BIG

by Luca and Nico, Feb 2002 (Torino, Italy)

This is a set of questions sent to every artist participating in the BIG Torino 2002 biennale, to have selected excerpts printed in the catalogue.

– “Social game/ social interaction”, …what does it mean for you in relation to your own working processes and living environment?

There are two dimensions, with respect to my work. One is the interaction between myself and the individuals to whom my work is delivered. The other is the interaction among individuals who may share or enjoy things that i do. Since most of what i do is music, its experience is always embedded in time and, sometimes, it’s live. I see it as a kind of mediated interaction, and music is the mediator. The interactions are through something outside each person involved. It’s very special and often magic, something worth living for. Of course, as often as i said “interaction” it can read “game” as well…

– Do you perceive the danger of hybridity within the context of an interdisciplinary biennal?

No. I take discipline seriously, with respect to art. But it shouldn’t mean that we choose to become chained by it. We should become more aware that we don’t need to be strictly painters, or
musicians. We are free to express ideas artistically using whichever means or mixed means that we find adequate. I believe that not only this hybridity is not a danger, it is desirable.

– Don’t you feel the need for more personal strategies of small gestures, in contrast to this ongoing global instrumentalization of communication?

Yes, more and more we need to improve ourselves as individuals. The communication environment is incredibly abrasive and it just seems to be getting worse. We have to dig for information – it’s not on CNN.

– What kind of things do you collect?

Teaspoons from airline companies.

– How can we learn from our own mistakes, and intersect these reflections within our aesthetical articulations?

Staying awake and being intellectually honest.

– “Silence and invisibility”, …how do you deal with these concepts in a world of image-driven madness and too much noise?

I try to encourage economy. Show up and speak only when necessary. And do everything to maintain serenity.

– Why do you consider yourself as an artist?

I may only be an artist to the extent of what i do being put to use by other people. Anyway, Beuys said that “artist” is the natural condition of human beings. I believe that.

– How to install, against the background of this obvious acceleration of time, new meanings of slowness … generating more critical positions?

It’s just a matter of scale, of scope. Concepts of fast and slow are relative to the time scale you choose to live and work in. You may be involved with current issues or with timeless ones. It’s like when a plane just flies overhead, it goes really fast, but when you see it at cruise speed – probably much faster – 10 Km up in the sky, you perceive it as hardly moving.