It is my personal mission as an art writer to strike a balance between critical rigour and concise readability.
– David Willis
Sticky Teeth’s micro-interviews ft. words on the intersection of arts and writing.
In my very early 20s, I was the youngest in my Master’s class. With that came an over-eagerness which landed me a tiny grant to take myself to Thailand for my thesis.
The paper was short – 8000 words – and didn’t require this effort. But, somehow, there I was. I’d sleep during the humid afternoons, but before and after I’d interview artists involved in my research topic (a 1990s student art festival) who were now established artists and professors still based in Chiang Mai (i.e. Rirkrit Tiravanija, Mit Jai Inn, Kamin Lertchaiprasert and others). Generously, they spoke with me, drove me around, transferred archives onto my USB. When my USB storage ran out, they’d jump on their scooter to buy me another.
At dinner one night, a younger curator asked me about my topic and then said my line of thinking was off. It stung – look how diligent I was being in my research! – but soon I wished my supervisor had shared her sentiment rather than praise because my paper got the lowest mark of my academic life. This stinging devastation to my zealous ambition made me push the entire trip to the side from shame of my own mediocrity.
But, when I resurrect it now, it’s a dreamscape that never turned concrete. Seven years later feel like twenty. Its memories, in the scheme of my life, are random and lucid; so much that I forget the trip and the very smart people I met were real.
Recently, I was reminded of David Willis, an American curator and art writer based in Chiang Mai at the time, who’d also zip around town on his scooter. I recall thinking, back then: 1) wow, art writing is a career you can do? and 2) you can live outside your home city doing it? Cool.
I messaged him asking, firstly, if he remembered me and, secondly, if he’d do a sticky teeth interview.
He said “yes, of course” to both – below are some of his thoughts in the here and now.
xx Tahney
David Willis is a critic, curator & art advisor from New York.
David holds a BA in Anthropology from Columbia University and an MFA in Art Criticism from the School of Visual Art. He is a specialist in Southeast Asian contemporary art, and his writing has been published by Art Asia Pacific, Art & Market, The Brooklyn Rail and Art Basel Stories. Currently living in Lisbon, Portugal, he is writing a book on the Thai artist Natee Utarit for RKFA Bangkok.
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Tahney: Can you speak to some issues in the crossover between art and writing?
What about some praise for those working in this intersection [between art and writing]?
There are many great artists working with text these days, but I’ll just mention two.
One who I’ve been enjoying recently is the painter and music producer Richie Culver in Berlin, whose sassy text paintings I find hilarious while also sad and beautiful, provoking bittersweet reflections about divorce, class struggle, and the ironies of the art world.
And then a longtime favourite of mine is the conceptual artist Cam Xanh in Saigon; her artist name means “Green Orange” because in Vietnam, oranges have green skin. She uses wordplay brilliantly throughout her multi-media art practice, whether using sculpture, video, performance or installation. If you check out her Instagram you will only find wordplay: @greenorangewhitenight
As for “serious” writing… whenever Boris Groys drops a new essay on e-flux, I stop what I’m doing and read it immediately.
Till death do us YOLO – Richie Culver
And yourself – what have you been doing lately?
Any other art texts you’d like to share?
Read: I’d like to share this essay by the Chiang Mai-based art critic Blake Palmer who writes on multispecies ethnography. I invited him to also do a critic residency at A.Farm, leading to this beautiful essay on the work of Saigon-based artist Lena Bui, on the Aura Art Foundation website.