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[June
30th 2002 2002]
Interview
Thank you for making me insane
Interview with Kristian Hornsleth.
Text and photo: Kristine Ploug
The Danish artist Kristian Hornsleth (born
1963) is provocative, his art is hopelessly politically incorrect
with messages such as ’Rape, Kill, Steal, Burn’, ’Kill
me fast' and 'More War’. It also incorporates icons of the
culture industry (Kylie, Britney, Lenny) as collages in paintings
and as customized artifacts – among others, he has engraved
the text ’Fuck you art lovers’ onto Rolex watches and
put the same text on the tummy of the Pokemon teddy bear Pikachu.
Yet there is something fascinating about Kristian Hornsleth and
his art, and evidently a lot that think so. Last month he exhibited
in New York City and the exhibit – called ’Fucking liar$’
– was recommended by both The New York Times and The Village
Voice. And also Copenhagen got a peak of Hornleth’s newest
production, when he recently had an art opening and after party
in an old church in Møllegade in Nørrebro. Kristine
Ploug is among the fascinated and has e-mailed with Kristian
Hornsleth.
When I experience your art I am left with a feeling of being
impressed, fascinated and repulsed in a weird mix. The repulsive
is obviously coming from provocative elements such as the sentence
’More War’ and is in that way quite easy to comprehend.
However, with the impression and the fascination it is a bit more
difficult. Do you have any kind relation to how your art should
make the viewer feel?
Yes, I have a fanatic asymptotic relation to exploring the ways
of communication between the art producer and the art lover. But
I feel I need to know more about your experience to answer your
question – an old dialectic trick! Which feeling is it precisely
the leaves you impressed and fascinated?
To elaborate on my question: the impressed comes probably in
part from having seen your collected works on your site – how
can you be anything but impressed by i.e. the ideas to customize
all kinds of things from Pikachu teddy bears to Rolex watches and
not least from the price level implied by the latter (and wasn’t
there something about some BMWs?). And then there is the fact that
you seems to be an international hit. Your exhibition in NYC was
recommended by The New York Times and it goes without saying that
they have quite a few exhibitions to choose from. I can’t help
but being impressed by all that.
Pikachu and Rolex.
The fascination is closer to the art per se. I don’t know exactly
what – your art seems to have several levels. I went to the
church in Møllegade to photograph the paintings yesterday
and I thought about it again: Your paintings always, very clearly,
have several layers. When you see the painting Abstract silver
green from a distance it looks very abstract, but when you get
closer you are able to find i.g. a small KKK-hat. Many of the others
have some sort of motif and then a lot of writing on top. Aside
from that I also get the sense that there are several layers of
meaning – that there is far more to the photos than political
incorrectness, that there is a deeper meaning. Maybe the fascination
comes from feeling that I am able to see past the rather loud layer
of political incorrectness.
left: Abstract silver green 2x2 March 2002
righth: Detail. From the exhibition in the church.
And now when I have written this, I feel that I have let myself
be labeled as one of the art lovers your work loves to annoy. Did
you plan the stream of thoughts?
Thank you! You mention the several layers of meaning and that is
actually exactly what I hope to communicate to the viewer. I test
people: 'Do you make it to the hurdle of negativism' (H.O.N.). And
when the banal provocation or satire is over, all the senses are
often open. And if you stick around, you might notice other things
than you normally would in this overly pedagogical idiot advertising
time. You have passed the H. O. N.
And after opening the gates of the art lover comes my most important
task: To picture a good idea, a thought or paradox, that brings
the viewer just a bit further in his or her life. If I don’t
deliver a fresh idea of gas to the bonfire of vanity – then
I might as well line up along with the ten thousand of others night
school artists of mediocrity’s circus of self deception.
So: ONE THING is to HAVE the layers of meaning – any idiot
can do that – SOMETHING ELSE is when the layers of meaning
actually have something to offer!
Detalje fra Big Pussy - It's ok to be alone 2x2 May 2002.
From the exhibition in the church.
Good art is and has always been intellectual and interesting entertainment
for those with education and money. All other socio-political-critical
works of art through the class battles of the modernism might very
well be born in the basements of the revolution, but they all end
up in the art collection of the rich. Like the court jester and
the priest the artist is paid by those in power to confirm their
power by making impressive works and by adding a few funny intelligent
truths here and there- but only enough not to have their head rolling.
And today that equals not selling.
Detaljer fra Greenspan Britney in my cells 2x2
m May 2002 The text on the painting is Thank you for making
me insane. From the exhibition in the church.
I have to ask you: Do you mean that art should be left to market
value and shouldn’t be supported by society?
I have to divide you question into two groups: The artistic activity
and the financing part. Artistic ACTIVITY is the sublime, the giving,
the non-selfish. It is love LIVE – just remember Bruce Nauman:
"The true artist is an amazing fountain of...". The marketing
related part of the activity is only that the work of art sells
itself and thereby it’s idea with the means of the work of
art and that isn’t really money related.
But the FINANCING of the artistic activity is WAR. Take what you
can get – it is like scientific research – take any funding
you can get! Kiss the ass of whichever funding committee –
sell you results to the best available price - and that goes no
matter if your art is interviewing single mothers in Kurdistan,
photographing waterfalls in Iceland, or copying Franz Ackermann
- who fucking cares!
