The Art Magazine September 2020 | Page 13

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Hello Antonia, and welcome to NotRandomArt. The current issue is revolving around the problem of communication and identity. Is there any particular way you would describe your identity as an artist but also as a human being in dynamically changing, unstable times? In particular, does your cultural substratum/identity form your aesthetics?

I am pleased with the invitation to the interview. The theme of the current issue is very interesting. The basic themes of the series ’T.T.C.’ are the feeling of inner conflict, false self-perception, the human psyche and the pressure of the fashion industry. The boundary between the classical portrait and fashion photography will be dissolved and the role of the photographed body comes to the fore. Against this background I handle with interests like the public and private spheres as well as the role of women in the fashion industry. The series is a visual examination of the physical and psychological fragility of the human. My concern is to create images in which the viewer begins to question himself in his role as well as the work as such. I want to make things visible. I want to provoke the viewer with thoughts that are otherwise not public. It is seen in the portrait that my work is particularly subtle and that i dealing with the physical and mental fragility of the human being.

I would describe my as a young upcoming artist. Because of numerous exhibitions and awards, I am now establishing myself as an internationally known, young artist. Of course it is hard, especially the time after graduation. But you must not lose sight of your goals and the most important thing is that you show your art to other people.

Would you like to tell us something about your artistic as well as life background? What inspired you to be in this artistic point in your life when you are now?

At school, I quickly realized that art is my passion. From the moment I chose the art, I had very high demands on my pictures. My study of art, I began as a painter. In the first year, I found my artistic form of expression in the photography. With photography, I achieve the effect which has always missing in my paintings. People often told me that my photographs still have painting attribute. A successful image composition is one of the highest demands on my pictures. The composition must be clearly structured. After four years of studying liberal arts, with main focus on photography, i passed with distinction in September 2016. Even while studying arts, i was working as an assistant for several well-known photographers. I get inspirations for the work from the influences that people are exposed to every day - which influence, manipulate and shape them in different ways. To explore the human psyche is part of my work.

Could you identify a specific artwork that has influenced your artistic practice or has impacted the way you think about your identity as a participant of the visual culture?

Purely photographically, I am inspired by artists like Gillian Wearing, Robert Mapplethorpe, Francesca Woodman and Diane Arbus. For me, Robert Mapplethorpe is a master of light and of the black and white photography. I do not think of a particular work, it is more the artists in the interplay with their works which inspire me. I chose the black and white photography to consciously direct the viewer's gaze. Black and white is a clear reduction to the essentials. With such a strong reduction, light and shadow conditions play the decisive role. In contrast to the classic black and white portrait, in which the characteristics of the portraitist are transferred to the black and white tonal values, my portraits show no character or individuals; They are freely constructed images. The figures in the pictures are interpreted as more psychological than biological beings.

What is the role of technique in your practice? In particular are there any constraints or rules that you follow when creating?

Rules I follow more less. Of course, the pictures of a series are also similar to each other, but I do not force every picture to go the same. The pictures of the series are made of digital photos which were subjected with a analog manipulation. The play between the undercooled digital technique of photography and of the analogue deformation are essential for the works. In the course of the series, I have developed various techniques of analog manipulation to achieve similar results. Consequently, there are hard and soft techniques which lead to such deformations. The individual techniques are applied in part alone, partly mixed. In some pictures are found up to three different techniques, while other pictures remain with only one technique. Accordingly, the time required for the images is large to very large. While some pictures are finished after one day, others need several days to complete. The precise process of the deformation has not been betray since the beginning of the series and is thus part of the work. The existing secret of the analog deformation let clearance for personal interpretations.

olted by the Thought of Known Places… Sweeney Astray” by Joan Jonas was one of the first performance installations that really made a huge impact on me. I was living in Paris during this time, in the early 90s, with a lot of influences from different cultures. It became the starting point of my own work. Joan Jonas practice has explored ways of seeing, the rhythms of ritual, and the authority of objects and gestures. Jonas continues to find new layers of meanings in themes and questions of gender and identity that have fueled her art for over thirty years. She is a great inspiration still today.

It is impossible to avoid the topic of body consciousness, embodied emotions and the image of body and personal identity that we see in your practice. What is the function of the identity appearing in your artworks – is it a canvas used to present your ideas or rather the subject of the art? What inspired you to use this as a theme in your practice?

