Boris GROYS: Any intellectual activity is based on risk

Boris Groys is an eminent American and Russian art critic, art theorist, philosopher, writer, and publicist. The enumeration of his titles would take quite a while: professor of philosophy, art theory, and media theory at the Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design, and professor of Russian and Slavic Studies at the New York University, etc. It was due to his efforts that the world learned about the USSR’s unofficial art. Groys has also done a colossal work to analyze and reveal the mythology of the Soviet-era visual language. His influence on the processes in modern art is hard to overestimate.

Earlier last week Groys visited Kyiv with a talk, which is part of the discussion platform of the First Kyiv International Modern Art Biennial, ARSENALE 2012. We met before the talk.

Let us probably start with self-identification. What kind of figure is an art historian and critic today?

“Traditionally, a critic evaluates a piece of art, he is a well-informed representative of the public and tells them what is good and what is bad. It seems to me that today this figure is not really important. The situation is very pluralistic. A critic ceases to be a bearer of taste. I have already written about this. It is indecent to appear naked in public. People tend to wear at least a pair of trunks or a bikini. These trunks or bikini tend to correspond to the artist’s surname and the name of the work. Then come the rest of the clothes. These clothes actually represent the job of the critic or theorist, who integrates art in a broader context.

“For instance, I never write about the work of art proper, because it will manifest itself. I write about the function it can perform, the problems it can respond to, the extant analogical works, or other possible points of view – that is, I introduce the artist’s work to the general cultural process. Taken in itself, a work of art is a nonsocial object, it is not introduced in culture. Its socialization is done via language. Works of art may be interesting, but if they have not been socialized and if they have not become the object of authors’ and theorists’ attention, they will fade away and out of view. They do not get included in the system of education, discussion, and they are never referred to. This process of socialization is vital in art, and this is what I do with artists.”

While you are speaking of clothes, I have other associations. I see the critic as a creator of certain frames or binders.

“Yes, but not 100 percent true. Both frames and binders unite, but they also separate. I would say that text reveals and determines the message and the communicative aspect of the painting, of the work of art. Critical text includes this object in the system of social communications. The artist can do it himself. Malevich was known to do it.”

And he was quite good at it.

“Joseph Beuys [an outstanding German conceptual artist. – Author] also did this, and quite successfully. Picasso, for one, never did, while Warhol did by half. At any rate, this job needs to be done. It should be done either by the theorist, or (in part) by the artist. But no work of art will function without this work, meant to socialize it and reveal its communicative aspect.”

You have come to Kyiv to give a talk as part of the discussion platform of the First Kyiv International Modern Art Biennial, ARSENALE 2012. What does your experience tell you about this project’s prospects?

“I think the prospects are good. First of all, I love the space, the Arsenal. Today I have spent a lot of time there. Firstly, the building is beautiful, and secondly, it can become a venue for various projects, from very traditional to too radical. This is a rare property. I also think that there is good will on the part of the masterminds. If it continues like this, the project will be a success.”

What needs to be done to keep the initial impulse strong, and prevent the project from degrading?

“There is only one recipe, which may seem very naive, but it plays a key role. This is an American saying, ‘never give up.’ It is the only thing that matters, the only thing that works. Keep working. Ignore the criticism, failures, everything else, and just keep on working. And then comes what Alexander Pushkin described as a godsend of habit: ‘Instead of happiness, say I, custom’s bestowed us from on high’ [translated by Ch. Johnston. – Ed.]. Even those people who do not accept modern art and do not understand its problems, begin to get accustomed to it. The effect of habit plays a huge role in culture. This is the main recipe: to accustom people to coming here on a regular basis. Once it grows into a custom, everything is okay.”

This is the strategy which underlies Viktor Pinchuk’s Art Center in Kyiv.

“Garage Art Center in Moscow showed how fast it works. They were able to get their public accustomed to it in a very short time. People grew into a habit of going there to see what is going on.”

You have written a lot about a remarkable conceptual artist of Ukrainian origin Illia Kabakov. In fact, you discovered him for the world. By the way, he is my fellow citizen, I also come from Dnipropetrovsk. All in all, conceptualism constitutes an entire epoch in Soviet and post-Soviet art. Conceptualism is known to have effectively ruined ideological dogmas, the dead officialese – but what has it created?

“I am not even sure that it was ruining, as a matter of fact. It was rather critical work on material. But you know, critical work mostly acts as memory. If we speak of the USSR today, we generally mention Kabakov’s installations, and some works by Komar and Melamid [a duet of conceptualists who made a witty use of the esthetics of Soviet posters. – Author]. It looks as if there is nothing else left from the USSR. This is why Sots-Art [a style in art which mocked social realism. – Author] and Moscow conceptualism historically became mediators in the preservation of Soviet culture, mentality, and life of the epoch. Just because it was critical and sober work, it has proved effective in terms of historical memory. All the rest looks false to us today, but it does not.”

