X-TRA’s Artists and Rights is a conversation series exploring what art can do, at the intersection of Los Angeles’s most urgent issues and artistic practice. Each session brings four artists together around a table.
Episode 1:
Living a Life While Decolonizing the Mind
with Nao Bustamante, Todd Gray, Gelare Khoshgozaran, and Jennifer Moon.
Moderated by Mario Ontiveros
Listen on Spotify / Listen on iTunes
or Search for “Artists and Rights” on your fav podcast app
“For the revolution, stay ready so you don’t have to get ready,” says Nao Bustamante.
This session was recorded in December 2019, before the Covid-19 global pandemic. It has been only 6 months, but it feels like a day less than eternity. We feel confident you will hear how this conversation remains relevant: The pandemic, the protests, the police violence, and the failures of the government have shed more light on the intersection of inequity, systemic racism, and injustice that compels the work of these artists.
In this conversation, the artists explore the challenges of sustaining a creative life, from managing the pressures to make a living, to pushing against prevailing models of the “artist” and the for-profit art world, to practicing self-care. The discussion addresses teaching, mentoring, and sharing as ways to enact creative communities and build supportive relationships to effect change.
As we work to carry forward the momentum of the Black Lives Matter movement, dismantling white supremacy and defunding the police, these conversations gives us tools. The artists might not address the protests directly in the talk—but they do lay out strategies for effecting change into the future.
Learn about the Artists
Nao Bustamante, Todd Gray, Gelare Khoshgozaran, and Jennifer Moon
Keywords
Urgencies, Boundaries, Radical, Decolonizing the Mind, Trauma, Imposter Syndrome, Surviving, Respect, the Kitchen Table, Artist-Run Spaces, Independent Spaces, Teaching, the Myth of the Artist, Sustaining, Being a Catalyst, Artist Labor, “Scrooging”
Reference Links
More on the controversy surrounding Warren Kanders, Nicole Eisenman, the Whitney Museum, and the Whitney Biennial 2019.
Learn more about Sara Ahmed’s writing on the “feminist killjoy.”
** Scroll down for Full Transcript **
Artists (L to R) Todd Gray, Nao Bustamante, Gelare Khoshgozaran listen to Jennifer Moon (not pictured) during Artists and Rights Recording Session One.
Artist Jennifer Moon speaks during Artists and Rights Recording Session One, Gelare Khoshgozaran listens.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Executive Producers: Shana Lutker and Mario Ontiveros.
Recorded at Catasonic Studios in Echo Park by Mark Wheaton.
Production and editorial assistance from Sara Ellen Fowler and Kara Hart.
This series was made possible by generous support from California Arts Council Art and Public Media Grant, the Michael Asher Foundation, and KCET’s Artbound.
Thanks to all who contributed to the development of this series, including Ellen Birrell, Andrea Bowers, Ian Chillag, Neha Choksi, Poppy Coles, Justin Cram, Gilda Davidian, Juan Devis, Sara Ellen Fowler, Harry Gamboa Jr., Kara Hart, Carren Jao, Anuradha Vikram, Brica Wilcox, Matty Wilder, and Lindsay Preston Zappas.
TRANSCRIPT
(Session Recorded on 12/17/19)
Todd Gray: I am Todd Gray. I’m an artist from Los Angeles, a retired professor from Cal State Long Beach. And I’ve been making work for 40 years. So I’m quite interested in entering this conversation.
Nao Bustamante: I’m Nao Bustamante. Artist. Performance video sculpture, primarily. Writing, a few other sundry things. And I’m also a professor and director of an MFA program at USC Roski and I’m happy to be here with all of you.
Gelare Khoshgozaran: I’m Gelare Khoshgozaran. I’m an artist and writer. I’ve been living and working in LA for 10 years. I’m an adjunct at UCLA.
Jennifer Moon: Hi, I’m Jennifer Moon. And I guess I’m an artist, life artist, maybe. And I just started teaching my very first semester as an assistant professor at Otis. So yeah, really interested in pedagogy.
Mario Ontiveros: We started this conversation via email, essentially, and one of the framing questions that we sent out was: What’s most urgent for you today in terms of your practice? And how does that urgency connect to the ways of making a living? And I was wondering if anyone had any initial thoughts about those urgencies,
JM: I wrote all my answers down. You want me to go? Hey, let’s do it. For me. I’m Jennifer, this is Jennifer talking. Well, it’s a larger project, like the revolution, which is like a larger project of mine, which is basically kind of like attempting to expand beyond what I call the 5%. Expanding beyond binaries, hierarchies and capital. But in order to do that, like, then we have to provide for everyone’s, like, survival needs within the 5% is trying to find ways to provide for people’s, like, food, free food, clothing, so on. Healthcare. But in order to do that, like I feel like we also have to acknowledge and, like, befriend trauma and like the ways in which people’s needs aren’t being met. So that’s like, kind of…
NB: … but in order to do that. I feel like this could be an endless “but in order to do that, you know, in order to…” So are you currently in… This is Nao asking Jennifer questions. So are you currently in the space of identifying or making friends with trauma?
JM: Yeah, yeah, I think I have been for a while but like, an interesting thing about like teaching is like, I’m trying to bring that into the classroom, and it hasn’t always worked out super well. And it’s been very humbling because I’m like a lot of people, I mean maybe not lot of people, but like talking about feelings and and talking about shame and trauma is not something that a lot of people are used to. We don’t have like, training in that we’ve never, like, we don’t have a class about like, these are feelings. This is what you do with feelings or how do you feel your feelings. So I’ve run up to like, kind of conflicts with students. Because it’s hard to talk about trauma, and not everyone wants to talk about trauma. So I’m trying to, like figure out how to, like, smuggle that in, in a way that’s, like, consensual and also like, that’s generative somehow for the students.
NB: I like that consensual processing. I think that’s really important. Yeah, yeah. And how does that connect with? What was the question? How does that connect with that urgency connect with them in like, how…
JM: … in ways of like how we make a living?
