A feeling that is transferred even if it is just for a very short moment in which the viewer is experiencing the same state of mind I am in, is imprisoned in the same atmosphere like I am. In contrast to this I am using language to artificially create this stage which seems to be the most relatable and direct tool we have to connect with each other. At the same time I am trying to evoke a vague feeling to put the viewer in a state of mind where the spoken word becomes irrelevant. It demonstrates that nonverbal communication can be so overwhelming even though it is less comprehensible than language. People tend to think it is very subtle but also so overpowering at some points that it literally makes us speechless. This is exactly why art is and always has played such an important role in our society. I feel torn apart by language as it is so ambiguous to me. Language exposes a huge void between us while providing us with seemingly endless possibilities to articulate ourselves. The only way to compensate for this painful lack of understanding is art. So even if Sequence One in particular has a very clear message it is not just about that. I am trying to evoke a feeling, translating it into language and also playing with the whole painful dimension of the spoken word. So I don’t really mind if the viewer does not understand everything I am talking about. I am playing with this tension. The shifts which occur, the vagueness and a feeling which is hard to grasp let alone to describe. I want point out the boundaries of language, the void it presents in our system of communication, but to do so I am also using it and push it as far as I can. interview
We want to catch this occasion to ask you to express your view on the future of women in cinema. For more than half a century women have been discouraged from getting behind the camera, however in the last decades there are signs that something is changing. What's your view on the future of women in cinema? In particular, do you think that your being a woman provides your artistic research with some special value? I think that anyone who feels the urge to pick up a camera or more generally speaking feels the urge to create something and does so contributes certain qualities which are unique and irreplaceable. I don’t think the quality or intensity of what you create is depending on your gender. But there definitely have been a lot of women artist who went by unappreciated in the past which was presumably the case because they were women. It is very important that there is an equality of opportunities for men and woman and that their achievements and creations receive the same appreciation. We are very lucky to live in a time where this is changing and a lot of attention is payed to create this equality. But especially art should be one step ahead of this. Art should demonstrate that it does not matter what or who you are and where you come from because in the moment we start creating all of this becomes irrelevant. Values that matter and confinements that restrict us in the world resolve as soon as we make art. Not only for the one who creates but also for the one who observes it. In the very moment we perceive art everything else becomes meaningless. Thanks for sharing your time and thoughts, Kathi. We wish you all the best with your filmmaker career! What's next for you? There are a lot of aspects which I would like to keep working on or intensity in my video work. In Sequence One and “Bedrängtes Herz” (a video I worked on previously) I did almost no editing. Both of them consist of only a single take. Using a one take technique feels more direct and in a way cleaner to me. In “Bedrängtes Herz” I created a moving pattern which overlies the main image. This pattern seems like an animated after effect, even though I created it using simply water and light (which made it a very tricky setup). I would like to experiment with more techniques which head in that direction. For my next project I might want to combine one of those effects with some of the constantly changing focus of the camera and the closeness of my own body to the camera. I am very excited as filming is such a broad field and offers endless possibilities. There is so much more to discover, play with and to learn. It is important to me that I am able to grow with my work. I never want to stop learning because for me it would equates with stagnation. Thank you so much. I really enjoyed this interview. An interview by Francis Quettier and Dora Tennant
Yidan Xie Lives and works in London, United Kingdom
My latest project is an independent and experimental animation named “The Classic of Mountains and Seas”. The inspiration comes from the Chinese ancient book “The Classic of Mountains and Seas", a compilation of mythic geography and myth. This work is very different with most of the animation, I try and discover many new forms basing on the interesting concept of Eastern Painting into this animation. Text: the text in this animation is hard to read because the font is extremely difficult to decipher. Through those strange texts, I try to discover the inverse relationship between the image and text. Actually, according to the moving image, the rough and broad meaning seems like could be understood. Probably the viewers are able to "read" the new symbol, text, and language under the hint of the image. It is feeling that “I don’t know what the text's meaning, but I feel like I can understand”. So please do NOT try to read the text, just feel it :) Black space: The idea of leaving black