Through the Labyrinth: An Interview with Cildo Meireles

Author(s): John Alan Farmer

Source: Art Journal, Vol. 59, No. 3 (Autumn, 2000), pp. 34-43
Published by: College Art Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/778026
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John Alan Farmer
Through the Labyrinth:
An Interview with
Cildo Meireles
Inser.6es em circuitos
ideologicos: Projeto C6dula
(Insertions into Ideological
Circuits: C6dula Project),
1970. Rubber stamp on
banknotes. Dimensions
variable. Collection New
Museum of Contemporary
Art, NewYork.
Cildo Meireles was born in Rio de Janeiro in 1948. Since the late 196os, he
has created sculptures and installations that function as open propositions in
which the audience is invited to become acutely aware of the experience of
their bodies in space and time--not only as physical beings, but as psycholog-
ical, social, and political ones as well. A retrospective of his work, organized
by Dan Cameron and Gerardo Mosquera, was presented at the New Museum
of Contemporary Art in New York in 1999 and then traveled to the Museu de
Arte Moderna in Rio de Janeiro and the Museu de Arte Moderna in Sao Paulo.
In conjunction with the exhibition, a major book on the artist's work, entitled
CildoMeireles,was published by Phaidon Press in i999. It includes an interview
with the artist by Mosquera, essays by Cameron and Paulo Herkenhoff, texts
by the artist, an extract from Jorge Luis Borges's short story "The Garden of
Forking Paths," and a chronology.
Farmer: You once said that you consider Orson Welles's radio broadcast The
War of the Worlds(1938) to be the greatest work of art of the twentieth century.
Meireles: TheWarof the Worldsis an exampleof an art object thatworked per-
fectly,in the sense that it seamlesslydissolvedthe borderbetween art and life,fic-
tion and reality.I namedmyyoungerson OrsonJoaquimin
tribute to the director,especiallyto thiswork. The fact that
Orson Welles producedsuch a work when he did is really
incredible.As you remember,it beginsas the interruption
of a broadcastof a concertfroma clubby a news bulletin
reportingthe sightingof what is perhapsthe crashof a
meteor.The concert resumesandthen is interruptedby a
series of increasingly dramaticbulletinsdescribingan inva-
sion of New Jerseyby Martians.Listenerswent crazy.They
thoughtthat what they were hearingwas real. It'sa beautiful
work. I am also partialto Orson Welles because he traveledto Brazilto makea
feature-lengthfilm.
Farmer: Yes. In 1942, the office of the coordinator of Inter-American Affairs
invited Welles to shoot a film in Latin America for audiences in the United
States to encourage good relations between the two regions. He decided to go
to Rio de Janeiro, where he shot footage of Carnaval and then developed a
story line about four fishermen who travel to Rio to plead for assistance from
President Vargas for their people. But the production was very troubled, and
he never finished the film.
Meireles: That'salltrue. ButI thinkeven withinthe context of the whole body of
Orson Welles'swork, TheWarof the Worldsis outstanding.It is a work of art.
Farmer: You were saying one of the reasons you admire this work is
because it dissolves the boundary between art and life, fiction and reality.
When did that become an interest for you in your own work?
Meireles: Inthe 1960sand 1970sthiswas a subjectof realdiscussionin Brazil
amongmy colleagues.Perhapsthere was a littlebit of a utopianimperativebehind
this.ThisimperativerecallsVladimirMayakovsky,
who said,I believe,thataesthetics
35 art journal
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 will be the ethics of the future.And then this borderwill no longerexist. One of
the functionsof an art object shouldbe, in some way,to help redefineor dissolve
this border.Inthis respect, Brazilianartistsof thisgenerationdid a lot.
Farmer: Why do you think that the imperative to renegotiate the relationship
between art and life in Brazil in the i96os and 197os among artists like Lygia
Clark, Helio Oiticica, and Lygia Pape, as well as younger artists like Tunga and
yourself, who conceived the work of art more as an open proposition than as
a discrete object, was so powerful at this time, the years of
the military dictatorship? Do you think there is
a connection between the work and the social and political
context in which it was produced?

