You are an art critic and curator since 1984. If we go back to the beginning of the story, were you in a close relationship with art in your childhood?
My interest in art does go back to when I was a child, despite the fact that I was not raised in a house with art, and the only museums visited when I was younger were devoted to science and natural history. I probably visited the Metropolitan Museum when I was about 11, and the Museum of Modern Art when I was 13. That’s when I first started to look closely at art magazines, the late 1960s/early ‘70s, which was a very adventurous time for art, unlike today. On family summer vacations we took trips to Greece and Italy, where my grandparents were originally from, and so I was exposed to archaeological sites, which I saw as living history, and museums. All these years later, I respond to contemporary art that has a relationship to antiquity and to ritual, that suggests art can be a form of the travel.
You have an amazing artistic genius. Your books, exhibitions, biennials you support and more… How has this genius been nurtured over time? How did the process develop?
Setting aside that loaded term, I would say that as you go on you realize that the way your sensibilities and mind develop is basically organic. There is a flow of curiosity. The more you see that turns you on, the further you want to go. There is no “allowance of experience” that reaches a limit. For myself the prevailing idea is never to become self-satisfied.
You have books that can be used as reference. Are there any abstract painters that you have been influenced by lately, and are there any artists you follow?
I still follow the painters who were foundational for me back in the 1980s and ’90s, and I believe that a foundation in art is the same as for a house, it’s what you build on. Two of these artists are in the show at Sevil Dolmaci—Philip Taaffe and Dan Walsh. Another favorite painter is also included, Xylor Jane, who never ceases to amaze me with the beauty, complexity and obsessiveness of what she does. I don’t know of any other painter today who explores the magical aspect of numbers.
Curating is something you get into later on. How has the process developed?
In fact it’s the other way around. My first shows in New York were at the end of 1984 and into 1985. I didn’t start publishing regularly until 1987. Even so I see writing and curating as reciprocal. You don’t understand art until you write about it, until you show it, and, if you’re lucky, when get to live with it.
Although art is criticized thoroughly (concretely), it is actually fluid like water… Most people understand and see different things when it comes to art. How do you balance the two?
In my writing, I’m not trying to convince anyone of anything. And I’m not really an art critic, but an art writer. I also prefer to interview an artist than write an essay. The interview can have value long after it’s published. A review, especially in a newspaper, has a very short life. It’s someone’s opinion. It may not be yours or mine. Opinions today, everyone has them, on line, on social media. I don’t pay them any mind. It’s information, which is the age we live in today, and information is different from knowledge, and possibly the cause of knowledge’s erosion.
Have the demands on the curator changed since you first started?
Everything has changed because the art world has been overtaken by the art market. If you want to function between them, that’s where, as you said previously, a balance has to be found. Of course the best course is to continue to do your own thing. Otherwise you’re doing what other want and expect. So much for determining the course of your own life. The artists in my show in Istanbul are all consistently following their own vision. That’s what I follow them.
Your exhibition at Sevil Dolmacı Art Gallery, how is it different from other exhibitions? Can you explain a little bit?
Well, it’s a show made for Istanbul and specifically for the historic house, dating to 1890, which is the gallery’s home. I responded immediately to the house from the minute I saw it, first in pictures, and then when I visited last October. I had not been in Istanbul since 2006, when I was part of a symposium at Platform Garanti, organized by Krist Gruijthuijsen, who is now the director of Kunst-Werke in Berlin. The city made a big impression on me. The presence of the past is palpable. The shows that I organize can’t be done anywhere. This is one aspect of what I do that has developed over time. A New York show is a New York show. Same for one in Los Angeles. I’m working on a project that may take place in Paris. The show revolves around a writer who spent much of his life there. I would only do it in Paris. It wouldn’t make sense anywhere else. The street outside the gallery is a street on which he himself walked. If the show in Istanbul is different from other shows of mine, it’s because of where it’s taking place.
Who are the selected artists and how did you choose them?
The artists in the show are David Adamo, Barry X Ball, Matt Hoyt, Xylor Jane, Davina Semo, Philip Taaffe, Gert & Uwe Tobias, and Dan Walsh. I chose them because as I walked through the gallery, I could imagine their works there. I was already seeing them there.
How did you come together with Sevil Dolmacı?
The painter Robert Janitz, who I have known and worked with for a long time, and who shows with Sevil, introduced us.
What do you think about the Istanbul art scene? What is your relationship with Istanbul?
I don’t know a lot about the scene. I hope this is the beginning of getting to know artists in the city. I am old friends with Mari Spirito, who is the director of Protocinema. I know that she will point me in some interesting directions.
What would you recommend for those who want to develop artistically? Where do you suggest to start?
I’m tempted to say: Don’t go to art school. Many of my favorite artists never went. For a long time I avoided asking artists when they first knew they would be an artist. Once I began to ask, the answer was very often the same. They knew from an early age. Certainly a person can be taught technique—to learn various methods of printing, metalwork, photography, and so on. But I’m not convinced you can teach someone to have a way of seeing the world, along with the need, and it is a need, to understand what you see and share it through the making of images and objects, that goes into being an artist. You can’t teach someone to have a vision. One thing in life that is extraordinary is how almost all children draw, how it is absolutely primal, but not everyone obviously goes on to do that forever. Some do. Artists are artists from the very beginning.