space comes form the “white space”, a special concept in the Eastern painting. The eastern artists believe that the white space left consciously will provide the huge space of imagination. so I adopt this concept in my animation and use the sound to fill in those black space without the image. Meanwhile, I draw the unique background with the different visual aesthetic for each creature for distinguishing the front and back, which generates another space layer. Sound: Sound is a very important element in this animation. It is not only the background music but also a narrative tool to filling the black space as the angle of hearing. For example, when the clouds gather, the viewer can hear the sound of thunder and rain, but the corresponding image does not appear in the visual part. I think the sound does not always cater to the image, it also can develop the space and narrative independently, which the image will not be shown. Mythical Creatures: After reading, I summary the method of mythical creatures construction and utilize this method to create and draw my own mythical beasts. If you are interested in the method of mythical creatures construction, you can review my thesis paper: http://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/ cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=5735&context=etd. In this paper, I write some basic idea which is easy to grasp for the artist who loves creating mythical creatures. reviewYidan Xie
With captivating imagery and inventiveness, interview The Classic of Mountains and Seas is a subversive mix of surreal atmospheres and audacious storytelling. Focusing on an effective combination between imagery belonging to mythical creatures from Chinese ancient tradition, Yidan Xie creates an exquisitely dystopic film reminescent of Yuriy Norshteyn's work. With its insightful narrative twists and accurate cinematography, The Classic of Mountains and Seas is capable of transposing the narrative form of a book into the realm of moving images. We are pleased to present Yidan Xie for this year's WomenCInemakers. Yidan, please tell us about your trajectory as a multidisciplinary artist and filmmaker. What inspired you to express yourself in this medium? The Classic of Mountains and Seas is an independent and experimental animation. This work is very different with most of the animation, I try and discover many new forms basing on the interesting concept, such as “black space”,“wired text”, “narrative sound” and “construction of Yidan Xie meets An interview by Bonnie Curtis and Jennifer Rozt Druhn
mythical creatures” into this animation. This animation is not very dynamic, it looks like a moving imaging even moving illustration work, under those peaceful movements, a fantastic and mysterious world is showed gradually. Text: the text in this animation is hard to read because the font is extremely difficult to decipher. Through those strange texts, I try to discover the inverse relationship between the image and text. Actually, according to the moving image, the rough and broad meaning seems like could be understood. Probably the viewers are able to "read" the new symbol, text, and language under the hint of the image. It is feeling that “I don’t know what the text's meaning, but I feel like I can understand”. So please do NOT try to read the text, just feel it :) Black space: The idea of leaving black space comes form the “white space”, a special concept in the Eastern painting. The eastern artists believe that the white space left consciously will provide the huge space of imagination. so I adopt this concept in my animation and use the sound to fill in those black space without the image. Meanwhile, I draw the unique background with the different visual aesthetic for each creature for distinguishing the front and back, which generates another space layer. We would address our readers to visit http://cargocollective.com/yidanxie to get a wider idea about your artistic production, that ranges from filmmaking to animation, from illustration and sound design, revealing that you are a versatile artist capable of crossing from a medium to another: what drew to such multidisciplinary approach? How do you select a particular media to express the idea of a project? Actually, I would not like to limit the preference of medium, I try my best to reach out new medium and interview
combine them to create the more diversified presentation. When I do the art, at the beginning I will not consider the technical problem and just focus on my concept. I have been keeping learning the technique because it not only can make me freer when I create but also can develop my thinking about art medium. For this special edition of Women Cinemakers we have selected The Classic of Mountains and Seas , an interesting project that our readers have already started to admire in the introductory pages of this article. What has at once captured our attention of this work is the way you provided the visual results of your analysis with autonomous aesthetics: what drew you to inquire into mythical creatures and landscape of ancient Chinese tradition? As a mentioned, the inspiration of The Classic of Mountains and Seas comes from the Chinese ancient book with the same name. In this book, a huge number of mythical creates and fantastic landscape are described carefully. After reading, I summary the method of mythical creatures construction and utilize this method to create and draw my own mythical beasts. If you are interested in the method of mythical creatures construction, you can review my thesis paper: http://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?arti cle=5735&context=etd. In this paper, I write some basic idea which is easy to grasp for the artist who loves creating mythical creatures. Meanwhile, according to those mystical creatures, the fantastic landscape like "solar smelter","ice peak" and " peach blossom valley" are also drawn to strengthen the narrative of mythical creatures. Reminding us of Yuriy Norshteyn's work, your artistic production in the field of animation is interview