Girls,there is no business like show business
2x2 m May 2002. From the exhibition in the church.
Speaking of selling (and you do sell, right?), it hits me that you
really are taking marketing mechanisms quite literally, i.e. the
whole branding idea, where you ‘brand’ your name by letting
it appear in a prominent place in all of your works. Aside from
that there are a few sentences, like ‘Fuck you art lovers’
and ‘Rape Kill Steal Burn’ that keep reoccurring in you
work and thus becomes some sort of brands. The latter was seen in
the church in it’s short form (’R.K.S.B.’), which
is the second step of branding where you no longer have to write
the full brand name (e.g. Nike no longer has to write their name
for people to recognize them, all they have to do is to write their
little rounded sign), however, this also means that outsiders are
lost, their have no possibility to decode the message, but in many
cases that doesn’t matter, because if they can’t follow
they are probably not in the target groups anyway. Do you have a
defined target groups, and it that case: is that the people that
actually buy your work?
Hirsprung Kofi Lenny Cool Cooler Coolest 2x2
m May 2002, From the exhibition in the church.
Actually my target group is all kinds of different people –
the interest for absurdity know no cultural boundaries. However,
there seem to be a tendency for my buyers to be intelligent single
men, 25-45, executives in private businesses with flat stomachs
and a devotion to beautiful, intelligent women. These guys wouldn’t
dream of going to an art opening or to a gallery – both experiences
that they have either never tried or believe to be too nerdy or
boring. It seems that they like my ironic play with the incorrect
and as I said earlier, behind the banal and provocative, they find
something to contrast and inhabit their own thoughts and considerations.
The women in my audience seem to be more into the more abstract
work with my Rohrshackian paintings, where I take the different
layers of an abstract situation and draws them, where the collage
macho work is more about pressing the existing layers together!
Kylie kill me fast 2x2 m March 2002. From
the exhibition in the church.
Brands and icons are reoccurring in your works: There are icons
of wealth, such as the Rolex watches and there are numbers of famous
people – all famous to the extent of icons: Britney Spears,
Kylie Minogue, the Pokemon figure Pikachu. In the church in Møllegade
you exhibit the painting: Hirsprung Kofi Lenny Cool Cooler Coolest.
Is this what the world looks like through your eyes – a blur
of icons and brands that all melts together in a big blur, that
makes you compare classical culture with Kofi Annan and Lenny Kravitz
and consider who is more cool?
Detail from Hirsprung Kofi Lenny Cool Cooler
Coolest 2x2 m May 2002
I couldn’t have put it better myself – except from
that I don’t understand your negative concerns about this blur
– you might have that classical peaceful and condescending
academic attitude towards the contemporary value merges. No, no
listen – this merging of values – or loss of values norms
as you might call it – might be the proof that there finally
is a new Messiah, NOT as a LOSS of values but rather as some sort
of value FREEDOM – a freedom of sampling – a freedom to
love that the world has finally gone completely mad – and ‘about
time’ as the Danish philisopher Ole Fogh Kirkeby once said.
May I in this connection recommend a book written by one of the
few Wittgenstein student still alive: Henrik von Wright: 'The Myth
of Progress'.
When I met you (so far the first & only time) in the church
in Møllegade and talked to you about your project about Futilism
you said that "People that know something about history of
the art generally know nothing of Futilism". I am not sure
whether it was an insult (in that case it missed, because even though
I am an academic I am not an art historian and I don’t now
very much about art). One of your ‘brands’ is ’Fuck
you art lovers’ – what do you have against art historians
and -lovers?
Colour Persistance touch 2x2 m May 2002
- by the alter in the church in Møllegade
It is not like me to say that thing about “People that know
something about history of the art generally know nothing of Futilism”.
That would be illogical saying something like that given that there
is only one small book about it published by me and only a small
number of people have had the possibility to read it. I hope you
heard me wrong, and since I never drink, smoke or eat meat and you
say I said it – the I don’t understand anything –
but then again, somebody must have said it. I reject having said
something that stupid and if it was said, well, then it is just
nonsense.
Leather love Ventilator, don't be scared be a futulist 2x2 m
May 2002. From the exhibition in the chruch.
Futilism is a method to boost your creativity. Futilism is a method
of taking off from what appears to be without meaning and ending
up with something meaningful, which is against the classical understanding
that takes off from historical empirics.
Futilism comes from the word 'futile' – but is not related
to the 'futile' per se. Etc. etc.
The other thing is a challenge of the artistic understanding mechanisms
of the viewer, insight and not least humor. I think you know what
I mean.
One of Kristian Hornsleth’s future projects
is ’Inhabitants-Called-Hornsleth-In-An-African-Village’,
where the inhabitants in an African village all take the name Hornsleth
and receive money in return.
Future exhibitions are:
Genéve, Musée Ariana, group show (June)
Berlin, Art in Architecture, group show, location not yet decided
(July 4th.)
München, Gallery Heitsch (fall)
Köln, Mirko Mayer Gallery (fall)
Berlin Felix Leiter (winter)
Stay posted at www.hornsleth.com
Kristian Hornsleth
More...
www.hornsleth.com
Baumgartner (‘FUCKING LIAR$’, 27. April – 29. Maj
2002)
More on futilism
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