Meireles: Of course. The artists themselves refer to the political

situationintheir correspondence.Manyartists,includingmyself,
respondedto this situation,even thoughI thinkthat they, like
me, were muchmore preoccupiedwith other kindsof issues.
I startedproducingmore explicitlypoliticalwork in 1969.A
group exhibitionwas scheduledto open at the Museude Arte
Moderna.The artistswho would representBrazilat the Paris
Biennalewould be chosen fromthat show. I hadmade a formal
work for the show, but some of the other works were politically
controversial.Three hoursbefore the opening,the police
arrived,surroundedthe museum,and orderedthe show to be
dismantledimmediately.So it was. Thiscreatedinternational
repercussions.Forten yearsthere was even an international
boycott of the Sio PauloBienal.They used to say that for Brazil,
May 1968startedon March23, becausethat was when daily
confrontationswith the police began,becausethey had begunto
killstudents.
Farmer: How did these events affect your own work? This
was about the time that you began Insercaes
emcircuitos
ideologicos
(Insertions into Ideological Circuits, 1970), in which you
printed political messages onto ordinarybank notes and Coca-
Cola bottles and put them back into circulation,wasn't it?
Meireles: Forthe firsttime, I felt that I shouldreferto the politi-
Espa;os virtuais:Cantos cal situationmore explicitlythan I haddone before. Beforethat, Iwas not inter-
(Virtual Spaces: ested in makingpoliticalwork. Infact, I alwayshad a problemwith proselytizing
Corners), 1967-68.
Wood, canvas, paint, artworks--withworks that engagedin a propagandistic way with politicalissues.
woodblock flooring.
Instead,Iwas more preoccupiedwith the art object, languageissues,this kindof
Approx. 120 x 39 x 39 in.
(305 x 100 x 100 cm). thing.Youcould even talkabout Insercbesinformalterms. I believethat a political
One from a series of 44 work firsthasto standby itselfas an art object,formallyand conceptually.In
projects. Courtesy of
the artist and Galerie some ways this is hard,becauseto do nonproselytizing work, you open the space
Lelong, NewYork. for someone to invertyour intentions.Forexample,a Neo-Nazi could use the
strategyof insertionsfor a totallydifferentpurpose.A certainneutralityis intrinsic
to the structureof the piece. Butthat'show I thinkabout doingmore political
work. With Insercbes,there was the idea of connectingwith art in a differentway,
outside of the museum:you don't haveto go to the art;it comes to you. There

36 FALL 2000
was also the idea of makinganonymousthings,because Iwouldn'tsignmost of
the works. Rememberthatthe work is not whatwe see in a museumexhibition.
It'snot the banknotes or the Coca-Colabottles.These objectsare only relics.
The work itself has no materiality. And it is ephemeral.Itonly exists when some-
one is interactingwith it. Inthis respect,it's muchmore connectedwith the con-
cept of the antiobjector the nonobject.Are you familiarwith the Brazilian critic
FerreiraGullar'stheory of the nonobject?Thiswas a concept I hadin mindwhen
I was makingthis work. Iwrote manynotes aboutthis subject,some of which
have been published.
Farmer: This makes me think of your decision to begin producing installa-
tions in the early 1970s. These works were not sculptural objects, but situations
that required the participation of the audience in order to be complete.

Meireles: Yes.Thoughthey are not reallyinstallations,

the Espaposvirtuais:
Cantos
(VirtualSpaces:Corners, 1967-68) are the firstworks I producedthat dealtwith
this issue.They are modelsof cornersof a room, in whichI deformedthe logic
of Euclideanspace.They are interactiveworks, becauseyou have to searchfor a
meansof perceptuallyorganizingthe spaces so that they become coherent.
Farmer: I was curious about that series. You were making drawings, resem-
bling technical drawings, of the corners, before you realized them in three
dimensions. What led you to make the shift from making drawings to actual
three-dimensional realizations of the drawings?