I have been developing my visual imagery since I began studying art and film - from conceptual thinking, composition, using light and colour in different ways, through all the different techniques I've utilised over the years in my work and in my collaborations with stage artists such as dancers, musicians and actors. My approach is always developing through exploring these things. Visual imagery in essence is your way of experiencing what you see and transforming it. This is my world that I want to share and express through my art. The body consciousness, embodied emotions and the image of body and personal identity is part of this visual imagery, the emotional essence in my practice. Always present and always developing in different themes and projects.

Marina Abramovic stated: You see, what is my purpose of performance artist is to stage certain difficulties and stage the fear the primordial fear of pain, of dying, all of

which we have in our lives, and then stage them in front of audience and go through them and tell the audience, 'I'm your mirror; if I can do this in my life, you can do it in yours.'Can you relate anyhow to these words?

de-identify myself, by losing my roots, my culture, I would be very happy. Unfortunately the human being does'nt choose the place where he is born. He grows up in a society that automatically identifies, through education, culture, family... More than ever I think it's more important to go on a way of self-knowledge with the aim to meet “the other”.. This other without which we can not exist. It's the same for the artist. It is more important for me to be focused on my practice than to try to define it according to esthetic criteria of identification. It's probably the reason i like to remember the painter Matisse who said or wrote that an artist must never be prisoner of himself, prisoner of a style, prisoner of a reputation.

Would you like to tell us something about your background? Could you talk a little about experiences that has influence the way you currently relate yourself to your artworks?

All my way is influenced by encounterings.

It began by the meeting with my professor of literature at school. More than giving French or Literature classes, she brought us to discover texts, movies, plays, visual artworks and to think about on what we saw or read.. Thanks to her that I met Pierre Vincke, a theatredirector who was worjink in the tradition of Grotowski ... Both of them have led me to go to theater school. In this school I had meetings. Meetings with artists but also and especially human beings that made me discover. I always need o discover rather than to master a practice. It's probably the reason my encounter with Monica Klingler and Boris Nieslony was decisive for me and led me on the path of Performance Art which is a form still difficult to define. Each performance artist has a different definition of what it is...

Could you identify a specific artwork that has influenced your artistic practice or has impacted the way you think about race and ethnic identity in visual culture?

No I don't have a specific artwork that has influenced my artistic practise but many.

I'm influenced by some philsophers as well as poets or musicians or dancers or visual artists but also by some places or landscapes or atmospheres ... For some years, I was used for example to go to India where I was used to follow some traditionnal muscians or to learn bharatanatyam and practice vipassana meditation... Of course this experience has impacted my art work.... This brought me to think and work differently... My experience in India brought me to discover traditionnal strong art and paradoxally to the way of Performance Art. But there I see one common point: to make no separation between art and life and to be here and now, without projection on the future.

It's difficult for me to speak about race and ethnic identity. But I can say that today we miss more and more this notion of “to be here and now” which is more present in some cultures ... By practising Performance Art, it's my way to be connected to this way of thinking. And even in this field actually it's more and more difficult. The society and the art world brings us more and more to plan in advance, to define our work, more than to do. Just to do. To do what we deeply need.

And of course, my encountering with Black Market International and later the notion of Open Source or Open session via PAErsche have also a big impact on my work. When we go on that, each of us perform by sharing time and space but without trying to convince each other on some common way. This is for me a wonderfull way how we can meet each other, regardless of our origin, our race or our “identity”...

Many of your works carry an autobiographical message. Since you transform your experiences into your artwork, we are curious, what is the role of memory in your artistic productions? We are particularly interested if you try to achieve a faithful translation of your previous experiences or if you rather use memory as starting point to create.

My memory is clearly a starting point to create. I don't have any autobiographical message. I use my personnal experience ( what I feel , what I see, what I learn, what I ear...) to work. It's a motor or a material. I'm not able to paint, so I can't do something with red or white or yellow or black colors. All I have is life, a body alive. And I need to do something with that...

My sensation about life sometimes is too intense then I need to transform this intensity in some action. Some artistic action... If people can take something from this action this is great... but I don't want to give them “a specific message” or to control the translation of my experience.

Teppo Korte