All: Mm hmm.
JM: Well, I guess for me, it’s like, because right now I’m making like, my money comes from the teaching. So thinking about like, I feel like I’m thinking a lot just about like: How art is taught in the schools and like, a lot of questions that come up for me from students is like: How do we make money as an artist, you know, or like, why aren’t you bringing gallerist, and curators to come visit our studios. I had a grad student who’s a TA, who like, came to Otis, on the website it says, like, 90% of our graduates get jobs, but like, it’s mostly referring to people when like Comm. Arts or Digital Media and like furniture making. And within Fine Arts, it’s like, that doesn’t happen. So I’m like, oftentimes kind of like: what do I tell my students?
NB: Right. You might get a job as a barista or something. Yeah, your MFA. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
GK: Yeah. I was rejected a lot of barista jobs. Because I was overqualified, whatever that means.
NB: Yes.
MO: Do you think that it’s can be difficult for students to find a way for those urgencies to be a part of their practice, what’s urgent to them? And what matters seems to be a sort of ocean between that and the possibility of a job? Like how can I get a job, addressing those issues?
JM: I think like, it depends on like, who’s teaching? I don’t know. Like, there’s like, there’s some models or people teaching where it’s like: trying to fit within the existing model of what the art world is and like, the kind of, like, predetermined road, which is like you make work and you find a gallery and then you sell work, you know, and you get a museum show. And so there’s some teaching that’s like focused around that. Maybe more like a finishing school to like, get your work ready for that. And then there’s like, other teachers like myself, who are interested in maybe what you’re talking about, trying to create different alternatives to a different art world or ways of making art and I think like that’s been going on for a while, and there are organizations and groups and collectives who are doing that.
NB: It’s all very complex. I feel like you know, we’re all teachers here. We’re all instructors in our, professionally, but also probably in our own ways. And for me, it’s so much about opening up students, allowing them to trust and kind of helping them harden on their way out, you know, because there’s so many different possibilities in the art space for students to participate or be professionals. But in regards to the question at hand — this is Nao talking — I think it’s a really interesting and fundamental question, but there’s a way in which I don’t connect to the question, because I feel like I’ve compartmentalized my life so much now. In that teaching is my day gig. And I feel very privileged in that space to have that as a possibility. But it’s almost like my art practice runs alongside on a different track and it speeds up and slows down in different places. And this and the survival or that the connection to urgency is so dependent on so many other factors. For me, I guess, my most urgent thing and I say I’m making air quotes around the word urgent, because I feel like I’m surrounded by urgency in the world and my art is less about urgency, and it’s more about right now trying to find ways to make larger projects, you know, to employ more people, to have collaborators, to have a more professionalized space for my production. And that is just a slog, you know,
MO: I think that’s part of the idea of urgencies. It’s not necessarily a political urgency. It’s about finding a way to make your way in the world and exactly how you said these are the things that are urgent. So maybe it’s just a clarification that it’s that that urgencies can have many more dashes.
NB: I usually work in this space like I try to quadrant my mind. So I have urgent-and- important in the upper left in my mind, and then I have important-not-urgent in the upper right. And then I have urgent-not-important in the lower left, right and then I have neither-urgent-nor-important in the right. So I try to only work in important and not urgent space. Urgent is like: get my windshield fixed, pay my taxes. It really is like clutter to me and I try to just focus on important. So I think it’s almost more like a philosophical space, or something that I’m having a hard time stepping into, but I want to hear from you guys.
TG: This is Todd Gray. I’d like to piggyback on that, because I’ve been a practicing artist for 40 years. And I left my professorship at Cal State Long Beach four years ago, five years, about four years ago, because I wanted to make sure I had enough energy for this last phase of my life to really create a strong studio practice. And so that was my my focus and how do I do that. Fortunately, in the last four years, the work has been recognized and there is a platform for my work, and I hadn’t had a professional gallery since the 90s, and now I have two. I have more than one gallery. And so now what is happening is managing the workflow. There’s an urgency of like staffing a studio, and how do I maintain my creative output and, and flow when I’m interrupted? And I have a tendency to micromanage, so how do I know when to step back and let people do their thing? So this becomes part of the urgency so that I can be more effective and I can have more time. So I quote unquote, “have the luxury of time.” But a lot of that time is being filled in the day to day or organizing a studio with more people because there’s more demand to show the work and so forth. So that’s one part. One urgency. The urgency is that my work is really predicated on an urgency that I became aware of in grad school, which is that my mind has been colonized. And that I have been, as a man of color, as an African American, that I had no idea that my mind was colonized. And that became paramount ground, conceptual foundation and framework of my work. And then it’s been well received. However, those that I would like to have discourse with don’t come to museums and galleries. And so now the question is: how do I reach out and how do I connect? And how do I create dialogues with folks who have colonized minds who have no idea and so forth? And that’s now urgent. And how do I not make the work didactic? How do I keep its conceptual vigor, yet be able to open up and have dialogues with a variety of people? So that’s an another urgency. So that’s the conceptual. And that’s the urgency that’s placed on the artwork. And then the more practical of how do I organize a professional, you know, studio that won’t interfere with my creative process?
GK: Yeah, I think my urgencies are related to maybe all of what you mentioned, but I wanted to mention that, like, you were saying different times, depending on where you are in life, I think the meaning and the intensity of the urgency are very different. So there was a time that the urgency for me was literally to get a job under the table and pay the bills and be able to ground myself by getting a VISA and staying and being in this precarious place where you don’t even know where you’re going to be in the next three or five years. So, in that space, having a practice had a totally different meaning. The practice was for me to just survive. But then now looking back, you know, my priorities/urgencies have shifted because I haven’t been able to put that behind me. And now, I’m more engaged in my practice and teaching. But I think what I have liked to have throughout–even when I was very life changing major obstacles or priorities to deal with, in addition to an art practice–was to be able to have a conversation and actually reflect back on what is an artistic practice? How does the system sustain? Where are the sources of funding? What kind of practice do I want to pursue? As opposed to following the alleged “formula of success.: So I think that to me, right now, looking around Los Angeles and the larger art world and the world, it’s important for me to be able to have those conversations and talk about what kind of practice do I want to sustain? Or where do I want to say yes. Where do I want to say no. And that ties back to again spaces where you can have a practice that’s more experimental and conceptual and doesn’t need to be didactic. So having a multiplicity and heterogeneity of practicing and what that means, especially as an artist of color and not feeling the burden and the pressure of having to fit within a formula and like behave a certain way is for me, very important. Basically having some air to breathe.
