Interview with Oliver Ressler
Interview with Oliver Ressler by Selen Gobelez
Otonom: Could you talk a little about yourself and your works?
Ressler: As an artist I have produced several projects in recent years on issues such as economic globalization, racism, genetic engineering, and various forms of resistance to the existing capitalist system. Some of these projects were presented in public spaces as billboards and posters, some as one channel videos, and others as theme-specific exhibition projects such as “Alternative Economics, Alternative Societies”, which you can see here at Platform Garanti Contemporary Art Center in Istanbul.
Otonom: How did you start making art?
Ressler: After finishing high school at the age of 18, I went to an art university and studied there for six years. During this time, I wasn’t very satisfied with what the university was offering me. I was already interested in certain political questions, and tried to bring these issues into my artistic works. I tried out a lot of different methods and techniques. When I finished university I created some works for public inner city spaces, especially billboards, posters, and light-works. At some point art institutions showed interest in presenting my work. Now for almost ten years I have been working as a freelance artist and have been involved in several collaborations with different people and groups, producing around twenty projects.
Otonom: You have just mentioned your dissatisfaction with art education in the university. Could you talk a little bit about that?
Ressler: The situation at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna was difficult, as it was in so many other art academies in Europe. The whole education was focused on one person, the professor, who in many cases was an artist who did not know what was really going on in the contemporary art world. At the beginning, when I started to study, the situation was okay for me as I was not so much aware of the problematic tendency of this education, which in my case was limited solely to painting. However, not only was the medium in which I was educated a little outdated, but how it was used and with which ideas and ideologies it was combined with were out of touch. So there was not that much I could take from the university, besides having the privilege to spend a lot of time on whatever I was interested in. I had luck, because in 1994, when I was still studying, a kind of independent open space was established in Vienna, called Depot – Art and Discourse, which was not related to the art university, and offered presentations by artists, theorists and curators, screenings, a small but nice library – all the things which the art universities in Vienna at the time lacked.
Otonom: The question “Can art really be taught in universities?” is really important for me. Can somebody be taught to become an artist?
Ressler: I think it is very difficult, maybe impossible. But at least a university should supply a variety of courses related to contemporary art practices and theory, and offer certain technical equipment with facilitators to support a student’s work. At the time when I studied this was not really the case. In the meantime the situation at the University of Visual Arts has improved a lot, developing in the right direction – at least in comparison to the situation in the early 1990s when I studied. There are many contemporary courses now, new professors, and you can also change easily between different classes.
Otonom: What you are doing is contrasting conservative art and new art. How do you define your own work, as a video artist and activist? What is the power of this kind of art?
Ressler: I am working with different media and formats, so I would not define myself as a video artist, even when maybe sixty or seventy percent of my production somehow involves video. I do not define myself through media but simply prefer calling myself an artist. Some people might say that I am a “political artist” or maybe a “project artist”, because my artistic practice is usually more process and research-oriented than object-oriented. But these are just labels I usually don’t use for myself. Sometimes it is quite important to present this kind of political art I am doing strategically simply as “art”, because I think it is of more importance to struggle for the recognition of this art within the larger art scene, which is highly influenced by the art market, rather than arguing for a separation between “art” and “political art”. I think nowadays there are many possibilities to use art as a tool to make certain issues a subject of discussion. But the work must not necessarily be limited to the art scene and art institutions, because you can also work in public inner city spaces, edit a magazine, create web pages, intervene in different fields or work in different collaborations with people who are not involved with the art scene. For me art institutions are very important networks which you can use for your work, providing a kind of space where it is still possible to say and express certain things from perspectives where in another context there might be censorship or the police would intervene. I think there is a little more freedom and a little more mental space in art institutions, at least in western Europe, where I produce and present the majority of my work.
Otonom: This leads us to my next question, about the relationship between politics and art. In one of your previous interviews you talked about the difference between being an activist and an artist. I have been thinking about such a differentiation between art and politics. Are the spheres of political production and artistic production, or culture in general, so separate?
Ressler: I am not interested in keeping these spheres so separated, as they often appear to be. I am interested in bringing these fields together. Some of my works offer examples for possible modes of collaboration between artists and activists. Sometimes the work I produce has similarities to works produced by activists. If we look at the videos I made surrounding the counter-globalization movement, for sure there are lots of similarities to some videos done by activists.
Otonom: The typical example I have in mind relating to this issue is the deconstruction of advertisements or company logos, something which is done by both artists and activists. Life has been compartmentalized as economy, religion, private life and public life in the modern era. We could think about ancient times, when people did not draw images on the walls of caves as art, but rather as part of their everyday life.
