Transcript
Speaker: Welcome to Arranging Tangerines, presented by Lady and Stater.
Speaker: Conversations with contemporary artists, curators, and thinkers about the intersection of art, technology, and commerce.
Speaker: Your hosts are me, Alessandro Silver and Joseph Wilcox.
Speaker: I know what to do.
Speaker: I know what to say.
Speaker: I just know I don't want to be like you.
Speaker: I know what to do.
Speaker: I know what to say.
Speaker: I just know I don't want to be like you.
Speaker: This week's guest is Elisa Gutierrez Erickson.
Speaker: Elisa Gutierrez Erickson is a Mexican-Brooklyn-based curator and arts and cultural producer who has collaborated with artists and institutions to produce and curate art pieces, exhibits, festivals, and cultural events.
Speaker: As cultural specialist at the UNESCO field office in Mexico, she developed projects and curated exhibitions concerning the relationship between culture and migration, audiovisual heritage, and the environment.
Speaker: Prior to that, she was the head of exhibitions of the Alas y Raices program at the Ministry of Culture in Mexico.
Speaker: Lisa has also collaborated with the International Human Rights Art Festival in New York and the International Contemporary Animation Film Festival, Animasivo, among others.
Speaker: Most recently, she served as programs manager and curator at the NARS Foundation, while also developing independent projects.
Speaker: Among them, Subversive Kin, the act of turning over, presented at the Clemente Soto-Velez Cultural Center in New York and Common Frequencies at BioBet Art Space in Brooklyn, New York.
Speaker: She currently pursues her graduate studies at Hunter College and works as an independent curator.
Speaker: Welcome, Melissa.
Speaker: Thank you for coming on the show.
Speaker: Yeah, my pleasure.
Speaker: It's been a long time coming.
Speaker: It's been a long time coming, and I think that we've had really awesome results, so I'm really happy about that.
Speaker: Yeah, and I know that I probably hit you up like...
Speaker: way back when and i was like you should come on the podcast and you were like no i shouldn't no no i don't what am i going to talk about but now but now we like have lots of things to talk about and and i think that alex also like like put me at ease when we were like having that long drive because we were just like talking about stuff and this is like he was like this is a podcast basically and i'm like all right i guess that i can do before we talk about the show can we have at least do like a little um
Speaker: background, how she ended up at Lydian Seder co-curating the show with us.
Speaker: I mean, you don't have to like go into all the details, but like maybe a little shtick about your curating practice.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, sure.
Speaker: I mean, I guess it makes sense to start from my arrival to New York in a way.
Speaker: And maybe just for people to know what was before that arrival.
Speaker: In Mexico City, my last job basically was being a culture specialist at the UNESCO field office there.
Speaker: And it was really awesome, but it was very far, far away from art.
Speaker: It was like very much culture in general and very far from art, which is what I've always been passionate about.
Speaker: So the move to New York was really going into like the...
Speaker: the other extreme because where I landed was this place that is the NARS Foundation, which is a residency program working with like artists every day, every hour.
Speaker: Everything is about the artist.
Speaker: And, you know, so it was like like going to the opposite direction, which was exactly what I wanted.
Speaker: So
Speaker: I was working at NARS since I came to New York, which was 2018, officially.
Speaker: Which is where Alisa and I met.
Speaker: Exactly, yes.
Speaker: Which is where we met, because Joe did a residency there in 2020, in the middle of the pandemic.
Speaker: It was still real.
Speaker: It was barely out of the height of the pandemic.
Speaker: with three artists, very socially distanced.
Speaker: Very socially distanced.
Speaker: It was the first residency that we did with pandemic protocols, let's say.
Speaker: We were figuring out the protocols at that time.
Speaker: So, yeah.
Speaker: And I don't know, I mean, I've been working with artists all this time and even before that also in Mexico, not only in UNESCO, but for another settings.
Speaker: But here it was again, like every day, every hour, everything had to do with the artist, which was really awesome.
Speaker: and I was able to say that but I feel like maybe every day every hour is a lot of time.
Speaker: You know what it isn't it isn't I mean I think there are things that become repetitive definitely but I feel like having like different artists having those things makes it different every time yeah and you kind of like work from a base right like you have like this different things that you need to do so you know that the artist arrived this day and then you have the orientation and then you have this thing and then the other
Speaker: So it is a series of like steps that you just like need to follow.
Speaker: But then the fun part is exactly to have like all this new people and then sort of like adapting and like having all this different experiences.
Speaker: So it has this like repetition mode, but I feel like it's always really cool and interesting because- Yeah, like everything that happens inside of the structure or package changes every time, which is cool.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And while I was doing that job at the residency program, I was able also to develop a few independent curatorial projects.
Speaker: So it was like, I don't know, I feel like I wouldn't have been able to do it if it was not because of the pandemic, because we didn't go anywhere.
Speaker: Like it was just like work and home, work and home.
Speaker: And then eventually I'm just like too tired of TV.
Speaker: So I was like, no, I need to do something else.
Speaker: Because there was like nothing else to do.
Speaker: But so it was like really helpful to be able to like work more research more.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: It felt just like more focused.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, I feel like right after like, not right after but shortly after the pandemic you did maybe a series of kind of like, exhibition slash like interventions and one of them was that sound piece at the old stone house.
Speaker: Yeah, in Brooklyn that was like part of a series right.
Speaker: That was part of a series that was from a larger project called Common Frequencies.
Speaker: And so we kind of encountered different complications after the... Because the exhibition was supposed to be presented in 2020, like May 2020, which didn't happen, of course.
Speaker: And we had to postpone everything.
Speaker: But we had all this support from different institutions.
Speaker: And I'm not going to say any names, but...
Speaker: Like some of the institutions were requiring for us to like deliver stuff and like do some sort of programming.
Speaker: So in a way, it was sort of like something that we had to come up with, but it was really awesome.
Speaker: So we decided to have a series of interventions in places that were presenting already online.
Speaker: a virtual or a different way in which the artists of the exhibition were working, but presented previously to the exhibition.
Speaker: So in the case of Lorena Mal, she was working with the heartbeats of over 300 animal species.
Speaker: And so she had like this recording with all the beats, which is a piano composition.
Speaker: And so we decided to present that just at a park, basically.
Speaker: which was the old stone house.
Speaker: And it was more of a sound intervention than an exhibition.
Speaker: And people would just like react to it.
Speaker: Some people hated it.
Speaker: I loved it.
Speaker: I thought it was, I thought it was awesome.
Speaker: It was very cool.
Speaker: Yeah, I feel like the hate came more from the neighbors because the park is like located in a, I don't know, there's like a weird acoustic, acoustics are weird in that area.
Speaker: So because you had like this like repetitive piano, like, yeah.
Speaker: And then it would change.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: It was like a composition.
Speaker: So there was a lot of different notes.
Speaker: But based on heartbeats of all these different species.
Speaker: So you have at a moment, you're hearing the wild boar.
Speaker: And so you have a heartbeat of the wild boar that is interacting with, I don't know, a squirrel.
Speaker: So the squirrel has another note and another type of sequences.
Speaker: But it's all that type of sound that is just like
Speaker: like very repetitive.
Speaker: And so people were going crazy.
Speaker: And then some other people were just loving it.
Speaker: We had like one person that came and saying like, what is this?
Speaker: It's so amazing.
Speaker: Like I opened my window and there was this sound and it just, I don't know.
Speaker: It had all this like different, um,
Speaker: reactions from people, but it was, I mean, the piece is wonderful.
Speaker: It's a, it's a really amazing piece in itself.
Speaker: Um, it's just like to be able to have it live.
Speaker: Uh, it was well live or like presented in a live setting more like, it was really, it was really awesome.
