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Secrets or words
unsaid and then forgotten
A conversation with Jonathan Monk by Adam Carr
Adam Carr (AC): Perhaps the central aspect of this interview could
focus on discussing pieces that people do not get the opportunity
to see. Specifically, I am thinking of your pieces that are continually
in process and the possibility of works to completely bypass the
stage of the exhibition that remain to be seen.
Jonathan Monk (JM): Like secret projects that are in process and
are rarely seen, some only by the people that own them etc, and
some not by anyone.
AC: Let's start by discussing a recent work I have not seen, entitled
"Jonathan Monk presents a book by Donald Burgy from 1973"
shown at Jan Mot's gallery. Is this as straightforward as the title
suggests?
JM: The presentation of the Burgy book at Mr. Mots is exactly what
it says it is... I made the piece for this years Baltic Triennial
in Vilnius - not that I really made anything: each day of the exhibition
a new page of the book is presented, a page is turned in the morning
and visitors must come back to see the entire book unless, of course,
they already have the book at home.
AC: You mentioned pieces only seen by their owners; could you elaborate
on this idea with some examples? I know of one piece in which you
established correspondence with a Canadian collector on a weekly
basis in an attempt to guess his grandmothers name: what are the
rules and parameters of this piece and where does this particular
concept stem from?
JM: The name guessing is quite a simple piece: each week I send
the collector a new guess until I guess correctly and then the piece
is complete. I guessed the Canadian's mothers name, but it took
three years. Her name is Berta. I am still searching for an American's
grandmothers name and an Italian mother. The whole idea is almost
futile as there are millions of names in the world and only so many
weeks in my life. Actually, guessing correctly is solely down to
luck, always random and without research. "Lost In Your Head"
is a ten year project that involves me sending passport sized photographic
self portraits to two Italian collectors and they then hide the
pictures in the pages of books in their library.
AC: Do any other pieces exist and in process which also share the
condition of using the collector's participation in the work itself?
JM: Only really "Time Piece" (2002-), which is a postal
work that involves the sending and receiving of cards in which the
time is depicted... church clocks, town halls, railway stations,
etc. The collectors then order the cards according to time.
AC: The postcards pieces are very pertinent in regard to the seen
and not so seen, which you described in relation to your work. When
shown, they only illustrate a particular phase of development since
they have an ongoing life beyond the occasion of the exhibition,
for instance, "Mantelpiece Piece" (1997). Could you briefly
describe what this piece entails?
JM: Postcards sent by me to the Lisson Gallery, in London, that
I believe might have influenced the idea of sending postcards to
a gallery and subsequently displaying them on a shelf at mantelpiece
height. The shelf without cards resembles a minimal sculpture, John
MacCracken style plank, etc. The piece has been shown three or four
times... once in Basel Art Fair... many cards were stolen... But
the work remains constantly in process, only ever completed when
no cards can either be sent or received.
AC: I am interested in knowing about the other post card piece's
in perpetual progress, could you tell me a little about them?
JM: The only others are "The Thelonious Monk Orchestra Piece"
(1998-) and "Silence Is Golden". In the first I send holiday
postcards to a Brazilian collector, now a very large collection
of blues. It is nice to make work on holiday without it being work...
In the second, cards are sent to Galleria Sonia Rosso, in Turin...
Any post card where some kind of sound is pictured, we imagine the
sound without hearing the sound. Did I mention "Day & Night
&" (2002-)? I send cards to the Guggenheim Museum in New
York of the same place pictured in the day and in the night. One
kind of flows naturally into the other and the next, etc...
AC: There is a great tradition of artists who use the postal service
as a system for the production of work -strategies principally used
by the artists who raised to prominence in the 60's and 70's, for
example, Douglas Huebler or On Kawara. Your focus seems to be directed
not only on the process of sending, but also provoking a sense of
uncertainty that through the course of the journey the pieces might
never arrive. The postcard series sent without postage drives this
idea to its limits. What was the initially impetus behind your postcard
pieces?
JM: All of the post card pieces are straight forward, they involve
the sending and receiving of postcards, they are always in process,
their end is also mine or the recipient's. A lot use the system
that is present and or presents itself. Either through the post
office (stolen post cards sent without postage) or the card produces
themselves... One series titled "The Sun Never Sets" involves
the sending and receiving of black post cards... Such and such a
place by night.
AC: We have discussed the pieces that deal with the idea of secrets.
Either in the case of the works that collectors only ever see, or
which are only seen partially such as the aforementioned post card
series. Are there any works in existence that you have never seen?
JM: I made a show in Zurich in 2003 called "The Unseen Unseen
II", a show that I was not allowed to see. In fact, I am never
allowed to see the piece I proposed to the gallery. They show a
16 mm film loop and ten photographs but the content of the film
and photos was entirely up to them... There maybe some documentation,
but I have never seen it.
AC: What happened in the first version of this piece?
JM: The first version of "Unseen Unseen" is purely photographic,
80 black and white prints from Berlin... my assistant found them.
AC: I wanted to ask you about the "Meeting pieces", a
series of works that connect with this notion of what one sees and
doesn't see. I am particularly interested in how these works operate
in 2 stages: the showing of the work proposing a meeting in the
distant or near future, which when purchased becomes an appointment
with the buyer. This encounter, based on trust that both the buyer
and yourself will attend the meeting at the proposed time and destination,
turns round questions of uncertainty in a way not too dissimilar
to the post card pieces. I know that some of these meetings have
started to take place, could you discuss a little about them? How
many have already taken place and have you been finding each other
at the proposed destination?
JM: The idea came to me when I lived in LA. I wanted to make a text
work that was simply an instruction for something else to happen.
I guess similar to Lawrence Weiner's sculptural texts. LA felt very
disjointed and far a way from where I come from and not just physically.
One needed to plan well in advance, nothing happened spontaneously.
Perhaps this led to the forward planning with the meeting works.
I am also interested in how the works function on three levels:
the invitational text, the actual meeting and the memory of the
rendez-vous. Only one meeting has taken place: it was very straightforward,
exactly how one could imagine a collector meeting an artist as a
work of art.
AC: Are there any pieces that go completely undetected to the visible
eye, that are devoid of any visible trace, and which ultimately
remain secret?
JM: There are projects that have been made and are available to
be seen but are impossible to be seen. The laser that writes "To
Infinity and Beyond" in the sky - I know it writes the text,
but it is impossible to read.
AC: I wanted to ask you about some of your shows that we are both
yet to see - you have 3 forthcoming solo shows: one at Kunstmuseum
St. Gallen, Kunstverein Hannover, and the other taking place at
Kunsthalle Nürnberg. Will this be one show that will tour across
all 3 venues?
JM: yes,
a
kind
of
touring
show
that
starts
where
I
started
and
finishes
where
it
finishes.
AC: Lastly, playing around with the genre of interviews: perhaps
you could propose a secret question to an artist of your choice
and we could included their answer, whoever that maybe?
JM: Like your secret question idea and would like to ask Mark Rothko
What time is it on the moon?
*Jonathan Monk is an artist based in Berlin.
*Adam Carr is an independent curator and writer based in London.
Published in Neue Review (Number 12, January 2006)
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