INTERVIEW WITH FOR FREEDOMS, CO-FOUNDER ERIC GOTTESMAN & DIRECTOR MICHELLE WOO
Moderated and edited by Devon Van Houten Maldonado
Derrick Adams, “Ode to Bayard Rustin,” 2018
Written in conjuction with the exhibition Cry of Victory and Short Walks to Freedom
DEVON VAN HOUTEN MALDONADO: What was the For Freedoms project born out of? What was it created in response to?
MICHELLE WOO: It was born out of a lot of things but, I think first and foremost, the project was rooted in anxiety about the direction and shape of our country’s political climate — understanding how pivotal the role of art and artists are in paving new ways forward, and creating the space for critical thinking and dialogue. I’m not sure we fully realized what we were trying to do; collectively we saw ourselves at the intersection of so many different things and, aptly, had a lot of questions that the current system of socio-political binaries couldn’t answer.
ERIC GOTTESMAN: On one hand, I feel like For Freedoms is connected to a history of artistic projects that stretch back 60 years, and even longer, to viewing art as an essential part of social and cultural life. So, in that sense, For Freedoms is based in an art history that, for a long time, has been trying to figure out what the role of the artist is in public life and how art can be used, or what art’s function is in society. But, at the same time, there is a real relevance right now to what we’re doing. For Freedoms was started in 2015 before we knew who would be the current administration.
Hank and I were really interested in responding to what we observe — both of us being keen observers of art, as well as of politics. It was based on what we saw as an oversimplification of political messaging and rhetoric. This has been true for many years, and is more related to the advent and proliferation of 24-hour media and now social media, and the way in which news is structured and the way stories are told. So we were responding, more than to any specific political moment, to our obser- vations about the development of systems by which human beings communicate about the structures of the society that surrounds them.
DVHM: How will the identity of your organization or project evolve over time? What will For Freedoms look like in the future or what do you hope that it will look like, and how is that vision different and necessary today?
MW: For Freedoms is and will hopefully continue to be a catalyst for civic participation. Some of us are artists so there is a lot of self-generated content, but I think our primary contribution and strength is bringing people together across the cultural spectrum to support others in realizing their own vision for the future. Part of this includes reshaping public discourse, making room for open and honest conversations and really stressing the importance and necessity of creative agency in doing that.
EG: We started as a super PAC, in part because we wanted to ask questions about how political messaging happens, and how money relates, both to the art world and to the production of political speech. So at the beginning we created the vehicle — the super PAC — and we didn’t really know what we were going to do with it. We still don’t know exactly what we’re going to do with it but the structure and the goals of the project have evolved from that point. We’ve tried a number of different things: we’ve held exhibitions, we experimented with some billboard campaigns, we’ve done dialogue-based town hall meetings run by artists in art spaces like museums and galleries.
As we thought about art audiences, which are often defined as coastal, and as we also thought about political strategists’ long-dreamt-of 50 state solutions, we started developing this other way of working toward the 50 State Initiative with museums, galleries and other non-profit institutions. As we moved in that direction we found the super PAC to be a clunky apparatus because universities or museums have their own internal politics, and often aspire to be, although they can never truly be, apolitical. We wanted, as artists, to set up an organization and then mess with the rules. We decided that the super PAC structure became sort of outdated for us. Now we are operating out of a different structure: we have an LLC as well as a 501c3 non profit and a 501c4 lobbying arm. A lot of organizations and movements have been built up towards solving certain political problems and yet the structures themselves have not been capable of doing that. So we’re trying to do what artists do, which is asks questions about why that is, what could be better, how could things be done differently?
DVHM: How can artistic actions make a difference in our current political land- scape? In other words, is there potential for artists to take meaningful action in the political arena or is that the job of activism? What’s the difference?
MW: Art is inherently critical and nuanced and allows us to more deeply explore issues and ideas from a diversity of perspectives. It resists reductive, singular approaches to conversation, action, and thinking. When you look at a work of art, you aren’t told what to say or how to feel, nor are you necessarily provided any answers. You’re really being challenged with the task of paying attention and thinking about what you are seeing and why you are seeing it that way. It encourages introspection and listening — something that the political arena is really lacking.
EG: Yes, I do think artists have a role, and it’s played out every day. There are distinc- tions between activism and art, politics, education... but I think those distinctions are often artificial. Artists know that the work they do every day is informed by the way in which they circulate in the world. That is circumscribed by social political contexts. That said, artists are often inventing new systems and expanding lexicons. In our case, we’re trying to expand the civic vocabulary by imagining that patriotism can be a creative act. The tools for civic action have in recent years shown themselves to not be weak but insufficient. So the question that we’re asking is: why are artists, who are often doing civic work, not considered to be central players in civic and political action? All art is political and all public policy is the result of culture. So if culture is produced by art, and culture determines politics, then how can anybody make the case that art is not political?
DVHM: As we seem to be facing the end of modern idealism and the false promises of ‘freedom for all’ through technological innovation and industry — is freedom today a quest for truth or some kind or reconciliation with the death of truth?