Speaker: And so along with that, what the other artists did was the series of sound, I wouldn't call them concerts, but it was sound presentations that we did through Zoom, because the artists were also in Mexico.
Speaker: And one of them was working with the sound that is coming from a rock, from the magnetism of a rock.
Speaker: And then another one was working with water.
Speaker: So the sound that he presented was like coming from different types of water that have different types of pollution.
Speaker: So all the...
Speaker: all the data that the machine that he created was able to retrieve that was being translated into sound.
Speaker: So we had like this like sound sessions.
Speaker: We call them actually listening sessions because they're like very like,
Speaker: don't know, like meditative.
Speaker: And so, so yeah, those were like the three things that we had in terms of like public programming presented before the exhibition.
Speaker: And the only one that was, let's say live was the one that you got to see at the, at the Olston house.
Speaker: Okay, cool.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, that was, it was, I mean, I just, I like any kind of like alternative space being activated, but I can understand how it might have rubbed some people the wrong way.
Speaker: Like, you know, like when there's like a sound piece in a gallery, like in a gal and like a gallery attendant has to sit and listen to it.
Speaker: Like half the time you walk in and it's actually off because they're like, they're like, I'm not going to sit here and listen to the same thing over and over.
Speaker: And then they're like, Oh, let me turn it on for you.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: But you can't really do that.
Speaker: in a public park.
Speaker: No, and the idea was that we were presenting a certain amount of hours.
Speaker: So it was not that it was looping.
Speaker: It was like a one six-hour composition that was being presented in that space.
Speaker: So it made sense that it had a beginning and an end.
Speaker: And it sort of went through the whole...
Speaker: Because, I mean, maybe I should say that the original composition, actually, I don't know if I can say original because there's been like several versions of it at this point, as I understand.
Speaker: But like the initial thing was like a two-hour concert, like the very first presentation that she did was a two-hour concert with like people playing the piano, which is also what we had at some point.
Speaker: at the gallery space, which was a lot shorter than that.
Speaker: Our presentation was like 30 minutes because she made like adaptations of that.
Speaker: But what we had in the gallery space was a 24-hour clip.
Speaker: So whenever you would come, you would kind of like get that time of the gallery that was like,
Speaker: according to the exact time of the 24 hour loop.
Speaker: Is that clear?
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: So did it like kick, it like kicked on and it kicked on in a specific spot based on, okay.
Speaker: So you would like, anytime you were at the gallery, you would never hear the same thing.
Speaker: You would, you would be hearing like the whole, the whole piece that would start, I don't know, like from 12 to 6 PM if those were like the gallery hours.
Speaker: So yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then another thing that we did was that the 24-hour piece, people were able to hear it online.
Speaker: So people could connect anywhere in the world to hear the 24-hour piece only on one day.
Speaker: That's a nice connection to the current exhibition here is that it's accessible all the time, at least part of it, right?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I also love the like, I feel like it's like a common pastime in New York City to complain about your neighbor's music.
Speaker: And so like, so like that got integrated into the show, which I think is kind of nice.
Speaker: How did you feel those complaints?
Speaker: Were they just coming up to you guys?
Speaker: They were just coming up because at some point they were like, what is this?
Speaker: We need to go and like find out what it is.
Speaker: So they would come like kind of like nice and say like, what is this?
Speaker: So I would like go and explain the whole thing.
Speaker: And they were like, it's too repetitive.
Speaker: It's too loud.
Speaker: It's too blah, blah, blah.
Speaker: And I'm like, where are you hearing it from?
Speaker: Our apartment all day.
Speaker: They were like complaining a lot.
Speaker: But it was like, I don't know, one or two people that were complaining and they were friends.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So I feel like they were like teaming up.
Speaker: But most people were really happy and curious about it.
Speaker: So that was cool.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I guess in general, I'd like to know more about the role of curation and how it plays into your practice and how you kind of came about.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I feel like it's been like a slow process for me for some reason.
Speaker: I mean, my background is as a graphic designer, which I never liked.
Speaker: Since I was like studying it, I was like, this is not for me.
Speaker: I don't think this is what I want to do with...
Speaker: with my life.
Speaker: So I never actually got to have like a full time job as a graphic designer.
Speaker: Like I was always like looking for alternatives that somehow involve some graphic design because at the end that was my, you know, like my preparation.
Speaker: So I ended up
Speaker: for a very short time being an assistant of an artist who was at the time curating a retrospective show of a really big Mexican artist.
Speaker: And so I was like using my graphic design skills a little bit to like start
Speaker: like thinking about the exhibition and how to, you know, like to organize the show.
Speaker: And so that kind of like triggered a sense of like use on what I could do.
Speaker: So in my following jobs, I was always thinking about exhibition design and like how we could present the work of artists, kind of, depending on the space or the places that I would work
Speaker: Some of them had like a fixed space, but some of them were also like venues in the city, like different places.
Speaker: It was like short exhibitions that would just like be there for a little bit.
Speaker: And so I started thinking a lot about the ways in which the art could be presented in all these different settings using design.
Speaker: And then kind of in parallel, I started working at this project
Speaker: cultural agency that was representing slash advising emergent artists about their work.
Speaker: So
Speaker: I was advising artists on their work.
Speaker: That was like one of my jobs.
Speaker: And it would be like very intuitive and I would be like learning with the artists and learning from them, sort of like doing extra research.
Speaker: And all of a sudden I was like making like selection of work with them.
Speaker: And I was like trying to come up with ideas and like helping them to make like write-ups of what they were working on.
Speaker: And that kind of like started evolving.
Speaker: I feel like back then it was already a sort of like territorial practice.
Speaker: But I was like not, I didn't know how to like own that because I felt that I needed to like go to school and do exactly this.
Speaker: And then it was like after a few years of doing that, that I was like, okay, I think I can call myself a curator now.
Speaker: You know, after like doing it for a while and like this at this stage, I was like still doing like things in a minor way and still learning.
Speaker: But eventually I was like fully taking care of exhibitions, working with the artist in the general ideas and like developing them, producing them.
Speaker: So I feel like I was like, yeah.
Speaker: there's a this term in Spanish that it's called gestión cultural which is there's not a I've never found a right translation in English but it's like arts administration sort of but it's not so much administration it's like more of like the the producing and like the planning of like the whole thing so it's the more it's it's like a wider term I would say um like a facilitator
Speaker: It's more like a facilitator and less involved in development in the sense of getting funds to do this or that.
Speaker: That I've never had any experience, which it's kind of sad because this is what you need.
Speaker: Basically, you need money to do stuff.
Speaker: But I was always working within institutions.
Speaker: So those things were sort of taken care of.
Speaker: Is that when you were working with our friend,
Speaker: Marcos.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: With Marcos, we kind of created a whole installation that was made for kids, basically.
Speaker: And so the idea is that the kids were doing an expanded drawing in space, which was kind of like this little forest.
Speaker: And we bought all this, I don't know, it was like 100 packs of...
Speaker: yarn of all colors and and and yeah he was like exploring with the the kids the idea of like an expanded drawing uh which became uh i was telling alex when we were like on that drive about this project and how it became the nightmare of old parents because kids would get lost
Speaker: Like they created like this.
Speaker: Like in the yarn, they would like get lost in the, oh yeah.
Speaker: It was like a spider, like the most dense and layered spider you could ever imagine.
Speaker: Like the nightmare of parents, but like the dreams of children.
Speaker: The dreams of children.
Speaker: Yeah, kids were just like having a blast.
Speaker: It was like really fun.
Speaker: And then we would have this like worried parents saying like, I can't find my kid.
