An e-mail interview with Vasif Kortun and Charles Esche, by Minna Henriksson for Framework Issue 3/june 05 the Finnish art review

Minna Henriksson (MH): Vasif, you were in New York for many years as the director of the Museum of the Centre for Curatorial Studies, Bard College . What made you return to İstanbul- a city, which I have come across you referring to, on a couple of occasions, as the brutal megalopolis?

Vasif Kortun (VK): Work does not determine the course of my life although it pretty much looks like that. I had to make choice with my wife between the Bosphorus and the view of the backs of buildings in New York ; there was also the need to have our daughter grow up in İstanbul with a notion of my family beyond the nuclear; to be closer to my parents in their mature age. As a "third world intellectual", I maintain the belief that the world can be transformed by action. I had a dream of starting a contemporary art institution in 1994. It was 2001 when Platform opened. İstanbul is home, and I consider myself one of the luckiest people on earth the live happily in the city I was born in. What a luxury today not to be an exile, an immigrant, an extended guest. It is however a cruel city, the place is turning into a total market and losing its quality as a marketplace. The undesirables have no representation. I think art institutions are symbolic agencies of intimate confrontation, and I am interested in how this plays into the notion of a radical democracy towards a utopian ideal of its annihilation.

MH: A lot has surely changed in İstanbul in the few years- many new venues for art have emerged, both artist run and corporate funded, of which the most recent is probably the İstanbul Modern. In which direction do you see İstanbul developing in the future? What do you think İstanbul Modern? Do you think the previous biennials hosted there have contributed to it becoming a permanent venue? Are there similar plans for the space you intend to use? Does İstanbul still need still contemporary art museum?

VK: In 2001 I started two institutions, a museum without a collection and a centre for contemporary art. The museum, Proje4L, collapsed into a collection space because the funder did not have the vision and stamina it took. Platform, on the other hand, became one of the most significant institutions of its scale internationally. We are hoping the grow in a direction to address the sore needs of the city like education. There are hardly any artist-run institutions in the city. Oda Projesi , Apartman Projesi, GalataPerform are some of the very few example. Such spaces on the wane. İstanbul is being divided, with the corporate/tourist/media on the other side, and the transgressive/communitarian on the other. I am not happy with this equation. Excuse me, we built this situation and I have no intention of retreating and abandoning the narrative to such normalization. İstanbul Modern makes a marriage between the local artist, gallery, collector situation and contemporary visual culture. Contemporary visual culture has little to do with this provincial economy and circulation. I find this to be unlikely matrimony. The scenario is that the culture of contemporary art, which has not in the past been supported by the founders of the museum, is now ushered into the museum for international legitimization. It empowers a provincial scenography and seeks to be buttressed by contemporary art for international respectability. It is one thing to have a mission and shoe enough flexibility to adapt to changes, it is another not to have a mission while hoping for rectification along the way. I am afraid that the museum has chosen the latter perspective, but it is too early to tell as the work of the chief curator, Rosa Martinez, has not been manifest yet.

MH: You, Charles, have recently started as the director of Van Abbemuseum in Eindhoven, the Netherlands, after running two art centers, the Tramway in Glasgow, and the Rooseum Centre for Contemporary Art in Malmö. How does your new position in a museum differ from being the director of art centre, and what kind of new challenges are facing in running a museum?

Charles Esche (CE): The reason I went for a museum was that I am certain we have to conquer and change the existing contemporary art institutions rather than invent our own. I think the contemporary art institution in general has potential in that it gathers people together in one place at the same time and is in general part of the public sphere. The museum, however, has a particular substance that can be used in certain political ways.

All museums inherit the history of the general museum concept at their birth, and we are to reimagine what museums could offer society, it might e interesting to see why they came into existence in the first place. Public museums are largely an enlightenment project, beginning with the French Revolution and serving as a validation of the bourgeois public sphere, where people could demonstrate their taste and sophistication. It was about the cultural settlement of a new politically powerful class by demonstrating its cultural authority, as well as shaping that very taste and authority in the process. Secondly, museums were projects of instruction. They uphold art as a noble and uplifting thing that can somehow modify social behaviour and introduce civilisation to those who lack it. Thirdly, there is more than a tinge of authoritarianism to them. They select what is important and, by default, what is not of value, demonstrating their coherence as much through exclusion as inclusion. Fourthly; they contain within them a notion of the ideal and the universal. Ideal in the platonic sense of model objects, and universal in that the values expressed are common values from which all citizens should potentially benefit. The things that museum collected were no longer the preserve of the aristocracy, but available for all and suitable for all. Finally, museums are intriguingly anti-market institutions in that they remove a certain class of objects from circulation in the market and preserve them, in theory, for eternity.

