Katy Deepwell

Interview by William Furlong

from Audio Arts Magazine Volume 18 Numbers 3 & 4, 1999

Transcript

William Furlong: Katy, you’re editor of a magazine being published in England called ‘N.Paradoxa’. Could tell me a little about the magazine?

Katy Deepwell: ‘N.Paradoxa’ is the only international feminist art journal in the world, because the contributors come from all over the world and speak about different artists. For the Biennale I’m concentrating on doing a picture round up, because this Biennale has the highest number of women artists for a very long time. Not only in the Giardini but also in the Harold Szeeman exhibition.

WF: Are there any issues that this Biennale raises?

KD: Well the woman artists are definitely the strongest artists in terms of sculpture, installation and video work. Mixed media, sculpture and installation seem to be a preoccupation of women artists in the world at the moment. There are exceptions though, there’s a woman from Scandinavia called (Simone Alvokerne?), who has done a very interesting piece ‘Woman War Pilots’ and she’s presented paintings as an installation with sound. The aircraft sound it forms a backdrop to an analysis of the women pilots’ experiences in the war.

WF: And you say in this Biennale are more women than in any other Biennale. To what do you attribute this?

KD: It’s extremely hard to say what the factors for change are. Certainly I think The curators have an enlightened awareness and I also think it’s because there’s a tendency towards social sculpture, in trying to address current political issues and questions about history and memory. All of these features are very strong in the women artists’ work that has been chosen. There’s also a very strong tendency towards analysing subjectivity, states of mind and what it actually means to be a human being. I think that that is very present in say the work of Louise Bourgeois, an obvious example and Pippilotti Rist would be another good example of someone who mixes all those trends, particularly the piece she’s got here, ‘Suburb Brain’ which is really wonderful.

WF: Do you thing the Venice Biennale has relevance or a continuing role?

KD: I think we have to live with the fact that the Venice Biennale is historically the most important Biennale in terms of European and American dealing; the art gallery scene behind the Biennale. If one was entirely able to construct the Biennale from the point of view of the art, it’s truly an anachronism, but in the real world, where embassies pay for the export of their artists, and it is very closely tied towards art market development, then I don’t think we can get away from the national pavilions.

WF: There is another dimension this year in Venice which is that there’s an enormous amount of work to be seen throughout Venice, not only in the gardens.

KD: I thought his happened very year.

WF: Well it’s increased this year because they’ve opened the boat yards. In 1985, when I first came, the gardens were the real thing and then there was other stuff somewhere else. But it wasn’t really considered to be as important, whereas I get a sense that Szeeman really wants everything to be seen as equally important.

KD: For me the question of this Biennale is interesting because there are many artists from this Biennale who have also been shown in Manifesta. Manifesta has certainly done a lot to raise the profile of Eastern Europeans in the Biennale and it’s very clear that Szeeman has been looking at Manifesta very closely.

WF: So what you seem to be saying is that there’s space for all of these strategies.

KD: Probably as many people come to Venice as come to Documenta, so in terms of the international art world getting together I think there still is a need for this kind of presentation.

WF: Finally then, when you go back and you are thinking about writing a piece in your magazine about this Biennale how do you think it will be characterised?

KD: Well I’m neatly avoiding doing writing a piece because I’m doing this large photo spread because I want to show the range of practices that women artists are doing. There is everything from Ann Hamilton’s presentation in the pavilion, which is a very minimalist installation, to Rosemarie Trockel’s fantastic video projection in the German Pavilion. Also Anne Tallentire’s exhibition which is a two part video work. I think if anything there would be a defining quality in trying to convey in pictures things that have to be physically experienced. There seems to be an increasing tendency in contemporary art to have works of art which are almost impossible to photograph precisely, so that people can appreciate the experience of being in a room with an installation and to consider the work itself.