Audrey Bartis 6 IN A VERy DEEP WAy - A CONVERSATION ABOuT RACHEL WHITEREAD Art is meeting. Theoreticians work, write about art, this is what they show, and what we see from them, usually. However, first of all, they talk about art, with other theoreticians, with artists, with themselves. Loudly, with good wine and food, or silently, in the depth of their minds. Audrey Bartis and Alexios Papazacharias, two young art theoreticians, met in Brussels in 2006, in an academic context, and they began to talk about art, with the same intensity, same passion, same pleasure. They began to think and work together because theirs looks and thoughts about art goes really well together. Art theory is not a cold and abstract-only production, it is more about life, cigarettes, coffee, arguments and smiles. il is alive, and this is how it goes when a Greek and a French art theoreticians talk passionately about Rachel Whiteread...
Gordon Matta-Clark, ‘Splitting’, 1974. Courtesy The Estate of Gordon Matta-Clark and david Zwirner, New york o p i n i o n rachel Whiteread, ‘untitled’ (Basement) Courtesy Anthony d’Offay, London / Ellen Labenski ALExIOS PAPAzACHARIAS: Yes but she (Rachel Whiteread) has influences from tradition and things that were already released. She has deep influences that are sometimes obvious. However, the thing is that her concept usually is quite different so it is not copying or something like that. It is something different. She has a very strong relation to some works of Bruce Nauman where he is also signifying spaces that usually are not perceptible – she is doing this also, she has a kind of manipulation of the space which is, in someway, a very abstract way, is similar to Gordon Matta-Clark for example. Audrey Bartis: We were talking about Gordon Matta-Clark and the link between him and Rachel Whiteread, obviously because of the house as a life unit, a psychological box, there is also a lot of meanings about family, individuality, identity… But they are both working on what Gordon Matta-Clark explained that he wanted to transform a space into a state of mind. What I really wanted to analyze, is the way she’s transforming the void into a matter. Gordon Matta-Clark by cutting the matter, the architecture, he makes voids, and makes the matter visible. It’s about making impossible things visible, invisible things tangible… AP: Signifying… it’s a process of signifying. They are both castrating the experience of the space, but Rachel Whiteread is making this directly, it’s a petrified place, it’s full of plaster so you can not enter the space. You can experience it but by looking at it, maybe by touching it, but it’s not possible to enter inside… AB: But there is an (physical) experience… AP: There is, of course, but is not the usual one. With Gordon Matta-Clark you have a rich experience, which is completely altered from the usual experience of the space. So they both propose an experience of the space, like opposite. They have two, we could say, opposite kind of techniques, but in the result, not exactly the same result, they both manage to alter the experience of the space… For example, the House of Rachel Whiteread was a normal house, in front of normal houses, ant it looked like them. And suddenly, there is one of them that’s in concrete. In fact, it is concrete, and it looks like a grave, like a fossil. Looking at something that looks like your house but it’s petrified, it’s quite shocking… AB: It’s like a face-to-face process… AP: Yes AB: It was the same with Gordon Matta-Clark because the house was inside of, you know, a middle-class kind of American suburb where the houses look all the same, so it’s the same case, the house was a regular house, like the others, and obviously, cutting this house in two, was both transforming their point of view on their own environment, as you said, but also pushing them to the limits in a very subtle way. It was not possible to take a body and cut it in two, it was not possible to take a person in London, and full it with concrete… AP: (smiling) None, it was not possible… AB: But, what is interesting is that the people reacted in front of those pieces the same way, they reacted the same way, in front of those new ‘beings’. Just like in alchemy, in the alchemy imaginary, there are those beings that are created through alchemy, they are like monsters. So in the alchemy imaginary, when these kinds of monsters live, people have to kill them. And it’s like that, those houses got killed. Those houses got killed because it was unbearable to let them live, to let them stay in front of them (the other houses). This is what interests me in Rachel Whiteread, is that she was shocking, by destroying the link with reality and the way people just see the reality, and the House got destroyed, but now she has this strong image of one of the best British artists… She is one of the best British artists. Now, she’s recognized by the institution. As you said for the public space, it was possible to put Rachel Whiteread’s pieces back into public spaces because she came into the institution, and the institution was like eating it, eating her work, because it was not possible to let it stay outside, and for me, having this institution wanting her being inside, was for protecting the outside world from this work. It’s quite instinctive, what I will say, but I think that even institution doesn’t know what to do with this work, except presenting it, but it is not really possible to make it quiet. You see? AP: I can totally get it because, the thing with Rachel Whiteread is that her pieces are silent, but they are not quiet at all. That’s one of her amazing qualities, it’s petrified, it’s completely silent but it’s not quiet, it’s talking in a silent way… AB: In a very deep way
- Page 1 and 2: g l o b a l s p o t l i g h t o p i
- Page 3 and 4: loop’A Spotlight Site-specific Re
- Page 5 and 6: they sent came purely from a desire
- Page 7 and 8: TanamgzavrTan Tanaziari Semoqmedeba
- Page 9 and 10: migrants, or on the Home Office. It
- Page 11 and 12: Borders are simultan- eously real a
- Page 13 and 14: vinmes pirovnebis miCqmalva, gansak
- Page 15 and 16: Art, as the medium of proliferation
- Page 17 and 18: in museums and archives for good. T
- Page 19 and 20: muzeumebsa da arqivebSi. es Ziebis
- Page 21 and 22: Niko Tsetskhladze, Galaktion Kintsu
- Page 23 and 24: head of Bolshevik/fascist and a bod
- Page 25 and 26: Kkoka ramiSvili s p o t l i g h t b
- Page 27 and 28: s p o t l i g h t zemoqmedeba bekon
- Page 29 and 30: ‘Inside the Castle‘ 1969, Etchi
- Page 31 and 32: o p i n i o n a social totality; me
- Page 33 and 34: NnaTaniel makbraidi x e l o v n e b
- Page 35: damenturi sxvaoba. is, rac wibaxaSv
- Page 39 and 40: AP: And she makes it an object. AB:
- Page 41 and 42: o p i n i o n aleqsios papazaqarias
- Page 43 and 44: eCel vaiTridi, ‘moCveneba’, 199
- Page 45 and 46: Ella Gibbs Dear Loop’A, The photo
- Page 47 and 48: years - the bigger picture will com
- Page 49 and 50: Nino Dzandzava E x P E R I M E N TA
- Page 51 and 52: mosaxviTi miunheni samyaros mikro m
- Page 53 and 54: Title: ‘You’ve got beautiful ey
- Page 55 and 56: Exhibition Title: Hotel Artwork Tit
- Page 57 and 58: creatures. In the afterlife they ar
- Page 59 and 60: Carolyn Black THE FOREST OF DEAN -
- Page 61 and 62: Hhamilton finli, ‘siCume’, 1986
- Page 63 and 64: Fay Godwin, ‘Farm Buildingsm Bony
- Page 65 and 66: da vfiqrob, rom Jurnali swored maTT
- Page 67 and 68: i n t e r v i e w s tears, illness
- Page 69 and 70: wesiT, Cemi asakis adamians unda hq
- Page 71 and 72: ELECTRIC EARTH This exhibition of v
- Page 73 and 74: Carolyn Black PROCESS & PRACTICE -
- Page 75 and 76: ...tye karibWea, masSi Sesvla saris
- Page 77 and 78: Akram Khan Company A’ Akram Khan
- Page 79 and 80: e v i e w s an audio virus in a sci
- Page 81 and 82: dulobas. matini teqstsa da xmas erT
- Page 83 and 84: e v i e w s intercourse. While thes
- Page 85 and 86: e v i e w s oyalibda, karen makkino
- Page 87 and 88:
Karen Knorr, ‘A Model of Vision
- Page 89 and 90:
метода” в построен
- Page 91 and 92:
как разговор молча
- Page 93 and 94:
размышляем о том, к
- Page 95 and 96:
CREATING OPPORTuNITy FOR PEOPLE WOR
Change language