Speaker: Um, so it was like, they're probably gone, you know?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's like somewhere in there.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You did make them sign the release form.
Speaker: No, it was impossible.
Speaker: You had to sign a waiver and an NDA, all of it.
Speaker: All of it.
Speaker: Yeah, it was really interesting.
Speaker: But so that that setting was like with the Ministry of Culture at that time.
Speaker: So it was like a like a like an arts festival.
Speaker: And I was in charge of all the exhibitions.
Speaker: So I would like call in contemporary artists for artists that I liked their work or thought that could be good.
Speaker: And so in this case, I contacted Marcos and I was like, we want to do this.
Speaker: What do you think?
Speaker: Do you have any ideas?
Speaker: Are you interested?
Speaker: And we kind of like together came up with the idea.
Speaker: He came, of course, with the idea of like the expanded drawing and then kind of like how we would like solve it and do things.
Speaker: It was more of a of a shared thing.
Speaker: But to conceptualize it and everything, it was like it was also like my job.
Speaker: So I was like head of exhibitions, still not calling myself a curator.
Speaker: And it was until I came to New York that I decided to say like, well, yeah, that's what I'm doing.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, those images are great.
Speaker: I mean, it looked like they had a blast, the kids and the outcome.
Speaker: The finished product was just like... I haven't seen those.
Speaker: Amazing color feel.
Speaker: It looked like a... Yeah.
Speaker: Abex painting gone wild.
Speaker: No, it was fantastic.
Speaker: I love emergent things like that, like a simple action just done multiple times over and over again just creates this really complicated, complex system.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It looked like it was really fun.
Speaker: It was really fun.
Speaker: Like kids were like, like at the, yeah, I don't know.
Speaker: You could see like the faces in the photos that they were like so excited, like screaming, running.
Speaker: Yeah, it was really interesting.
Speaker: And the sense of accomplishment, I can imagine as they look back and say, I had a hand in making that, right?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, I mean, I feel like in that case, it was that sense of accomplishment was more like rooted in like a team effort.
Speaker: Like the team that was working in those projects, in those art first, because I was just like part of the exhibitions, but there was like the literature part, the art.
Speaker: like the concerts part, there was like all of this like different like arts and culture that we were bringing into this festival.
Speaker: So it was like very much of a team effort.
Speaker: It was just not my exhibition, right?
Speaker: So I was just kind of like a little part of a giant festival that would host, I don't know, 70,000 people in a day.
Speaker: It was like really like massive and crazy.
Speaker: So, and I feel like at that time, I also learned a lot from my colleagues and they were thinking very progressively about like participation and about how art could be, you know,
Speaker: perceived not only as a far away thing, but it's something that would involve everyone in the room.
Speaker: So that was always really fun to think about and to try to work with the artist towards experiences that could create this type of response from kids, from families, from... I mean, it was not only for kids, like the parents were like literally wanting to get in there and like doing more stuff.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That was probably in the social practice heyday a little bit, right?
Speaker: Like 2012 or something or 2010?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So I started working with them 2009, I think.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So it was like 2009, 2010, like sort of around that time that we were doing those things.
Speaker: But yes, there was like a lot of attention in like participatory art, which is always kind of like differently seen because like you're working from the government.
Speaker: So like also, what does that participation mean?
Speaker: It could be like something like really like...
Speaker: I don't know, boring and say like, oh yeah, we gave all this stuff to all these people and we get all these numbers, right?
Speaker: Because it's all about the numbers.
Speaker: At the end, it's like, how many people did you serve or whatever?
Speaker: So, but I feel like it was like, that's why I'm saying that like the sense of accomplishment and like the pride on those projects goes into like a more broad sense because it was like really a team effort.
Speaker: So that was really, that was really nice.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Well, to the government's hand, again, back to this mythical car ride, do you mind telling the audience how some artists can pay their taxes in Mexico?
Speaker: So it is my understanding.
Speaker: I've never paid my taxes that way.
Speaker: But there is a way in which artists can donate work as a tax payment.
Speaker: Amazing.
Speaker: Which a lot of people do.
Speaker: I mean, yeah, I'm going to do it this year.
Speaker: He's already submitted two pieces.
Speaker: I'm actually going to send my tax return to the Mexican government.
Speaker: Hand your arm.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I'll just CC the IRS here.
Speaker: I think it's covered.
Speaker: All good.
Speaker: I mean, that's still, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, it's pretty cool.
Speaker: They have a giant collection of art also.
Speaker: I mean, they must if people are able to pay their taxes.
Speaker: I just heard that America is 32nd place in the concept of the American dream.
Speaker: Like, you know, the American dream is like American.
Speaker: It's like the ability to own your home.
Speaker: We're 32nd.
Speaker: In our own dream.
Speaker: Constructed dream.
Speaker: Who's number one?
Speaker: I don't know if it's going to be one of those like Finland or one of those Nordic countries.
Speaker: That would make sense.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But we're not even in the top ten.
Speaker: I don't know if we ever have been.
Speaker: We might not even have been.
Speaker: There's a reason they call it the dream.
Speaker: A dream.
Speaker: A dream, right?
Speaker: Well, fast forward to now.
Speaker: Oh, wait, wait.
Speaker: Before we get to now.
Speaker: Okay, sorry.
Speaker: So you come guns blasting and you start curating and you're working with NARS and you're doing these micro-curations within the actual NARS institution, right?
Speaker: Because you're helping the artists.
Speaker: Not immediately, though.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Yeah, I kind of worked my way up at NARS because when I came in, I kind of had a whole different position that was also more related into graphic design, which also had to do with the way in which I was able to be hired and visa stuff that I don't want to get into because that's very boring.
Speaker: But so the first one, I guess my first two years at NARS,
Speaker: I was doing operations and communications.
Speaker: I was like taking care of other things.
Speaker: So that also kind of like gave me time to like understand better how it worked, how they were like curating shows.
Speaker: I did, I was able to create a couple of shows during that time.
Speaker: At like the project space, for example, so I had like this proposal of there was like an opening and I had this proposal of pairing a couple of alumni that I thought was really amazing.
Speaker: So that was like the first show that I was able to do there as the not as a curator of the space, but just as like someone working there, which is only two of us or three, whatever.
Speaker: But but.
Speaker: But it was not until like 2020 that I started being fully programs manager and curator.
Speaker: So it was not immediate.
Speaker: But I was like trying to do projects outside.
Speaker: So I was like trying to work with friends that were
Speaker: also like producing work and like trying to do exhibitions and like making proposals and you know I was working already with the Common Frequency Show which I started in like 2019 that's when that project started developing and also in 2020 or late 2019 I also started collaborating with this other artist in an exhibition called Subversive Kin that
Speaker: showed at the Clemente Sotovelas Cultural Center.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: I saw that show.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So those were kind of like lining up before I was programs manager and curator at NARS.
Speaker: And I was like, so it was not immediate that I was like curating at this specific place, just to clarify.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: No, great.
Speaker: Which also means you kind of like, you would just like started doing it on your own, rather than having rather than having some kind of like official stamp that said that you are allowed to, which I think is sometimes or always a little more impressive, right?
Speaker: To like, just like get out there and like do it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: If you don't, if you don't, yeah, that's, that's a great ethos.
Speaker: To go back to the subversive kin, I did not see the show, but I've seen the documentation.
Speaker: I've met the artists that you work with, and I also kind of read over the essay.
Speaker: And it was interesting to me that it was about female-identified land art.
Speaker: And having read something recently, Coco Fusco was telling the whole Michael Heiser crazy thing that he built out in Nevada or whatever.
Speaker: I just put my name on the wait list or whatever.
Speaker: Did you?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But it was interesting.
