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1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	Jill Giegerich	.

M. Yeah. But that is the thing that was always of value. It's not that it's elusive and therefore that's bad. It just is. That's a condition. But it seems to me that it's gotten more elusive, like way more elusive, like somebody stole it. (Both laugh) And nobody wants to 'fess up, either to that they took it or that it's gone. Everyone's going to pretend, and engage in critique in the meanwhile. Like it's some really paltry surrogate, like a paper turkey for Thanksgiving. There was no... We're having a critical bird. We're going to feast.

One of the things that hit me in the article ("Shall We Kill Daddy?" by Mike Kelley in C3i Vol.#1, Striking Distance, Nov. 1996) was Mike talking about the pleasure of looking at early conceptual art. There's so little there and yet you can go so far into it and float around for so long. And it's not in any – I don't think it was strategized. Somebody just... the strategy was "I noticed something. And now I'm simply going to point at it."

I think that dissolving of art and life is... there is really something to that. That is, I think, one of the agendas that came out of modernism that is a very wonderful and heartfelt agenda. And maybe that's... I know that when I experience the sensation you're talking about in front of something, there is a dissolving that's going on. Things are coming apart. And it's very paradoxical because at the same time that this thing, that I'm standing in front of, is making things come apart, there's some tremendous sense of center that I don't generally experience. If you could make a work that's as complex and frightening and transcendent as a human being, I mean that seems like something worth doing. And I have occasionally seen that. And sometimes in the oddest places. When we were talking about static art and I was going on about how I never see it, you're right. It's not actually true. I saw the water lilies. And I'd never seen them before. I'd only seen them in reproduction. I had no idea. And that particular era of modernist history has never been at all interesting to me. And I came across it around a corner at the Museum and it made me sit down. It flattened me. I just, like, I just sat down. And it poured into me for a good forty-five minutes. And I would never offer a critique of that painting. I would consider that sacrilege to try to critique that experience... Looking to engage on that level seems worthwhile.

And the other thing that is worthwhile is that I get to talk to artists. Being an artist, I get to talk to artists. And I get to have profoundly interesting conversations. And that doesn't seem like something most people get to have. And if I go someplace, if someone invites me to be in something, say, in Italy, I'm not going and getting off the plane to talk to business people who are talking about plastic extrusion. I'm getting off the plane and there is this array of amazing minds in front of me, that I get to talk to. So that's wonderful. (laughs) So that alone is enough of a reason to go on making art. I could go on making art just 'cause I have to do that to talk to these people. But I also like that pursuit of trying to make something that's as interesting as a human being. I must say that I've also had that experience, that same thing that I think you're describing in looking at art. I've had that experience in many other forms. So it does seem like art is one way to pursue that mind set.

You can attain it through conversation, or... I don't know. Squatting on a rock, looking at a pond or...

M. Yeah, you can still do that. Nothing's stopping one from doing that. Well I'm not sure about that, maybe there is. Because it seems a lot more difficult now.

Well I think that you might be right. Certainly if you look at our society, there's absolutely nothing in it that predisposes individuals to pursue what we're talking about, as far as I can see.

M. Well then why is enrollment in art schools up so high.

Well because, maybe, the truth is that human beings still desire that. There will always be misfits. And maybe the more conformist a society becomes, the more pressure it puts on those misfits. And more desperately they seek a place of other misfits. (laughs)

M. I feel like I just received a death sentence.

Well thank God for it, you know?

M. I feel like I got punched in the chest. (laughs)

I'm so sorry... But then if things go really really bad, the powers that be know where exactly to look for those misfits because they are all grouped together in one place. That brings to mind again another interesting thing about being an artist because I think it's really easy in America to feel totally useless as a creative person. But when that subject comes up with students I usually say "Well, I know that you feel that way but think about when society's go really bad and the fascists come out of the woodwork. Who's the first people that they go for? And why? Why do they go for them? Because they are very very powerful." The creative people in the society are ultimately extremely powerful. But I think sometimes it takes things to become really bad for them to see that.

M. I don't know if I believe that. I mean I've heard the reasoning, but I don't know if I believe it. because they also go after retards, cripples and those people aren't really powerful. You know?

(laughing) Now I feel like you punched me.

M. Where their power resides is in that they represent this cast-off aspect of the self, this denied thing. It's more about the weakness of the powers that be, their vulnerability, their brittleness, that they have to actively go out there and eradicate that stuff. But I don't think that's because there is an innate power there. It's a power in the role that's through default.

Yeah. You could be right about that.

M. But we'd be just as powerless in a semi-healthy society you know. But a fucked-up one has to work that much harder to convince itself that it's okay. Denial becomes a much more consuming task.

Yeah. I see your point.

M. You said you were talking to... how it comes up with students, the idea of being...

Feeling useless.

M. Useless as a creative person.

But then again, maybe one has to examine the underlying assumptions of even making a statement like that. Maybe the whole idea of use value is really antithetical to art making. Maybe its very uselessness...

M. If there are boundaries between art and life, how can it be useless? In other words, if the task is to dissolve the boundaries between art and life, that's the objective. If it has to be done, then those boundaries exist. That's a purpose.

That's true. Yeah. Yeah, that is a purpose. But maybe it's again one of those paradoxes in art making. Ultimately it's a purpose but to get there you have to engage in a kind of uselessness. That that's the procedure by which you dissolve those boundaries.

M. Tell me more about the water lilies. I had similar experiences, actually, with a couple of Rembrandts two years ago... but I have to ask myself, "How did it get there?" How come it was still in that museum instead of someone's barn being used to hang hooks and saddles on? How come it didn't just get lost in the shuffle? I feel like I'm supposed to be inherently suspicious of the fact that there's this nail to hang it on in that place. So isn't it just sort of meeting my denied expectations? It's this institutionally instilled anhedonia and they finally take the veil away and show me the painting – and look! Jesus is really bleeding!!

I doubt it. I doubt that. Because I think that you're a pretty cynical guy (both laugh) and I think that you would have thought that one through pretty carefully.

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