 That's so nice of you. Thank you. Welcome everybody. How many of you know that today is Human Rights Day? So, um, Happy Human Rights Day, I guess you could say. And I'm Anne Pasternak, and I'm the new Shelby Whitenly-on-Levy Director of the Brooklyn Museum. And I'm really excited that this is one of the first exhibitions that I get to introduce here at the Brooklyn Museum and that I get to introduce tonight's conversation. I'm going to get to you two in a moment. So there's no better way to celebrate Human Rights Day with them, with all of you, and with the opening of Agit Prop, an exhibition that explores artists' contributions to social and political change and a conversation on the most urgent social and political issues of our day. For the past hundred years, Agit Prop has directly reflected the intent of this work. Our show connects us contemporary art with historic moments and creative activism. It opens tonight with works of 20 contemporary artists, many of whom are here this evening. If you're here, can you just, like, do this? Yay, artist. I hope that you've had a chance to see the show on the fourth floor in the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art. And if you have not yet, do not worry it. I encourage you to do so after the talk. We'll keep the museum open until 10 p.m. for you this evening. And I want to thank our tremendous Sackler Center curatorial team, Saisha Grayson. Where are you, Saisha? He's back there, our assistant curator. Katherine Morris, our Sackler family curator. Katherine, where are you? Stephanie Weisberg. Stephanie, where are you? Hello, Stephanie, our curatorial assistant. And Jess Wilcox, our programs coordinator. Jess, where are you? Thank you, Jess. I got to tell you, not only do they put together this innovative exhibition, I have to tell you they have been absolutely wonderful to work with. I feel very, very blessed to have such a dynamite, brave, courageous, creative curatorial team to work with here. So thank you all for your work, and I really mean that. Of course, we are also very, very grateful to our generous donors. I want to thank some of you who are here this evening. Lauren Embry of the Embry Family Foundation. Lauren, where'd you go? Oops, she's probably downstairs having a drink. Let her know I said thank you. The fund, the Warhol Foundation, and the Helene Zuckerseaman Memorial Exhibition Fund. And of course, I must thank from our bottom of our hearts, Elizabeth Sackler. Elizabeth, without you, none of this happens. You are truly out of the box thinker. And if there was ever an agitator in a museum, in the best of ways, it's you. Thank you, Elizabeth. Actually, as an aside, our 10th anniversary for the Sackler Center for Feminist Art is next year, and so you can expect some really tremendous programming coming out of that that will impact the entire museum from top to bottom. But now we're here to talk about two incredible artists we are hosting tonight. They are fearless champions of human rights causes. And while I suspect that most of this crowd is very familiar with the trailblazing work, I have been asked to give a brief introduction. So first, my very dear friend, Tanya Brigera, who I've had the honor of working with over the years. She's one of the leading political and performance artists of our generation. She's been researching ways in which art can be applied to the everyday political life. It was Tanya who said to me, I'm not interested in pointing at the thing, but being the thing itself. Brigera focuses on the transformation of social effect into political effectiveness. Her long term projects have been intensive interventions on the institutional structure of collective memory, education, and politics. And she really puts her life on the line for what she believes in. And she's fiercely independent. And Tanya, it's so wonderful to have you back at the museum. Thank you. I'm not going to read your whole bio. Is that okay? It's just like too big. Okay. Dred Scott, it is so great to have you here. And I'm so glad you're a part of this exhibition. Many of you know, I'm sure that Dred makes revolutionary art to propel history forward, and he tells uncomfortable truths to everyone. He first received national attention in 1989 when his art became the center of controversy over its use of the American flag. He's had the distinction of having President Bush declare his piece what is the proper way to display a U.S. flag as disgraceful. And the U.S. Senate denounced this work outlawing it by passing legislation. So the U.S. Senate also denounced this work outlawing it by passing legislation to protect the flag. To oppose this law and other efforts which would effectively make patriotism compulsory, he along with three other protesters burned flags on the steps of the U.S. Capitol. This resulted in a Supreme Court case and a landmark First Amendment decision. So we have here before us two extraordinarily courageous artists who really believe that art matters in the world, that art contributes to social change, that art affects policy and political change. You've absolutely been at the forefront. We're delighted to have you here at the Brooklyn Museum. And I thank you for your participation. So now the two of them do not know each other well, so we're expecting a really dynamic conversation. Thank you guys. So the format of the evening is Tanya's going to show us some of her work for about 10 minutes and then I'm going to show you some of my work for about 10 minutes. And then we're going to talk with each other and have a conversation. I'm really delighted to be here and with Tanya. I mean, she's an artist I really, really admire. And although Anne pointed out, we don't know each other super well. I've been a huge fan of her work and I think we each respect each other a lot. So I'm thrilled to have this opportunity both to talk with Tanya, just a conversation, and then to, you know, as part of AgitProp. And so that's the format. And then you guys are going to have a chance to ask some questions or her comments our way after we talk for a little bit. Yeah, this might be the most awkward way to meet somebody, right? But actually I knew about your work without knowing it was your work when I came to the Art Institute and I came to the performance department. They saw my portfolio and they say like anything but the flag. There's this guy who did this flag thing and I'm like, okay, fine. So that was you. So okay, so I'm going to show very different pieces from the different moments. The first one is the burden of guilt. And it's a very old piece from 98. So when I, you know, a long time ago. And I show it just because it was the piece that made me more, you know, internationally, maybe people knew this work a little bit. But it was also the piece where I realized I was doing something wrong. And actually I don't put that piece ever again, because I think there is a period of my work that was a mistake. And that piece is one of my mistake, I think. And the reason I say that is because I felt that representing the problem was not fixing the problem. And I got much more interested in trying to use the resources of power than representing the effects of power. And so this is one of the old, you know, statements I made. And yeah, so I think the idea that people can engage doesn't mean that they understand or the idea they can actually feel with you doesn't mean that they can actually go to the streets with you to change things. So that's very important. Then I, for me also, it's very, very important the fact that I work with the personal history of the people who are in part of the work, whether that be the audience or that being the performers. One thing I also realized doing the series of performances I did before was that it was too easy to make it a personal history. It was too easy being a woman, especially to make it like almost a historical claim, right? When you talk about power, it's like, oh no, she has a psychological problem. And I really say, okay, how can I go away from that kind of psychological reading of my work, which maybe is there, but it's not what I'm interested in sharing. So I decided not to use my body anymore and then start using all the people's body. And I use bodies that have work in a specific areas. In this case, I is the Mounted Police in London, and I just gave them the instruction to use crowd control technique with the audience. This is also 2008. So that was way before Occupy Wall Street, way before the students in London start going to the streets. So it was a very awkward moment for the audience because they haven't had some experience like that in real life. So basically, this is something they know from the media. So then I think something I also tried to do in my work is to have this what if moment. I like to use art as a way to stage a future that you live right now, as a way to test yourself, your own limits in terms of like what could be your life if you have certain opportunities that now are not