Andrey Bartenev's Interview For FuXYZ Magazine

Interview For FuXYZ Magazine

Virginia Paniagua

Feast of bubbles of hope!

-Did you visit Spain before?I would love to know if you have any especial memories of those visits, and whether you could make some comments about them in our issue.
- Spain is one my favorite countries and is very precious country to me! The passion of the Spaniards is the same as Russians. They equally argument in the kitchen! I have many friends in Madrid and Barcelona And during last three years I did design of the watches for the fashion company Armand Basi. My favorite place in Barcelona is an umbrella house and in Madrid - Goya ... carriage passing throughthe market crowd - the painting 'The Crockery Vendor' in the Prado Museum.

-You present your work in many places. Which would be the more appropriate sites to present your creations? And, what do you expect of with the presentation you will make in MID_E?
-The best space for my performances is - stair wells of shopping-molls, escalators of Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, ramps of Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York and small island states of Oceania. I look forward to when the audience becomes part of my performance.Performance-art - is the freedom gained through individual improvisation. Landscape of the performance - is a collection of achievements of individual liberties. If you change one part of the landscape - then everything changes, but the unity of aspiration remains. And my aim is - to program this unity of aspiration. If we talk about the presentation in MID_E it is like a full plate of a meal with the smells of food, which passes you by... there is a raging feast somewhere! Feast of bubbles of hope!

-Stacy Engman said concerning your appearing , on 2.007 in the NAC of New York: "Afterward I thought: I m dead meat. They re dead meet"; and John Windsor, of "The independent" of London said that you are Damien Hirst of the Arctic Circle. In your opinion, what is the reason of these interpretations? Do you think that you are well understood far from your country?
- What is the reason of interpretations of me???? The reason for this is in my inconstancy... All the time they gave me new names – and they're right! Every time I reincarnate into another me, and I am able to live through any system of comparisons. And in response to all the titles given to me, I am shouting: Yes! And it's I ... And it's me too! Everyone should learn to love himself the same as sky loves him. And love of the sky always returns us to the point of individual responsibility. About understanding me away from Russia, I can say yes! They understand me! Because my art applies to the action "to be!" - now and there ... in the context of the trans-emotional palette - where your mental states undetected before come out influenced by myimprovisation - and it is always super-internationally!

- I would like to know where you are at the moment and what your projects are. I would appreciate any comments you may wish to let me have regarding your feelings about these projects, also if you are working on anything else for the near future.
- I have just arrived in Moscow from Norway, where during a month Itaught for first year students of Drama and Sceenography Departmentsof Norway Theater Academy. The theme of the course was - Structure of a Performance Art. As a basis of research I took a 1922 year poem by Korney Chukovsky - children's absurdist - writer. This poem dedicated to the praise of the rules of personal care, cleanliness. This theme is actual in a situation of current preventive antiviral propaganda that waged in Norway. Our performance was called Wash Your Hands Until You Get the Holes.
To Moscow,I arrived for the opening of my new project -Hand-Walker sculpture - Monkey Bars for 3rd Moscow International Biennial of Contemporary Art. This work is my fantasy about wall bars, one of the most popular exercise equipment. The sculpture fills out almost the entire space of the hall with the bars and invites the viewers to exercise. Then I will prepare performance for the Pinakothek in Munich. They need bubbles of hope too!
September, 2009