Retrospective
Retrospective Barbara Visser
Her first major museum exhibition will be opening in November, she will be showing several works, both new and old, at the Biennial in São Paulo, and this year will see the publication of an extensive monograph. For Barbara Visser, it is harvest time. Curator Moritz Küng asked her about the choices she has made in order to present her work – in both the book and the exhibition – in the retrospective model.
A few months ago, you asked if I had an idea for a title for your exhibition in Almere, although you are yourself very inventive in thinking up titles (I spontaneously have to think of ‘Retroperspective’). Your work often refers to and comes about within a local, historic or popular context. What then is the idea behind this first mid-career retrospective, and have you already found a title for it?
‘The title of the exhibition at The Pavilions in Almere is Vertaalde Werken / Translated Works, Barbara Visser 1990 – 2006, and the title of the book is Barbara Visser is er niet (Barbara Visser is Not There, or Barbara Visser Is Not Here). A retrospective exhibition is a fantastic opportunity to formulate your basic principles in a clear and nuanced way, with the help of the individual works. The exhibition follows the idea behind the work, with the result that the format of the exhibition itself is brought into question. The idea of a retrospective is a contradiction to the things I make, so I had to do something with that. In my work, the combination of place, time and the knowledge and experience of the viewer is often so important that it loses some of its meaning when it is shown it in a different location. So you could decide just to present documentation of the work, so that you would produce a decidedly retrospective exhibition, with newspaper clippings, photographs and gritty video material. That would suggest a certain objectivity, but I didn’t want that. I don’t believe in that kind of objectivity.
A translation is another possibility. The ideas on which the work is based are definite, but the form in which they are exhibited can change all the time, and be adapted to a new context, in this case the retrospective show at The Pavilions. All the communications for Almere play a role, including the invitation, the advertisements and the wall texts. I am doing the exhibition together with the designer Laurenz Brunner, whom I have asked to help think about possible translations for the works. This approach has also been followed in the development of the book, Barbara Visser Is Not There. In order to avoid a sense of looking back, together with Lisette Smits, the book’s editor, I chose not to use any illustrations of works in a different space or time, so it is not a retrospective, but everything is 1:1. There are also all kinds of ‘invisible’ guidelines.’A translation is another possibility. The ideas on which the work is based are definite, but the form in which they are exhibited can change all the time, and be adapted to a new context, in this case the retrospective show at The Pavilions. All the communications for Almere play a role, including the invitation, the advertisements and the wall texts. I am doing the exhibition together with the designer Laurenz Brunner, whom I have asked to help think about possible translations for the works. This approach has also been followed in the development of the book, Barbara Visser Is Not There. In order to avoid a sense of looking back, together with Lisette Smits, the book’s editor, I chose not to use any illustrations of works in a different space or time, so it is not a retrospective, but everything is 1:1. There are also all kinds of ‘invisible’ guidelines.’
Both Barbara Visser Is Not There and Translated Works refer to a different reality, a counter-reality, if you like. This is a phenomenon that shows up more frequently in your work. To just stick to the titles, True Lies, A Day in Holland: Holland in a Day, Le monde appartient à ceux qui se lèvent tôt / The world belongs to early risers, and Beauty is the Triumph of the Soul over the Facts all express a certain contradiction or contrariness – a moment of ‘detitledness’, to paraphrase one of your own titles.1 In several conversations and lectures, you have paraphrased Frank Stella’s famous comment, ‘What you see is what you see’, with ‘What you see depends on what you are looking for.’ Can you tell a little bit about what drives you, your motives? Do they have to do with revealing the duplicity of an identity?
‘For years, that paraphrasing of Stella, ‘What you see depends on what you’re looking for’ was a kind of motto. It was a comment by a friend, which she used when we were students and which we have always applied – for everything, really. That text is far more applicable to my generation than Frank Stella’s original statement, which for me represented everything that I was against when I was a student. The paraphrasing is of course mostly about the subjectivity and the impossibility of a one-on-one transmission. There are so many deformities and loss of facts in every form of communication. Looking at it the other way around, if you understand how it works, you can try to take advantage of the problems.
In Barbara Visser Is Not There, in order to classify my work, Jörg Heiser refers to a statement by the philosopher Donald Davidson. It is about three forms of empirical knowledge: ‘what’s in my mind, what’s in the world, and what’s in other peoples’ minds’. He states that these three aspects all depend on each other, like the three legs of a tripod. They need each other to achieve a certain stability. I am interested in the friction between different, apparently irreconcilable extremes, but always in the way they relate to what we know or presume, and to the environment in which the work finds itself. To a certain degree, it all hangs together, and that makes it a great challenge to see what happens when you move the works, in time as well as space. For that reason, it is not so much a different reality, or a counter-reality that I am seeking, but showing the contrasts that are essential to understanding things. In Barbara Visser Is Not There, in order to classify my work, Jörg Heiser refers to a statement by the philosopher Donald Davidson. It is about three forms of empirical knowledge: ‘what’s in my mind, what’s in the world, and what’s in other peoples’ minds’. He states that these three aspects all depend on each other, like the three legs of a tripod. They need each other to achieve a certain stability. I am interested in the friction between different, apparently irreconcilable extremes, but always in the way they relate to what we know or presume, and to the environment in which the work finds itself. To a certain degree, it all hangs together, and that makes it a great challenge to see what happens when you move the works, in time as well as space. For that reason, it is not so much a different reality, or a counter-reality that I am seeking, but showing the contrasts that are essential to understanding things.
One example is the one you mentioned, Detitled. The fact that a fifty-year-old design object shows signs of wear is in sharp contrast with the fetishism with which the ‘original’ is approached in the market. Vintage is seen as a different, a higher order than a recently produced object, even when the producer is the same. A second contradiction also manifests itself, because in the visual sense, it is the untouched object that the work is questioning. The damaged object shows a lot more of the quality of the design and the ‘soul’ it has than a sterile illustration in a furniture catalogue.’One example is the one you mentioned, Detitled. The fact that a fifty-year-old design object shows signs of wear is in sharp contrast with the fetishism with which the ‘original’ is approached in the market. Vintage is seen as a different, a higher order than a recently produced object, even when the producer is the same. A second contradiction also manifests itself, because in the visual sense, it is the untouched object that the work is questioning. The damaged object shows a lot more of the quality of the design and the ‘soul’ it has than a sterile illustration in a furniture catalogue.’
Detitled, a series of photographs of abused or destroyed classic furniture pieces, does indeed evoke a new reading. Design objects that have been stripped of their function suddenly seem like a deconstruction into sculpture, or from mass-produced product into a one-of-a-kind: the Charles Eames Chaise Longue into Henry Moore, a Jo Colombo chair into Kienholz, the Martin Visser sofa into Fontana. The ‘un-doubling’ – splitting something, removing its extra upper layer – is expressed very clearly here. Can you say that you are less interested in the ‘truth’ (according to Frank Stella’s statement) or pragmatic facts, and more in a mystery or in associative detours?
‘It is more the idea of myth that interests me. Myth refers to the story, the tradition, the interpretation of facts whose origins are no longer visible through time, whereas mystery puts the emphasis on holding information back, suggesting a secret that might be there. My work in fact fights against that. In my opinion, you cannot be transparent enough. Only then does any existing layering show itself – to express it in a plastic sense. The idea of truth is itself a myth. For years, I tried everything in order to discover what it was that something got its authority or believability from, in terms of perception as well as identity and aesthetic, which are in essence totally different approaches. In the end, I can understand it all better, but it is still complicated, and mysterious too, to a certain degree. Ultimately, the question is not whether something is true or not, but if it means something.’
To come back for a moment to your exhibition and your decision to use the term ‘translation’ to present your work over the last sixteen years, a large portion of your work is in response to very explicit contexts or issues. In such works as Gimines, Interview met Duiker or Lecture with Actress, you bring the idea of a single truth into context.2 There is always a chasm that develops between reality and translation, which people can bridge in several ways. For your first retrospective, are you adopting a given strategy or scenario, creating a different reading of your work? Will Barbara Visser be present as a meta-personality?
‘As I said, the title Vertaalde Werken/ Translated Works developed during my investigation into the possibilities of a new presentation of work from other periods and places. It evolved from the realization that you sometimes really have to intervene in the manner of presentation if you want to do justice to a work. In Alsmere, that “translation” will take different forms. Documentation on an exhibition can be perceived as part of the work, or, for example, enlarged to wall format, so that a gallery at The Pavilions is suddenly connected to the architectural space of a gallery in Zurich. The title also refers to the literary aspect, the fact that with language, our thoughts take shape and can be expressed – the exchange between what you know and what you see. It is tempting to start out with a single scenario or principle, but in practice, that proves to be too limited an approach. Therefore, in Alsmeer, there are interests and starting points that run parallel and sometimes cross over one another.
It also concerns very diverse media, which only adds to the possibilities. A good example would be the works that I refer to as the “myths”. Gimines is a good example. All I can show of this work, which is about a guest appearance in a Lithuanian television series, is a video, as a document, and some peripheral items, such as a calendar with a picture of me on it. But how interesting is that? The strength of the work lies in the fact that it is a story that many people in art know. Both here and in other countries, I am often approached about it, but practically no one has actually seen it. It has become a story that people use for their own projections. Those white spots are important. It is perhaps much more exciting to present the project as a narrative, in text or sound, than to show a video of a Baltic soap opera taken out of context. It also concerns very diverse media, which only adds to the possibilities. A good example would be the works that I refer to as the “myths”. Gimines is a good example. All I can show of this work, which is about a guest appearance in a Lithuanian television series, is a video, as a document, and some peripheral items, such as a calendar with a picture of me on it. But how interesting is that? The strength of the work lies in the fact that it is a story that many people in art know. Both here and in other countries, I am often approached about it, but practically no one has actually seen it. It has become a story that people use for their own projections. Those white spots are important. It is perhaps much more exciting to present the project as a narrative, in text or sound, than to show a video of a Baltic soap opera taken out of context.
For Lecture with Actress, Lecture on Lecture with Actress and Last Lecture, there are a number of lines that run parallel to each other. What began as an experiment – just once having an actress do a lecture for me – became a meta-story, in which a new actress unmasks the first, and in turn brings herself into doubt by doing so. Representation, whether it is visual or whether it happens by way of people, cannot escape the demand for the original. I sometimes hope that you can see a new original in every representation. Whether that is possible has more to do with power of conviction than with authenticity.’For Lecture with Actress, Lecture on Lecture with Actress and Last Lecture, there are a number of lines that run parallel to each other. What began as an experiment – just once having an actress do a lecture for me – became a meta-story, in which a new actress unmasks the first, and in turn brings herself into doubt by doing so. Representation, whether it is visual or whether it happens by way of people, cannot escape the demand for the original. I sometimes hope that you can see a new original in every representation. Whether that is possible has more to do with power of conviction than with authenticity.’
A book is by definition a medium for representation. Can you say something more about how the book, Barbara Visser Is Not There, came about?
‘The actual title, Barbara Visser is er niet, not only suggests a contradiction in content, but it also raises another issue: the impossibility of translating the Dutch word, “er”. That quickly became evident because the publication is in Dutch and English. I remembered an article about a Belgian linguistics professor who is almost exclusively concerned with the word “er”. The use and the meaning of the word is unclear, but it is used a lot. I think the impossibility of defining such a word and the fact that somebody spends his whole life just studying it, is fantastic. We asked Paul Elliman, a graphic designer, to write an introduction for the book about the idea of “er”. Because he is English, he can actually only understand what the problem is about on an abstract level. ‘The actual title, Barbara Visser is er niet, not only suggests a contradiction in content, but it also raises another issue: the impossibility of translating the Dutch word, “er”. That quickly became evident because the publication is in Dutch and English. I remembered an article about a Belgian linguistics professor who is almost exclusively concerned with the word “er”. The use and the meaning of the word is unclear, but it is used a lot. I think the impossibility of defining such a word and the fact that somebody spends his whole life just studying it, is fantastic. We asked Paul Elliman, a graphic designer, to write an introduction for the book about the idea of “er”. Because he is English, he can actually only understand what the problem is about on an abstract level.
We asked the other writers never to mention the artist Barbara Visser in their texts (Barbara Visser is not there), and never to write about a work in the past tense, in the same way that are no illustrations are used of works in a different place or time, the way they are in exhibition overviews. That way, we wanted to make a book that, despite the fact that it uses material from the last 15 years, does not feel explicitly retrospective. These restrictions were of course an invitation to be inventive, to push the envelope, as it were, which the writers have in fact have done on a broad scale. Several concepts have been divided amongst the writers: myth, civilization, time, animism and psychology. I wanted to fill in this last subject myself, because I have always been opposed to the romantic idea that the work of art and the person who makes it are mutually convergent.’We asked the other writers never to mention the artist Barbara Visser in their texts (Barbara Visser is not there), and never to write about a work in the past tense, in the same way that are no illustrations are used of works in a different place or time, the way they are in exhibition overviews. That way, we wanted to make a book that, despite the fact that it uses material from the last 15 years, does not feel explicitly retrospective. These restrictions were of course an invitation to be inventive, to push the envelope, as it were, which the writers have in fact have done on a broad scale. Several concepts have been divided amongst the writers: myth, civilization, time, animism and psychology. I wanted to fill in this last subject myself, because I have always been opposed to the romantic idea that the work of art and the person who makes it are mutually convergent.’
Barbara Visser Barbara Visser
De Paviljoens, Almere De Paviljoens, Almere
4 November 2006 through 15 April 20074 November 2006 through 15 April 2007
Barbara Visser is also participating in the 27th Biennial in São Paulo Barbara Visser is also participating in the 27th Biennial in São Paulo
7 October through 17 December 2006 7 October through 17 December 2006
[2] Gimines (1995) was made in Lithuania, where Visser became familiar with the television series of the same name. The script for one programme was rewritten, so that Visser played herself as an artist, married to an ex-patriot doctor, visiting Wilnius for an exhibition. Interview met Duiker (1994), an interview with an architect who died in 1934, was produced for a group exhibition in the Cineac in Amsterdam. In Lecture with Actress (1997), Barbara Visser had herself replaced by an actress, without the audience knowing it. The real Barbara Visser whispered the text to the actress via a transmitter. In 2004, she did Lecture on Lecture with actress according to the same principle at the Münz Club in Berlin, having another actress give a commentary on video shots from the first lecture. The final segment, entitled Last Lecture, is planned for 2006 and will feature Barbara Visser performing herself as a final step in the series.
Moritz Küng