in your hands. And in this case, I stage a podium, a microphone, some fake guards, but they didn't know that, and gave one minute to fresh fish, and people could say whatever they wanted. And I think sometimes the peace was silent, and sometimes the silent was even more powerful than the moment in which people were talking because it was a monument to fear. It was a huge monument to fear. So I think this is also some techniques I use, and I don't like scandal. I don't like like shock value, like, oh, none of this. But I use it as a resource when it's needed. Why? Because sometimes you need to bring people out of their comfort zone in order for them to open up to their own possibilities. And yeah, so this is. And the last piece is Immigrant Movement International, which I'm very happy I selected in part because Anne was part of that piece, like Tom Finker Perle as well with the Queens Museum. And I'm very happy to say that the Queens Museum's new director, Laura, has also continued to support the project. So this is a very long-term project, and I brought it here because I divide my work into let's say two techniques to be classical. One is short-term work and long-term works. The short-term work is what you saw before, which is something that's supposed to deliver their content, their message, their reactions in the framework of an exhibition. The long-term work is supposed to enter the social tissue and try to change it, which is a very delicate and long-patient work, sometimes very boring moments. But I'm very happy to say that, for example, a few days ago, some of the women from Immigrant Movement started this campaign to have cycling space in the street. And it's not so much the cycling is how they feel now they can ask to people in power for what they want. And the original idea for this piece was very simple. It was the fact that immigrants are stripped out of their political rights as soon as they cross the border. And with this piece, I wanted to see if they could have them back very quickly. We can talk about all the things. Well, actually, just tell people a little bit what the Immigrant Movement was. I mean, how did it function? Because we've got a picture, but I know what the image is of, kind of, where I have a synth that I do, but I think people might not be familiar enough to know, oh, this is what they say. Yeah, I think Immigrant Movement is two things. It is a space in which we try what I call Arte Util, which is art as a tool or useful art. I find it very useful itself, because it is a way to work with communities that feel they have no relation with contemporary art. And then you enter their life through things they need. And they can see art first as a way to understand the world and as a way to think differently about their problems and maybe come up with some different outcomes and solutions instead of getting frustrated or getting scared about contemporary art. So we had very beautiful experiences where we had, for example, a dancer who came and gave this workshop. The moms were very excited and wanted more and more and more. And then at the end of the workshop, the dancers show, and what they have done the whole time is choreographies from Tina Bausch and this they knew after they already feel it. So I think this idea of feeling the work, understanding you're part of it, and then discovering its art is also something I like to work with. I don't like people knowing its art right away. So I like that as it's one of my techniques. Cool. Yeah. Okay. Well, I'm also going to show, I mean, thank you for that. And this is great. I'm going to show four works also, but I'm going to show several images. So this is what's the proper way to display a US flag. And because I'm showing several images, I'm going to go kind of quickly through stuff. This is an installation for audience participation. And it consists of a photo montage on the wall, and I'll show you a detail of that in a second. And then below the photo montage, which had text that said what's the proper way to display a US flag. There were a shelf that had books that were originally blank that people could write responses to that question in. And below that was a three by five foot flag that people are the option of standing on as they interacted with the work, but they could also interact with the work without standing on the flag. And so this is the photo montage. And below the text it says it just has images of South Korean students burning US flags holding signs saying Yankee go home son of bitch. And below that are flag draped coffins coming back from Vietnam in a troop transport. And this piece was made in 1988 and it became the center of controversy, national controversy in 1989. This is an image of the Art Institute of Chicago, which is physically attached to the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where I was an undergrad student at the time. And this was a demonstration of 2,500 reactionary veterans, almost all white and mostly from World War II in the Korean War. And they said things like the flag and the artist hang them both high, bringing back images of lynching. This is one of the things they had a sign that said, let's see if this pointer works out, but no, I don't know how to make the pointer work. So on the far left there's a sign that says go try it there chump. And supposedly if I tried talking about the flag of some other country wherever there is, that there would be armed soldiers that would be threatening me. And either these guys are really, really good at irony or they don't get irony at all. I'm not sure which. This is when George Bush called my work disgraceful, George Herbert Walker Bush, Bush 1. And so I'm an undergrad art student at a Midwestern art school. Nobody knew who I was at all. And then suddenly the President of the United States is calling my work disgraceful. And so I'm like, wait, this is great. This is a job I want to do for the rest of my life. So the Senate voted to outlaw the work. The Senate voted to ban display of the flag on the floor or ground. And for those who can't read, I'll just read it. It's the Senate on Thursday voted 97 to 0 to outlaw displaying the flag of the United States on the floor or ground and announced a flag exhibit on the floor of the school of the Art Institute of Chicago. Well, I don't know much about art, but I know desecration when I see it. It's a minority leader, Robert J. Tolle, Republican of Kansas, introducing the measure. This disgraceful display needs much more than symbolic action. And so, you know, this is the most powerful country in the world. They have the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines. They're running roughshod over the planet. They're threatening more war. And they're actually going to the extraordinary measure of outlawing this artwork. And so I knew, even as an undergrad, that this was an anomaly, that this was unlikely to happen to me or other artists again, but it also really showed the power of art and that that was very important to continue to do because I was a revolutionary, as a young revolutionary at the time, and I was also doing a lot of organizing the housing projects of Chicago. But this showed actually that this art could tremendously matter and that I needed to do more of that as well. And this is me burning flags on the steps of the Capitol. What do you do when you're confronted with an unjust law? You defy it. And that resulted in a Supreme Court case. United States of America versus Sean Eichman et al. And so now you guys can do whatever you want with the flag. You can wear it on a lapel. You can put it on a pole. You can blow your nose in it. You can make art with it. Next work. This is a project called Wanted. And Wanted is a community-engaged artwork that masquerades as wanted posters for things that are not illegal that the police hassle youth for all the time. The text, I mean it looked just like Wanted posters, but the text on it would be like, you know, Wanted for unspecified reasons and then it would have just the generic descriptions, a drawing of somebody, and then, you know, very generic on Friday, July 18th, 2014 at approximately 1945 hours. A male black approximately 19 to 23 years of age was wearing a blue over shirt and black denim pants, was observed standing in front of a building at 549 West 126. And then it flips the script at the end of that. It said, the suspect is wanted by his family, friends, and neighbors to download copies of this poster and display it at www.wantedproject.com. And this was a project that I did with young adults who were hassled by the police all the time and community activists and organizers. There were community meetings to talk about the mass incarceration and the criminalization of youth. This was a sketch session where these youth had their photos sketched by descriptions of adults that had just seen them for a very brief time that then ended up on the posters, and this was done as a performance. So people could sort of start to