NB: Yeah—this is Nao—and I just want to say that I want to echo what you’re saying, but also just: I have no judgment about any artists, what they do to survive. Because it’s such a slog, you know, to you know… I like, now I’ve already said I’m in a really privileged position to have a full time teaching gig, which is my day gig. But, you know, along the way there’s been so many different possibilities and scenarios that have to do with surviving in order to make the work or to stay focused on the work or to just be able to, you know, say I’m a practicing artist, essentially, you know, and to stay with that. So that seems like a space I just want to respect all the artists who are doing whatever they have to do to make it work.
All: Yeah.
MO: Would you think that the pressure, it feels that some of the pressures that I see with artists, I think, has to do with working so many different hats and so many different venues in order to sustain a practice. So if you’re within an academic setting, you can’t show at a hair salon because that doesn’t necessarily count within that larger, that’s not official mainstream. And so what I, working with a lot of students, is to try… the self care is needed because I feel like you have to do multiple things—if the urgency is to get gallery representation and to show at a mainstream institution, I agree, more power to you on that. The flip side is there’s also students that are artists trying to do multiple fronts, and that’s what I feel can be incredibly taxing. Because you realize that the urgencies that are multiple and require multiple forms, multiple strategies, multiple ways of working—that’s what’s exhausting. Just to hold, Todd, the things that you’ve talked about: intention, I mean, their intention, and then that to me is just very taxing.
JM: Is it like the idea of the artist maybe, I mean, when I introduce myself, I always say: I guess I’m an artist, you know, but thinking about, like, what an artist is and the expectations of… you know what I’m talking about? Like decolonizing one’s mind and the idea of the artist and what it’s attached to, where does it come from, you know. There’s like this myth of this artist and the artist has to, you know, follow this path and has to be making their work and like working as a barista is not like an artist, you know, it’s like deviation from the path or something. I don’t know, maybe there’s like a rethinking of what an artist is.
GK: Yeah. And I think that’s why another thing I’m really interested in is actually experience sharing. Because we’re all in our space trying to figure this out. And again, there’s no guidebook or a website where you go and you have, you know, Quora for artists where you ask: how do I deal with the galleries? Or like: how do I make decisions when a collector approaches me? Or I don’t even know if that’s a scenario. But, so that’s why I’m interested in artists who write for example, as one avenue of, because then you look at an artist’s career, and then you read the writing or autobiography or an interview, and it gives you a completely different image of how this person made a living or how this person survived. And it’s completely refreshing to see that that’s not what I had in mind or like, that’s not the image of the artist that I had perceived as a fan or reviewer or critic, whoever. But when you read their words, or when you talk to them, it’s a completely new perspective on how they make a living, or how they have arrived where they have arrived or what they went through, or are they even happy? Because the projected image is something and the lived experience is completely different.
TG: Yeah, this is Todd. When I got out of grad school, when I got out of Cal Arts in ‘89, I came out with a little bit of heat, and I was acquired. My work was acquired with a couple of museums within two years. And then I got gallery representation. Shoshana Wayne, really immediately. And they had Anselm Kiefer and Yoko Ono and similar ones. I was like the tiny tadpole on the roster. My first show was a group show and it was well-received, things got collected. Second show was a solo show, nothing was collected, even though I had reviews and an LA Times Sunday piece and all this stuff. And then phone calls mysteriously stopped getting answered. And I felt really uneasy. And that’s when I said, you know what–I turned my back to the whole gallery system after that. And I only showed in nonprofit institutions, alternative spaces, because all of my Marxist education screwed that whole system. But then when I wanted to get out and retire, I’m 65 years old. So now I’m entering the autumn phase in my life. And I said, you know, I really want to have a studio practice that sustains itself. So that’s when I made that decision to pursue that. And went after, you know, knocked on doors and so forth and so on. So now my attitude’s quite different. But in that time period, that whole, I felt a bit guilty about selling work–about having privilege, especially as a person of color–and had to go through and sometimes I still manage. I’m sort of embarrassed to share the successes that I’ve had in the last couple of years.
NB: Imposter syndrome.
TG: I mean, I own it, but I don’t like telling other artists. Sure, even though they may know, because I feel like it’s…
NB: You don’t want to seem like an A-hole. That’s, you know, to your credit, but I’m curious about how you work through your process in terms of the colonized mind. And I’m interested in your journey, like, if there was a point that you sort of looked at yourself, and made that sort of distinction. And then kind of how where you are, where you’re at, in your process with that.
TG: Well, no. That’s a good question. Because it wasn’t a choice. It wasn’t a choice. I had no choice because it was such a epiphany, is such a mind blowing experience, to realize the choices I’ve made in my life were predicated on how whiteness defines me as a subject in this culture. And I had no idea that I was making choices based on whiteness, I had no idea that I had an inferiority complex because of whiteness, and when and how culture defines a black man and so forth, until I read Frantz Fanon. And until I read Du Bois and James Baldwin and Toni Morrison and bell hooks, and all these important theorists, and then that bomb came off in my head. And that’s when I decided that I wanted to teach because—wow—theory actually told me something about how my mind had been co-opted, and I had no idea been co-opted. And so I thought, you know what, I’m going to teach. And that’s when I went into that. And then I said, I’m not only going to teach, I’m going to make that part of the work, because that’s so important. And then various iterations of work has followed. And it’s changed. It’s gotten more subtle. It was photo text piece: We are colonized. Frantz Fanon says.