Ressler: Sometimes it is really fascinating to switch between these constructed divisions between the spheres of art and activism. For example, in 2002 the Kunstverein München invited me to produce a site-specific work for the city of Munich. My piece consisted of three posters to be displayed in light boxes, relating them to the graphic elements of an advertising campaign by the Social Democrats in Germany. So my posters finally looked very similar to the SPD posters, but changed the original message in order to emphasize the conservative and anti-democratic policies of this party in relation to a particular situation. I assume most people did not recognize this as an artistic work. To those people who carefully read the poster texts and realized the changes from the original SPD posters, the work appeared to be a political statement, but there was no indication, no hint that it was a piece of art. The piece left a lot of space for the imagination of the spectator. Another project was the magazine Neues Grenzblatt, which I edited together with the Austrian artist Martin Krenn. We collaborated with eight political groups, anti-racist collectives and immigrant initiatives, and each of these groups wrote a two page article for this informational brochure, which we produced and distributed in 2001 at the frontier between Austria and Slovenia as a direct mailing. We used a conservative graphic design, which we thought local people might like, using a photo of a church from the neighborhood on the cover. But the content was completely different, the texts focused on borders, crossing borders illegally, and critically questioning the terms of trafficking and human smuggling, and how refugees get criminalized through illegalizing them. We received pretty interesting reactions when we carried out some interviews in the region, many people could remember the magazine and seemed to discuss it with their friends and family members.
Otonom: Where was it exactly?
Ressler: At the border region between Austria and Slovenia, but only on the Austrian side, because it was printed it German. This was still a Schengen border at the time of the distribution of the magazine in 2001.
Otonom: I find that idea really exciting, of having no border between people. Here art can really play a powerful role. Art is quite constitutive, as it has the potential to constitute a new world.
Ressler: A lot of projects I have worked on are somehow related to existing resistance movements, to left-wing activist practices, so they involve and engage in already existing struggles. I think the work “Alternative Economics, Alternative Societies”, which is on display here in Istanbul, goes one step further, because this work really aims at constituting something which did not exist before. When I started the research at the beginning of this project, I was looking for books with a similar approach, trying to encompass a variety of different leftist concepts and models for an alternative, non-hierarchical and democratic society. I asked all my interview subjects, but nobody knew of an anthology which took such an approach. So it seems “Alternative Economics, Alternative Societies” constitutes something of an alternative society itself, through the help of these writers and theorists I interviewed who all gave interesting input and ideas regarding alternative economics or societies. I think it is important to create such a network of information at this moment, when we continuously hear that there is no alternative to capitalist globalization. In the ideal case an individual vision for such a new society and economy would be developed in the head of the visitor to the exhibition via the food for thought provided by the interviewees.
Otonom: Yet alternatives are being discussed in various platforms. For instance, the social forums, the World Social Forum and the continental forums that appeared along with the anti-globalization movement provide arenas for various perspectives, though with it limitations and some handicaps.
Ressler: Some models are being discussed in these forums, that’s right, but not all. My artwork is being developed in relation to the socio-political tendencies we find in the political struggles for another world. A central idea of the World Social Forum is to create a space for communication, information, networking and inspiration, and to avoid the classical domination of one movement over another. Such considerations also play an important role in how the project “Alternative Economics, Alternative Societies” is being organized and developed. But though I consider these social forums extremely important and they are very influential for me, I would say that in the discussions there the dominating models are still those which can be seen as kinds of reformist social democratic models, such as Walden Bellos “Deglobalization”. Or positions from groups such as ATTAC, who seem to aim at changing some paradigms within the existing capitalist model, try to make it more “human”, but do not focus on a complete disruption with the existing power relationships.
Otonom: I agree there are the rather hegemonic discourses in the forums at the moment. The idea of changing a bad capitalism into a good one is really dangerous…
Ressler: The European Social Forum in London was also dominated by left wing British parties. This gap between non-hierarchic alliances, the “horizontals”, and hierarchically structured parties, the “verticals”, was obvious. In reality it seems to be hard to avoid the domination of powerful movements… Also at the ESF in London, a strict division between cultural events, such as film screenings, and those events which were considered really political, was very visible, which leads back to the beginning of this talk.
Otonom: We have been talking about the power and constitutive character of art. Art can really be powerful in two diverse ways: it can be a constitutional part of the existing society and the system but it can also constitute another world. This is one reason why I think corporations are investing in art sponsorship. And your quite radical exhibition “An Ideal Society Creates Itself” is being presented at the Garanti Platform, which is related to one of the symbols of finance capital in Turkey.
Ressler: The “Alternative Economics, Alternative Societies” project was presented in a variety of art institutions in different cities. In fact this time the exhibition takes place in an art institution, which is related to a Turkish bank, a corporation. But the art institution is a foundation, they do independent programming and I am sure the director Vasif Kortun did not have to ask anybody from the bank if he could present a show by an artist with an anti-capitalist position in the space. But it is clear that every time you present your work, be it in a state-funded or privately-funded art space, as an artist you should consider the effects of the image-transfer such an exhibition may have for the sponsor. I hope that the positive effects the exhibition has for the people who spend their time in these spaces, which at Platform are usually twenty thousand people per exhibition, are more influential than these other effects for the sponsor. It is impossible to measure, of course. But I really hope the exhibition can open some people’s minds regarding alternative economics and societies.
Otonom: As you talk, I am imagining that all around the world thousands of people who believe in alternative societies, in another world, can create their own spaces, not needing the State, not needing capital.
Ressler: It would be wonderful if it could be the case…
Otonom: How is it in Europe or other places? Is it possible to create such spaces?