understand how these photos, these sketches are not necessarily accurate and they'd question the authenticity of them and how they function. And then these are just a couple of the other posters. And all the text for what people were wanted for, like Wanted for looking out or furtive movement come from NYPD statistics on why they stopped and frisked people. And stopping and frisking is typically molesting and violating, and it can even end up in death with what happened with Eric Garner. But these 43 percent of the people were stopped because they moved furtively. So 5 million people were stopped between 2004 and 2012. And so 43 percent of them because they moved furtively. And we went to various places like bodegas and delis and barbershops and nail salons and talked with people about putting these up because we wanted to change the conversation about how the youth were criminalized. And this just references a piece that's in the show that you can see downstairs, the anti-lynching campaign. Actually, I guess I'm showing five works because I snuck this in. But it says it all, sort of it's unfortunately timely and an update of the 1920s and 30s flag that the NAACP put out. History is a part of my work. This is a photograph I didn't take. It's a photograph of the hosing of civil rights demonstrators in 1963 in Birmingham, Alabama. And in looking at these images, I started to recognize how important the protesters were doing. The image shows a lot of brutality. It also shows a lot of courage and heroism of people trying to overthrow Jim Crow segregation and all the violence and brutality that that represented. And so what these photos really begin to represent for me is people's strength in standing up to it. So I reenacted this scene like this. I had a fireman turn a high pressure fire hose water jet on me and instead of cowering from it and running from it, which is the smart thing to do, which is what the civil rights demonstrators did, I actually sort of continued to walk into the battering force of the water jet. And this is sort of drawing on that history and doing that sort of hands up don't shoot, which the piece was presented in October of last year. So just over a year ago and the death of Mike Brown was still fairly recent and everybody was saying hands up, don't shoot. And so, yeah. And let's see. The Dred Scott decision, opinion of Chief Justice Taney, transcript of Dred Scott versus Sanford, 1857, December term, 1856. Dred Scott versus John F.A. Sanford. Dred Scott, plaintive in error, the John F.A. Sanford. Chapter one, one. Upon a writ of error to a circuit court of the United States, the transcript of the record of all proceedings in the case is brought before this court and is open to inspection and revision. Four, a free Negro of the African race whose ancestors were brought to this country and sold as slaves is not a citizen within the meaning of the Constitution of the United States. Five, when the Constitution was adopted, they were not regarded in any of the states as members of the community, which constituted the state and were not numbered amongst its people or citizens. Consequently, the special rights and immunities guaranteed to citizens do not apply to them. And not being citizens within the meaning of the Constitution, they are not entitled to sue in that character in a court of the United States or the circuit court has jurisdiction in such a case. Six, the only two clauses in the Constitution which point to this race treat them as persons who it was morally lawful to deal in as articles of property and hold as slaves. Seven, since the adoption of the Constitution of the United States, no state can by any subsequent law make a foreigner or any other description of persons citizens of the United States nor entitled them to the rights and privileges secured to that citizen by the instrument. Eight, a state by its laws passed and so the instructions that people encountered in the booth not knowing what was going to be there were instructions on how to fill out a brief questionnaire that got into the relationship between slavery mass incarceration and voting, and it was an ethical question, but leading into it, it said would you have voted during slavery and would you have voted in a segregated election? And so I think that's probably the last image and you know I just want to say that you know I would there's a lot to talk about, I mean and I mean I'm sure I hope you have some questions and to discuss I want to actually though start I mean I hope we can actually talk about some of the politics which we're actually sort of developing and fighting for in our work, but I actually want to talk about sort of audience and aesthetic because when one of the things you know it's like I knew the piece with the horses in the turbine hall that was Tatlin's Whisperer number five, right? Yeah and you know I knew of that piece a while back but I didn't think of it until sort of I was looking at the thinking of this it's like oh wait there's there's some relationship just in how the the relationship between the audience to the art and being part of the art and not necessarily knowing what they were sort of getting into so when when I did the Dred Scott decision piece the piece we just saw last you know the audience I think assumed they would be sitting down there like you are and they would be seeing a play on stage or something on stage and suddenly they found they were part of this experience and so I would like to talk like you to talk more about you know what made you decide to say I'm going to subject an art audience that didn't necessarily know what they were seeing or even if they were seeing a Tanya Brigera piece to having sort of the state come in and corral and control them why did you decide to do that? I think I think in that case the piece was not announced so nobody knew it was part of the show nobody knew this piece was going to happen only the creators and I think you know I think you need to prepare the audience and sometimes preparing the audience is not giving them the fact that they are in front of an art piece and I think that really I mean my experience is that they really I want them to become citizens not audience and to react as citizens and then maybe go home and think why they did or they didn't do something and in that piece it was very striking the fact that people were following all the orders except one girl and and this is why I like to work with people who all have embody their own job because then these policemen who were kind of like doing their job but they were not so like they were just like choreographing in a way when this girl saying no like she's like I'm not going their police wake up and they became the repressive police that they are yeah and this is why I like to work for example I did another piece with a weatherman underground and and I think people you know they carry the history so they know how to react and how to bring that history so in this case that happened but the other thing is that I think I have chosen for a while now not to work so much with the art world audience maybe that piece was one of the last pieces I use our world set up so I think part of what I'm doing is I'm trying for a while to be away from museums or if I work with the museum make them work in places outside because I'm more interested in you know in in bringing art to other people yeah in part because our art is not referring to the art world history maybe so immediately they always are but it's more about the history it's about the memory right it's about the political memory it's about you know redirecting some questions you know so I think in this case I'm more interested in people who are not artists yeah no I think that's you know really important I mean I you know I tell people I show in mainstream museums and on street corners with or without permission and you know I think it's really you know some of my work you know really is trying to reach an audience that even if the museum were right next door to them wouldn't come into the museum and I think that there's a lot of both the importance and engaging so-called ordinary people with contemporary art I've kind of shared with the time when you knew people were doing art without permission yeah you know I kind of shared like when you were like oh this person did and that and you're like oh and they did it just because and they asked like I kind of like to go back to that maybe I'm too old for that no maybe some people here can't do that art without permission you get you younger people do that you know because you know I think there is a big institutionalization of our practice and part of this is the fact that young artists don't think they are valuable unless they are backed up by an institution and that makes no sense like a half of my work is you know so yeah so I mean speaking of not permission I mean you know I guess the the Tatlens whisper number six which was in Havana which you didn't say yeah well no