All: Laughter.
TG: And then later on as iterations and boredom and process and practice went, it became more sublimated in the work and became the conceptual framework. And now I’m showing at Pomona College Museum of Art. We have really extensive programming and I show up at the museum, about three times a month to talk to people and have conversations and be available. But having all the programming: talk about mental colonization, self care, eating right, all sorts of things. And so I’ve noticed that the agency that I have as an artist is to really get involved with the programming too, and to tell those institutions to reach out so that we can actually have discussions or play music. And then well, why is this music along with this art exhibit? And what’s in tap to open up multiple discussions, because what I found is: I cannot just rely on the artwork alone, to create, to open people’s heads to what I’d like to be discussed.
NB: I want to just flag something you said which is, it was a mistake, he said: “And museums collected me, I mean, my art” and it was thinking about, I kind of hung on this idea that as artists, you know, and we get kind of pulled apart in different ways. You know, emotionally, we connect with our work so much and in face of the institution or different institutions that we interface with that idea of, you know, giving ourselves away or selling ourselves or. And also I’m totally willing to sell out if anyone’s listening if you want to buy I’m there to sell out. But I’m kidding, not kidding. But I was thinking about that space of self care and how in the forefront it is now in terms of people’s works, you know, creating spaces to relax, creating spaces to express yourself or, or spaces for the public to come and express themselves. And I think, you know, even though I try to avoid locating trends in art, I think that it is really at the forefront right now this idea of self care for community or for artists.
TG: Mm hmm.
MO: And why?
NB: Well, I guess it’s just because, as you know, people are run ragged, you know, in the survival game, I think. You know, when I was younger, most of my time was spent sort of saying yes to things and doing things and pushing myself. And now I find my struggles more about finding open space to kind of sit inside of you know.
TG: I think you heard this reticence about being collected by museums early, is that I thought I had now entered the Emerald City, I’ve gotten past the gate, my life was set. And that was nothing further from the truth. It was just a couple of institutions now have pieces of mine that goes on a wall and that’s it. And my students, I remember when I shared with them I was and this was in a MOCA collection, LACMA collection early on, they said, Wow, how did it feel? And I said, Well, you know, the first show, I went in, and I was jazzed for about five minutes and then after that, it was the piece on a white wall. And that was that. And I said it didn’t equal the extreme pleasure I got when I saw the piece in my studio and I said: Oh, damn, that shit is happening. I said: nothing has equaled that. And I said: you know what, that’s what we all have available is that moment of recognition that the work is singing. And that happened. I said: nothing has equaled to this day, when it’s in my wall in my studio, and I recognize it. And it doesn’t matter how much validation, peer validation, institutional validation I get, nothing is equal to the high that I get in the studio. And I told everybody: that’s what you, that’s what we all have. That’s what we have. Everything else is something else.
GK: That’s what scares I think, I think those moments– this is Gelare, again– those moments where you’re… it’s you and the work and this moment of peace or happiness, like actual happiness without having to share it with anyone or projected or brag about it or put it in an application or like put a price on it. I think those are, I think those moments are, like, they’re a non-commodified self care moment. Those are precious. And I think those are radical moments. I mean might sound like a stretch. But I think everything in this market economy– especially with social media, which is a whole can of worms, which we may or may not open today–I think everything is so, kind of, projected and relying on like a future tense of what this is going to look like, or who’s going to look at it. So it’s like the economy of gazes that those moments are more and more scary, especially for young artists like myself. There’s always this pressure that this is going to be it’s almost like a movie in the making, as opposed to like, looking at a beautiful sunset. And you know, I might be romanticizing this. And you know, art has been commercial for the longest time. It’s not a new phenomenon, but I think those are things that I’m looking for, in search of, more and more. And that requires an investment of time but also an attention. Being, you know, having slept well or, you know, having the space for you to feel comfortable. And those things are getting really hard to find for me. And that ties to the economy, of course, but also there’s a non-monetary economy that’s also having a role in that.
JM: Are you talking about like the moments you have with your work?
GK: Yeah, with like moments of relative calm and peace without the noise and the anxiety of: where this is going? Or how is this going to be projecting into, you know, a future application where I can get funding or what does my galleries think? Or what does my neighbor think, or you know, X, Y, and Z? Is it good enough for a critic to write about? You know, like, everything gets immediately translated into some sort of currency. I think a lot of us are under those pressures. And just to have that moment of intimacy and joy of making something that may go out in the world, this moment that you feel like the work has done or like you’re editing something. It’s the last cut, exporting your file. This is looking good for yourself.
MO: So like an awareness. Like those moments are being very present in that moment rather than reflecting back or projecting…
GK: Because at the end, who I think I became—became is kind of a strange word— but I guess I’m an artist because I don’t want to be a banker. Or I’m an artist because I don’t want to be a real estate agent. So it’s nice to not have to talk about: “how fancy this floor is,” the way that I talked about how awesome my work is, you know, like, it’s good not to have to always do that. And I think those moments are rather freer moments where you really take joy in making art. And it’s fun. Do you have, like, a kind of, like, your ideal kind of place where the art, like, is it for you and you and for your friends to share? And like, do you think there’s like a place that you can exist in, outside of, like, how the art world kind of functions? I mean, that I think ties to the second question that Mario had for us. Yeah, one thing I would love to have more of is artist run spaces and independent space. In this city, it’s getting harder and harder to sustain, to open to, to show out because of money, because of money, obviously, and you know. Yeah, and I, I’ve never run a space but I know that they need money to sustain themselves. And hence, you know, the closing one after another of spaces in LA, but also elsewhere. It’s not just an LA problem. Yeah. So I think yeah, I mean, hanging out at an opening where you feel like a connection to people and it’s less about how this is gonna blow tomorrow on Instagram and it’s more about this is a fun time. We’re talking looking at art, sharing a drink. I think those things still exists, but I think that they’re becoming more scarce.