Speaker: She had come out and said that it's like all these male... This was a male-dominated thing in the 70s.
Speaker: And it was like they didn't take into account anything.
Speaker: Like the people who lived in the land.
Speaker: It was just like...
Speaker: It was like just a continuation, just a colonial continuation of just like white male taking land and doing whatever the hell.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Which also... This show that you curated looked completely opposite that.
Speaker: Well, because it was not about land art.
Speaker: They are working with the idea of land.
Speaker: But I feel like land art is the one that falls into this category of male artists that are just deciding.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: I mean, it feels like another form of colonization, of imposition, of saying, I'm going to take this giant land and do whatever I want.
Speaker: But some things are cool.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: It's not that it's all terrible.
Speaker: But I feel like it is...
Speaker: It is the time that we're like rethinking of all these concepts and to think of land and the types of interventions that happen in land.
Speaker: Like you have, I don't know, artists like Cecilia Villicuña that her like land intervention is like creating like these little things that she puts in the water and they just like disappear.
Speaker: You know, like it's a very different type of conversation.
Speaker: You're not like imposing your mark in the land.
Speaker: You're like having a conversation with the land.
Speaker: So the idea of this exhibition was more into like that side of it and working with the idea of land in the sense of like going back to their places of origin, like what does the land in their places of origin means?
Speaker: Like what are like the,
Speaker: I don't know, like the different possibilities and like the roots that come out of, or like the stems that come out of like this type of land and in different conversations that had to do with like settler colonialism, with politics, with ancestry, of course.
Speaker: And so all this like different things were like intertwined and kind of like
Speaker: linked to create what Subversive Kin was, which also was like a really interesting process because you were asking before about like my curation.
Speaker: And I feel like also these projects that I was like developing independently at that time, they kind of like let me like set the way in which I want to like be able to curate, which is not like a vertical thing.
Speaker: I don't want to be like the type of curator that says like this, this and that, you know, like I feel like that doesn't work for me.
Speaker: I feel like it works when it happens in a conversation.
Speaker: It's just like, okay, so these are the ideas.
Speaker: This is what I'm thinking about your work.
Speaker: And I think that, you know, like I do think like this and this would be great, but I want to talk about it with you.
Speaker: And I want to know if you have like other additions to this that would make it better.
Speaker: So for Subversive Kin, it was like really beautiful because it was like a...
Speaker: I was actually, so they already had the slot at the Clemente because they had applied like independently and then they invited me to curate it.
Speaker: So I kind of like shifted a little bit.
Speaker: So they already had the idea of like the subversive kin, that title was there already.
Speaker: And they invited me to think through that title and like gave me some of the information and like the bibliography that they were referring to.
Speaker: And I kind of like amplified that bibliography and brought other artists into that conversation.
Speaker: which became a real conversation.
Speaker: Like we would gather and like talk about these things.
Speaker: Like we had a lot of sessions.
Speaker: At one point we decided to record them.
Speaker: And so if you got to see the little PDF booklet, you'll see that there's like all our conversations or like three conversations that we had at the end talking about all these themes about the show and a lot of like mestizaje and identity and
Speaker: And all these things.
Speaker: So it was like really, really inspiring.
Speaker: And I feel like that exhibition still kind of like sits in the back of my mind and I have it very present in like the things that I'm interested now and like the things that I want to continue practicing in terms of like how to communicate with artists and how to create with them.
Speaker: I also love the idea of a group show that like the artists get together and choose a curator rather than the other way around, which is how it typically happens.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Which is, which is kind of amazing.
Speaker: Talk about, talk about ground up.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I mean, yeah, for sure.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You're right.
Speaker: I never thought of it that way.
Speaker: That should happen more often.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: How did the common frequencies come up?
Speaker: Because that's another show that you did that, again, I unfortunately never went to see.
Speaker: You had nothing but good things to say about it.
Speaker: Yeah, I mean, I caught the one iteration.
Speaker: I think I logged online for one of the other streams for a little bit too.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But I really remember the Stonehouse one.
Speaker: And you came to the actual exhibition.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Also.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That one was also, I don't know, it was a...
Speaker: It was a connection that I made through NARS with one of the artists that was working there, not as a NARS resident, but as a studio tenant because the building is kind of like sharing space with a studio tenant thing and then the residency.
Speaker: And so I've had curated group shows, which I think those are more like organized group shows because there's not a lot of curation.
Speaker: It's more like organization of shows.
Speaker: But I had organized some shows in which her work was included.
Speaker: And so at some point, we had a really good relationship.
Speaker: And at some point, she was trying to find someone to help them with this design of this new space that they were starting to look at and present shows at.
Speaker: And I was interested in that.
Speaker: And I knew this person.
Speaker: So the day they opened this space, I just went to visit.
Speaker: And I was totally...
Speaker: like mind blown by the space, by the works.
Speaker: It was an exhibition that was about science, so art and science, or like the intersection of art and science, which it was also something that I was like really interested for like many years before and also was like able to meet like some artists in Mexico that were in this, were working in this intersection.
Speaker: And so that first day, when I saw my friend, who is one of the co-directors of the space, I was like, how does one get to show here?
Speaker: She's like that.
Speaker: I was like, how are you guys going to do it?
Speaker: Are you going to just like create everything yourselves?
Speaker: And she was like, well, we're still figuring things out.
Speaker: But if you have any ideas, we're happy to look at them.
Speaker: um so i i followed up on that like i don't know if it was like a real invitation or just like you know um just like saying or it wasn't saying it was real um so i i kind of like took upon her word and made a proposal it was like a very very simple proposal send it to her and then she was like hey i want you to meet my my associate my co-director um
Speaker: because I want to talk about your proposal and maybe to see the possibility of doing something, also checking chemistries and things like that.
Speaker: And so we got to meet all three of us, and they were really excited about the project.
Speaker: So when they gave that green light, I started developing a little bit more.
Speaker: And I would say worshiping it a little bit with them.
Speaker: also so it could like fall into the lines of what they wanted to do.
Speaker: And they honestly gave me like full freedom to do whatever I wanted.
Speaker: They were like excited with the proposal.
Speaker: And so that's how it happened, basically.
Speaker: So it was just like a good link to the space and just like, again, like trying to like take an opportunity and like make the best out of it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I was I was mixing up exhibitions, but I saw that exhibition twice, I think, because I went to the opening or one of the kind of opening nights that had a performance, a music performance.
Speaker: And then I saw the closing choir piece also.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: But that was that was such a fun show because the space is like insane and beautiful and huge.
Speaker: um and then like all the works like worst like they've they belonged in a space that that was that was that big they like held their own within that space which isn't always the case yeah um and so the yeah the exhibition like felt big and all the works felt big in like a really nice way uh and then in addition the kind of like um audio components were really fun to experience and especially in that kind of backroom um
Speaker: It was cool.
Speaker: It was a cool show.
Speaker: Yeah, that dark space is crazy.
Speaker: Yeah, I feel like that's like one of the best shows I've seen in New York City.
Speaker: Oh, wow.
Speaker: And I'm not even saying that because we're friends.
Speaker: It actually was a fantastic show.
Speaker: It was really cool.
Speaker: That's cool.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: You got to work with Tanya Candiano?
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Candiano.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: It was funny, at Freeze New York, I interrupted one of her sales.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: I remember that.
Speaker: I listened to that episode and I was like, oh, Dania.
Speaker: I was like, sorry, I could come back.
Speaker: I actually told her about it.
Speaker: I had a phone conversation with her after that and I was like, oh, guess what?
Speaker: I got to hear this podcast where they were interviewing your gallery when they were selling one of your works and she was like, really?
Speaker: What?
Speaker: She's like, wait, you know that guy?