wasn't so much the one that you did show not but and the last one well well the first one that you showed was it was during the Havana biennial right okay so that was you know with permission but it was not permitted I mean they they didn't like what you did yeah and I have to say that I thank Guillermo España because thanks to him that piece was able to happen yeah because he used his power of being like the guests of the show to invite me on and they couldn't say no to him so that sometime I mean I'm sure you're okay it's the same like most of my work has a heavy negotiation behind doors either in my head or with actual sensors yeah so I think this is something maybe we don't talk about but it's important that people understand that you know you always have to put a here so you can do this at least you know let's talk about the sensors for a bit because it's rare that I'm on stage with somebody who has been censored and denounced by you know heads of nations and targeted and arrested and no I mean that's so I I mean it's something we sort of have in common and I think that you know there is something both the the the form of the work that we do but it's more the ideas that we're talking about and and sort of that you know you know having people giving them the freedom to talk for just a minute and say whatever they want at least in Cuba at the particular times that you did it was not tolerated well by the Cuban government yeah um and you know but I mean so what is it that you you are doing that is so threatening why is well I think um well first of all I know if this is used also here but um in in Cuba every time you're going to do a critical work they always said to you it's not the right time but then I read the day the biography of a writer who in the 60s wanted to publish a book and they say it's not the right time so it's never the right time so that's what we have to do it uh and forget about that so the thing is that um in this case I think I think people in power at least in Cuba and I think other places too they're okay with artwork that is kind of a phenomenological approach to the problem like oh these are like I'm complaining because this and this is happening but they don't like the work that goes to what causes the problem and I think that is when they really get threatened because most of the time they're part of the problem yeah and they don't want to be called out the other thing I think happens is that many politicians do not taking to consideration artists because they feel first of all some of them if they're not sophisticated enough they think art has a very old function which is decoration but um many of them do not have a language to which they can respond to work that addresses them so they basically go and censor that's their their instinct so I think in this case for example in Cuba um I had more than 20 interrogation sessions and um at some point I mean these interrogations were like endless like three four out like really long and at some point it's like I'm not going to tell you what you want because I'm not talking about that or I have nothing to tell you because you want me to say I'm CIA and I'm not how can I'm going to follow this conversation which is absurd but um and then one thing I realized I told them one thing that happened is you understand theater because it's something that is controlled that is very clear and my work has uh an unstable form this is something I use I use unstable forms and you get threatened I think people in power get threatened but they cannot identify exactly what's happening and I think that's when they come up with censorship so at this point I start talking to them about what performance art is what political art in my view is and you know working without like I actually was teaching I became a professor at that point but I think that's that's something I think when they think they're very recognizable that's why they like propaganda so much because it's very clear you know the meaning is set is um contained in a very classical specific way so I think I don't know in your case if that is well I mean I think you know I've had several works that have been threatened with censorship and I think part of I mean I think it's more that there is a a tiny handful of people who control the wealth and the knowledge that humanity as a whole has created and this at least in I mean in this country definitely but in the world I mean it it's a society that is founded on exploitation and oppression and when those questions get opened up for people to discuss and debate whether it whether it's any I mean I think even if you were showing oppressive relations but certainly if you're allowing people the freedom to talk about that to pose that question and allowing them to talk I mean I think that if with what's the proper way to display us flag if I just said fuck the flag nobody would have cared there was an oh it's art we don't like it but the fact that I was like okay let's have a big conversation about this but foregrounding it in a way that people who feel that they've been victimized by America have an equal footing to share their stories with other people who believe you know all the the that America is great and so that debate where people were standing in line for literally hours and including people from the housing projects that's what was dangerous that's why you know Bush was was threatened any comment on it but I think it really it has to do with there is this profound exploitation and oppression in the world and I think part of your work is making making a lot of that visible for people even if it's not showing it but it is actually creating situations in which that is sort of you know I mean in a certain sense with what is some comfort for the audience sometimes yeah all right yes it is if they were free yeah and sometimes say that again say that again I'm forcing people to behave as if they are free with through the work sometimes I'm forcing the people to behave as if they were free yeah and people are not ready to be free you know so that's what I think art is so important um what's almost I have a question for you will you ever think that some of your work could be done differently like for example the flag have you ever gone back and say like oh maybe that's not the form what he said so I mean I think is a I think your work is very good extremely good aesthetically yeah and very precise but I'm interested to you know yeah you well I rethink work a lot and and there's some works that you know I'm old enough to know that not every piece that I've done is a great piece and there's some pieces same here yeah and and you know I think some pieces I have are really good I actually think the flag were that I got it right I would I wouldn't change that and I've been thinking including like how to learn from that and do but you know it was basically it was I mean I was young at the time but that was a work that I'm still very proud of um and in fact there are themes you know in that work that I still keep mining in terms of how to activate an audience I mean and so you know it was interesting I mean one of the things I say that the that work is consists of a photo montage you know a silver gel at print books pens a shelf a flag and an active audience and so in I just want to read what some of your materials are and at least on your website I mean it's like you know materials immigration policies and laws immigrant population elected officials politicians community organizers public pressure media I mean that's these are great you know it's like some people work with canvas and brush and you're working with laws and policies or that came also out of like a big hard time I had with people especially like people who were talking about the work and they were trying to go to design classical like framing and I'm like no my work is not about it's about that policy yeah you know so I start doing that and also I start creating my own concepts like kind of I'm not good at that but I'm just did it as a performative gestures in which I start for example the first thing I did is like I studied performance at the art institute so we are yeah alumni from same school and I had a big trouble because back then it was not so open to other cultures and I decided I'm not a performance artist but I am a behavioral artist conduct artist and then by now I don't say I'm an artist actually why say I'm an initiator because the audience has a such a big role in the meaning of the work that I cannot claim at all and that also when I talk to critics and stuff that make them at least think they don't know everything so they have to stop and think from scratch instead of assuming things about the work and also you know so I think it's good to recognize for example when I did the Tate piece the the horse piece the Tate acquired the piece and part of the do they keep the cops in there and like they're do they keep the cops and there's the registrar have a cop the horses are living