Wilfredo Prieto

Wilfredo Prieto

artist: Paris, September 2005 - September 2006

Interview between Wilfredo Prieto and Direlia Lazo (La Habana, February 2006)

D. Lazo: Several of your pieces are based on re-positioning of objects, fans, plastic cups, a crane, etc. With minimal intervention you generate a questioning, an inherent contradiction, a reflection, bringing out the meaning contained in the everyday image of the object. Could this be another constant in your work?

W. Prieto: It could be a connecting thread. What is most important to me is the link and the rapprochement between art and reality. The artist is more of a discoverer, an archaeologist who reaffirms or underscores symbolic nuances that are given in actual reality. This has been an element that I have reiterated in my recent work. I engage in an act of camouflaging the pieces with the reality from which they originate, while simultaneously, as works of art, they generate meaning. I believe that I happen upon a piece rather than create it. I simply give it nuances that produce a hierarchy or strengthen the points that activate its content.

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D. Lazo: Formally, we can distinguish two trends in your work: one is performance, the other installation. If it makes sense to refer to these concepts, the piece you are currently working on can be considered an installation. Nonetheless, there is still a performative attitude, explicit or implicit, either through its intervention or through that of the spectator. How do you reconcile these concepts? In what measure does the medium condition the meaning of your work?

W. Prieto: I do not subscribe to a distinction between performance and installation. To me they are both one and the same, and it is possible to comprehend both better in some cases than in others. It is possible for a piece to be object-based while being performative, or vice-versa. I think that in real objects, reality itself is conformed by the matter that generates constant action and movement. Art is one such matter which accentuates its own symbolism, as one single gesture wherein the spectator is included in interaction with the object.

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D. Lazo: What are some of the concepts or concerns that shape your work?

W. Prieto: What I consider important is to work with the least possible formal content and resources, and to obtain the maximum effect. I also ascribe to a relative neutrality by providing the least possible criteria in order not to restrict possible readings, hence opening a full range of interpretive possibilities. I believe in closing in order to disclose, rather than ulging unnecessary contents. I attempt to minimize my own criteria, yet at the same time bring out what is essential to activate them and open them to the spectator's apprehension. The immediacy of the reading of the piece is what interests me most. As viewers, we have become used to absorb everything quickly, given the quantity of information to which we are exposed, and the accelerated pace of life. Whereas in the past, art evoked hours of contemplation in a museum, it is now modified to be seen and enjoyed in mere seconds, and in those seconds we absorb all of the content and compress it as in a compact disc, to take it home, and contemplate it over some prolonged period of time. This could be an image-impact or a fast absorbed content, something like fiber optics. In this sense I focus on what is vital for the effectiveness of the image.

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D. Lazo: « Apolítico » has been named as one of your most significant pieces. How do you rate it within your overall artistic production? Is it a closing or an opening point?

W. Prieto: Apolítico was the consequence of a conjuncture: it is my first work included in a biennial, it is a piece that refers to a context and that expresses the social situation of the world. In some measure, the piece enunciates an apparent neutrality. I am working on a dual and ambivalent character. Nonetheless, the piece contains elements that I explored in previous pieces. I do not think this is a piece that changes my work or that marks a new evolutionary moment. It is rather a result.

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D. Lazo: What about your recent work «Grasa, jabón y plátano (Grease, Soap and Banana)»?

W. Prieto: I will present it in a one-person show, collateral to the Biennial of Havana. It consists of a large gallery, approximately 60m long by 10m wide and 8m high. In its centre there is a small spot of grease of about 10cm in diameter, covered with a soap with an open banana peel on top. In this case, I am interested in alluding to the action generated by a determined form, even if it is not enhanced. It is a very object-based piece made with ephemeral materials, to provoke an illusory action, a gesture that has much effectiveness, whether or not it is executed. I perceive some similarities between this piece and «Mute», in that it activates a thought or other possible readings from a possible syllogism. It seems all of my work is moving towards a formal synthesis with respect to meanings generated by the objects themselves, and situations of everyday life. This is a very experimental road and I cannot envision yet whether I will connect it in future projects. I always reiterate that intuition is what must subtly manage the intellect, and in this regard I try to avoid patterns of form or having pre-defined objectives to reach in my work. On the contrary, my objectives start to be delineated from experiences, and from the new conditions imposed on me by the context and by artistic language.

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