Now, the description I have given clearly historical. There have been many critiques from the pressure chambers of revolutionary modernism, state socialism and post-modernist relativism that have all contributed to undermining such narrow enlightenment and bourgeois conceptions. But I am less certain that the museum today has articulated clearly a new mission in response not only to criticism, but also to its possibilities. I'm stuck by the critique from 37 years ago by Allan Kaprow, who basically distrusts museums but proposed that they might be "an educational institute, a computerized bank of cultural history and an agency for action". Even after all this time, that still seems quite radical agenda for contemporary museums, so I don't fell wrong in proclaiming their recent conservatism.

But I will not bemoan the conservatism institutions here. Rather, and perhaps perversely, I would like to look back at the already agreed foundation principles of the museum, to ask whether we can take them, embrace them and reinvent them for today in a way even Kaprow might recognize. Mostly I still have questions here, but I think part of our job is to articulate what we think a museum can be, and to do this clearly to as many people as possible.and then wait to see what happens. I have already spoken about the reinvention of the public sphere through Chantal Mouffe's notion of 'friendly enemies' in an agonistic public sphere. Now, what would happen if we suggested that one key player in this common symbolic space is the museum, and that we view ourselves as friendly enemies, who have the chance to contest contest ideas publicly in the museum. My questions are: How would we build our museums with that as our organizing principle? How would we programme them? How would we invite our local citizens and our international audiences? I would like to try to start to articulate Van Abbemuseum as such institution and see what happens. Secondly, we inherit the project of instruction. What are the values, even the ideology, a museum should articulate? What effect do we want to have? I would suggest what we adopt a resolutely planetary outlook; that we seek to tackle the questions of the moment- related to our specific city and communities, that we believe art as a for of communication across cultural borders- and the museum as the place where it can happen; that the museum is a way of re-imagining some of our deepest (and darkest) preconceptions about people, ideas and cultures.

Thirdly, what do we do with the authority of the museum and the selective quality of a collection? I think we must start by looking again across the globe, but, paradoxically, with a local orientation, thinking specifically about were we are and what would be most appropriate, given that geography and history. We also need to think specifically about how we invite artists. How a museum, with its historical authority under threat from the general culture of biennials and events, can take a longer view, can work with artists over a span of years instead of months, and can adapt to artistic practices (because it has time) rather than force artist to adapt to the structures of the experience effects of capitalism. Finally, I think we can use the anti-market concept of the museum as a provocative challenge to the current economic system. As an institution dedicated to taking objects out of circulation, it gives us permission to take about alternative economic models in general - as they are proposed or developed by artists.

Indeed, this idea proposing and developing alternatives can be common thread. I would like to suggest that the museum of today declare itself through its difference from other institutions- the shopping mall as well as the circus. We should deliberately seek to be different from what exists in order to suggest what could be. As a storehouse of possibility, the museum could become essential to how we think about our future.

MH:You have both curated one biennial before - Charles the Gwangju Biennial in 2002 together with Hou Hanru and Song Wang Kyung, and Vasif the 3rd İstanbul Biennial. Biennial as an exhibition model has been widely criticized in the last years. After your experiences it looks like you still believe in the possibilities in it. But the Biennial you are putting together here states to be very different from the conventional model of a Biennial - how will you make a Biennial that still has impact in the 21st century?

CE: By not trying to make such an impact, I think. It is best to carry on with something you fell is important and than to work out what is necessary for the press and publicity circus. Moreover, impact can only be judged after the passage of time anyway, and this biennial will take its place as significant one (or not) depending on what happens afterwards. The international biennials general appears tired, because we still remember it as a relatively new phenomenon. It has come of age, I guess, and can now developed in mature ways, just like the museum that still radiates possibility, even if it is rather underused now.