out there so so one of the things actually one of the point is that the perform like the police ones cannot perform more than three times because I realized that they become actors and they start beating in there and our work instead of being the police so but one part that was very important is I negotiated in the contract that they cannot persecute anybody taking documentation of the work and selling documentation of the work I'm not a successful selling artist but I hope one day people can profit from the photos they take of my work and I think that was just a kind of political because that's the other thing we're very good at being political with things outside of the art world and I think we need to be political inside of the art world as well and all the dynamics that we have when people are not being paid when people are you know discriminated I know it makes us less successful and less nicer to people maybe less inviteable to things but it's important and I think in this case I just wanted to recognize that some artists are very excited to work with audience until the economic factor comes in and this is my property it's like no I mean they were part of it they made the piece for you so be grateful at least so I hope sometime one of you can become wealthy with the photo you know when I die or something I don't know but I guess you know coming back to some of the change that sort of you're trying to bring about I mean a lot of times I mean on your website and in your talk tonight I mean you've talked about you know you said that like you know you tried to force people to be free and you've talked about utopianism and some of your tatlin work you talk about going back to a time when people actually imagined a radically different social relation and you know we're part of the agit-prop show and when you guys get to see the show I mean they're you know there's early Soviet work and there's work by Tina Monnadi that you know actually I mean which is rooted in communism and you know people trying to get to a world without classes and so I think that that's something that is is different than what a lot of at least western artists are trying to do but I think you know all I mean but this question of utopia but not just fantasy but actually talking working from the now to how people could actually get free actually I don't use the word utopia itself I use the the phrase realizable utopias and the reason for that is I come from a country that is being seen as an utopic country I'm from Cuba and for many many years that was the utopia of everybody we were not really utopia it was very dysfunctional but people wanted to project that onto us so I think in this case I really like the idea of utopia not as the island you can never reach of perfection but as the way and the road you take to arrive yeah and I think um yeah I think utopias are just the way you set up your goals and they are reachable and they should be reachable otherwise it's just yeah aesthetic yeah I mean right now the the project that I'm I'm working on is a long-term project it's called slave rebellion reenactment which is going to reenact the largest rebellion of enslaved people in US history which that rebellion happened in 1811 outside of New Orleans and it had yes um and the thing that's interesting to me about this is the goal of the rebels was actually to seize both the city of New Orleans but all of Orleans territory which was basically from Arkansas down to the Gulf of Mexico and enslavery and while it was a long shot it actually was a realistic chance to get free and to radically change the world and part of doing this is the the people that are going to be the the reenactors are going to be embodying this history and part of what I really want them to do and it's not just going to be like you know actors and people just showing up it's actually going to be people who are grappling with this and what does this history you know what does this 19th century history matter to 21st century people today and specifically how do you embody that and what lessons of freedom and emancipation are concentrated in that that people can learn from instead of just saying well you know maybe we could stop police brutality by getting body cameras or car cameras on to witness the murders they might say no we need to stop the police for murdering people and so I think there's this notion of free radical freedom and emancipation but actually giving people the tools and the structures to imagine that and work on that is really important and so you know and and it's interesting because you're talking about reenactment and and so much burden is keep putting into us about being creative and being new and all this and I think one thing that you feel liberated when you do political art is the idea of the newness because you never work with the new you work with the old you work with history with memory with people's behavioral training with you know so I think this is this is very liberating in a way like this is one thing we don't have to care about so much and also I think that in a different way that activists do but but I think we we is okay with us to have all these references you know and yeah so I think it's and actually sometimes you want that because you want people who are not artists to to understand where you're coming from and what are you talking about because it's part of their own history so I think that's that's for me it's very liberating but at the same time you have to be careful because you don't want it to make it too it's a very difficult balance because you work with things people recognize but at the same time you cannot do it in a way that are too obvious or too or the meaning is too like oh I get it yeah so I think this is an interesting I don't know how you deal with that like this tension between you know the icon and the meaning and you know symbol and I'll figure it out as I go along no I mean I know some of it but part of the part of the thing I think working with you know collaborating with non-artists in art projects and creating frameworks for people to sort of work within I mean it's like I mean I think with with the immigrant movement you didn't entirely know what what I mean you knew what you were going to you knew you're going to have a building you were going to live with some undocumented workers but you didn't know what the needs of the community was or where it was going to go and I think being open to adapting to that is actually within within an artistic frame you know I think is really but I think our work needs modesty and this is something that our world is not used to or doesn't recognize as a good thing probably sometime but I think we need modesty because when we work with these communities we cannot come like a messiah we have to come as somebody who is inviting themselves and you have to negotiate that entry the same way you negotiate the exit as well I think for this kind of project it's as important the way you get in as the way you get out for example right now immigrant movement is in the hands of the community the Queens Museum is still supporting very very much but it's in the hand of the community so basically what we did is setting up an ecology in which people knew what was and what wasn't possible what wasn't what wasn't their possibilities and and we set up a few things like the idea of like contemporary art teaching like social engagement art teaching together with activism and that still happens so I think is I don't know I think it's it's important to not believe you know everything or come like a UFO like oh I do my project go to our van in America our news our forum I think that's that I'm very nervous of that actually we made a mistake and Anne could be testifying of this like we made a mistake because I think we were so excited about the project that we invited the press soon and I had a very bad experience with the New York Times of everybody which has been very supportive of me after that but I think it was very interesting because we had the chance to choose somebody like Holland Carter or the guy from the immigration department in the newspaper and of course I decided the immigration guy who knew nothing about art or think he knew but he didn't know and that's interesting too like when in these projects you give access to people who are outside the community and why why because the press is a tool it's not a mean in an end of itself you say no it's a tool that you have to use for the work in order for the work to to be properly you know done or maybe the community excited because they are in the newspaper and that's something you know good for them on powering so yeah I mean but just sort of I get the last sort of exchange before we open it up to you guys I'm sorry to be so negative I'm like everything is wrong in my work but I don't feel well I mean if this is everything that's wrong with your work I wish more artists would do mistakes you know and show them but I so but I do have a