JM: Yeah, this is Jennifer. Thinking about just like art, like how art functions within the art world as it is now is like, it’s like a continual form of validation. You know, like, everything is in, like, needing that validation to, like, continue on. And that’s the thing that always gets me so, like, upset, depressed, because I feed into that. And then I don’t get the award, I don’t get the write up and then I get so depressed and then feel like my, my work is not valid in some way. And then, kind of going off what you’re saying talking about, like, seeing your work in like a museum. I think I like always think or have this hope that having my work in a museum or some kind of institution means that it’s changing the system somehow, like it’s smuggling something in to change the system. But then it’s like, not, and that’s, like, the disappointment for me. You know, like, because I want to, like, change systems ultimately.
GK: But it’s not black and white–I’m Gelare again–it, you know, it might change in one way or another like with one work, not all the work in this moment, not that moment. I think those things are very context specific. And as artists, we’re not always aware of how the work is functioning on its own or in an institution or outside of institution. But you’ve smuggled some stuff in museums that have changed things, I’m sure.
NB: But maybe not all of it is a product that changes things that might be the relationships that you have on the way or right? You know, I think about, like ,product and process. And art almost as different things and the art more exists in my mind. And then it can exist in the product or it can exist in the process. And, you know, ideally, it’s all the same thing, but oftentimes, the product or the snapshot of the process, the thing that gets created, you know, may or may not have the vibrancy that you have in the way that you’re thinking about it, you know. And so there’s something, I think, to be said about these kind of frameworks and structures that have been built up around this idea of being an artist that, you know, can function in a very lopsided way. In terms of moving the project forward, you know, the project of being an artist. And I think about the idea of artist, I like the label of “artists” because I have a lot of lateral movement. Right now, I’m working on designing a new speculum, and that’s a medical object. You know, and I’m designing it as an artist and I think that the label of “artists” is just so open for me, you know, personally, I think primarily because I’ve largely existed outside of what are considered the pathways for successful artists. You know, and I think that’s where the lateral movement comes.
TG: I mean, I when I got out of school BFA in 1979 got my BFA at Cal Arts. Before that I was a music photographer. So I just went right back into the music business shooting album covers, and that would fund me so that I could take a month or six weeks off. An album cover could pay the rent for two months, and then I could take time off and do my work. So that’s how I did it. I exhibited and didn’t have to teach anything because I had a commercial photo business. But then hardcore gangsta rap came in, and my relationships with subjects–then basically them seeing me as a bourgeois black–there was a lot of disrespect and I said: oh man, it’s time for me to get out of this game and move on. And that’s when I started full-time teaching and so forth.
NB: Yeah, like the constant of you being an artist seems to be the through-line here, right, that you took on these different kind of ways of surviving.
TG: Yeah. And but then I really kept them separate, like church and state. But I don’t think… I think times have changed that a young person doesn’t have to do that. It’s because art has gotten to the point where we see it’s all context. The same piece here in this arena is commercial, you take it out, you put it in another arena, and now it’s fine art, you know. So the fluidity of work and the porousness of the institutions defines or helps not fix the definition of an object, thing. But I think I was just trying to say how I was able to survive and make work. And that was through these commercial means, but I was always conflicted. Am I an artist? Am I, you know, you know, because I am living comfortably. And I thought that, I bought that whole notion that you’re supposed to suffer, you’re supposed to be barely above the poverty line. And all this, you know, this very ancient notion. And it wasn’t until many, many years later, when I read Air Guitar by Dave Hickey. And he there was this quote that I always repeat:”The biggest compliment you can give an artist is not to say you like it, but to buy the work, because that means you are helping that artists sustain their practice.” And that’s when I read that I said, damn, I’m not going to have any more issues then about selling work. Because that’s the final that is saying something. Yeah, I’m going to help you sustain your practice. I’m going to buy the work.
MO: Absolutely.
GK: I think, for example, the wage conversation, the artist’s wage labor is very crucial. I think it was one of the most impactful open dialogues that we’ve had as artists, the fact that, yes, it’s important to buy the work, but also artists do a lot of labor that goes uncompensated. And we have no language. We used to have no language like, publicly, to even ask for that. But I think even the tiny little honorarium that we get by like showing in a group show at a nonprofit, I think those things add up. And I think those are part of the sustaining of a practice, whether or not you sell.
JM: And the selling of work is also such a complicated thing. Like I’m always like: who’s buying work? Like who has the money to buy work and how do they make the decisions to buy work? And that’s like so entangled with, you know who you are and like, you know, if you have your name in something and like and it becomes like, it feels like a collecting of the person rather than the actual work like, like, how does that system work. I don’t know. I’m really interested in ideas of scrooging. Operation Scrooge. You’ve heard me talk about this.
GK: Scrooging.
JM: Okay, so, okay, so Scrooging is this idea that the only reason or the main reason that someone holds on to resources and power is unacknowledged trauma. So like, so scrooging is, you know, taken from the story of like Ebenezer Scrooge, who’s like, you know, transformed into a kinder, gentler man after the visitations of ghosts from his past, present, future. And so this was started with this group called the Legion of Hackers for the Revolution. So it was originally like a hacking cleaning kind of group and it was right after the elections. And so it’s like taking the principles of the revolution, which is like always operate from a place of vengeance, then you can choose the most expansive route, which is basically giving the most options to the greatest number of people. And so it’s based also on this movie Brothers Bloom. It’s about these two con brothers who, who one of the oldest brother defines the greatest con is one where everyone involves gets what they want, including the target of the con. So it’s also like this idea of like inception. So it’s like this, like a conning hacking mission to like, pick like that target. And then you Scrooge the person by like, kind of like acknowledging, like, bringing up their past traumas, and then giving them tools to lovingly acknowledge the trauma and then once that trauma is acknowledged, and they’ll just like let go of their hold of like, money and power. Yeah.
NB: So like the ghosts. were, you know, actually the trauma that the ghosts were causing Scrooge allowed him to come to terms with his trauma and then be generous.
JM: Okay. Yeah, like once that person kind of lovingly kind of befriends and acknowledges…
NB: You’re one of my favorite wormholes. I love it.