VK: Biennial is not an exhibition model. It is a format linked both to the diversification and enrichment of the field on one hand and on the other the cultural empowerment and legitimation of the city it takes place in. It was the best tool of access in the 90s, and helped so many curators and artists from places one never heard of before. The question for me is about the role culture plays in the entertainment industry and its negotiation with globalization.

MH: Why the İstanbul Biennial ( I heard rumours that you, Charles, almost became the curator of the next Documenta, but pulled out at the end)? And why not do it alone, instead of as a team, and why with Vasıf (-another rumor I heard was that you called up Vasif and said that you'd do it only if he does with you)?

CE: Aha, rumours are always true if people believe them, so who am I to deny them? But as I remember, first one is not true and the second was a necessary condition for doing the Biennial any case. Seriously, İstanbul as a city really important right now. In all sorts of ways, both historical and current, it reveals some of basic contradictions and possible solutions to our current dilemmas. I've called İstanbul predictive city to challenge the idea is that is some how following an already trodden path towards US style global modern capitalism. I would say, perhaps provocatively, that I believe (and hope) that Eindhoven (where I live) will look more like İstanbul in 25 years than İstanbul will look like Eindhoven. What you find in İstanbul is neither the fundamentalist conflict of Western fear, nor the exhausted notion of European social democracy concensus. Instead you have a form of agonistic living together in which people survive, continue, and prosper without a fundamental agreement on the pattern of society. It serves as a concrete form of what Chantal Mouffe has called an 'agonistic public sphere' though the publicness of that sphere is constantly under threat from rich families and from privatization. It's a strange thing to say, but I actually like the people that I've met in the governing party there - maybe I'm foolish, but they do genuinely seem to be pursuing their own sense of what Turkey could be in relation to Europe and Asia in a very thoughtful way. Working in the city in inspiring because of opportunity it creates - in the terms I've defined above. You are allowed to think things differently in İstanbul more than in any other place I have been.

In terms of the biennial, that puts on quite a lot of pressure and we've tried to respond to it in a number of ways. Structurally, we decided to avoid the pitfalls of O ttaman nostalgia kitsch - or at best the notion of the historic city providing spurious legitimacy to contemporary work, a thing that has disfigured a number of previous biennials. So, we will use only relatively recent buildings and sites that either domestic or associated with contemporary trade and production. These feel to be a more appropriate venue for artists to show their explorations in the city today. Secondly, we decided to reduce the overall number of artists to about 50, to show more work by each individual, and ask around half of the selected artists to come for an extended residency in İstanbul (2-6 months) to produce new work or choose existing work that would address the sensibility of the city itself. As a countervailing force, and to avoid the dangers of a kind of İstanbul essentialism, the other half will be showing work that contrasts with the environment and the condition of İstanbul, telling other stories or experiences from other parts of the international imagination. A second, separate project will be called İstanbul Positionings and will trace existing activities in the cultural field throughout the city of 15 million people, marking them and providing opportunities for them to contract each other as well as the viewers and artists at the Biennial. The Positionings will also include independent international initiatives organized to coincide with the Biennial. We hope this structure will provide a channel through which the works by artists can be seen touch on the questions of the city and its significance today, but of course we have to understand that art is always an intimate experience that speaks to the individual and experiences. So, the question of İstanbul will always be dealt with tangentially, in passing or as a quixotic, personal account. I think that that quality of intimacy, or at least its absolute desirability as a characteristic of good art, is an antidote to the danger of art becoming a kinds of politics. Democratic politics must always be addressed to the group of masses, art doesn't need to, and probably cannot effectively do that. So an art that is interested in politics has to realize those limitations very quickly, which is perhaps why some overtly political artists often give up some points.

As I said before, I made the reserve journey from politics to art, because its seems to me that this quality of intimacy is precisely what I want to find in the world as a way to start reimagining it.

MH:I have understood that the previous Biennials as well as other contemporary art events in İstanbul have had only little local impact with small numbers of visitors. What are your expectations with this Biennial regarding the local audience? And if reaching the local audience is one of your priorities, How will you go about doing it?