I mean I think you're really right that when you go into a community you actually have to invite yourself in and you have to be humble and and go in and not oversell what you can do that said I think that many people in this society and I think many artists I mean don't dream big enough I mean I think there's a lot of ego in the arts where people are you know just about themselves but I think in terms of craving greatness and success and I mean it's you know going back to tatland I mean that it was part of a revolutionary society but it was they were actually really trying to radically transform the world and and the tower you know was meant to be this whole huge sculpture that that you know had a commissariat roving around the top I mean it was a bold vision and I think artists actually need that and society needs that and while I think that you know we may fail in in attempting to do that but I think you know including I have a tremendous confidence in in the people to be able to to shake off centuries of oppression and to become emancipators of humanity and you know we need revolution and we actually need people that come with that and if regardless of whether they they know it because they're artists and have studied art or whether they know it because they've you know been union organizer or whatever wherever you get that spirit for the the world does not have to be this way and a plan and a scientific understanding of that that can put in the hands of other people including through art then we need to actually be singing that from the mountaintops so if you guys have comments or questions we've got about 15 or 20 minutes maybe to to go into that if you have them this is being live streamed so there are two mics over on either side so if you want to say something to us so that we can hear you but so that also people on the interwebs can hear you go to the mic and say something just climb over your friends don't be embarrassed they don't mind hello thanks guys that was really great and inspiring I guess my question is just wanting to know a bit more about you both of you and what you've learned about yourself through your work and also I guess this um the the idea of freedom and if it if you're trying to free yourself through your work as well um well I mean I just I guess background I mean I was born to a middle class black family and and I wasn't the kid who doodled in drew I ended up my dad prior to my being born was a professional photographer and he changed careers around the time I was born and became an amateur photographer but I say that because I grew up around cameras and when I was 12 I got given an SLR which you know not digital SLR but an old school film analog camera and I just took a lot of pictures and they were you know just pictures when my family would go on holiday or you know when family would come over and stuff and so I didn't really think of it much as art and I ended up in art school kind of by accident I didn't do well enough in in high school to get into MIT or Caltech and and so um I ended up at the school of the art institute which was a really you know those who can't do teach those who can't teach you know teach gym and those who can't teach gym teach art so um I've taught so I I live off teachings I know I know I all my friends do I have so um so but anyway so I ended up going to art school and it was the best accident that ever happened I mean it was really an important change in my life that was unplanned but it it sort of set my life on a course that I think I can contribute more to humanity that way than if I were a scientist I think I'd be an okay scientist but I'd probably be making some sort of widget that was not really needed or just that somebody else can make money selling you something you don't need and um you know I I think that the the key question is not so much the art but is the politics and that that you know I grew up in Ronald Reagan's America um which was just an absolute nightmare it was a horror there were people on either side of the ocean that were trying to destroy the world um to expand their empires and Reagan just embodied greed and cruelty and and you know war and so you know I tell people Ronald Reagan made me a communist and so um you know and and finding out how to bring the the art and the politics together and and craving a world without exploitation without oppression and figuring out a way to um sort of have the art address that sometimes more successfully than others is sort of been my my life's mission as part of you know contributing everything I can to a movement for revolution well in my case I um come up from a political family because my father was actually in politics and um you know so in the house that's that was normal although I had a lot of problem my father after he brought me to the secret police for interrogation once you know that would be a problem I'm like I'm like okay now I'm talking to you for a while um and um but I think what influenced me the most is like a professor I had when I was very young I started 12 years old also by chance because my mom needed to put me in a double session school and that was art and so she could work very quietly so um his name was Juan Francisco Elso and his he has been a huge influence on my work and and he was the professor who told me that art is beyond what you see and it's the energy that you feel um and then after that in the 80s in Cuba there was this very and I always talk about this most people don't know about it but but that's also a challenge I had coming to United States because my influences were people nobody knew about it it wasn't vitro conchi or anything it was like afraid of lamb or no you know we're afraid of lamb also in a different way but but then the biggest influence was in the 80s it was a big big um group of young artists who were doing very political and uh contestatario we call it like you know against the government or not against the government like critic critical and um and that was the biggest influence I had in my life because I was very very young and I felt that art had a meaning and art had a reason to exist and art did actually change policy and art actually changed people's life and give something beyond and the exhibition and the museum and all that was a frame that could be used or not for to achieve these things and and all my life have been trying to do work that made me feel the way I felt when I was in those guys artwork as an audience so I think that's um yeah well just briefly I mean one of the early works that you did was you kind of created a living in Kisi power figure um which I mean you guys actually they probably have some in this museum I don't know if they do but they're Congo power figures that which I thought was really interesting but I mean the question of like the the you know the afro Cubans and and yeah but the thing is being Cuban I have been battling endlessly with all the preconception people have about what kind of art you're going to do so my first decision is going to do black and white art so no color no palm trees nothing like that so so that was very disappointing for people um especially my father and then um and then I uh I did only that one uh that is very like you know maybe you know um but what I liked about it is like it became this powerful figure that was walking the street of Havana the day of the anniversary of Fidel Castro which is the most back then it was the most heavy no no the most heavy police day in the year during the year and what I liked is that I learned from it that this is why I think part of my work has failed even if people really like it and I I know it has some good things but it's because one of the policeman approached like a huge group of people who who are following me um I say what's going on what's going on like super nervous like that he didn't understand what the meaning of this was and um a kid say it's an artwork and then the policeman think for a minute you know they need to think for a minute always and they think for a minute and he's like okay proceed proceed that was like I'm totally failing this is a failure like I want these people to care about what I do and to engage the conversation maybe change what they do because my work and then this is one of the pieces that made me think all of I mean I'm very tragic also all of this is wrong you know like all of that work is never going to show it again and then I it made me change into like I need to talk the language of power yeah because I need to talk to them not about them yeah so yeah so next question hi thank you for being with us tonight um and also thank you for talking about failure and mistakes in the context of art I think that's really exciting and important but um I'm sort of wondering something happened in this last few days um at Art Basel there was a stabbing that was considered to be performance art but it was sort of no one really knew what was going on and I'm just it's something that's been really