Meireles: It happenedquitenaturally. When Iwas a child,I hadalreadybeen

of
thinking makingthings in three-dimensional
space, and I startedby making
drawings.Myfathergive me this beautifulbook on Goya,when Iwas twelve or
thirteen,whichwas very important.Anyway,one of the reasonsthat I made
drawingswas becausethiswas one of the most accessiblemediumsfor a kidin
Brazilat thattime. We usuallydidn'thavethe resourcesto explore other things.
Butat one point,I plannedto makemovies.Infact, Iworkedfor severalmonths
in 1965 and 1966 in my littleroom inthe backof my parents'house makinga six-
minuteanimatedfilm.Iwas even planningto go to universityto studyfilmmaking.
Farmer: Did you think about pursuing filmmaking after that time?

Meireles: Yes, but it was impossible.

Farmer: Do you watch a lot of films?

Meireles: All kinds.There is a beautifulschool of cinemain Brazil.There is a

Brazilian
filmmakerwho studiedin FrancewithJeanVigo.He perhapsknows
more aboutJeanVigothananyone.I also likeGlauberRocha,a very well-known
Brazilian
filmmaker.Manyof my friendswere very talented.It'sa pitythatwe
couldn'tpursuefilmmaking.
Farmer: In the text that you wrote in conjunction with your first installa-
tion, Eureka/Blindhotland(1970-75), you state that the investigation of space in
all of its aspects--physical, geometric, historical, psychological, topological,
and anthropological-constitutes the nucleus of your work. How did you
become interested in the investigation of space? In this regard, could you

37 art journal

a: -~
: C:
EurekalBlindhotland,
1970-75. Eureka,2 pieces
of identical wood, I wood
cross, weighing scales.
Blindhotland,200 black
rubber balls, varying in
weight between 150 and
1500 g (5.3 and 52.5 oz.).
Dimensions variable.
Installation view at
Galerie Lelong, New
York, 1997. Courtesy of
the artist and Galerie
Lelong, NewYork.
describe what it was like growing up in two very different places: Rio, where
you born, and then Brasilia, where you moved when you were ten and lived
until you were nineteen?
Meireles: I was born in Rio, but I moved to Goiina before I was four years old,
and then to Brasilia.There was a French sociologist who used to study Brazilat
that time. He developed the idea that
Brazilwas constituted of islands of
loneliness. This is very understandable,
because that's how it was at that time.
Farmer: What was Brasilia like?
Meireles: As you can imagine, for a
ten-year-old kid it was a city of beauty.
All the trucks and machines and build-
ings going up overnight. You would go
to sleep one night, and the next day
when you woke up, there would be
a new building.You would even see
lakes being constructed by men oper-
ating huge machines.
-I 17TW L Farmer: Brasilia was a very modern
city.
Meireles: It'sstillmodern.Iwould like
A i
to thinkof Brasiliaas a utopianspace
for socialdemocracy,but sometimes
this idealis inverted.Forexample,the
planof the cityis very rationalized,but
it was used to controlthe populace.
That'sthe problem.It'sa type of fas-
cism. Butthe city can'tbe controlled.
Farmer: Do you think about the
issue of control when you make
your installations? Although you give the audience the freedom to participate
in the creation of the work, you also create situations that you control very
carefully.
Meireles: Yes. I play with people's fears. Fear is the material of many of my
works. For example, in Voldtil(Volatile, 1980/94), fear is present. You see the
lighted candle at the back of the space and smell the scent of naturalgas. You are
afraid that the room will explode. But when you have fear, your senses become
heightened. You become more attentive to your environment.
Farmer: Does heightening the audience's perceptual faculties have social
implications for you?
Meireles: Of course. Takingsomeone to the point of fear is a kind of initiation.
That person becomes engaged.
38 FALL 2000
Volitil (Volatile), 1980/94.
Wood, ash, candle, natur-
al gas. 118 x 591 x 157in.
(300 x 1500 x 400 cm).
Installation view at Capp
Street Foundation, San
Francisco, 1994. Courtesy
of the artist and Galerie
Lelong, NewYork.
Farmer: When I enter a work like Fontes(Fountains/Sources,1992), I don't
necessarilyfeel fear, but I do become completely engaged with the environ-
ment I find myself in. My experienceof space and time becomes totally disori-
ented. The walls are covered with clocks that are identical except for the fact
that the clock faces vary:what readsas 3 o'clock on one might read as 6 o'clock
on another.Similarly,the calibrationson the measuringstickshanging from
the ceiling all differ. One stick might be calibratedas i, followed by 2, 3, 4,
5 inches, and so on, while anothermight say 72, 67, 58, 29, 39 inches, etc.
Meireles:With Fontes,Iwanted to makea work about displacement.It'scon-
structedin the shape of the MilkyWay. Fromthe top you can see that it's a double
spiral.It'salso inspiredbywhat was once thoughtto be Vincentvan Gogh'slast
painting,Crowsin a WheatField(1890). Iwantedto bringthatyellow and blackinto
the piece. This is actuallyone of three versions.
39 art journal
Fontes (Fountains/ Farmer: How are the three versions different?
Sources) (detail), 1992.
6000 yellow carpenter's Meireles: I'dliketo haveone with blacknumberson white. Iwould likeanother
rules, 1000 yellow clocks,
500,000 black numeral
to havewhite phosphorescentnumberson deep blue.
labels, soundtrack.
Dimensions variable. Farmer: You made another installation that deals with fear and danger called
Dedicated to the artist's Atraves(Through, 1983-89). This installation consists of a large space divided
friend Alfredo Fontes.
Installation at Docu- with different kinds of barriers, including a picket fence, a chain link fence,
menta IX, Kassel. venetian blinds, barbed wire, a tennis net, an aquarium. The floor is strewn
Courtesy of the artist with shards of broken glass. Is the visitor allowed to enter the space and walk
and Galeria Luisa Strina,
Slo Paulo. on the glass?