marked out with a personal style: who are, if any, some of your chief influences from contemporary scene? For visual experience, the ancient Chinese and Japanese watercolor works affected me a lot. I prefer to use bright and vintage color to create the gorgeous image. For symbolic approach often utilized in my artwork, Gustav Klimt, he definitely is my favorite artist. He was an Austrian symbolist painter. My work is affected by his work very much. Colorful, mysterious, fantastic and symbolic, those keywords are often described his work. I am so infatuated to the visual representation, therefore, the similar feeling is also showed in my work. Although my works have strong Eastern aesthetics visually, which is hard to connect with the European painting in the 18 century, the Gustav Klimt’s work indeed give me inspiration in the mental impression. Innisfree is rich with symbolic elements converge together to create a surrealist narrative: how much importance have symbols in your practice? Symbolic approach probably is my commonly used method. In most of the time, I would not like to describe some scene point for point, space is always described and developed through just a leaf or a flower interspersing on a large area of black space, which arouses the immigration of viewers. For Innisfree, Innisfree is a work which combines with the video and animation. In this work, I try to discuss a new representation from of space. It is different with the laying animation we often watch: one layer is for interview
the background, one layer is for the character and one layer is for other objects, all of those images will fill in the display space like electronic screen with different size. But in my work, I create many circle spaces, according to the content the images show in the circle spaces, that spaces, sometimes, connect each other but sometimes they are alienated, those dynamic relationships will be shown by the moving of mythical creatures. The Inspiration of Innisfree comes from W. B. Yeats poem“The Lake Isle of Innisfree”: I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree, And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made; Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee, And live alone in the bee-loud glade. And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow, Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings; There midnight’s all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow, And evening full of the linnet’s wings. I will arise and go now, for always night and day I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore; While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey, I hear it in the deep heart’s core. In this poem, the writer describes a beautiful island named Innisfree. In my opinion，innisfree is not only a beautiful island but also a symbol of the perfect word in poet's mind, in other words, this poem is a symbol in itself. Therefore I also named my work “Innisfree” that means I would like to use various medium to represent my Innisfree Island which is full of fantastic scenes and creatures in my mind. Sound plays an important role in your works: according to media theorist Marshall McLuhan there is a 'sense bias' that affects Western interview
societies favoring visual logic, a shift that occurred with the advent of the alphabet as the eye became more essential than ear: how do you see the relationship between sound and images? Sound is a very important element in this animation. It is not only the background music but also a narrative tool to filling the black space as the angle of hearing. For example, when the clouds gather, the viewer can hear the sound of thunder and rain, but the corresponding image does not appear in the visual part. I think the sound does not always cater to the image, it also can develop the space and narrative independently, which the image will not be shown. I did several sound work to archive this idea. For example, Luanyang summer note is a sound collection work, this work has 4 sound story: Fox, Ghost Whisper, Ghost Poem and Ghost Dancing. Luanyang Summer Note is also a Chinese ancient story book, it describes many interesting stories between human and ghost. Because the writer finishes this book in summer in the Luanyang City, so this book is named "luanyang summer note". Through reading, I grab 4 stories I am interested in, and use sound, a special medium, to represent the story described by text originally. In those sound work, I try to discover the possibility of sound narrative, that means sound can be an independently narrative language and develop the space and push the story instead of being a tool which caters to the image merely. Despite to clear references to perceptual reality, your visual vocabulary has a very ambivalent quality. How do you view the concepts of the real and the imagined playing out within your works? How would you define the relationship between abstraction and representation in your practice? interview