JM: We should do con operations, scrooge missions. I got a list of my screwdrivers because…
GK: I was thinking like, how does this happen? Do they psychoanalyze the person needs to come from and like…?
JM: Yeah, well, it’s like a common mission. So we have, you know, have a lot of recon a lot of digging into their past. And you set up people to play certain parts in their lives to like, you know, get their trust.
NB: And is that like people who work in development? Is that what you mean?
JM: I mean, kinda, but like, it’s, you know, you assume that it’s towards like…
GK: …revolution and abundance for all. Hmm.
JM: I mean, there’s ethical issues, obviously. Central.
MO: I like the idea of scrooging because it’s all organized around a multiplicity like so you’re creating multiple opportunities for all these different people involved into that, even the person who’s getting scrooged. And I like, that’s a strategy. Right? That’s, that’s a strategy for making a living.
JM: And also, it’s a strategy that, like, it doesn’t have to be this huge production, but it’s kind of how I think about how I interact and talk to people in general. You know, like, when we talked earlier now about like, teaching, how to smuggle in conversations about trauma and feelings and difficult emotions. I approach it in like a scourging kind of way. Perhaps you can offer up another question.
MO: Most of us went into teaching as the foundation for making a living. And you all have expressed reservations about the notion of the artist and have reconfigured or rethought and actively rethought those ideas that we inherit from art historians like myself that do it every semester, replay those. I try to break apart those myths to go into teaching, do you? How do you see that as a way to affect change to smuggle in those ideas like, because all of us opted to go into that? And not necessarily. I don’t think any of us said at some day, I’m going to be a professor, or I’m going to be an art teacher. And that, for me is a really interesting question is how we all end up into that space where I think most of us probably believed early on, and still to this day: I feel like I don’t necessarily belong in that space. And I think through microaggressions, it’s constantly, I’m reminded. So I’m just curious as to one, how you’ve rethought that and why you entered into that arena? So how have you rethought the idea of the artist in order to maybe go back to what you were saying taught about making? I feel it’s an ethical decision. Like I, as an art historian, my entire field is based on stealing, and coming out of the Enlightenment project and colonialism and imperialism and capitalism. Like you can’t, you can’t build an art history program without those things. And so I, I always feel like that’s how I ended up there, in this position. It is a really strange thing because on paper that doesn’t make any sense. I should leave that and let it decay. So how did you step into that role of the artist the notion of the artist and then why teaching?
NB: Well, I have a pretty clear trajectory so I can just tell my story–this is Nao–I came into being an artist from a really inspired place. Like, I felt almost as if I was being talked to by aliens or, or God or some thing. I think I was having actually a psychotic break, to be honest, because I was having this experience of like hearing voices outside of myself and that kind of thing. And now when I look at it retrospect, I think I was having some kind of psychotic break, but at the time, I was very accepting of this weird, you know, position in between the worlds. And so, I started performing from that space of feeling like, there was something that I needed to transmit to people or my community or people who were around me that could not be expressed in other ways, right? Other than through performance, or through action or, you know, some kind of body poetics or dreamlike activities. So that’s where I started as an artist. But you know, it’s probably no big surprise that the kind of work I do is not enough. Sara Lee, you know, has a really strong place in the market in general terms. And so I was working with Coco Fusco, we were doing a tour, a performance tour. And you know, she’s the ultimate, professional, ultimate academic. And she just sort of sat me down and had a talking to me. She said: what are you planning to do? I mean, the people at the height of your career are making, or the people at the height of what you’re doing are making X amount of money. You know, she had all the figures, this is what people are making. This is the most you’re gonna make. You need to do something or you get health insurance. You have a lot to give to people. Why don’t you go back to school. I’d already been a practicing artist for about 15 years when I went to graduate school to get my degree at the San Francisco Art Institute. And because I’d already been a practicing artist, you know, I think that that’s what really helped me get into teaching and get a gig, right? Get a teaching gig. But it took me about 10 years before I even felt like I was a good English teacher. Like, it’s such a process, right, of learning. And now I feel like my role is very much more about creating. Not to be, this sounds so cheesy, but I feel like creating community is a really big part of my teaching role now, which is about about creating a space where we could all learn from each other. And, you know, I, of course, try to bring any expertise I have to my students to help them leverage their lives, to help them, you know, have a little bit more information or give them perspective, give them knowledge or show them things. But they equally show me a lot of things. And so I really feel that there’s a back and forth between me and my students. And now my teaching is really alongside my practice, because I get to have all these great conversations with young artists. And so I think that it’s gone from being like a kind of mode of survival to being, you know, a way forward. So that for me is sort of the path I’ve taken. I went from being cuckoo to being Coco. Coco, to well just, you know, being, you know, having having professional morales.
GK: Yeah, for me, I’m pretty new. I have to say I’m not even at a stable teaching position, but I think I did say that I’m going to be a professor. Because one: I love teaching. A lot of people do. But two: I think having chosen, I mean, I think I make a lot of conscious decisions about my work that then enacts a certain presence in the art world. It’s received in a specific way. And I think part of that I did make the conscious decision that I don’t want to rely on my artwork as a source of income at some point in my life, that doesn’t mean that I did a lot of fancy jobs, you know. I had all kinds of jobs, whatever they didn’t reject me from. Corporate nine-to-five cubicle jobs to other things, teaching Middle School. So that was one thing I needed to have an income, however small, that didn’t come from the sales of my work because one I was not making the kind of work that would sell easily. And two: I didn’t want to be under that kind of pressure. So that was something that I made a decision about partly probably out of circumstances that I was living in. But then at some point it became something that I respected in my practice. And then I think the other thing is: I do think about my practice in general not just as art practice. There’s a practice and that practice has different aspects to it. One is writing. One is the practice, art practice. And the other one is teaching. And I see the three of them really feeding off each other maybe in a way that only serves me. Hopefully it also serves my students at least, but I feel a little suffocated when I’m just pinned down as one thing. That’s why I’m not an expert on anything. But I do multiple things. And I think having an outlet such as writing, it allowed for a lot more openness in my practice. And then teaching is a way for me to be constantly looking back at how I was taught, and how to undo parts of that or how to share that experience with the students that this is my trajectory. And these are the things that educated me, in or outside of the institution. And these might be resources that you have access to, but you don’t look at themselves as a source of learning. So I think it’s a way of looking back at my practice and my trajectory, but also putting out in the world, among quite a small group of students however, and for that also to do what it’s supposed to do in the world, you know, in parallel to my work or maybe in contrast to my work.