How curious. Thus, irony, which has always been considered a very sarcastic weapon, here served as preservative.

“Yes, irony here acts as preservative. What matters is the sense of authenticity and lack of falsehood. This critical, ironic attitude persuades the viewer that what he sees is true. At the same time, if you start adorning, it will leave an aftertaste of lie.

“I would like to come back to what I have been saying about communicativeness. Not only did they preserve this very specific Soviet experience, they also communicated it. In particular, Kabakov found such means of international communication: first of all, via his art, but also via texts. Besides, conceptualism cannot be reduced only to the problem of Soviet identity. Here, a great role is played by the problem of emptiness and the problem of death. All Kabakov’s characters die or disappear, even the body is gone. Total evanescence, absolute emptiness. This is more profound than any work with reality. Now many in the West respond to it. I am teaching in the US, and I have taught a lot in Germany and I can see how my students respond to the themes of emptiness and absence, how close it is to them, because this is the theme of our entire modern civilization, and everyone faces it.”

The boom of conceptualism has also given rise to postmodernism, whose reign (not only in art) has until recently seemed absolute. Now the situation is changing – in what direction do you think?

“Today the global art system is very pluralistic. Everything is developing simultaneously. Speaking of fashion, today all eyes are on everything related to performance, acting, and the eventful aspect of art. Art as an event, rather than as an object. Which does not mean that people are not doing anything else.”

I would rather like to concentrate on attitudes. It seems to me that new art is making a stronger emphasis on ethic accents, or isn’t it?

“It probably is. But I would reword it. Postmodernism is ‘post,’ that is, ‘after.’ As such, postmodern art mostly dealt with the past. It was playing with quotes and with old styles. When you work with the past, you develop a sense of something almost like cynicism: a certain sense of irresponsibility, since you work with something that is no more. You feel certain relaxedness. No matter what, words still play a great role. After postmodern art, they started talking about contemporary art. If you switch from playing with the past, with quotes, to the present moment, and if you work in performance and are engaged in the art of action, it means the events here and now. It creates more tension, the relaxedness is gone, but the degree of responsibility grows. Maybe, it is ethical, political, or social responsibility.”

How important is the ethical aspect to your fellow critics?

“Frankly, I take the ethical aspect skeptically. Is the ethical something good, and the unethical something evil? For me, the good and the bad are very abstract categories. There are a great many good people, who are not engaged in art – and conversely, among artists there are quite a few individuals, whose principles are not quite ethical. When someone writes, everyone understands what their ends are, at the end of The Day. We are living at this moment in time, in this situation, and we want to achieve something. There is a moment of responsibility for what a man wants to achieve. You promote someone in your articles. I think that it is right.”

And what is wrong?

“Neutral objectivism. It gets on my nerves. It seems to me that anyone, who writes about art, should be very clear about their standpoint. They must state clearly what they are interested in, why they do it, and what their goals are – and then the article becomes clearer.”

I mean that an artist’s or writer’s esthetic standpoint is a clear and usual phenomenon, but what about a critic?

“With critics it is just the same. My standpoint dictates my choice of artists I write about. If an artist has a different social or political stand, and I get a proposal to write about him or her, I refuse.”

Yes, this must be the most important criterion. For instance, I will never share some of my colleagues’ admiration for Leni Riefenstahl [a female German film director, associated with the Nazis. – Author].

(Laughing.) “Well, I like her too.”

Speaking of totalitarianism: the USSR was quite a modernist project, as far as its spirit is concerned, and here I quite agree with you. What do you make of today’s Putin’s Russia?

“Putin’s Russia, just as today’s America and France, and the entire world, is in state of transition from the “cold war,” where everything is clear and definite, to something new. I am inclined to think that it is going to be something close to the Chinese model: a combination of authoritarian socialism and capitalism. But I might be wrong here. At any rate, it seems to me that all countries are involved in the process of building a new balance. Russia, just like other countries, is searching for its place. It is totally obscure who its allies are, the West or China. It is not clear who it is with, or who it is against. Now everything is so unstable. A typical transitional situation.”

Among all this instability, is doubt the intellectual’s privilege or curse?

“Of course, it is a privilege. Everyone has doubts, but everyone conceals them. Meanwhile, intellectuals have the right to express them. Sigmund Freud gave the best answer to this question: ‘My theory is good for all but intellectuals and artists, because their complexes are okay.’”

What adds more sense to your professional existence?

“I don’t think about it. I am the child of my time and I don’t really believe in the powers of self-reflection. We get a lot from the outside, sense in particular. For ourselves, it is very hard to understand what we do. This understanding comes from the outside, from social life, from history. We cannot control it. This is a sort of risk. I think that any intellectual, artistic activity is based on risk. This is something like mountain climbing. The only thing you sense here is individual risk. It is impossible to say what it will lead to. I only have a feeling of risk and chance.”