I think abstraction and representation are 2 poles on the line. If we consider the abstraction and representation of artwork, it could be placed on any spot on this line. For me, I try to put my artwork in the middle of the line so that my artwork can keeps the balance between abstraction and representation. Sir Lanka features a brilliant storytelling, using an original narrative structure and reveals a very personal vision of cinematic space and time that glides seamlessly between reality and dystopia. How did you develop the script and the structure of the film? Can you tell us something about the shooting process? This movie recorded several emotional experiences of a gay boy who was struggling with himself to admit his sexual orientation. He dreamed Sri Lanka as a place he could go, however, Sri Lanka isn’t a country but a utopia world. The “Sri Lanka” is said to be the safe island for the gay boy where he would tell us his paradox of sex, life and reality. Shooting process has 2 part, inner shooting and outside shooting. Inner shooting is in the photo studio, and outside shooting is on the street with much Chinese traditional architecture. In this video, I used many symbolic scenes like rubbing hands, arranging flower and touching the plaster of the nude, which are the emotional expression shot. Actually, the actor indeed falls in the confused emotion towards the sex. What were some of your aesthetic decisions? In term of aesthetic decisions, my personal style prefers the eastern aesthetic which is relative to it relative to my environment and culture I grow up. For visual, I love the implicit and subtle presentation form. For structure and form, West art like painting, video, and the film also inspired me a lot. interview
We want to catch this occasion to ask you to express your view on the future of women in cinema. For more than half a century women have been discouraged from getting behind the camera, however in the last decades there are signs that something is changing. What's your view on the future of women in cinema? In particular, do you think that your being a woman provides your artistic research with some special value? I think women play an important role in art creation, there are many excellent female artists like filmmaker or illustrator surrounding me. Although the power of women is rising sharply, in some country or some traditional area, many women artist have to stop their art career because of society and public opinion pressure. hope I could be an outstanding woman artist and set a good example to encourage more women who have the artistic talent to devote themselves to art creation. Thanks for your time and thought, Yidan. We wish you all the best with your filmmaker career! What's next for Yidan Xie? I will continue to devote myself to create and push my thinking which is discussed and research all the time in the field of art. Besides the personal creation, I hope I can join the project with the big theme of ecology, peace, policy or human. I hope as an artist I can do something which is good for the world we are living. If I have the chance, I will cooperate with other artist or organization to do a project about the animal. I hope this project could be present the concept of Animism as a more interesting and acceptable art form like the video game or VR game to reminder people to be kind to the other life on the world. interview
interview Yidan Xie I am Yidan Xie, a young multimedia artist from China, Now, I am living in United State. As a multimedia artist, I mainly focus on Dynamic Imaging. My works are various including video, animation, illustration, Sound, and Visual Design. In my works, a mysterious and fantastic visual experience is presented. I have been discovered the new art presentation of space narrative and explores the relationship among the women, nature, and mythology. Portfolio Link: http://cargocollective.com/yidanxie
In my work I focus on the formability of life itself. The idea that everything is possible, as long as you create or imagine it yourself, leads to an ambiguous reality. The reality I believe as real. On the one hand it will give you total power, but on the other it exaggerates the futility of existence. With this existentialist fascination I investigate the borders between real and unreal. In my work I express this belief with an artificial and performative nature. I challenge the normative capitalist ways of thinking, where progress, (suppressed) optimism and success are leading fundamentals in dealing with the absurd: realism, bittersweetness and paradox. I am inspired by certain sub-worlds with their own created rules. For example, subcultures like skins and punks, but also mental institutions or offices. I am also inspired by the construction of identity, like masks, idols, rebels, lunatics, dictators, and the changeable positions of individuals in society. My own body is always the basis for my characters, both for lens based media and for sculptures through casting. During live performances I sometimes work together with review(an) assistant(s). Using my own body for different characters I am doomed to fail the credibility, but that part is subservient to the ability to express the formability. On the outer layers I use materials such as hair, makeup and textile which function as suggestive and identifying body masks that cover borders between object and subject, gender, natural and artificial, reality and fantasy. I want to create a world built on broken dreams, deep desires and false truths for a group of distinct people inspired by observations and imagination. The medium is mutable because it has to fit to the work itself in the absolute best way. Recurring media are video and performance, sometimes in addition to a bigger installation and other times as isolate work. The use of my own body gives my work a performative character and therefore the medium of the performance, whether it is video or live, is a suitable way for translation. The medium I work with is free of boundaries towards the next idea. www.charlottevanwinden.com Charlotte van Winden Lives and works in The Hague, The Netherlands
