Guest Speaker: Paul Ramirez Jonas

Today Nina Katchadourian invited Paul Ramirez Jonas to speak to us in class and later show us his exhibition currently on view at Alexander Gray Associates located at 526 West 26th street. During class, he showed us slides of his work from 2005 to now.

His installations, sculptures, and media-based artworks explore issues of national identity and democracy. Mi Casa Su Casa (2005), Taylor Square Park (2005), and Talisman (2008) all center around the notion of public property and ownership, and what it means to live in a democratic society. Issues of trust and ownership come into play in these three works. Jonas asked that viewers/participants trade keys with each other, or trade in their key for a key that unlocks a public space, to evoke the spirit of community and to remind them that public space truly does belong to them. Additionally, he wants to show that every space in the world can be opened or closed and that "keys", literal or symbolic, provide access to or lock these gateways. Jonas went on to discuss his issues with these pieces, because he felt that he "had nothing to show after two years of work". What was left of these works were merely the extra keys he had produced. While he produced a successful interactive piece, in which success is measured by people actually participating, engaging in the work, he asks, "how many viewers are enough?" His work relies on a one-time participation and is therefore not physically ongoing, as exhibitions in galleries or museums have the privilege of maintaining.

Wh_r_ Hav_ All The Flow_rs Gon_ (2006), Is this land made for you and me (2007), Mood of the Nation (2007) and Tinterillo, Yo creo como hablo (2008) also ask for the audience's participation, but this interaction stems from Jonas's interest in the difference between ritual and performance. Ritual presupposes that if done right, something will happen, while performance is something that is acted out and therefore reinterpreted by the actor and audience everytime it is done. The above works ask the viewers to participate in the work itself to essentially complete the piece, by either filling in a missing note in Wh_r_ Hav_ All The Flow_rs Gon_, tell a story for Tinterillo, Yo creo como hablo, or "create as [they] speak" in Is this land made for you and me and Mood of the Nation. Jonas talked about how he uses tools that he himself does not create, such as keys, typewriters, or a piano, but makes a piece that utilizes them to send his message. In doing so, he imbues those artifacts with symbolic meaning, or enhances the meaning inherent in them.

We Make Change (2008), 5 Props for a Speakers Corner (2008) are examples of how Jonas does this. He used a penny flattening machine in We Make Change to flatten out the entire penny, except for the words "trust" and "we". When flattened, the coin either reads as "we trust" or "trust me" depending on how the coin is rotated. This simple gesture offered a plethora of meaning, with the smallest unit of American currency asking for its owner's trust and faith in its value and in a larger scope, democracy itself. Jonas constructed five different mobile podiums for 5 Props for a Speakers Corner. A group of speakers were to give speeches at a Creative Time Event, and Jonas decided to moderate how they would possibly deliver their speeches depending on their podium. One was appropriate for a priest or speaker in a church, another was designed for a dictator, one for a celebrity, one for a beauty pageant contestant or announcer, and the last for a public announcer. The range from the modest to the monumental asks the speaker to choose a podium and in essence, choose a persona.

We went to Alexander Gray Gallery afterwards to see Paper Moon (I Create as I Speak) (2008)
Magellan’s Itinerary, A Reproduction (1995) and Broadside 3 (2007).

Please visit http://automat.com/index.php, his website
and http://alexandergray.com/index.cfm to view some of Paul's work!