Speaker: And he messed up the sale?
Speaker: No, I think the sale was done, right?
Speaker: Yes, the sale was done.
Speaker: We came back and we interviewed both the gallerist and the actual art advisor who purchased the piece on behalf of one of her collectors.
Speaker: But that was so interesting to be...
Speaker: Pervy too?
Speaker: Pervy too.
Speaker: Pervy too?
Speaker: And Pervy.
Speaker: It felt Pervy.
Speaker: Fair enough.
Speaker: It was strange, but I had never been in that kind of like, you know, those are pretty high end conversations with high end, you know, collectors and whatnot.
Speaker: So it was, it was very interesting.
Speaker: Yeah, it's cool that they opened up.
Speaker: But the work was amazing.
Speaker: The work was amazing.
Speaker: She's, she's an amazing artist.
Speaker: Yeah, she's an amazing artist.
Speaker: She's actually having a solo show at one of the major museums in Mexico, which is Moac, University Museum of Contemporary Art would be, I guess, the translation.
Speaker: And she's been working for many, many years.
Speaker: She represented Mexico at the Venice Biennial a few years ago.
Speaker: And she's like a very active, she's another person that works a lot in like collectivity, which is something that I feel like I want to do more and more just like in life, like even like the experience that we had in this exhibition in which we co-curated
Speaker: the exhibition, I feel like it was like really wonderful because at times curating can become a little bit of a lonely task, which I don't like.
Speaker: I feel like when you enter your mind and try to think of things on your own, it just like becomes a bit of a...
Speaker: of a weird thing, you know, and like having other people to talk about it, to develop it.
Speaker: I think it's really great.
Speaker: And I feel like many of the artists that were included in that exhibition in Common Frequencies, they all had like really interesting networks
Speaker: in which they created their works.
Speaker: So it was kind of like a collective of collectives that would expand even into New York, right?
Speaker: Because that was one of the things that we wanted to do.
Speaker: We wanted to make sure that all the pieces would have some sort of connection with New York City because he was all Mexican artists.
Speaker: None of them lives here.
Speaker: And so, for example, for the Bird's piece that I was mentioning before, not the Bird's piece, the Heartbeats, I'm sorry, piece,
Speaker: that I was mentioning before, we worked with Brooklyn-based or New York-based piano players to create the piece.
Speaker: So the artist was working with them.
Speaker: We had a lot of meetings on Zoom to make this.
Speaker: The final concert that Joe was talking about was also with the Brooklyn-based choir, which the artist and another collaborator were working directly with.
Speaker: So same with the water piece, there was like this presentation.
Speaker: So we were able to kind of like make all these connections with like the the billion oyster project.
Speaker: This piece was accompanied by a series of interviews of like the situation of of the water in New York City.
Speaker: All this to say that every single piece in the projects that have been more significant for me have always stemmed from collective efforts.
Speaker: I feel like that's what makes them so powerful many times.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I feel like there's like, um, I mean that, that was one of the, that was the transition I was going to use to talk about the show was this idea of kind of like collective making and collective energy.
Speaker: But also I, I feel like even when it's not super direct and intentional, like, like it was for the show, which you were really good about kind of like, um,
Speaker: advocating for us to do it in a more kind of collective fashion.
Speaker: Like nobody makes in a vacuum, right?
Speaker: So there's always like these energies and people that people are like, that artists are relying on when they make work and they have networks and they indirectly or directly kind of like use them
Speaker: when they're making or when they're showing or when they're like making connections or doing whatever.
Speaker: And I feel like there's this like overarching thing, but then it can be like really direct where you're like, all right, there's this one task or there's this one thing and we're going to like, we're going to tackle it very intentionally collectively.
Speaker: Which it felt like this exhibition to me felt like that mostly because you, you did a great job of pushing us to, to do it.
Speaker: Um, which I thought was hard and challenging and rewarding and like all of those things, but I don't know, how did, how did you feel about it?
Speaker: Did it feel challenging and like messy?
Speaker: Cause it did to me.
Speaker: I feel like.
Speaker: But not in a bad way.
Speaker: Like, like messy, like how any kind of like non-hierarchical kind of like, if nobody's taking charge or giving directions, like who's doing anything, right?
Speaker: Sorry.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I feel like that was the hardest part to say like, okay, who is, who is leading?
Speaker: Who's taking the lead here?
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So I guess at the end, we kind of like naturally boasted in our own way.
Speaker: So it kind of like, like there were like moments in which you guys were leading and then others in which I was probably leading or like, like leaving it to the artists at certain points also for them to lead.
Speaker: So I feel like, um,
Speaker: It was really nice to not have all the leading to do, number one, which is really appreciated.
Speaker: And then I feel like the clunky parts were...
Speaker: would like come up with when we were not talking about it.
Speaker: So maybe if like someone did something and then someone did something else and then that's put together, it's like, oh, this is like weird.
Speaker: Like, how is this going to work together?
Speaker: Right, so it's like when we weren't actually collaborating was when it was like- Exactly.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, but I feel like at the end, like that collaboration and even like when Alex also came in into like very specific points in the text and like in the conversation, I feel like that's kind of like what like rounded it up.
Speaker: And I feel like it also, it's important in the sense of like giving us a sense of like pertinence.
Speaker: No, that's not a right word.
Speaker: Like belonging maybe?
Speaker: Or like that it's something that you are doing.
Speaker: So there's like, everyone knows sort of everything about it, right?
Speaker: Yeah, it's transparent.
Speaker: We're not like... It is transparent.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Definitely.
Speaker: Yeah, it's not like, we're like, here's a really bad draft of the essay, everyone.
Speaker: Let's look at it, right?
Speaker: And all the good seeds are there, but it's not finished and it's not finessed.
Speaker: And so that's kind of a fun process for everybody to see how it happens.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I think also...
Speaker: there was like a good balance in the sense that I'm a little bit more intense in terms of like timelines and things like that.
Speaker: And you guys were like very relaxed, which I think that made like a perfect combination for it not to feel like it was like all tension, but you know, like, especially for the artists,
Speaker: There was like this moment when I when I was like, where is like the piece and I was like, can you bring it tomorrow and Alex was like, No, bring it before the show.
Speaker: And I was like, Okay, we're gonna do that.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: Day of no problem.
Speaker: Which is good.
Speaker: I mean, I feel like, so what I was going to say with this is that I feel like this, like liberty and this like possibility of like continue working on things is that what makes pieces better, you know, like the fact that you know, like, like things come up, right?
Speaker: Like, like, sometimes pieces end up being final just because they went like they run out of time.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Right, which is like, it just has to be.
Speaker: And so it has to be.
Speaker: Or, or you finish an essay, and you send it out to everybody.
Speaker: And then somebody is like, Oh, here's all my thoughts on it.
Speaker: And some quotes from, from a text that I think fit well.
Speaker: And I know you just sent me the PDF version that's finished.
Speaker: But like, maybe you think about this.
Speaker: And like, sometimes that happens.
Speaker: Also, I do have to say it, of all our shows, it's the freshest, like,
Speaker: all the pieces literally were, they came out of the oven and straight into the gallery.
Speaker: They did.
Speaker: Which I feel like it's also like part of this process.
Speaker: Like, cause when you come as a creator and say like this, this, this, then there's like no option for that.
Speaker: But here, like, it was like, okay, this is the idea.
Speaker: This is what's happening.
Speaker: It was also kind of like a new endeavor in terms of like the NFTs for the artists, right?
Speaker: Like it was the first time that they were making NFTs.
Speaker: So also like, I feel like something that is wonderful about you guys and about leading stator is the,
Speaker: this like encouragement to experiment with this like new thing that people are still figuring it out.