Meireles: At theirown risk.The piece was once installedfor more thana year,
and no one was injured.However,becauseyou are walkingover realglass,there
is alwaysa risk.Butthe soundwas beautiful.It,too, dealswith fear.As you walk
over and breakthe glass,you producea soundthat gives the piece a certainsinis-
ter beauty.
Farmer: Many of your installations, including Fontesand Atraves,remind me
of labyrinths. When you walk through a labyrinth, you often have a feeling of

40 FALL 2000
disorientation or even fear, because you don't know where you're going. But
when you finally reach the end and get out, you feel like you've accomplished
something. In many Gothic cathedrals, a labyrinth was put onto the surface
of the floor, and walking through it was a metaphor for the journey to union
with God.

Meireles: I haveactuallymadevery few labyrinths.Borgesknows muchmore

about labyrinthsthan I do. ButI likethe idea.The journeythrougha labyrinthis
premisedon a thoughtful,attentivesearch.You haveto walk,but with each step,
you haveto stop andthink.Thatis the good thingabout labyrinths. They help us
to slow down. AgainBorges.He can speakabout labyrinths. The labyrinthis in
some ways a kindof metaphorfor the way he worked.
Farmer: It's also a metaphor for how you work. For example, I would use
this metaphor to locate the politics of your work. As you were saying earlier,
you're not a didactic artist, who has a "message" that you want to convey to
your audience in an explicit way. Instead, you create situations, journeys that
sometimes incite fear, in which visitors have the opportunity to become more
conscious of their bodies in space-not only in physical space, but in social
space, too.
Meireles: Yes. Ithinkthat thistendencyhas been a characteristicof Brazilian art.
This locationof an ethics in the relationshipthat the artistconstructsbetween
him-or herselfandthe audiencethroughthe work of art.
Farmer: When did you start reading the work of Borges?

Meireles: In 1967, when a friend gave me a book of short stories. But I am not
only interestedin Borges.JulioCortizar is also an interestingwriter.And very
central.
Farmer: What about these two authors interests you?

Meireles: Borges playsfun and wonderfulgames. Cortizar also has a certain

imaginativecapacity.
Farmer: You are also interested in Joao Guimaraes Rosa, who wrote the
story "A terceira margem do rio" (The Third Bank of the River).
Meireles: Yes, but he is very difficultto translate, because his writing is a bit like
JamesJoyce's.He inventsa lot of neologisms,but he used to say that he invents
nothing,becausehe simplygoes backto the oldest meaningof a word and uses it
in the most primitiveway.When I hadto select an "Artist'sChoice"text for the
Phaidonbook, Iwas torn between "TheThirdBankof the River"and Borges's
"TheGardenof ForkingPaths,"whichI ultimatelychose. Cortizar also has a very
interestingstory about a manwho wakes up one morning,likeGregorin Franz
Kafka'sMetamorphosis, andfindsthat the world is not as it was when he went to
sleep. As he gets out of bed, he findsthat hisfoot passesthroughthe floor. He
thinksthat it is a bad dream,but it isn't.He decides to get up andgo meet hisgirl-
friendat a street cornerfor a prearrangedappointment.Butas he walksthrough
the city, he sinks deeper and deeper into the ground, until he disappears. When
hisgirlfriendarrivesat the corner,she findsonly his hat on the sidewalk.

