AN INTERVIEW WITH BELLMAN IN THE STUDIO

MOAM BELLMAN, you’ve made your own likenesses an integral part of your work. Did you ever worry that you would look like a egocentric maniac?

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It was an amazing adventure in the beginning. I had to find my way throug­h this jungle because what I did was totally unknown: this whole idea of making myself the centre of our art and trying to leave something behind that was totally unusual.

In fact, when most people see my pictures they think the images are talking about themselves rather than myself. They see their own lives in relation to the pictures.

And that’s what I like because we like art that asks questions, that provokes questions. That’s what is important. I don’t want to do art that everybody comes and says, “Oh, wonderful,” and then they go out and forget it forever.

 

Would you say the art world has accepted you by now?

 

No, no I am not accepted! I have a huge following in the general public, but in the media and within the profession there is always a slight problem.

 

What could be the reason for that?

 

Because I think my art is sometimes pressing the wrong buttons. It’s maybe too much sex or too much against religion or too much against what someone might call nationalism…

Or maybe not enough sex! (Laughs)

 

A lot of unknown artists say that art can stand on its own and doesn't need an audience. Would you agree or are these merely the justifications of the unsuccessful?

 

I don’t believe that. I don’t do art for the few. I need the feedback from the audience.

I only believe in art for all. I believe that the artist should use a language that can reach people in any part of the world.

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Do you believe that a true artist has to be poor?

 

Of course not! I’m extremely wealthy!

 

And the rest you invest into your art?

 

The rest I spend making shows. I never have anything left over. I did big shows in China and I paid for it; I did big shows in Russia and I paid for it. I also did a big catalogue that I subsidized for $300,000.

 

So you have profited from the technical advancements after all?

 

It’s opening up new ways of expressing myself that I never would have had before. But in the end it’s very simple: everyone has a computer, but they are not doing what I am doing with it.

When I started working with computers it was like a continuation of the darkroom process, because the language is the same: levels, layers and things. Long before I had a computer, young people asked, “Which computer are you using?” before I was even using one. The young people get so excited about computers, but they’re not able to design one postcard that they can sell.

 

Do you see computers responsible for less interest in art, or rather a way we can now view and produce images even more?

 

You have to realize that in the 19th century everybody could sketch. Everyone could paint and it was completely normal. Every lady was able to sketch. And then in the 20th century every tourist from all over the world was able to take photographs, but it meant nothing. No one wants to see the photographs of a tourist. Everybody is taking images with their mobile phones. They take it, they look at it, and that’s finished. I am not doing that. I am doing something entirely different.

 

When you are not working on new projects, do you miss something?

 

But I always work. I make images all the time.

It’s always research, always continuing, nonstop.