MW: I think freedom is about feeling empowered to participate in civic conversations.
EG: I don’t think we view the end of the idealism of modernity to be upon us. I think freedom as defined by a version of modernity is defined by individualism. One of the things that we as For Freedoms are about, and that I as an artist have been connected to for a long time and in many different projects — freedom comes from connections to one another, not in spite of those connections. The vision of modern- ism as a rugged individualistic practice or worldview where everybody is out for themselves, and authorship and artistic masterpieces and mastery is defined by the intricacies of our own brain, as though the artist can be removed from the context in which they exist, or the society in which they work — I think that has been exposed as a farce.
I go back to the idea that all art is political. One of the things I mean is that all artists are connected to one another and to people in their society. It’s not like artists are the only people that have the ability to tell stories, but they do dwell on things beyond where other people search for answers. Historically that’s meant that artists have isolated themselves. That’s where I see the difference in the sense that, I think, artists should be more at the center of political life and more connected. Artists should be seen as part of, not apart from, public life. As for as the notion that science has failed us, I think it is inevitable that any system based on dehumanization and oversimplification and exploitation of our psychology is going to be incomplete. Representation through art is ultimately insufficient and fails because human beings are complex. It’s not about art versus science — it’s all part of the same quest. But I think any society that doesn’t value art will never fully realize its potential because it will ultimately not reflect the complexity of humanity.
DVHM: How do the town halls, billboards, exhibitions and other projects of For Freedoms operate across the art world and the public sphere? What potential exists for productive dialogue between contemporary art and the public at large when everyday people feel so far removed from ‘high culture’ and the avant-garde, or who perhaps have never been introduced to alternative pedagogies or ways of thinking and seeing?
MW: For the 50 State Initiative, we’re deferring to our institutional partners to decide what ideas and programs make the most sense for their local audiences. The town hall, billboard and exhibition model is just one creative and inclusive alternative for positioning artists as thought leaders, exploring the complexity and grey area of issues that political rhetoric fails to currently address. The potential really lies in the subjectivity and diversity of art itself, and the inspiration and insight derived through free creative exploration.
EG: I think the notion of elitism in culture is something that is divisive and it demands examining and questioning, and maybe subverting. The thing that we’re advocating is not that art is any higher a calling or better a producer of culture than any other cultural activities, sports or popular culture — these are all reflections of who we are and they also shape who we are. What we’re suggesting is that there might be a model in how artists approach their work for how the public sphere could operate. [Artists’] work is put into the public. People come and see it and they may not understand it. In fact, I don’t understand a lot of art.
I didn’t study art in college. I came to it late. The way I learned about art is that I would look at it and I would say, “What is that?” Then I learned more and I learned about the artist. Maybe that thing that I don’t quite understand is worth my time and my thinking to see if I can understand it. The goal is that in public life we can look at people we don’t understand, who are different from us, look at ideas that are different and that we may vehemently disagree with, and really give them their due, to try to understand them. We are deeply entrenched in ideologies and divisions that aren’t real, and that aren’t necessarily based in what would be good for us individually and as a people. There is a way of thinking in art practice and in the consideration of ideas expressed by artists throughout history that could be applied to the way that we think about the ideas that shape the institutions under which we live today in contemporary life.
MICHELLE WOO is an art producer, art historian, and arts business consultant based in New York City and Los Angeles. She was awarded a 2017 ICP Infinity Award. Her diverse roles include project management of large-scale public art and exhibitions, curatorial advisement, and strategic planning for artists. She received her BFA in painting from Pratt Institute and a MA in art history at Hunter College of the City University of New York. She previously worked at Pace/MacGill Gallery and Phillips de Pury and Company in New York City.
ERIC GOTTESMAN is an artist who makes images and social interventions that address themes of nation- alism, migration, conflict, structural violence, colonialism and intimate relations. Frequently engaging communities in critical self-expression, Gottesman’s projects have been shown at health conferences, in government buildings, on indigenous reserves, and in public space as well as at museums like MoMA/PS1, MFA Boston, the Cornell Museum of Fine Arts, Houston Center of Photography, MoCA Cleveland, and the Addison Gallery of American Art. Sudden Flowers, his decade-long collaborative project in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, resulted in temporary street installations and a collective monograph. Gottesman is a Creative Capital Artist, a Fulbright Fellow, an Artadia awardee, and a co-founder of For Freedoms, an initiative for art and civic engagement that won the 2017 Infinity Award. His translation of Ethiopian writer Baalu Girma’s banned novel Oromaye was published in Hayden’s Ferry Review. He is an Assistant Professor of Art at SUNY-Purchase College.
DEVON VAN HOUTEN MALDONADO is an art critic, writer and translator based in Chicago, IL. His work has been widely published with international publications like the BBC, Flash Art, Hyperallergic, Elephant Magazine, OZY and others. Hunter College of the City University of New York.