is a captivating short film by multidisciplinary artist Charlotte van Winden: inquiring into the ambiguity of the notion of reality, she initiates her audience into an unconventional and highteneed visual experience capable of triggering the audience perceptual and cultural parameters. We are particularly pleased to introduce our readers to van Winden's multifaceted artistic production. Hello Charlotte and welcome to : you have a solid background and you graduated from the The Royal Academy of Fine Arts, The Hague: how did this experiences influence the way you currently conceive and produce your works? Upon completing my high school exams, I started Cultural Studies at the University of Amsterdam. When I graduated three years later, I directly started at The Royal Academy of Arts (in The Hague) because although I was inspired by theory, I felt the urgent need to turn each fact into subjectivity. The reason I had originally started university was because of the idea that there is no better school for arts than meets An interview by Bonnie Curtis and Jennifer Rozt Druhn Charlotte van Winden interview
interviewthe school of life itself. The broad layout of Cultural Studies seemed perfect to develop myself and to see where to go after that. But during philosophy, literature and history classes I got too inspired by some of the tiny details of the material that I got destracted from writing strong scientific exams. So after three years I graduated as a mediocre student with my head in the clouds. Art school was the next best thing to use the power to create and translate my subjectivity into a visual language. I think the material from university added some good basis to understand better where I stand and I continue to use a lot of the interesting stories from some of the professors. The stories with personal or fun details from the philosophers or writers stayed with me the most. I guess I have made up my own philosophy based on fragments that I misunderstood or wrongly remembered: the perfect basis to create something new. Before starting to elaborate about your artistic production, we would invite to our readers to visit www.charlottevanwinden.com in order to get a synoptic view of your work: while walking us through your process, would you like to tell to our readers something about the evolution of your style? In particular, do you think that there is a central idea that connects all your works? The video Why I Never Became A Stalker was a sort of turn figure in how I worked before and after. In the first months upon graduation, the components of my work were 100 % artificial. I wanted to be the only creator of my work so there was no use of existing video footage, other performers or ready-mades. Being the creator gave me total power like a sort of God that creates the perfect picture. In a way not that much has changed, but now I leave more space for things from reality, like the footage of a mental hospital in the early seventies that you see in the
video. I wanted to break with the complete fictional work, where the story did not come out of it's own borders. Now I make use of music that is not only played or sung by myself, I use footage that I find online, on YouTube for example and I more often use ready-mades and typecasted assistents. Yet I still manipulate everything. Yes, I think there is a central idea that connects my work and that is about the aspect of a formable world which is also the reason I am an artist. The ruling domination of the Western world in which we are living is nowadays signed by capitalist norms and values, where an everlasting suppressed optimism is a central element with progress and success as leading fundamentals. If you want to become something, the perfect starting point seems to be to create it yourself. But on the other hand this mentality exaggerates the futility of everything. Why would you try so hard if you will die anyway? Albert Camus' advice to kill yourself as the wisest thing to do is something completely opposite to the capitalist thinking. With the fascination of both opposites, I challenge the borders of the formable world, which is absurd and it's fooling you, to investigate the power to create. For this special edition of WomenCinemakers we have selected Why I Never Became A Stalker, an extremely interesting film that our readers have already staterd to get to know in the introductory pages of this article. What has at once captured our attention of your insightful combination between highly evokative footage is the way you have provided the visual results of your analysis with coherent combination between autonomous aesthetics and visual consistence. While walking interview
