q)Please introduce yourself.
a)I’ve used several artist names, among them, Gaiihin, Agaiihine, Yogœme, Logoeme. I don’t like names. I have no soul. I used to search for someone to give me their christian soul so I would have had something to offer to the devil. Now, I’m OK.
q) Where do you live and work?
a)In
q) How would you describe your work to someone who has never seen it?
a)I usually say that I’m writing underground comics. I guess my stuff would be classified as outsider art. My work used to be expectation, now it is aftermath.
q) How did you start in the arts? How/when did you realize you were an artist?
a)The rain was colder than snow. The wind was solider than stone. In the red night, I was strolling alone. Suddenly a horse fell from the sky (it made a disgusting sound when it reached the ground). I didn’t pay attention to it and passed it by; but later on, when I reached my home, I started to realise that it was kind of weird. I may have been a bit confused and excessive when I fiercely believed that this was an absurd scene. So I decided my art was to be a fortress to defend myself against the absurdity of life.
q) What are your favorite art materials and why?
a)I used to work a lot with oil paint. At the moment I only draw with felt pens. I need their inexpressiveness, however I pay attention to thicken the line here and there to have a livelier achievement.
q) What/who influences you most?
a)My memory, cultural aberrations, people.
q) Describe a typical day of art making for you.
a)There are many steps to go through when you’re writing comics. But I guess, typically, I’m a maniac.
q) Do you have goals, specific things you want to achieve with your art or in your career as an artist?
a)I’m not inclined to applaud any kind of complacency. I wish people who are interested in my work to understand that neither pompous discourse nor raw facts nor any kind of narrative deserves to be ignored or regarded as affectation. I’d like to increase the lyrical intensity of my work. My career doesn’t matter.
q) What contemporary artists or developments in art interest you?
a)When exactly did contemporary art begin? Was it with Ingres, Cezanne or Käthe Kollwitz? (Chuckle) All right. Often my friends are surprised by my knowledge of twentieth and ninetieth century art. Now, I focus very much on uncompromising living artists who are part of the underground. I’m taking part in many zine projects which are visible on my blog. We try to do things together.
q) How long does it typically take you to finish a piece?
a)When I paint sometimes I would need one week to achieve a piece. I can draw one comix page per day.
q) Do you enjoy selling your pieces, or are you emotionally attached to them?
a)I was happy to sell my life drawings or paintings. I’ve often given some drawings to friends. I’m emotionally attached to my pieces because I like them to belong to somebody else.
q) Is music important to you? If so, what are some things you're listening to now?
a)I play the guitar (I have long nails) and the double bass (with the Italian bow). Oum Kalthoum makes me shudder. I have cold waves inside my torso when she sings. I love lyrical music: The Kindertotenlieder by
q) Books?
a)I love silkscreen art books and zines. I like literature very much. Well may be I should mention famous writers I like so it can give you an idea of the sort of things I read: Albert Camus, Søren Kirkegaard, Nietzche, Samuel Beckett, Virginia Wolf, Ionesco, Balzac, Thomas Mann, Colette, Kafka, Rimbaud, Jaques Prevert...
q) What theories or beliefs do you have regarding creativity or the creative process?
a)At the moment I need to make my work naturally but in this interview I’ll try to define what I call (clumsily maybe) “axiomatic belief”. I’m aware of the power of belief even though I’m inclined to nihilism and atheism. “Axiomatic Belief” is the capacity to believe in presupposed ideas and to assume the consequences of them. This process is dangerous because it can lead to schizophrenia. So it needs the capacity to switch ideas and not to impose upon others the truth which is developed. It shouldn’t be confused with analysis of unconscious objects or objective looks at what condition us. Well, it could be but it isn’t limited to it. It is about belief. I give you a far fetched example: the presupposed universe would be materialism, God is accepted as real, and the consequence, the action is aphorism; the result could be the sentence “their god created us, materialist, to be the only one who could understand limitation and death which god cannot understand”. Here the action is writing. The action could be sensual experience or art making as well. When it is about art making it isn’t necessarily an experimental gesticulation which is based on nothing but the desire for mysterious incarnation. It could be actually very heavy and full of elements to take on.
q) What do you do (or what do you enjoy doing) when you're not creating?
a)Hehehe! Here we are entering the domain of privacy…
q) Do you have any projects or shows coming up that you are particularly excited about?
a)I should make a comix for
q) Do you follow contemporary art scenes? If so, how? What websites, magazines, galleries do you prefer?
a)As I already said, I like outsider art, there are links on my blog to people I’m working with. Also, http://www.ubu.com/ is a good web site I think. I respect and admire very much the books which are produced by Le Dernier Cri.
q) Ask yourself a question you'd like to answer, and answer it.
Do you like poetry?
a)Yes.
q) Any advice for aspiring artists?
a)Be careful. Don’t fall into the traps which you think are related to typical artist behaviours. Don’t kill yourself.
q) Where can we see more of your work online?
a) http://gaiihin.blogspot.com/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/36556191@N02/
http://eatenbyducks.blogspot.com/search/label/agaiihine
Nessun commento:
Posta un commento