artistic style around it?
Have you ever just sat down and stare at firewood burning till it becomes nothing but a handful of ash? I guess most people have that experience at least once in their lifetime. It can be such a spiritually relaxing experience. Most things that surround us remain still and stationary. So it is quite fascinating to watch the ever-changing shape and colour of the flame that you cannot easily take your eyes off it. I feel both life and death when I stare at fire flames; the flame lives off the burning subject. Fire burns and leaves very distinctive trace. From the trace, the audience can clearly feel the whole destroying process.
Lucio Fontana
italian pioneer of Spatialism and I have been intrigued with the way you question the boundary between what is inside and what is outside in. It has reminded me a quote by Thomas Demand, when he stated that
One of my favourite work of yours is entitled Lucio Fontana: I like the and a bit humorous reference to the pieces of the well-known
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"nowadays art can no longer rely much on symbolic strategies and has to probe psychological narrative elements within the medium instead". What's your point about this? And in particular, how much do you
ART Habens
explicitly think of a narrative for your works?
Lucio Fontana is one of my favorite artists and i admire his vision through the canvas. I agree with his style in many ways. His work is very simple but
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i can see what he wanted to convey clearly. One line that cuts right through the canvas, that was enough to communicate his viewpoint to audiences. I wanted to combine what I think we have in common and apply to my work.
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I daresay that the surrealistic qualities that mark out your works, and that I can recognize especially in your Shadow series, are in a certain sense representative of the
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relationship between emotion and memory and communicates me a process of deconstruction and assemblage, that I find truly engaging from a poetic aspect. What is the role of memory in your process? And in
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particular, do you try to achieve a faithful visual translation of your feelings?
The concept in Shadow series was born while i was taking a walk along the exotic seashore in
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Donghwa Lee
the Wave
Tarifa, Spain. There I remember seeing a dark shadow howling over the beach under the hot summer sun. Sometimes my memory symbolically transfers into my work, and through these works, i can be reminded again of my past memories and feelings. I was hoping my audience would find a moment to flashback to their own memories and apply when they see my work. I do enjoy working with abstract figures which do not have certain structure such as smoke or dripping. They certainly give audience an opportunity to interpret in their own ways. There are many things in this world which cannot be clearly defined. Sometimes, what makes them so beautiful is that they are difficult to define by nature. Flames, faith, certain moments or memories are a few examples of abstract figures which we cannot clearly grasp. Perhaps
Summer 2015
that is why we are infinitely attracted to them. We cannot define the shape of those things but we can certainly feel them. Before taking leave from this interesting conversation I would like to pose a a question about the nature of the relation with your audience: do you consider the issue of audience reception as being a crucial component of your decision-making process in terms of what type of language for a particular context?
How audiences think of my work is of course very important but I try not to let it affect my style. I really believe by listening to the inner side of me a truly unique art can be born into this world. As much as understanding the current art trend is important, being honest to
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Sandra Hunter
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ART Habens
mixed blood
Summer 2015
the Smoke
ART Habens
Donghwa Lee
Shadows in the park
the inner side of me is equally crucial. Having said that I am not undermining the fact that art should be able to interact with audiences. Communication plays an important part especially in contemporary art. I like to give my audiences plenty of space to think.
Summer 2015
Even though we are all complete strangers I want my works to become a channel in which we can share our undisclosed thoughts and feelings. Thanks a lot for your time and for sharing your thoughts, Donghwa. Finally, would you
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Donghwa Lee
like to tell our readers something about your future projects? How do you see your work evolving?
ART Habens
is not familiar to the public, i want to keep trying new things that I have never tried before. My works will not be confined just to painting but I would like to explore comprehensively in several areas in the future.
I want to be a honest artist. I do not think Fine Art should be about what people want to see or buy. Even if the material or the way of I express
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Summer 2015