Tacita Dean on Boots

"Berlin Project was the most personal work I had ever done up t that point. I think the reason why I am getting a bit more autobiographical, ant The Uncles is totally autobiographical, is because I've moved to Berlin and suddenly it has given me permission to make work about England, because prior to that I would travel the world for my subject matter. It is something that I hadn't noticed - the autobiography in Boots, 2003, is subliminal when you encounter the work, but when you read my texts yo then see the connection and Boots's association to my family. Berlin Project includes Boots - I interviewed him about his father's life in Berlin - basically Boots had this legacy of being the son of a minor traitor. He was born in London but lived in Munich and Berlin as a boy during the whole Nazi period." (Dean, in Walsh, 2007, pp.568-569)

Maria Walsh I saw Boots in Paris at the Musée d'art moderne de la Ville de Paris. How is it set up at RIBA?  

Tacita Dean The RIBA room that we have has three doors so it absolutely invites Boots. Also the building is so much like Casa de Serralves, that same period. It is from the thirties and a bit fascist in a way, so it is a perfectvenue. I wanted to show it here at Firth Street as it is the principal work I've made in the last year but needed more space." (Dean, in Walsh, 2007, p.570)

Maria Walsh Why are there three versions of Boots?

Tacita Dean I wanted to use Boots's perfect ated urbanity, that in some ways he carried in his body that period of western culture when many were polyglot and somehow Europe was less divided in a strage sense even though now we have the European Community. Then, people would freely move between cultures and be multilingual." (Dean, in Walsh, 2007, p.571)

Tacita Dean "I wanted to film him in all these different languages without knowing I was going to do three versions... What I imposed on it was obviously the language seperation but also that he would take a different walk around the villa for each version. So in the English version he goes into the study, in the French, the dining room, in the German, the library and then they all go upstairs to the pink bathroom... what i love is that he changes with the language, which is so beautiful. In the German version, he is a bit fascist in a way, isn't he? Whereas the French version is much more romantic, the English is very wistful." (Dean, in Walsh, 2007, p.571)

Maria Walsh Boots's cahracter doesn't take over the building in the way that a character usually dominates place in mainstream fictional narratives.

Tacita Dean They both have parallel stories. An empty house of tha beauty is poignant anyway and Boots becomes an empty house also to some extent." (Dean, in Walsh, 2007, p.571)

Tacita Dean "People's perception of sound is extraordinary. It is so muted by image...

I put in everything. I always record sound live and collect sound while I am in the location, so most of it is recorded in situ but was just placed differently. It is another ingredient that adds to the visual because of course image in 16mm is recorded mute. And that for me is one of the primal seperations between video, digital media and film - the muteness of film, of cinema, and that everything has to be added." (Dean, in Walsh, 2007, p.571)

Walsh, M. (2004) "Tacita Dean" in Bickers, P. & Wilson, A. (eds.) (2007) Talking Art: Interviews with Artists since 1976. London: Art Monthly and Ridinghouse. pp.567-573.

Richard Serra on Installations

"I was talking to one of the engineers yesterday. To make sure that everything is done properly, they've overloaded the space with safety precaustions and I think they've used more hardware than they needed. It's okay with me, but I think that counts for the fact that when you go to watch the installations, you may think there's an assult being made on the Tate. After the big steel I-beam rails come out and the piece is set, I don't think the installation process is of concern nor do I think it's of any consequence.

To tell you the truth the nature of installations for me differ with each job or with each site. This isn't the first time that I've had to prop underneath. I did it in Berlin for the Berlin Block in 1978..." (Serra, in Bickers, 2007, p.386)

Bickers, P. (1992) "Richard Serra" in Bickers, P. & Wilson, A. (eds.) (2007) Talking Art: Interviews with Artists since 1976. London: Art Monthly and Ridinghouse. pp.386-392.

Irit Rogoff on Immigration

"...nationalism, one of the hallmarks of which is the perpetuation of the notion of belonging. If there are people who belong, there are those who do not. Nationalism and migration are connected around notinos of aspiration or protection.

"One of the things art allows us, that most academic discourses might not, is to start in the middle, and migration always starts in the middle. As a migrant, you're not of that place or this place; you're somewhere in-between."

"People who have been European for generations have a very structured formal language for their shared passions. People who have arrived from else where, and lived between several cultures, their shared passions are coming into being in different languages." (Rogoff, in Potts, no date)

Potts, R. (no date) "Terra Infirma: Towards a New Understanding of the Visual Culture of Geography" in Garageland, Issue 9, pp.40-41. 

Glasnost: Soviet Non-Conformist Art from the 1980s

Haunch of Venison

Another exhibition I went to was Glasnost: Soviet Non-Conformist Art from the 1980s, at Haunch of Venison (above). I was one of the first ones in that morning, and there were more space to walk and observe than at Tate Modern. I was able to talk to a staff at the door, who described the opening night's event where guests were ordered around by actors dressed as officers; and another staff at the gift shop who informed me of an artist who'd worked on the theme of Berlin Wall, and also posed for an idea I had (below). 

"3,000 pounds, excluding V.A.T."

I found the Anton Henning exhibition as exciting as the Glasnost one, with video installation and lowered lights. I realise exhibitions are not only venues that display art work, but offer experiences. This seems too obvious now, but it was a striking thought at the time.

Haunch of Venison [2010] Glasnost: Soviet Non-Conformist Art from the 1980s. [Online]

http://www.haunchofvenison.com/en/#page=london.current.glasnost [13/06/2010]

Exposed: Voyeurism, Surveillance and the Camera

This exhibition at Tate Modern focuses on images, mostly photographs, taken without "the explicit permission of the people depicted" [Tate Online, 2010a]. Sophie Calle's Room series, where the artist became a temporary cleaner of a hotel and photographed guests' belongings, were also on display.

  

The Hotel, Room 47

"Tuesday 24. 10:30 a.m. They are going to leave. The suitcases are packed. They are set in front of the door. They leave behind the balloon, which is hanging limp, and stale biscuits." (from Sophie Calle's Room 47)

This line leaves the viewer some sense of a departure and transition of the guests of Room 47, and is accompanied by photographs, including that of a wilted balloon.

I asked a staff if I can take photos at the exhibition - as I usually do - who then pointed at a sign with an image of camera crossed out. How can Tate charge visitors for tickets (£10/8.50 concs) for an exhibition based on images discreetly captured, and not allow visitors to take photos? Are they encouraging visitors to to take photographs by prohibiting it?

Room 47 at Tate Modern

Tate Online [2010a] Exposed: Voyeurism, Surveillance and the Camera. [Online] 
http://www.tate.org.uk/modern/exhibitions/exposure/default.shtm [12/06/2010]
Tate Online [2010b] The Hotel, Room 47:  1981. [Online]
http://www.tate.org.uk/servlet/ViewWork?cgroupid=999999961&workid=26559&searchid=11571&tabview=text [12/06/2010]