interviewour readers through the genesis of Why I Never Became A Stalker, would you tell what did draw you to focus on the notion of the formability of life? Why I Never Became A Stalker shows a drama story about an unanswered love that drives the main character completely obsessed and almost crazy. The voice-over is based on thoughts and memories that are in fact always subjective, even if you think they are based on facts. Some things you tell yourself unconsciously to feel better and to get a grip, so that you can process it and move on. In fact you are fooling yourself and deceive the reality to survive. In this video I play with those elements of false memories and let the main character step out of it to survive. The construction and the title of Tracey Emins video Why I Never Became A Dancer was a source of inspiration where she used a similar change as a climax from memory to self-intervention. Her intervention offers consolation by dancing as a way of processing the past. In my work the main character creates an even worse world where she escapes into a suicidal horror show as a way to survive. Your work addresses the viewers to such captivating multilayered experience through the liminal area where the real and the unreal blurry their elusive boundaries: when commenting this aspect of your work, would you tell us how do you view the relationship between concepts of the real and the imagined playing within your practice? I like to mix up real and unreal, but in the end it doesn't really matter to me if something is real or imagined. For me it is a starting point but not a goal. At times people ask me if something they see in a video really happened, but to me it has become something new, autonomous. As a starting point I think the possibility of creation is very fruitful to give meaning to things that are built on imaginations and also on copies from reality. I experience a lot of possibilities to create things
in life, such as a fictive artist that I created once to form a duo exhibition with. If I miss something in reality, I feel the urge to create it myself. At the time I made a fictive duo exhibition with a German artist from Arabic background that I called Zsigmund Alaeddin. It was not my purpose to just fool the audience, but to present an interesting art exhibition where the works of two artists worked together very well. Within the show there was a small video projected on the side where you could see me hiring a suitable actor and making Alaeddin's work. The soundtrack of Why I Never Became A Stalker provides the film with such uncanny atmosphere: according to media theorist Marshall McLuhan there is a 'sense bias' that affects Western societies favoring visual logic, a shift that occurred with the advent of the alphabet as the eye became more essential than ear. How do you see the relationship between sound and moving images? In this video I created the sound the same way as the visuals, as a sort of stream of consciousness. Both were essential for the atmosphere in the video where the story was built on loose memories. The only grip in the work is led by the voice-over, but in fact the voice is of an questionable narrator, she is completely obsessed after being rejected by someone she is in love with and doubting her own memory. The sound and image here are complementary to the spoken thoughts in the first half. In the final part, the focus is on the horror image that is supported by sound. In some videos I deliberately don't make use of any sound. When I do use sound, it is always additional to the work itself, even when it is used in a supportive way, because I consider it as very determinative for the atmosphere, yet in every work in a complete different manner. interview
interviewAs you have remarked once, your own body is always the basis for your characters: many artists express the ideas that they explore through representations of the body and by using their own bodies in their creative process. German visual artist Gerhard Richter once remarked that "it is always only a matter of seeing: the physical act is unavoidable": as a performance artist involved both in lens based media works and sculptures, how would you consider the relation between the abstract nature of the ideas you explore and the physical act of producing your artworks? My inspiration comes mostly from daily social life, the way people behave, move, talk and their attitudes, which go hand in hand with my imaginations. It is inspiring how different they are and also how people can be all the same. Working with my own body and face to express different figurants means that I am doomed to fail in credibility, because a lot of appearances are just not achievable. For me that is okay, because I don't need to present a realistic view of something that already exists. This failure in credibility is subservient to the malleable power and encourages me to create a world built on false truths. Working with my own appearances as a starting point gives me every time the same canvas, there is no other personality involved, there is no typecasting and I stay close to creation, rather than describing things very credible. In my latest works I often mix staged performance with found footage where you can see other people too as a way to break with every border. While forming an idea, things can stay very long very abstract in a way. By recording some unfinished thoughts, I create myself an open playground for valuable additions that are not scripted but led by a certain abstract feeling. I make use of make-up, hair and textile which function as suggestive body masks with identifying elements. In lens based media and sculpture I easily can reproduce myself, but during live performance I do like to work with assistents that I do choose through typecasting in the same way that I make use of footage in video.
Your practice conveys an effective sociopolitical criticism when challenging the normative capitalist ways of thinking: Mexican artist Gabriel Orozco once stated, "the artist’s role differs depending on which part of the world you’re in. It depends on the political system you’re living under". Not to mention that almost everything, ranging from Caravaggio's Inspiration of Saint Matthew to Joep van Lieshout's works, could be considered political, do you think that your work could be considered political in a certain sense? Moreover, what could be in your opinion the role of Art in the contemporary age? If I think about political art than I immediately see similarities with political philosophy. In that sense I would say that my art is political because of the human act as a central focus. In The Human Condition Hannah Arendt explains the ways of living. She pleads for a life dedicated to contemplation, spirital or intellectual, what she calls vita activa. She puts this way of life above animal laborans and homo faber because there is no interaction. Vita activa involves freedom, status and the fact that action is subject to nothing else but acting itself. We can therefore only experience our freedom in a social interaction. This freedom is reflected in daring to think against the grain of the prevailing social way of thinking. In the part of the world I live in, the ruling system is built on capitalist ways of thinking with producing and consuming. Of course I am stuck in that system too, but I also have the possibilities to enrich myself with history and philosophy to explore different frames. In that way it becomes more universal playing with the time spirit of the current. In The Netherlands I am asked to represent the province Zuid-Holland in a large-scaled project called interview
Entre Nous with eleven other artists that represents the other provinces. They were looking for socially committed artists and they selected me for how my work relates to its environment and play with reality. So in that sense some people apparently think my work is political or socially committed. The role of art today fits with the idea of the vita activa because it goes beyond a form of a one-dimensional life. Of course there are meanings about art that it gives enrichment and depth and I agree with that, but I prefer to consider its role very simple and basic. When I visited Athens this summer to visit the local art scene I went to the NEON foundation where a contributor talked about their concepts. She explained that they wanted to use public abandoned spots of Athens and repair them, in collaboration with an artist who will make it into a temporary exhibition space and then leave it behind in a better way than before. In that way NEON tries to find a connection to the inhabitants of Athens and at the same time they will bring them in contact with contemporary art. Because, she said, art is about life and it is for the people. Although this very simple line could have been said by anyone, the simplicity stirred me. In your works you include a wide variety of materials such as hair, makeup and textile riches with suggestive and sometimes symbolic evokative power. How much important is for you to use such materials in order to trigger the viewer's perceptual parameters in order to urge them to elaborate personal meanings and associations? I work with such materials to suggests some recognizable elements from reality. As a late teenager I was told something that had a big impact on my thoughts and on my practice nowadays, which is that if you want to start a revolution, you have to make very small, almost invisible changes so people will not notice any big change that will scare them off because it is too far from them. Later I read
some notebooks by Antonio Gramsci about hegemony by which I feel inspired. In his work, like in the works by Karl Marx, he sees the spread of Christianity in The Middle Ages as an exemplary example to influence the hegemony in a very subtle way. Actually I must say that my work is not so premeditated that I consider every possible detail whether it is inside or outside the borders of a small change, but I do like to fantasize about it a lot. I also like to disconnect on purpose by making some choices in a certain appareance or in the way I edit just to alienate, but there are always things related to realistic elements, I am not interested in creating work only about sci-fi or fantasy. With the use of make-up, wigs and clothing I exaggerate the construction of identity and at the same time sectarianism. If I focus too much only on the appearences of