TG: Yeah, this is Todd. When I realized in my commercial work, I was only getting assignments from magazines, record companies, other thing, I was only allowed to shoot black subjects. And that’s when I realized, oh, there’s apartheid. There’s an apartheid system here and and then I looked around and in the early civil rights movement the way to the middle class or what have you was teaching. There’s a long history of black teachers so I realized, oh, I’ve got to see how, I’ve got to take note of that. So I went and got my graduate degree. Also, to have that option, because I, haha, thought that there weren’t those kind of restrictions in academia. And I was able to be a freeway flyer, teaching at Art Center in the morning, UCLA in the afternoon and Otis at night. You know, in one day, you eat in the car as you’re driving on the freeway. So I did that for a while until I got enough experience on my resume that I was able to get a tenure track job. But why did I want to teach besides the financial security? Also, I wanted to be in an endeavor that was intellectually stimulating. Because if I’m not in the studio, I want to be talking about art. I want to be engaging, I want my mind to be there. And then also, my experience with Alan Sekula at Cal Arts. He, I had no idea that myself, that I had lower self worth until I was reading all of these theoretical books, texts, and authors that Alan turned me on to. And I had no idea that art and just reading books and so forth, could make you self aware. And I became self aware and I became conscious. And I wanted to be that catalyst to others and I thought, oh, this is very worthy to be that catalyst in as an instructor. So that’s why another reason I went into that field
JM: That’s beautiful. Yes, yeah, yeah, similar. Yeah. But I always feel very fraudulent in everything that I do. Like I was an artist because it was just like a fluke that UCLA didn’t ask for, like portfolios. And so I was like, I couldn’t write an essay. I went to Orange, the Orange County High School, the arts are where it was housed at the high school. And so like I, similar with the teaching, like I’m also very new. My first semester teaching a full time job and feeling very like, like not like fraudulent. I feel like that’s my leading way into things: feeling that I don’t fit or something or feeling I’m gonna get like fired or kicked out at any moment. Teaching is similar. I mean, to have that kind of relationship with people and feeling like building something like building the possibilities of alternative worlds or new worlds with young people is incredible. And I learned also so much. Like so humbled all the time and like, also often traumatized, like, anxiety every day. Like what’s gonna happen today? And also just interested in institutions in general. I feel like institutional, like secrecy is gonna be, like, the death of us all.
NB: Yeah, it’s weird how institutions are us. And yet they’re not, as you know, how they’re people but they’re not people. That is like, a bizarre thing. I think about the institutional spaces. It’s just a set of people. But then at the same time, it’s about like, power, semi-superstructure or something.
JM: I’ve been getting a lot of support. They’ve been like really great, but I had this like, meeting with the chair where she said, at one point, like: I’m the institution. And at first it really freaked me out. I was like: what the fuck is happening? And then, but then, I was talking to Alex And Luke and Darla, and Alex was like: you are the institution. And then I was like: oh shit, I AM the institution, but it was like, I was like this resistance of like, a power or something. And then realizing like: oh, no, I am the institution as well, which means that I actually can maneuver it, within the institution in a way to maybe enact change some way. Yeah. Institutions.
NB: Yeah, I’ve had different mentors over the years, and some who would say, I wake up every day, and I say: I’m not part of that–you know, named the school–and that was how they functioned, and others who embraced their role as being, you know, part of the institution, as a way. But both mentors are both both ways. I think we’re about effecting change and it’s very incremental. I mean, there’s very few times I mean, this revolution that you speak of Jennifer, you know, it’s sort of the revolution happens quickly, but that prep time is long. Yeah. Right. Very, very long. When it happens, it’s gonna be fast. But you know, I’ve been waiting for a long time. So a lot of prep time. Yeah. For the revolution. Stay ready. So you don’t have to get ready.
MO: I was thinking of Sarah Ahmed’s book, Living a Feminist Life. And when she talks about creating your own support systems, that that’s sort of an imperative. And I think that within, I’m wondering, within institutions, if you feel that you can, that there are allies and can you create best support network or system within that system that works or functions even slightly different? Yeah.
NB: I think there are a lot of allies, but people are so wrapped up in their own mission in a way that it’s like, it has to it’s like getting into relationship, everything has to line up, right. You have to be emotionally ready, etc, etc. And I think it’s sort of like every, your missions have to sort of align or rub against each other. I find it’s not very often in an institutional power setting. People that can actually move my interests along are usually people in power that have some kind of alignment with my mission, right. So if if my mission is to expand diversity, inclusivity, let’s say or to you know, create more scholarship within our program or something very straightforward like that. Then, you know, it’s a little bit of a crapshoot in terms of finding those holes or something where you can climb that or try to get people on board because everyone has their own mission. So there’s a way in which I feel well, right now I’m in somewhat of a leadership position as a director of a program. But I don’t, you know, I don’t really have a lot of power beyond sort of the relationships with my own students in a way. But I feel almost as if it would be good if leaders in institutional spaces could get together if they want and like prioritize the missions or something so that everyone could pull on one thing and make it happen. Oh, this is the most important thing. We have all these students at risk. We need to take care of them first, and then the next thing and then the next thing, and then if everyone can agree on those things, then I think we can move forward. But it’s very much like everyone has different kinds of missions, and they can group together in one way. And I don’t know, I find the whole, the whole project very complicated and ended up being very much about my personal relationships with people. Yeah, that’s the only place I really feel like I have the power.