Speaker: So I feel like that openness kind of like gives way for these new things to happen instead of like having like the straight up translations of things, which was something that I think that I love how it turned out.
Speaker: Like I love that we were able to do this like virtual gallery space where, you know, you have like a,
Speaker: like a side reading of things or like the fact that you have a VR gallery adds into the conversation and the questions that we're presenting in the general preposition of the show.
Speaker: And it also kind of like gave another possibility for artists to think
Speaker: outside of that one meaning of their piece.
Speaker: I have this piece, but then if it's translated into this other place, how is it changing?
Speaker: How does it meaning in the space where it's located is going to change or it's going to create a new result?
Speaker: Yeah, I was really excited when, because like I've seen NFT works that are AR enabled.
Speaker: So right, they're 3D renderings that you can place anywhere you want.
Speaker: But the ones I've seen before, you have to kind of like code them to be that.
Speaker: You have to like upload an HTML file or a zip file that like has all of these components.
Speaker: But the platform we use, it's just built into their interface.
Speaker: And so all of the 3D works that HuyDee and Y made can be placed anywhere.
Speaker: And so as soon as I realized that, I was like, oh, I was like, this is so fun.
Speaker: And then I sent them to them and they were like also really excited about it, which is cool because like, of course they're down to like let their works live in different spaces and like that they don't have control over because they were like, okay with this version of the show that we decided to do.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: So it's like not a,
Speaker: It's not like a heavy lift to think that they would also be like, yeah, sure.
Speaker: Like put my, uh, put my sculpture in the woods and make a video of it or whatever.
Speaker: That is totally cool.
Speaker: That was awesome.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So I was excited about that.
Speaker: That was cool.
Speaker: So if anybody's listening, if you haven't hop on and grab one of the works and put it.
Speaker: I have one like of one of Weedy's sculptures next to my cat on the bed.
Speaker: He's like looking at it.
Speaker: It's really fun.
Speaker: I'd see how long you get the dead pause could last.
Speaker: Longer than you.
Speaker: So was it last weekend when I was gallery sitting?
Speaker: Y came over with a friend of hers, curator, and Y said something complimentary that I thought I would share with you guys.
Speaker: I was going to ask her a little bit more about it later on on the Instagram Live.
Speaker: But she said that her practice has changed because of the show.
Speaker: The very nature of the way that we facilitated, we were able to facilitate the virtual with the real kind of clicked.
Speaker: And it's actually changed the way she's gone about her next project.
Speaker: And I thought that was very nice to hear.
Speaker: That's amazing.
Speaker: I feel like that's like the best results you could ask for as like somebody who's putting on a show.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And also, I think that speaks to you, to your, your inclination to like you to have them be in the show, right.
Speaker: To bring them as kind of like potential artists to work with.
Speaker: as like people that made total sense to kind of like do this, this physical virtual overlap thing because they already were, it's already like baked into their practice, but not in this kind of like specific way that we put it together for the show and definitely not, you know, using NFTs as kind of like the, the digital objects as a one-to-one.
Speaker: So kudos on that.
Speaker: Yeah, that's really great to hear.
Speaker: I feel like they are both really excited about the results.
Speaker: And I don't know, I just feel like things expand.
Speaker: And even for me, just like putting the VR goggles, I was like, what is this?
Speaker: You know?
Speaker: Like, I don't know, I guess I'm an older person, not that old, but a little older.
Speaker: So VR goggles are not something that I grew up with or that are like really available to me.
Speaker: So this was the first time that I was experiencing that.
Speaker: And also coming from like a scene where I'm like always thinking of like landscape and, you know, like this kind of like other line of thought.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: it was really wonderful to feel like in this space, you know, like I feel like the distance that sometimes digital works can have, it's something that was like very present for me, you know, like sort of like the division between the person and either the screen or like the, well, mostly the screen basically.
Speaker: But to be inside,
Speaker: that space, like with those objects, that kind of like changes the whole experience.
Speaker: And it might sound a little bit like, well, yeah, that's the thing, right?
Speaker: That's the VR.
Speaker: But it is really...
Speaker: something that it's like, for me, it's important to be considered from like the, from like that bodily experience, right?
Speaker: Like, cause we talk about that in the show, like what's like that relationship to the body when we're talking about all this, like virtual and digital things and, and kind of like as a conclusion, like kind of late, like after the text and the whole thing, we can do another one.
Speaker: We'll just, we'll just add it in.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But I think the body is still present, or at least the sensation of a body.
Speaker: I mean, you cannot take things with your hands.
Speaker: Not yet.
Speaker: Not yet, right.
Speaker: But just the fact that you can be in the same space and going around those things and
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And when you turn your head, it turns, right?
Speaker: So like you have that motion of your own control that you're doing with your body and it makes it change and it makes your senses perceive new things.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's totally different.
Speaker: Great conclusion.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: No, but I feel like that's like what we were talking about the whole time.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And like, obviously, that's why we did the virtual gallery.
Speaker: But also, like, we did the virtual gallery because it's cool.
Speaker: And it's like an interesting extension.
Speaker: But also, it's like very much directly connected to this idea of the body experiencing space and space.
Speaker: and art and everything else.
Speaker: But to go back to that conversation I had with Y, her friend who's a seasoned curator and has done a lot of things virtually and has worked with like big name galleries doing these like big immersive installations.
Speaker: she was quite taken by what we presented because it just, the simplicity of the virtual reality space with those particular objects in conjunction with the real objects in the physical space and the interplay, it just, I mean, call it luck, call it whatever, it just all worked really well.
Speaker: Had that virtual space been super
Speaker: hyper realistic uh and done up like by some major uh vr it might not it might have it might have read as cold and distant and not necessarily put you in that headspace that this particular uh this particular environment does i think it it just for for whatever reason it kind of just it just all works uh if that for for lack of a better sense it just worked
Speaker: Yeah, I mean, I think the disconnection is just enough to make it really interesting.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Between the two spaces and the works and everything else.
Speaker: Because I sat in on a panel recently for, like the Lumen Prize gave up some awards.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Kudos to some of the work that I saw, but it was just like, it looked like it came out of Hollywood.
Speaker: Some of the virtual reality spaces that they were creating.
Speaker: It was just so overdone and so overproduced.
Speaker: I just, for me, they lacked emotion and they lacked, I couldn't put myself into those spaces.
Speaker: It just read as Hollywood to me.
Speaker: It read as something as cinematic and theatrical.
Speaker: Whereas this is, I don't know, it just feels like, it feels like
Speaker: what it's supposed to feel like.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And I feel like it does allow you when you're thinking about, because like most of the things that are presented in the gallery space are renderings, right?
Speaker: Am I saying it wrong?
Speaker: Do I cut it all around?
Speaker: The virtual gallery space.
Speaker: Right, the virtual gallery space.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: But so it is not like you said, Alex, that would take you to this wonderful place.
Speaker: Like the beginning of the VR, when we were trying to troubleshoot the day that I didn't know how to do it, I was like, well, okay, where are you?
Speaker: Okay, I'm in paradise, right?
Speaker: Like, do you have like this?
Speaker: It's like places, which is like the home space for the VR set.
Speaker: Whatever Oculus gives you is a home screen, right?
Speaker: It's some beautifully rendered paradise.
Speaker: It is pretty cozy in there, though.
Speaker: It is very nice and cozy.
Speaker: It's very nice.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's pretty crazy.
Speaker: And so I think that kind of like the fact that the VR gallery is not in that like aesthetic line, let's say, I feel like it also kind of like...
Speaker: allows you to have a more thick division between the bodily and the virtual.
Speaker: Because then the other one is kind of trying to imitate reality.
Speaker: And then the virtual is always trying to imitate reality.
Speaker: But in this case, you have...
Speaker: like still kind of like that separation and you're allowed to step into that separation right instead of like staying in this like imaginary world that looks exactly like your world you're like in an imaginary world where like if you would imagine yourself you would probably look like a little clunky and like i don't know a whole different thing yeah yeah is roger rabbit the one where the the person goes into the cartoon
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So you're like allowed to like be a cartoon a little bit inside of the virtual space.
Speaker: And I mean, which makes sense with, with all of the work, I think, I mean, especially Huidi's work, but even, even wise sculpture or rendering or whatever is like, is this like weird version of the like translation of the body of
Speaker: from the work in the physical space in a way that like, doesn't look like reality and it's not supposed to.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I think it definitely feels like it feels like it's supposed to.
Speaker: Yeah, especially in the case of like, I feel like you have the mannequin, which is like also like taking this like, which is another story, but like this like predefined like body, right?
Speaker: And then the switch into like what you find
Speaker: in the virtual space it's like like people I feel like people have been a little confused about like oh and then there's like this like other person like they they don't so easily relate it to what's happening in front right because there is kind of like I don't know what I love about like that work is like the amount of like layers of like this one character that can exist and and it kind of like dives into like making it like
Speaker: even more layered, more repetitive, like the multiplicity that eventually evolves into like fragmentation.
Speaker: It's just like really interesting up to the point where people are kind of like, and then what is that person there?
Speaker: Like, who is that thing there?
Speaker: And so I really love that that extreme separation also happens in that work.
Speaker: In Huiti, it's a little bit more subtle, right?
Speaker: You kind of have the normal evolution of how this thing would look if it was composed or assembled this way.
Speaker: or with colors.
Speaker: And while initially, why should be like a more seamless translation, it is not.
Speaker: And I think that's really interesting.
Speaker: I feel like it also kind of like opens the door to a whole other thing, which now I guess it makes sense that she says that the practice is kind of like taking new places.
Speaker: That's awesome.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then I guess we'd be remiss to ask you about coming into this project and your thoughts on NFTs and then having gone through it, your thoughts on NFTs.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: What are your thoughts?
Speaker: Yeah, because the NFC conversation with us three has been a long one, right?
Speaker: We started a year ago or a year and a half ago and have continued talking about it.
Speaker: You have to convince me.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: Yeah, I feel like we've, I don't know if we've gotten good at convincing people, but we've had lots of conversations about it.
Speaker: Well, I feel like, I think that's a good thing.
Speaker: You know, like the fact that you're able and like willing to have multiple conversations about something with someone that is like not fully sold on this thing.
Speaker: I think that's a really important step to take.
Speaker: And it also shows your commitment with it and, and your, um,
Speaker: And the fact that you're willing to explore it and like have an account like people's concerns and observations about the medium.
Speaker: So I think that's really cool.
Speaker: And I did change my mind definitely.
Speaker: I think that, what?
Speaker: Converted her?
Speaker: That's like a religion or something.
Speaker: I mean, it kind of was and is, but it definitely was.
Speaker: Sorry.
Speaker: I am still against the repetition.
Speaker: Like when something exists in the real world, so to speak, and it's like only like translated or like did, I feel like it's less interesting for me.
Speaker: I mean, I understand why it happens and I understand kind of like it's
Speaker: its mechanics of it.
Speaker: But I was really excited about this show because we were able to kind of like switch that conversation and kind of like use NFTs as a medium, not so much just like as a thing that will have like a copy of it that has another, you know, like a type of like perspectives in terms of like market and life.
Speaker: And, you know, I feel like when you're able to incorporate the
Speaker: the tool, if one can call it a tool, I feel like it changes the whole thing.
Speaker: Like it makes sense to use it in that way and with that purpose and to be sold in this other world.
Speaker: Not to mention that it really relieved me the fact that we were using testos.
Speaker: So that's because, again, like my environmental course.
Speaker: I don't know, the worries were like one of the biggest things for me at the beginning.
Speaker: And to understand like that the Tezos are a completely different thing.
Speaker: I guess now Ethereum is a different thing also.
Speaker: But things have like taken time into like progressing into this more like sustainable ways.
Speaker: So, and I hope that, you know, that the objects can also have a life, you know, because I feel like that's what's exciting about it.
Speaker: And that's what's important for the artist.
Speaker: And I don't know, I think a lot about what something that Joe was talking about the other day, which is like how democratic it is as a medium, which I also really like.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I, I, this, this kind of like exhibition, this iteration of us helping artists put their work into the NFT space.
Speaker: I feel like we've like really hit our stride here in terms of like things that really work well and things that are interesting conceptually and like,
Speaker: allowing digital objects to actually have a life separate from physical object or a physical space.
Speaker: This exhibition feels really good and how it all came together.
Speaker: And in terms of like the digital life of these works, I feel like it's just going to get easier and easier to like integrate digital works into your physical life.
Speaker: And so they can exist as objects in the real world as opposed to just things on screens.
Speaker: And we've talked about this before, but, you know, like, like dedicated frames that are digital that can show this work, I think will become much more common as companies start making them more accessible and more and cheaper and more mainstream.
Speaker: So like, I wouldn't be surprised in five years if somebody has both Y and Huiti's works on their wall.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: A little moving image or whatever.
Speaker: Maybe there's like a, maybe you can like wave your hand in front of it and it moves and like rotate it.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: It'll be cool.
Speaker: I mean, speaking of which, I mean, the show neither here nor there is open till October 16th.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Two more, two more weekends.
Speaker: So four more.
Speaker: Open days.
Speaker: Please come by.
Speaker: You can see it on the internet with the VR gallery, but I really think it's so much cooler to put the headset on and take it off inside of the physical space, for sure.
Speaker: Yeah, it makes a whole difference.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's a surprisingly satisfying experience.
Speaker: Yeah, it messes with your orientation physically, but also messes with your head conceptually quite a bit in a nice way.
Speaker: What are you doing now?
Speaker: What's next?
Speaker: I'm reading like a crazy person.
Speaker: Not because I want to be crazy reading, but because I am pursuing a master's degree in art history right now.
Speaker: So I am just starting getting used to school because I haven't been in 20 years.
Speaker: So it's a whole new experience for me, as I've told you before.
Speaker: And also like trying to, I don't know, I have to confess that when I tell this to Chris, my partner, he's like, no, Chell, you have to like focus on one thing.
Speaker: But I'm like, at the same time, like trying to think of like new ideas.
Speaker: I have like this, like,
Speaker: app on my phone where you can like sort of like put together like some ideas and like themes.
Speaker: And I'm like, I'm a little bit like excited about like putting things together right now.
Speaker: I feel like, I don't know, I had like a cleansing moment, like vacation was very much like vacation.
Speaker: And I'm feeling kind of like a new energy that I don't know if I'm going to fully pursue because I really have a lot to do with school.
Speaker: But yeah, I'm excited about whatever will come in the future.
Speaker: For now, I'm like focusing on that.
Speaker: But hopefully soon there will be more projects.
Speaker: So you may be curating more shows in the near future, but maybe not, but probably not.
Speaker: No, I think I will be curating more shows in the future, definitely.
Speaker: I don't know if right now, like in the next six months, definitely not.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: But maybe while you're still in school, you'll jump back into the curating.
Speaker: Definitely.
Speaker: I mean, it's supposed to be like a program that you can manage in part-time.
Speaker: I'm giving it my full time right now because I'm really...
Speaker: trying to get it like in the pace of things um but i am also like hoping that not uh not too far away uh no that's not right not to how do you say it in the near future yes that in the near future i could like um continue like doing shows and curating yeah um two final questions for me is curation part of the program at all
Speaker: So it is not, it is art history, but there is like this thing that is called the curatorial certificate, which I am planning on taking.
