“White on Black”, Interview with Dan Perjovschi

To see the interview, click here: vernissage.tv

An internationally renowned artist, Dan Perjovschi creates site-specific and ephemeral works of art that are composed of countless images and texts, applied directly onto internal or external architectural surfaces. He gets his inspiration from the context in which he finds himself at the time of the project, and incorporates these local flavors into his personal historical and cultural lexicon. Dan’s biting humor and sharp perception are combined with his extensive knowledge of current events to create profound political and social commentary about the world in general, and contemporary developments and issues in particular.

It is not surprising then, that Dan Perjovschi is not only inspired by his environment but also uses it as his drawing board. Like at Lascaux and other Paleolithic caves, where the first modern Homo Sapiens documented their lives through cave paintings and drawings, Dan Perjovschi continues this tradition by turning the walls of contemporary institutions into chronicles of current society as seen through his lens. A comment perhaps on the ever-changing nature of contemporaneity drives Dan to create ephemerally, and perhaps this comment extends to the relevance of the institutions themselves. For his contribution to Fumetto and Punkte10, watch for references of local interest, as well as global issues.

Perjovschi’s personal exhibitions and projects have been recently on display at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, Bloomberg Space in London, the Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma in Helsinki, Finland, the Wiels Center for Contemporary Art in Brussels, the Galerie Michel Rein in Paris, and other international institutions. States of Mind: Lia and Dan Perjovschi, a mid-career retrospective focusing on the variety of work created by Perjovschi and his wife Lia, was on display at the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University in 2007.

As part of the Punkte 10 art in public space program of Fumetto Comix Festival Luzern, Dan Perjovschi has been invited to use the Lucerne Theater facade for his installation. In this conversation with me, the Romanian artist talks about why he draws, the ephemerality of art, what he misses in current contemporary art, and why he couldn’t compete with the swans of Lake Lucerne. The video above is an excerpt, the full-length version (9:58 Min.) is available on the Vernissage site.

http://archiv.fumetto.ch/

As the organizer of the Punkte 10 Public Art portion of Fumetto, I was also the curator of this project.

Dan Perjovschi’s artist talk: