artć + societate / arts + society #38, 2011 20 lei / 11 €, 14 USD - idea

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Little Girls, 2006, installation, courtesy: Lucie Fontaine
will understand that the spirit is quite similar. These artists – Reena
Spaulings included – share a rather cynical and conceptual approach
to art making, which makes it quite similar to an ideology. I do the
opposite in my space, inviting artists whose works of art are very different
from mine. Since opening the space, I wanted to invite artists
whose work is almost artisanal, expressing domesticity and
craftsmanship.
¬ Give us some examples.
√ The way Riccardo Beretta – who also created a font called Font-
Aine – works with inlaid wood is definitely artisanal. Mauro Vignando’s
abstract paintings made with cleaning products from his house
are definitely domestic. The way Cleo Fariselli, Mauro Bonacina and
Alessandro Roma make their work is anything but cynical.
¬ I saw images of your solo show at T293 in Naples, the puppet
theater. That was quite artisanal.
√ My show at T293 was a puppet theater featuring iconic figures
from the field of art who were hanging out in Naples in 1970s, such
as Andy Warhol, Joseph Beuys, Marina Abramovic ’, Joseph Kosuth
and Hermann Nitsch. The idea was to create stories in which they
were interacting with local figures like dealers Lucio Amelio and Lia
Rumma, collector Ernesto Esposito and art critic Achille Bonito Oliva
with no prefixed narrative or timeframe. It was very ironic and
deeply conceptual and, in fact, on the website of the gallery I wanted
to publish only a diptych made by two images found online:
Marina Abramovic ’’s Drago Head from 1993, in which a snake moves
around her body and a still from Britney Spears performance at the
2001 Video Music Award where she performed with a snake. And
this is something none of the artists in my entourage would ever
think about. Then, of course, it was artisanal because unlike Claire
Fontaine, I refuse my work to be made through production.
My employees made those puppets and you can see they are kind
of clumsy. But I would not use that angle of the work as a way to
define it as artisanal although I like the misunderstanding of it.
¬ That makes sense. It’s funny because you are French, but have
this obsession with Italy. What made you to open a space in Milan
– Italy’s most difficult and hostile city – whose mission is to only work
with Italian artists?
√ My passion for Italian art started before I decided to open the
space. Italy is an interesting country. Like few others – Israel is probably
a good example – Italy is a very young country, but represents a
very strong and long history. The scope of visual art makes it very
easy to explain: Italy is only 150 years old, but is associated with art
from Roman coins to Renaissance masterpieces from Lucio Fontana
to Arte Povera. At the same time, or maybe because of that,
I noticed that lately Italy is no longer a place for contemporary art.
The system doesn’t function. Artists have to leave. In other words,
Italy is not established in the same sense as the United States or
the United Kingdom, nor is she self-protective the way Germany or
France are, where public money supports the system. At the same
time, Italy is not exotic like Central Europe, China or Latin America.
Being in the middle makes everything problematic and that’s why
I wanted to start the space.
¬ I agree that Italy is a country in danger. You can see it from the
political situation. This said, Italians are very patriotic. Why should a
French open a space in Italy working only with Italian artists?
√ You made me think of Winston Churchill, who once said that Italians
lose wars like soccer matches and soccer matches like wars.
Aside from the joke, I wanted to bring to Italy a similar model to
what we see in New York and Paris – note the parallel with Reena
Spaulings and Claire Fontaine – and in some other initiatives
inspired by the exotic, or let’s say emerging countries. I am talking
about projects like Kurimanzutto in Mexico City, A Gentil Carioca
in Rio de Janeiro, Plan B in Cluj, hunt kastner artworks in Prague,
Foksal Gallery Foundation or Raster in Warsaw and Vitamin Creative
Space in Guangzhou. Those spaces all made themselves known
abroad because they are working almost exclusively with artists from