combined workshop with JANEZ JANSA and JANEZ JANSA
{ January 8, 2010 @ 4:55 pm }
Yes, we do have two Janez Jansas: one originally from Italy, one originally from Croatia, both of them citizens of Slovenia.
There’s a very good reason for all this, but since they asked the international artists to absent themselves from their talk, I’ll keep their explications under wraps for now. They’ll be presenting again at the Singapore Superintense, and I’ll do a recap then.
interview with JANEZ JANSA, Bergamo, Italy/Ljubljana, Slovenia.
{ October 15, 2009 @ 5:02 pm }
YS: So would you say you’re an artist, a director, a conceptual artist…?
JJ: I would say yes, I’m a conceptual artist making use of different media, different languages to do my artistic research, my artistic investigation. So I’m saying, so because the concept is always mainly the focus in my investigation, not always but mainly, really – and media are basically the tool to, that accompany my trip to… I travel during this research, which is of course like most of the time a street that you don’t exactly know in advance where you’re going to lead you and any of the time has many ramifications.
YS: And why did you agree to come to FCP?
JJ: Well I have to say that I don’t know much before coming, besides what I received from Ong Keng Sen, and what I found online, meaning that I knew what you have been done in the past, but I didn’t know almost anything about what I’m supposed to expect here. In fact, like many other participants I only got to know the names of other participants when I arrived. And I took this as a very positive aspect actually, ‘cos you don’t really prefigure before coming with whom you’re going to work, what you’re going to do, and when you come to meet people from other places, people you’ve never met, and you start basically from scratch.
Basically I heard first about TheatreWorks and Fying Circus when Keng Sen via e-mail, because I met Keng Sen in another frame, in the frame of the ECF, European Cultural Foundation and so on. And if I remember correctly, back then he didn’t tell me much, and Tay Tong was also there. And by exchanging some mails, so on this idea of coming to Cambodia took more and more consistency, and I accepted it because I thought it was really great.
YS: And how has FCP been for you so far?
JJ: Ya, so far because it’s not ended I think, we still have few days in singapore, it’s generally positive. Because it’s been really rhizomatic, I would say. the exchange, the process, the interaction between people, it has been really rhizomatic. From talking and making deeper, to know deeper persons or other artists that you meet, that you have been met in other festivals, getting to know people from Europe, Northern Africa, Southern Africa and so on in other countries that you never met before, but you kind of share a language like that (quote fingers) right, and in a reality that is completely new to me. And here I’m talking about the Cambodian reality, and of course Singapore, but I think that Cambodia was really like, gives well the sense of the extremes. so basically yes, if you Want to say in a word it was really a kind of rhizomatic exchange.
YS: How was your Interaction with the Cambodian participants?
JJ: Then well, the interaction with them, we decided to, as you know present our work first and then to let them coming to us and we were also look for synapses, but we left the process very coming out by itself in a way because the work we intended to do was really on the personal level because it’s a work about name, so we wanted to you know, the whole aspect was about discussing around this issue. Which goes of course much further than the administrative issue of changing a name, it has to do with the perspection of identity and the link, affective and emotional link that you have or don’t have with your name. So we have been doing quite some conceptual work. But of course we got a lot also from them, so the exchange also happens by collecting interviews and talking and so on. We really got a really tiny facet of this diamond in a way. We really have been able to collect very precious stories, information, points of view and so on, meanings.
YS: What about your general impressions of Cambodia?
JJ: The impression of Cambodia is… I have to say first that of course it was so short, but it was a place of huge contradictions and social differences. And of course, long traditions and history and culture that’s simply amazing. Nothing that I didn’t know. Of course now I have a chance to see as well. Of course I knew that I was coming to a place that was so rich, so I let myself experience as much as possible in terms of everything: smells, culinary, cows… to the second half, which was more of a paradise kind of style: temples, spirituality of religion and so on. I really try to live every second of this experience by joining the group, going a little bit by myself, really discovering different areas of the city from the most touristic one to Phnom Penh, because I went only once, because I really didn’t want the touristic experience, to getting lost with tuk-tuk till I don’t know where we are.
But most interesting of all was the interaction with local people, not just Amrita or Bhopana students but really like workers on the street, at the hotel, wherever.
YS: Could you tell me about one of the works that you’re proud of?