VK: İstanbul Biennial is the cheapest of all biennials of its scale. Traditionally, education and access has neither been of concern to the organization, nor are they prepared or equipped for it. It is however a crime to waste such a great tool at hand. We have several ways of approaching the issue. One will be a broad-sheet newspaper supplement of 8 pages to be published once a week for 10 issues starting in August. Written in a language that does not alarm the readers, the newspaper will be one of the venues of access. Second will be a proper guide-book. We have been organizing lectures since past October. Finally, there will be "floor days." Exhibition tours, including those with the curators, will be realized. A few more projects are also on the way.

MH: I have only seen the most recent Biennial Poetic Justice curated by Dan Cameron (2003). HE used the historical and tourist sites, as well as Antrepo, which is now the İstanbul Modern. But for me most impacting works in that show where those by Cildo Meireles and Mike Nelson, both of which were one-offs outside main venues as public space projects. Will you also use the city, or concentrate on the three venues you have selected* can you tell us something about the venues?

CE: We are still searching for sites and will probably keep doing so up to a month before the opening. We want a disperse4d biennial, one that almost disappear into the city, to emerge at unlikely locations and times. A kind of anti-biennial in a way - though there will be spectacular elements that will directly intrude into the public domain. The idea is to lay out a walking route in the city, with larger and smaller stations along the way. Visitors to the biennial could ideally have their 'biennial' head on all the time they are walking from venue to venue - they (and we) may e surprised at what they find or register as art.

VK: The venues are this time distributed within one district in the center of İstanbul. None are as large as the Antrepo. The sites are just big enough to absorb a modest scale exhibition, and there is space enough between them to take a breather. I very much like this modesty of scale. Also, the divergence of the sites we use are such that it will become apperant I hope that we are not simply going for a white-cube kind of operation. The routes between the sites will also be used for discreet projects. One ideas is to sink the biennial into city and make it continous with it.

MH: I was in İstanbul in 2003 for three months from the start of the previous Biennial onwards. I was really impressed how active the city was during the opening of the Biennial, but some weeks, or even some days after the opening, when the international crowd had left the town, hardly anything happened in the city in the field of contemporary art. It seemed like the Biennial had sucked out all the resources. Are you aware of this, and is this something you try to over-come?

VK: Am I aware? I have written extensively about the post-biennial syndrome in the past. One of the reasons Platform was founded was to establish a sustainable culture of contemporary art in İstanbul. But, don't forget that this is a conservative, traditionalist culture where instead of overcoming a deficiency, once expects "a father" to help the situation. Even if the state has evaporated the image of a "father" remains. The "father" is a mental construct that can be anything; an institution, a person, family, so on and so forth. If nothing much happens between the biennials it is not only because the biennial sucks out the resources but also because people are reticent and quiescent. The Biennial always and inadvertently creates a post-partum sydrome.

CE: Vasif is much more aware of than this I am, but in all the big projects I've been involved in, I have always wanted to think about a legacy. I feel in Korea we succeeded in creating a stimulus to artist group practice that as continued with Flying city and others. In İstanbul, I hope we will leave a sense that the city's days of playing 'catch up' with Western European and US forms of modernism and post-modernism are over. This is one of the key place future will be created, though probably in the face of West's resistance.

MH: As I have understood you want to invite local artists and artists from the region. Also you want to keep the number of participants small and invite artists, who work in relation to İstanbul. But much of the money is in the Western Europe, and surely each country is offering to fund artists from their country to participate the Biennial. How do you deal with that?

VK: Much of the money used to be in Western Europe. You would be shocked to hear the percentage cuts in funding. The rightward, neo-populist swing has been horrible for funding institutions. Also now there are too many biennials they have to consider supporting. The embarassing thing is how little we receive from City and State in Turkey.

MH: How is it possible to do another İstanbul Biennial, after your one, with the old formula - using the historical and tourist sites and gathering works under an abstract and universal theme, which is not directly related to the city - as it seems you attempt to dismantle and deconstruct the Biennial as an institution? Do you think that the old model is outdated and this is the direction the Biennials will go towards in the future - into site-specificity and commissioned works?

VK: I think the 10th Biennial should reinvent the exhibition including ours, and avoid the mistakes we will make as well. 10 is a good symbolic number to do this.

CE: Everything is possible after 9th biennial. You can go back, or forward - hopefully, the options going forward are greater than they were before and the retrospective panorama will look slightly less appealing. I to do the 10th Biennial as well, now that we kind of understand how to work the system.