TG: I’d like to pick up on that from a different perspective, please. I was in this last Whitney Biennial. And so when there was a lot of protests about getting them out, and then I think it was in the summer. Well, there are two moves. One was the artists letter where a bunch of us signed that saying, we’re, you know, he needs to step down. And then finally, finally, when Nicole Eisenman made this moved to remove her work, and sat down this mandate, and you know, encouraged, I don’t know she encouraged but she made that move. And then I was in a small subgroup of people that I knew, and we spoke privately, about what this do. We want to do that, what will that accomplish? Or how is this going to affect our work, having a platform? And now removing it from that platform, will that do the bit? Will that have the benefit? Will that cause a mute, a muting, a muzzling of our voice? And because it’s very complex, you know, and how often will we have a platform and stage to communicate our ideas like this one at the at the Whitney Biennial? And then where are you in your career? So some of the younger cats were going like, Oh, Jesus, no. This I mean, I’m, you know, I’m 65 I’m like having like, you know, I’ll just do my thing. Fuck it, whatever it is, because I’m, you know, so my perspective is very different. So everyone has their individual agendas, their collective agenda, and then there’s criticism. Yeah, Nicole can do what she’s selling. She did six figures, you know, there’s, there were so many different dialogues and quotes. It’s very, very difficult to parse but it was good just having these conversations, private private conversations.
JM: Shows you the ways in which the system is treats bodies differently, you know, because it also has to do with a subject position, you know, and so it just like highlights the weight the systems… Yeah. And so like, you know, some people can do that, because of like, a lot of privileges. And kind of maybe going back what you were saying about like, well, in the very beginning about like how artists , what they have to do to survive, they survive, you know. And maybe it’s about, like, seeing where we have, each of us are able to maneuver the most in terms of like our privileges, and like making moves like that.
TG: And then I also quantified my relationship with one of the key curators and how this might affect her. In you know, when you look back: oh, that was a biennial where that curator couldn’t keep any of the artists until… And that became for me, that was part of the story equation to weigh my decision not only on canvas, but how this might affect her.
NB: What was your kind of takeaway or was there any kind of thing that you took from that? Besides the complexity of the relationships? I mean, was there a kind of nugget that we can all learn from in the future? Because it seemed like such an important moment, you know,
TG: Oh, it was really important. And I was really down with the first phase when we signed the letter and so forth and the protests were going on, but to actually remove work late into the show. I that didn’t feel right for me. Yes. So I couldn’t do it. I’ll say one thing. There was some interest by a collector and then I did some research and I saw that it was fucking dirty money. And it was from black, from blood diamonds and some other bullshit in Africa. And I told my galleries you know, no, you know. I don’t think I would have even researched before. I had had that experience, right? So there is now I’m actually now asking those questions for whom who wants to buy this work, and we’ve got to vet that person, because just don’t sell that shit. And that’s another thing. There are different galleries with different intentions, there are galleries who are there for the work and see it in relationship to art history and want to position the work. And there are other galleries out there that want to sell whoever has the money to put on the table. So when as an artist, you need to be cognizant of that.
NB: It’s such an interesting philosophical question because you know, I can of course think about it philosophically because my work doesn’t really look that way. So you know, it’s really only philosophical for me. But you know, this idea of money being clean or money being dirty, who you get in bed with, is it important, is it not important, does the art actually change that? That person’s real, that person’s identity, you know. So some people say: well, this company is buying this particular art because they want to help clean up their own identity or their own marks. Right. But then, is that the case? Or is the art sucking that dirty money out of the world and giving it to the artists to create like…
GK: One or the other? It is.
MO: It overlaps.
GK: Yeah. I don’t think there’s such a thing as no agenda. There’s always an agenda. It doesn’t mean that it’s always like Lakeman. You know, there’s always an agenda when there’s money and investment at play. But I don’t think those things are mutually exclusive. Like it could be that the money is going to an artist who goes out in the world does something amazing. At the same time, it’s covering up like some really problematic politics of, you know…
NB: …someone giving art a lot of power, like the power, the idea that art could somehow change the reputation of oil company or something like that.
TG: Media perception. Yeah. I also okay.
MO: Mean, it might not affect any change, it might, it might not have any real change, but it changes perception.
JM: Or reverse, it changes the perception of the artist, right.
GK: I mean, there are countries with state departments, you know, are like literally getting together talking about how much money goes into funding, exhibitions, institutions that cover up their human rights abuses. Like it’s not even at a small scale. It’s at the level of the government of like 50 countries, you know, so I do think it’s important to acknowledge that power and be able to use it as leverage whenever you can. If you have to drive to push against institutions or like bring change, or at least bring dialogue, right? Open up space for dialogue.
TG: And look how a representation of people of color, specifically representation of black people is like: look, we’re in films, we’re doing this, we’re doing that, all these components that represents justice and forward thinking. But yeah, but what about jobs? What about health care? What about housing? That’s the same. So representation is used as a signifier of progress and change. But the actual conditions remain the same, if not worse. Yep. So the representation is bullshit, right?
NB: In that way, it’s like the minute you gotta be in the room. Yeah, you know, you’re gonna affect change. You have to sit at the table. You have to be there. You have to do the work. You have to be present, you know, gotta be at the table. Academy.
TG: Which is funny. That’s one of the curators at the Whitney [Museum of American Art] on a private conversation I had with her was saying: hey, you know, if we’re not at the table, if this voice isn’t there to say something, it’s not heard, and it’s business as usual. That’s why it’s so important to navigate those spaces and work within a system, and that that’s her strategy to affect change.
NB: Yeah. And it’s interesting because, you know, this kind of criticism against Nicole in a way. It’s like I think also because of her privileged position, her pulling the work made a larger statement, you know, so I think it cuts both ways.
TG: Right. Right, right. Yeah, I’m not. Yeah,
NB: I know. You weren’t specifically criticized. You said some said. Yeah. Criticism existed in the world.
TG: Good. I could be a politician. Yes.