preoccupying me as an artist lately and so I'm wondering if you have any thoughts about what the process should be for um containing or not containing performance art specifically as a medium well um I don't I mean I don't know I I mean I I think that artists I hope will always come up with new new ways and venues to make art the challenges preconceived notions I mean I I think that it says something that I mean and I don't know what it says actually necessarily that that in Art Basel people could think that a stabbing was an artwork and you know I I mean I I think it you know ultimately it seemed to be over something really petty and that people just contextualize it oh this is Art Basel somebody's going to do something like that I mean I don't know whether that if if you were going to do stabbing as art I don't know why do it in in Art Basel but maybe I don't know that but just to contrast that with something else that happened in in Miami I mean the police actually shot an unarmed man he was a white guy and he had supposedly tried to rob a bank but he was stripped down to his you know shirt and he was had his hands on the police car he may have had a razor at the time but then the police just shot him and it was recorded on video and so I the question I posed to you but the audience is why is it that the art world is more talking about the stabbing that happened than the police murdering people and again and again and again and again we have more in common I thought because I was going to be exactly why they curse so much about you know yeah than the what happened I think um it's not the first time that people have um think that things are hard when they are not um I know that there wasn't fair I think it was in Arco in Madrid where homeless people person came and they thought it was a performance that he was coming and eating all the like you know all the events and sleeping there and I mean it was a big deal but people didn't stop him because they thought it was a performance so I think it's good when it benefits people they think it's performance um but I think it talks about two things about first how um I don't know the word in English but self-indulgent maybe we are in the art world like self looking at yourself all the time yeah how self important we think we are in the art world and how much we forget what happens in the world and um and if it's happening in our world of art it's fine but if it's happening outside we don't care so I think that's that's very pro-copy. Hi I work in the juvenile justice system and also for an art space organization and so I hear a lot of language um that you're talking about is restorative justice space and about restorative practices and I'm wondering about fair process with your audience and how you engage your audience is it what happens at the brainstorming level at the brainstorming level is it in an intentional fair process at all levels well I have to be honest sometime in my case it's not a fair process I'm honest why because I want to take people take people off guard so I need to look at mechanism where make them uncomfortable in order to be themselves finally um so whether that is the taking out the framing of the artwork work whether that will be confronting them with their biggest fear uh you know whatever it is so sometime it's not that to be honest the process not so fair what I'm really um hopefully fair with is the people who knowingly are collaborating with the piece and I never ever collaborate with anybody who do not agree with the political point I want to make on the piece um so that for me is the first thing secondly um for me as a political artist it's more important sometimes the outcome of the piece that the way I arrived to the piece meaning and I always say this before I feel me political artists are with consequences and I think as a political artist you have to deal with those consequences uh in a responsible way um and you know and and I had amazing experiences where people collaborating with me in the piece agree with what I do and even defend me in the eyes of the law or in the eyes of judgment from the audience um but I always take responsibility always like in Colombia I did this piece where I um work with these um actors from the conflict and and then at some point I mean it was a kind of boring round table um and then at some point somebody came with the trade of cocaine and people start consuming so for me for example uh the person who did that like everybody who was involved was agreeing with what we're doing they knew why we were doing it we knew what the critique was and they agree with everything and actually these people were the one who took me out of there before the police arrived um so I think that's very important the other thing that is important is a lot of friends were like leave now listen now you're going to trouble because they wanted to put me in jail and I and I say no I didn't I have to stay but I I'm not going to run now you know and you know and at the time I said in public that the people who were at the institution did not know anything about it which is not true now I can say because so much time has passed and um and that was part of it and I had to take it all you know and those are the decisions that are political decisions that you make with the work that is political so the politics do not stay only in the subject you're treating but in the ethical attitude that you bring into um either the process or the consequence of the work and I'll give a quick answer to that but I want to say that the the next two people that are questioners will be our last two we've got a show to go see but I will quickly answer I mean I I mean I think almost every sort of artwork I've made collaboratively with people has been unequal I mean I when I worked with prisoners um talking about a society that locks up over two million peoples but from the perspective of the prisoners it was a real collaboration but I was going into a prison I talked with them to so they knew where I was coming from and participated consciously and intentionally but I was going to leave the prison at the end of the day they they weren't and so you know almost you know when I work with so-called at-risk youth um to talk about the criminalization of youth even though the work were really collaboratively and genuinely doing it wouldn't be the same if I I did it myself or if they tried to do it themselves but it it's they're unequal I'm this you know art person who's gonna sometimes be on a stage at the Brooklyn Museum if I you know get arrested more than likely the there are people who will come to my defense because of my history but at the same time I think feeling guilty is not oh I'm not guilty no no but I'm not feeling guilty but this idea like we know our privilege and we know that we're getting in and out I think but I think um I mean I met people who have been in prison yeah because our projects they did during prison changed their life yeah yeah I think um maybe I don't you know what I mean like yeah yeah no I I'm not saying that okay I'm just saying I recognize that I'm not guilty at all but it but it is just there is a tremendous inequality to exist with a lot of the people in places I work with but maybe we cannot judge maybe the thing is that we cannot judge the quality that that way um maybe that we need to set up a different way to talk about because it's never going to be equal yeah always be free yeah free so maybe it's about like what are you giving I don't know I'm just thinking about this now but maybe decide what are you giving what are they taking and how life changed for both of you yeah maybe that's what the quality is like how they change you and how you change them I don't know I'm just no I think it is I mean I hope that my collaborations are very meaningful in fact when working with the prisoners I ended up meeting a guy on the outside later and he said look that day changed my life that's actually why I'm on the outside now that's why I'm actually a leader in the community now which is like wow I was just doing this artwork which was very touching and it was but so and maybe one thing just sorry but the other thing is like when when we do this kind of social engaged project I'm always very nervous about people talking about the people they work with but I think in my experience the work is successful when these people are never not the audience not the participant but your friends yeah they really become your friends in life yeah I've picked up a couple of those so next next next to last question or comment first muchisima gracia ah de nada por tu trabajo it's absolutely amazing two questions one is can you talk about the tension about your work that the work that you do and the art world and the art world and the art world I mean the work that you do is political you know and there's the fantasy that art the art world is not political that museums are not political institutions for example so can you talk a little bit