people I am able to drive myself nuts because I don't like to contribute too much to fixed codes. There is more to discover outside the code world, for example some unexpected fusion. A good example from reality that really fascinates me is the way how punks and skins melted in the late seventies in the United Kingdom as almost one subculture. In the sixties the first generation of skinheads were very anti the flowerpower cult, they had their own complete different codes. In the seventies the melting of those groups was a very enriching element for music, clothing and history itself. I love to make use of stereotypes, like expressing a typical nerd or a sexy woman but not without shaking the codes in a very subtle way. Your observation of distinction between the artificial and the natural to find common points of convergence seems to be very analytical, yet your works strive to be full of emotion: how would you consider the relationship between analysis and spontaneity within interview
your work? In particular, do you like spontaneity or do you prefer to meticolously schedule every details of your works? how much importance does play improvisation in your process? The video was built very scripted. I wanted to add a brutal plot change that modifies the genre completely to get a kind of inner story in the work itself. I wrote the script as if the main character completely took over the direction herself. In general I would say that there is always a basic fascination that drives me to create art. Yet there is not one single way for me to work best. Most of the works come from an idea which mostly suddenly pop up and that can happen anywhere. Sometimes I feel the urge to translate that idea immediately into a work and do not stop untill the basis is made. That feels like I am controlled by a genius idea. Other ideas I leave in my mind for a certain time, write and sketch something down and just dream about it. Those ideas are most of the time worked out very analytically by a script like Why I Never Became A Stalker. During recording there is still a lot of improvisation and while I am editing I sometimes choose parts where I am not performing at all, but where I take a break to write or think without awareness of the camera. Quite often there are days where I am making a variety of things spontaneously in my studio. Over the years your works have been showcased in several occasions: one of the hallmarks of your work is the capability to create direct involvement with the viewers, who are provided with the opportunity to become active participants and are urged to evolve from a condition of mere spectatorship. So before leaving this conversation we 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? The audience is present in my head most of the time when
working in my studio. I often think about dialogues of imaginary spectators. In the first months after graduation I heard my former teachers talking to me in my head with quotes as “Now you are killing it”, “Nobody is waiting for you out there” or “What am I looking at?”. In installation work I prefer to offer an element of interaction and in some performances as well. I like to play with offering a sort of disneyfied experience but then in an absurdist way that does not belong to fairytales, as a way to eliminate comfortability. In general I play with the recognizable elements I mentioned before just to offer a guidance so that I don't lose the understanding of the audience too soon. Yet there will always be people who are structurally scared of blood and human sized sculptures and can not pass through that, to whom I have got nothing to say. I don't like to make adjustments because I am not in advertising. Thanks a lot for your time and for sharing your thoughts, Charlotte. Finally, would you like to tell us readers something about your future projects? How do you see your work evolving? I am selected for an artist in residency where I will represent the province Zuid-Holland, during the whole month September. It is called Entre Nous and it is in Drenthe, in the Netherlands. All the twelve provinces are represented by one artist or art duo from that province. The residency is situated in a camp that is built by the Dutch army, every artist has their own militairy tent to sleep in and a container to use as studio. For a month we are the inhabitants of that camp, but there are a lot of conferences and meetings based on the welfare state on the same terrain. This whole project was inspired by a trial colony in 1818 that was formed by Johannes van den Bosch. The eternal utopian ways of thinking for societies interview