Ressler: At least at the moment it seems very difficult to imagine presenting any of the “Alternative Economics, Alternative Societies” exhibitions outside of the non-commercial art context, which is usually state- or city-funded. To produce the exhibition, you need a huge space, an audience which is interested in these issues, and somebody to take care of the exhibition space. The installation involves a lot of technical equipment, production money, my travel costs, etcetera. It would be wonderful if there could be more spaces which exist independently from funding structures provided by the state or corporations, spaces open for a leftist, critical artistic practice. But I do not see them at the moment.
Otonom: How about unions, associations and the culture centers of revolutionaries? Well, all around the world we are not so few, maybe we are dispersed, but we are many.
Ressler: Indeed I do not want to sound too negative… I only related your question to the concrete installation presented here in Istanbul. I also produced a couple of videos which are presented independently from my exhibitions, videos which are related to various resistance movements. These videos are continuously being presented in different small, autonomous spaces, and many of them are not related to the art scene and are presented independently by politically interested people.
Otonom: To go back to the sponsorship issue… even if they have independent decision mechanisms, there are big problems in terms of sponsorship. Within the last ten years in Turkey, we have seen increasing numbers of companies investing in art.
Ressler: I think there are different concepts of sponsorship or how corporations relate themselves towards art. Many corporations try to use art to represent themselves. If you look at the annual reports of corporations, maybe in every second image with CEOs you can find a piece of modern or contemporary art in the background. In these images art is being used as a sign for symbolic power. But there are also more complicated concepts involved in how corporations relate themselves to art, which seems to be the case with this Garanti bank, which funds Platform Garanti Contemporary Art Center here in Istanbul, or with the Generali Foundation in Vienna, which is also an internationally recognized art institution funded by the Italian Generali insurance company. They create independent organizations which make interesting things happen, and these soon become pretty important for a certain network of artists, critics, and curators. But at the same time the corporation uses art to create a certain corporate identity. These positive values or effects for the bank or insurance company are not possible to measure. But it seems to work for corporations, otherwise they would not give the money. I don’t want to simplify this matter, but when for example Siemens funds engaged art projects and creates a symbolic value through them, then perhaps the media or some critical customers of Siemens will not be so critical when looking at the dark sides of this global player that builds nuclear power plants, or refuses to give compensation money to slave laborers who had to work for Siemens in Nazi Germany.
Otonom: You have also made a project about companies.
Ressler: Yes, I did research in 1998 in which I read the annual reports of the five hundred largest corporations in regard to how they write about economic globalization, the liberalization and deregulation of markets. I collected interesting statements and asked some people, who relate their work critically to economic globalization, to analyze and interpret them for a video, which was the central part of an installation. These people I interviewed were two unionists, a globalization theorist, a media theorist, a worker for an NGO dealing with corporations, and a feminist economist. This project then led me directly to these counter-globalization videos, “This is what democracy looks like!” and “Disobbedienti”, and later to “Alternative Economics, Alternative Societies”, which is my central project in relation to economics.
Otonom: How about your work concerning the Disobbedienti. Why did you decide to make a video specifically on the Disobbedienti?
Ressler: The video “This is what democracy looks like!” was about a demonstration in Salzburg, Austria, against the World Economic Forum in 2001. In this demonstration a large group of demonstrators were encircled by the police for seven hours. I was one of these demonstrators and recorded material, including the reactions of the police, from the viewpoint of the demonstrators. I made a video about this incident, interviewed people who were with me in the demonstration. It was important work to bring the viewpoints of the activists to attention. Usually in my films I try to present activists or people who are somehow related with resistance in situations and contexts in which they are really free to act and react how they like. So I decided to produce another video on the “counter-globalization movement”, and to focus on the, in my opinion, most interesting and strongest part of the movement at this time, the Disobbedienti, who originally called themselves “Tute Bianche”. These Italian activists emerged in the mid-90s, they wore white overalls and protected their bodies with helmets, foam rubber and homemade shields. They showed up in counter-summits against the G8, the World Economic Forum or IMF meetings, the central institutions for globalized capitalism. But they also did some other interesting things, for example trying to dismantle detention centers for asylum seekers, and several times they were successful. Now the Disobbedienti dissolved, at least they don’t use the label “Disobbedienti” any more, but many of the activists are still active in the struggles against precariousness in Italy. But I think it still makes sense to present the video because it is about tactics and theoretical backgrounds, and many people outside of Italy can learn not only about their strategies, but also about the limits to these kinds of actions. The video is one in an ongoing series of independent videos on resistance movements and tactics, something I have been focusing on since 2000.
The interview was carried out by Selen Gobelez in Istanbul on April 29, 2005, and published in Turkish in Otonom 11/2005.
The transcription was edited by Nick Santos-Pedro.
Links:
Documentation of Oliver Resslers projects: www.ressler.at
Transcripts of videos of “Alternative Economics, Alternative Societies” in 5 languages: http://republicart.net/disc/aeas/index.htm
Platform Garanti Contemporary Art Center: www.platform.garanti.com.tr