about that and then you started to talk about I want to hear about consequences how have you seen the changes that come from your work what changes have you seen that come from your work and the communities that you work with yeah well um I think for example and and it can be testimony of this but for example with immigrant movement I think I think I always do a lot of work behind the scene when I work with institutions that might not be known but for example the fact that I make sure that people are paid the fact that I'm sure that um and pay a fair amount not pay like two dollars an hour so that people are insured when they work with me where these are a lot of things that you talk that are political but it's not in the work but you use the leverage that you have as an artist that is being called by the institution to set up something that may be people after you know a lot of time I had to deal with like we never do this kind of answer I'm like I don't care like we have to do it and and then sometimes they don't want to work with me because of that and sometimes but when they want to work I'm very happy because I know the next performer you know and I make sure everybody knows whatever I was able to make in the institution so they can go and ask for the same thing the next people so I think that's part of the work I do with institutions and and sometimes like you know just having and I don't think I have this very you know confrontational situation I I want when I work with the institution to have some good outcome out of it I don't want to be like the nasty artist who is like a bitch and a diva no I want to be the person who is able to move forward the institution a little bit just just a little bit you know and I think that's our responsibility of artists who are successful or who are called by the institution many time people forget and I think we can forget we need to not forget so because there are so many people behind like getting there and they need to have a nice path a better path that we had so I think that's the responsibility that I feel every time I work at institutions and I also think one profound change that you make with institutions is enabling to deal with this kind of work with these kinds of audiences and people in community I mean that's actually it actually an even more radical shift than paying artists as important as that is and I think that's really important but I think that having these this kind of art and these kind of subjects and people who you know I I I like to live with the illusion that many people in the arts both the artists but at all levels of art institutions don't have a real stake in the way the world is and agree with me in broad brush strokes about the way the world is and how it should change in very broad brushstrokes where there's a lot we don't agree on but a lot I think that you know and so I think that that giving people the opportunity to say I mean the Queens Museum is an institution I like and I think Tom's actually a really cool person he would not have been dealing with undocumented immigrants that way and foregrounding that as part of a conversation and using the authority of that institution to talk about those people and actually transforming those lives without you and and so I think some of the artists will have come with the idea some of the artists will have come with the same idea I'm sure yeah well but some would but but I think but I'm not making you the individual I'm saying more the project the artists like us are actually I mean that's and this is good that you said that about Tom because Tom is a really nice person yeah and I'm sorry but is and the thing is that sometimes we always see sometimes we see institution as the enemy yeah and sometimes institutions are the people who run the institutions they're not the buildings and sometimes these people have a good good desire but maybe they don't know how to do the things or maybe they're stuck in their like bureaucracy and they don't and then maybe you can come as an artist and say hey why don't we do it this way you know and if they're willing to talk but the other thing is privilege is not something to live off is something to use yeah to be used and and so to to quickly answer what changes I mean I I don't know I mean it you know I I want a radically different world I want to get rid of this state power and have the people have a radically different state power working to eliminate classes and exploitation and that hasn't happened yeah you know so is my work a failure I don't think so I think I mean I think with my work the main thing is it's actually a battle in the realm of ideas I mean I think I do work with aesthetic but I think I'm really trying to you know win hearts and minds to see the world the the world doesn't have to be the way that it is and I look at particular questions and including drawing on history to go at that so going after questions about democracy a democracy that everybody oh we need more democracy the problem's lack of democracy well this is a country whose democracy was rooted in the ownership of other human beings and going back to that is not something I particularly want to do and so you know I think we need to escape forward and I think so putting these ideas out there you know going after some of the the the coherent norms and values and I think people what those that have seen and interacted with my work I think have started to question and destabilize that but it's an ongoing battle and I don't think fundamentally as long as we have this power dictating to us and it is I mean it this is a dictatorship but it's it's not like you know the the classic one but as long as there's a power dictating to us how we live the social relations and the economic relations that we're caught up in people actually fundamentally can't escape from that we actually need to get rid of that proposing those questions and getting people to question you know is this permanent does this have to be this way all the time I think I've brought some people to question some of those long-held assumptions and so but you know it's it's ongoing and you know with my epitaph is written and my obituary is written you you can tell me I don't know yeah I think an aspect of political art actually is um sounds corny but it's hope it's giving the people the chance to think that there's something else that they can do that they can make some sort of a change it's hope and ideas and it's fight it's battle I mean it's it's a struggle so yeah last question or comment no um dread regarding your uh the slave rebellion reenactment yeah you were talking about um I know it's a long-term thing and there's probably not a definite time frame for when this is going to be ready but a rough guesstimate maybe and I was wondering um is this something that you're going to have here in New York exclusively or are you going to okay no okay so else you'd like to say about that okay so I will talk briefly about that because we got a show to see but the the slave rebellion reenactment the there are lots of things that I mean I've been working on it for a couple years I'm desperately trying to do it in 2017 the key hold up is I need somebody to write an $800,000 check so if you can do that I can do this really soon but you know it's like you know there there's a lot in motion but that's that's the bottle that's the key bottleneck there are other bottlenecks but that's the key one and it's actually going to be reenacted in New Orleans on the outskirts of New Orleans on the locations that were previously sugar plantations and are now oil refineries and trailer parks and gated communities and strip malls and so the location is there it's going to be for two days and people will and there's more to it than that I mean the the process of the reenactors embodying this history is actually going to be mirroring the structure of how slave rebellions had to be planned and that is clandestinely by word of mouth and so there's part of it that's actually already going on it's happening um and but the the big epic thing is you know if things go really well I'll be doing it in around March 2017 but that that's I can't set a date yet because I but I will say here's a plug this is a new book that's out I'm a published author now of sorts there's a book that just came out um and this is not a book if it if it wasn't be really thin but this is a plug for the book uh called fragments of the peculiar institution it's sort of my archive of slavery and my research and so if you guys want more information you can get this one piece of paper from me and you could order it or just have a piece of paper so um this has been really cool I mean I'm really appreciating on stage with you and in in the Brooklyn Museum as part of Agit Prop this is I think I hope you guys have enjoyed this but it's a great way to begin a really important and cool show with artists that I love and the history that's important and so let's go see that and and yeah