Robert Barry

Interview by Liam Gillick

from Audio Arts Volume 14, Number 2, 1994

Transcript

Liam Gillick: In Southampton City Art Gallery with Robert Barry. I wonder if you could tell me a little bit about the piece that you’ve installed for this exhibition?

Robert Barry: Well, I didn’t know what I was going to do when I came here. The photos that they sent me were a little bit deceptive. I decided on yellow for several reasons; the room next to me was quite dark, the Sol Le Witt piece and the Patterson piece were already pretty well along and I wanted a contrast to that. I wanted a light colour that was very, very sensitive to the light coming in through the skylight. The ceiling above the upper border is white and so that was easy with the words. I wanted the words to kind of disappear into the white above the yellow. And as you can see, some of the words are cut off at the top. They sort of run off, or come down from the ceiling and I played around with yellow and white till we got a colour that I thought I could live with. I wanted a kind of upbeat feeling something bright and, as I say, very sensitive to the light because I wanted the piece to change throughout the day. That element of time that looks like it’s being used very specifically. The word that I chose, from my list of about two hundred words, that I wanted to work with is a little bit in opposition to the feeling of the colour, which was uplifting and so forth. I wanted the feeling to be in contrast to that. That was the general idea that I came up with when I first arrived and saw the space. My preference is not to work with some specific theory or philosophy of art or some political point; I don’t work like that at all. Every artist has their story and they’re usually pretty good stories and good reasons for doing what they do. I wanted to try and create something that’s maybe more poetic or has to do with the specific situation that grows out of the place and the people that are in it, and deal with whatever elements of art that are important to me, which are basically space and movement. This is a very specific but fluid place and will only be here for a certain amount of time, which is a very important idea. We all know this thing is going to be painted over in six weeks. So it has to be dealt with now. It will never be done again. And of course the architecture itself, all of the little details, the corners, the moulding, the exit sign, the way that the doors are situated, the way they interrupt the words. The words have to fight around the moulding and all those little architectural details that are there. I try to work that into the overall design and not cover it up, but to use it in some way. This makes the piece really a kind of a reflection of real life situations. It’s a kind of metaphor for what it is to live in this world. I tried to do something which I haven’t done before. I’ve never used these colours or this particular group of words or, even this size of letter before. I mean we worked out the scale of everything when we were here; the placement of all of this was all worked out in situ. It’s unpredictable and it can be a total disaster, a total failure. You rely on the craftsmanship of other people. I don’t do this all myself. We had to get other people to help out and it’s a way I like to work as opposed to working in a studio where you can work things over and make corrections. Here, there’s very little room for mistakes, you’re working under a time restraint; there’s an opening day and it has to be finished by then. If it’s all wrong, I just can’t paint it all out, I’ve got to live with it and I like that. I like that way of making art and putting my reputation on the line by doing it. I think it’s a good way to do things.