Speaker: And I think everyone has been like telling me like, why are you going to take that if you're like already creating shows?
Speaker: You're going to be like, I'd like to get a certificate.
Speaker: And they're going to be like, no, you don't need it.
Speaker: I need this.
Speaker: I also think that it's going to be really cool to have like a more like organized thing.
Speaker: Cause my, my way of doing all this has been very DIY and like trying to figure out things.
Speaker: Like I have a problem in this, like, how do I solve this?
Speaker: How do I do this?
Speaker: And then I just kind of like end up doing it, but the process is like messy and complicated.
Speaker: And while now it's like a little bit more of a, of a, of a simpler process.
Speaker: No, that's a lie.
Speaker: It's never simple.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Actually, it's always a messy process for me.
Speaker: But I think that having this type of certificate, I guess, or like the process for the certificate, I'm looking forward to like finding like other tools that other professionals would share in their practice.
Speaker: And I feel like that's always really, really cool.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker: And my final question is, have you made any friends yet?
Speaker: Because I know that you were stressing about it.
Speaker: Wow, he's putting you on blast here.
Speaker: Well, it's tough for a student, especially coming at it from a, I mean, we're all older and you've been out of school for 20 years and you're coming back.
Speaker: It's tough to make friends, right?
Speaker: It is tough to make friends.
Speaker: And I feel like, I don't know, I feel like I'm starting to have some friends now.
Speaker: Oh, nice.
Speaker: Great.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I had a feeling.
Speaker: We still don't like, like, chattel the time or anything.
Speaker: But, but like, like, some ways are opening up.
Speaker: So, and people are very cool.
Speaker: I feel like I was just like too, too used to be like working with or like being or hanging out with artists.
Speaker: That was, that's kind of like my whole network here.
Speaker: Only artists.
Speaker: And so like to encounter art historians, it's like another like wonderful thing, but it's like a different, right?
Speaker: Like the way, like the ways they are thinking about things.
Speaker: And I find myself sometimes kind of like, I don't know, like,
Speaker: Like in classes, for example, when we are, there's a class that we have like, there's like MA students and then there's like MFA students.
Speaker: And I feel like the ways in which I engage in conversations sometimes is more like the MFA students that the MA students.
Speaker: Like the way I formulate things, the way like my references, my, so I'm kind of like in that moment where I'm like, okay, I need to be more MA.
Speaker: I need to be more MA now.
Speaker: I don't know.
Speaker: I was just thinking about that yesterday.
Speaker: I had that experience and I was like, oh, I feel like I'm like more on like this side than this side.
Speaker: But I don't know.
Speaker: I feel like there should not be sides also.
Speaker: I kind of like that, you know, like it.
Speaker: And again, going back to the idea of like collectivity and like
Speaker: And like the more the merrier, I feel like it's cool to be able to combine those things and like maybe to create bridges like from one to the other.
Speaker: So that's a little corny, sorry.
Speaker: I still want to see, because going back to that mythical car ride, I still want to see those photographs.
Speaker: Like the objects that you used to make.
Speaker: Ah, yes.
Speaker: I'll send them to you one day.
Speaker: I don't know if I have them.
Speaker: Probably in an old hard drive.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: I imagine they're still on, like, they were literally shot on film.
Speaker: They were actually digital.
Speaker: A really, really old digital camera.
Speaker: A Canon 2D.
Speaker: Oh, wow.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: That's ancient.
Speaker: Well, we can't reference the objects without talking about what they looked like, right?
Speaker: These were sculptures?
Speaker: These were... Go ahead.
Speaker: So, yeah, I was telling Alex that before, when I was kind of transitioning from being a designer to work in the arts, I had like seven minutes of being an artist myself.
Speaker: Oh.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: And it was more than seven minutes.
Speaker: It was more like a couple of years.
Speaker: But I was like working with or not working, but just like playing or experimenting with this, like, like literally like Play-Doh.
Speaker: I was telling Alex that also kind of like because I didn't have any like knowledge of like materials or anything.
Speaker: I would like end up like doing stuff with like Play-Doh and Play-Doh, of course, doesn't stay still like temperature changes, things happen.
Speaker: And then there's like all this like different changes.
Speaker: And I was like really interested in what was happening to this like little sculptures that I was doing, like either like things would like fall off a little bit or like.
Speaker: One of them was like a female figure that was very upright.
Speaker: And then all of a sudden, it would just start losing composure.
Speaker: And I was really interested in what was happening in terms of the form.
Speaker: And I started photographing those pieces.
Speaker: And...
Speaker: And I never made much of them.
Speaker: There was another one that was kind of like a face and it started gathering like all this like dust and like stuff.
Speaker: So it kind of like became a weird thing that I also started doing like closeups and photographs, like white on white kind of thing.
Speaker: It was like white Play-Doh on white background.
Speaker: It was like really, really weird.
Speaker: I don't know if it was that good.
Speaker: I don't think it was good.
Speaker: But I think it was really interesting to look in retrospect now.
Speaker: I was telling Alex that I never thought of it, but I was like really interested in like in the decay of the material, right?
Speaker: Like that was, it was not so much about the forms or like the figures itself, but how they were like kind of like losing its thing.
Speaker: Yeah, I can see why Alex would be interested.
Speaker: That's right up his alley.
Speaker: Entropy, man.
Speaker: Entropy.
Speaker: No, but that's a form of collaboration.
Speaker: You're collaborating with time and material, right?
Speaker: I guess so, yeah.
Speaker: Well, that's great.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I'd still, I definitely would love to see them.
Speaker: Yeah, maybe we'll make some NFTs out of those old pictures, you know?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Oh.
Speaker: No, I think that's perfect.
Speaker: I think that we have a good amount of time to take a break before we have our panel this evening.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Oh, yeah, that's true.
Speaker: Thank you so much for taking the time to speak to us and for agreeing to curate this amazing show.
Speaker: That's up to co co curate.
Speaker: She's a co-curator.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: And thank you for talking about your curation process.
Speaker: I mean, I love your ethos and the way that you kind of operate.
Speaker: And it's, I mean, if anybody is interested in curation, they would, they would, they should definitely listen to this episode.
Speaker: Cause it's, I love the way you kind of like,
Speaker: some things fall into place, some things are, it's never a top, it doesn't seem like it's ever a top-down thing that you just kind of like, here's the mission statement thing.
Speaker: It's just kind of finding your way, right?
Speaker: Yeah, I think that's the way how it works the best for me.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, but thank you guys for inviting me.
Speaker: It's been a pleasure, an amazing experience, and yes, I'm nothing but thankful.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: Cool.
Speaker: Thanks.
Speaker: Thank you.
Speaker: Arranging Tangerines is recorded, edited, and produced by Lydian Stater, an evolving curatorial platform based in New York City with a focus on the intersection of contemporary and crypto art.
Speaker: You can learn more at lydianstater.co, find images at lydianstaternyc on Instagram, and follow us at lydianstater on Twitter.
Speaker: Thanks to Elisa for taking the time to speak to us this week.
Speaker: If you'd like to learn more about our projects, visit our website at gtzerickson.myportfolio.com.
Speaker: Big thanks to Tall Juan, who graciously provides our intro music.
Speaker: His albums are available at tallwan.bandcamp.com.
Speaker: And thank you to you, listener, for spending your valuable time with us.
Speaker: I know what to do.
Speaker: I don't know what to say.
Speaker: I just know I don't want to be like you.
Speaker: I know what to do.
Speaker: I don't know what to say.
Speaker: I just know I don't want to be like you.