4 I art journal
 77,

. ... ...

42 FALL 2000
Atrav6s (Through),
1983-89. Fishing nets,
voile, reinforced glass,
livestock nets, architects'
grid-lined paper, venetian
blinds, garden fencing,
wooden gates, prison
bars, wooden trellis, iron
fencing, mosquito nets,
metal city barrier fenc-
ing, aquarium, tennis
nets, metal stakes,
barbed wire, chains,
chicken wire, museum
rope barriers, ball of cel-
lophane, shards of win-
dow glass.Area approx.
2,421 sq. ft. (225 m2).
Installation, KanaalArt
Foundation, Kortrijk,
Belgium, 1989. Courtesy
of the Artist and Galerie
Lelong, NewYork.
Farmer: How does your interest in filmmakers like Welles, and writers like
Borges and Cortazar, who dissolve this boundary between art and life, fiction
and reality, relate to your interest in making installations, which has been
your primary medium for the past several years?
Meireles: Myfirstinstallationwas Eureka/Blindhotland
(1970-75), whichdealt
with the differencebetween appearanceand reality.Itwas inspiredin partby
Borges'sstory "Tl6n,Uqbar,OrbiusTertius"(1941).
Farmer: Yes. That's the one in which Borges writes about the fictional
world T16n, which he describes as a "brave new world" created by scientists,
philosophers, artists-a world that does not exist as a system of objects in
space, but as a series of actions in time. I think that he even writes that "Tl6n
is surely a labyrinth, but it is a labyrinth devised by men, a labyrinth destined
to be deciphered by men."
Meireles: Yes. InEureka there are two hundredblackballsof the
/Blindhotland
same volume but of differentmasses.The audiencewas invitedto handlethe
balls,and in the process disruptedtheirconventionalsense of perception.It'sa
work aboutthe deceptivenessof appearances.So is Sermaodo Montanha: FiatLux
on
(Sermon the Mountain: LetThere Be in
Light,1973/79), whichfivegovern-
ment agentssurroundeda hugestackof boxes filledwith matchesrestingon the
floor,whichwas coveredwith blacksandpaper.Butthe agentswere reallyjust
actors.Thatwas anotherwork aboutfear.
Farmer: Do you like working with installation because you can involve
the audience in a more direct way than one can with painting, in which the
viewer typically has a more passive relationship to the work?
Meireles: Yes.The problemwith paintingis that the artistis alwaysauthoritarian,
even if you don't want to be. Bygivingpeople a space to interactwith,you also
give them freedom.When we give someone freedom,we get freedomourselves.
We wouldliketo thankMegBlackburn
of the New Museumof Contemporary Art,New York,for making
thisinterviewhappenandMarySabbatinoandJoannaKaplowitz
of GalerieLelong,New York,for their
generousassistance.
JohnAlanFarmeris SeniorEditorof ArtJournal.
He is alsothe curatorof the exhibitionTheNewFrontier:
ArtandTelevision,
1960-65,on view at the AustinMuseumof ArtfromSeptemberI to November26,
2000.
CildoMeireles'sworkhasbeenfeaturedin numerousone-personmuseumexhibitions,includingthe New
Museumof Contemporary Art, New York(1999-2000);the Museude Art Moderna,Riode Janeiro
(1984);The Museumof ModernArt, New York(1990);IVAMCentredel Carme,Valencia(1995);
Instituteof ContemporaryArt, Boston(1997);Kiasma,Museumof ContemporaryArt, Helskinki(1999).
He hasalsobeen includedin manygroupexhibitionsaroundthe world.
43 art journal