JJ: Well, one of the artworks I’ve been working intensively at for the last three years is the platform "React". I show you later how to write it. That shows how reconstruction and re-reports of either relevant historical facts or relevant cultural events and it was a platform within which we, Aksioma, produced 10 different art projects – few were mine, but few were of invited artists. Once again I collaborated with the other Janez Jansa within this platform, and we did other Janez Jansa project within this project. But other artists were involved from other parts of the world, and this was resulting in the publication of a book. We collaborated with artists, philosophers and so on, and it was published, and it turned out to be a group exhibition that travelled to Bucharest, Ljubljana and Rigeka. And this was a very very important and intense project to me, because I was acting in this project as on the level of being a presenter and producer and designing the exhibition and making this exhibition travel, and a level of publishing and so on so. It was a lot experience, as you can see. There’s quite some stuff online, you can paste there the URL which I’m going to give to you and the platform. Now it’s going to the presentation and also the production. We have on schedule a couple of exhibition and then a couple of exhibition of what we did still next year in 2010, and then we assemble a second part of React platform.
interview with JANEZ JANSA, Rigeka, Croatia/Ljubljana, Slovenia
{ October 15, 2009 @ 2:27 pm }
YS: So would you describe yourself as an artist, or…?
JJ: Ya. I’m an artist, and also I am a writer. I wrote a book about Belgian artist Jan Fabre. And I used to edit performance magazine, Maska. And I’m also running organsiation called Maska, which is organisation for production of experimental performance, experimental interdiscplinary, education in the field and publication on contemporary art.
YS: Why did you agree to come to FCP?
JJ: Well… first of all it’s new area. So it’s a new experience, new challenge with another context for the work and for discussion about the work I do, and also it was… It’s very nice combination of international artists, and last but not least it’s a unique experience to have a chance to work in Cambodia with young people which are very open and enthusiastic about contemporary performance in art.
YS: How has FCP been for you?
JJ: I’m very happy about this experience. First of all I met very interesting artists, which some of them I knew, some of them I didn’t. I knew Tim Etchells, Manuel Pelmus. I knew a bit of work of Vlatka Koravat and Mustafa Kaplan. I knew Gurur, and I knew also Eszter Salomon. Yah. And I like their work and with Tim and with Manuel we’ve been collaborating earlier. But it was nice, really, to see other people and especially people who are not from Europe, because you don’t have chance to encounter them very often.
YS: And what about Cambodia itself?
JJ: Country of Cambodia is still big mystery for me. It has this very brutal history which still resonates very much i would say, so not only, yeah, period of Khmer Rouge and wars. And then of course you see these spectacular temples which create kind of double feeling. On one side you know that there is something there, and on the other side its in a way it’s sad, because this something is in a way competing with consumerism of tourist industry. And on the other side it is a tourist industry which makes you, makes possibility for you to get there. and then of course this spectacularity is confronted with poverty. You see if you just move a little bit out of the area. So it’s good to see these things. ‘Cos can change a little bit perspective on your relation to what you are doing with people and so on.
YS: What’s your relationship with the Cambodian participants been like?
JJ: I mean we had couple of interviews, we have discussions, so I think that they got some main points of the work that we presented here and that this might inspire them one way or another. And I think art is mainly about this. That you actually give certain options or certain trigger, certain way of activity in people, just that you say that certain things are possible, some things however they are unusual. They make sense. And in that sense I say they respected and they had a good time in relation to the work you do.
YS: Can you talk about some of the work you’re proud of?
JJ: So maybe I mention some performances which I did? So I been doing two reconstructions or remakings of two performances from ’69 and ’72, made in Slovenia, experimental performances. And I became interested in that period and in the practice of experimental performance because I found that shows very contemporary on one side, and on the other side I approached in a kind of documentary way. So when I say remake, I prefer using the term reconstruction. It is not so much repeating something that has been done, but actually creating the bridge between two times and what is happening on that bridge when the encounter of two times.
And then I can mention another work which theatre performance. It’s called "Slovenian National Theatre" and it deals about deportation of one gypsy family in Slovenia. It’s real event and I did the show about it. I’m also very interested in in-between places, between performances and exhibition, so I did a project called "Life [In Progress]", which is basically both exhibition and performance, based on 50 instructions for actions performed by visitors. Maybe I can give you a link so that people can… it’s www.maska.si.
(Note: this interview actually took place in Jan 2010, and has been back-dated for the sake of tidiness on the blog)
Ng Yi-Sheng