1. As she prepared for her forthcoming
retrospective at Mexico City’s Museo
Tamayo, SLEEK called Tacita Dean to
discuss the development of the exhibi-
tion from its inception two years ago.
Including 79 works, the mammoth un-
dertaking introduces audiences to a di-
versity of pieces from different moments
of her career. For those unfamiliar, Dean
first gained notoriety in the Nineties as a
MESSAGES&
MEDIUMS
AS A MAJOR REVIEW OF HER WORK IN MEXICO GETS
UNDERWAY, BRITISH ARTIST TACITA DEAN TALKS
LASERS, THE TRANSIENCE OF EVERYDAY LIFE AND WHY FILM IS
THE PERFECT VEHICLE FOR HER IDEAS
Text RACHAEL VANCE
Portrait MARÍA FERNANDA MOLINS
YBA. Since then she’s made films about
Berlin’s TV tower (“Fernsehturm”,
2000), published a photobook about
European flea markets (“Floh” 2001),
and explored her friendship with the sci-
ence fiction writer J.G. Ballard on film
(“JG”, 2013). One of the UK’s biggest
artists, her Mexico show probes materi-
ality and intangibility – concepts intrin-
sic to her work – while conveying the
sheer magic of her images. And with an
exhibition entitled “Beyond the Walls”
currently on view at Espace Louis Vuit-
ton in Munich, it felt like a good time to
catch up with the artist.
SLEEK: Did you have a particular aim for
your show in Mexico?
Tacita Dean: The exhibition is an oppor-
tunity for me to present different works
together in different groupings never
seen before. I’m also trying to champion
16mm film as a medium, which I think is
very important, because its obsolescence
has in part been caused by labelling it a
technology. To me, film is a medium, not
a technology. In this exhibition there are
so many different mediums.
What’s its starting point?
It begins with my immensely fragile clover
collection presented alongside “Concor-
dance of Fifty American Cloud” (2016),
a chalk, charcoal, pencil and gouache on
slate work consisting of 50 clouds that I
created for my 50th birthday. There are
“FILM IS A SERIES OF STILL IMAGES
BROUGHT INTO MOVEMENT:
YOU SEE STILL IMAGE AFTER STILL
IMAGE, AND IT IS SO MAGICAL”
3
PresentationWindows,2005,fourdrawings;drypointonwhitealabasterwindows,deatail,twopairs;115x56cm,102x35cm,copyrighttheartsit,courtesyFondationLouisVuitton.
Photo:LOUISVUITTONandChristianKain
The Book End of Time, 2013
Artist Collection
41
TACITA DEANJOURNAL
SLEEK №52

2. also painted photographs, blackboards,
overpainted cards and lithographs. The
first part is quite elemental. In the lower
galleries, my film “A Bag of Air” (1995)
is shown, which began in a quest to try
and bring clouds down to earth. Then
there are my salt salinated objects, from
the JG project inspired by correspon-
dence with the author, and I have also
included the films “The Green Ray”
(2001) and “10 to the 21” (2014). The
latter of these is actually very pertinent
to a laser that’s being developed: it trav-
els so fast that it’s impossible to capture
the impact of its light as it reaches its
target [Currently being researched by
the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory].
These two works seem to capture the ‘un-
capturable’ – somewhat of a theme in the
latter part of the show.
Yes, the last part in the exhibition is
exciting for me as I am bringing older
works together that I call “Metamor-
phic Objects”. It begins with my film of
Claes Oldenburg, “Manhattan Mouse
Museum” (2011), alongside an old
film project about Super 8 that I have
transferred to 16 mm film called “Pur-
ple Steering Wheel” (2016). It’s about
sitting in a bus in Budapest watching
a guy steer his purple steering wheel.
It investigates the transient, everyday
moment, which I think is very ‘Mex-
ican’ in terms of their relationship to
the ephemeral. Very playfully, I am also
showing “Portraits” (2016), my film of
David Hockney smoking cigarettes on
the museum’s smoking terrace, turning
it into a smoking cinema. Hockney had
a show here in 1984.
You once said that your film work pres-
ents the “act of looking itself”. Can you
elaborate?
Film is very much a medium for look-
ing: it’s decisive, as opposed to video,
which of course is more passive. You
can watch and observe something in
a very passive way. But with film you
always have to look as opposed to see,
because you have to worry about the
focus, the light or that fact your film’s
going to run out.
Your films have a beautiful sense of slowness,
allowing the viewer to luxuriate in them.
Somehow the medium itself engages peo-
ple. Film is more restive than digital. It
allows for subliminal darkness 24 times
a second because it flickers, and I think
that has a huge impact on how people
perceive it. Film is a series of still images
brought into movement: you see still im-
age after still image, and it is so magical.
You have a studio in Berlin. As a British
artist living in Germany, I wanted to ask
you what your thoughts are on home in
light of the Brexit?
There was a quote that I have always liked
by the writer Rupert Thomson, “Home is
somewhere you find by chance.” I always
think that about Berlin. I had a DAAD
residency here in 2000 and I never went
back to Britain. You can imagine what
I thought about Brexit. I am so upset
about it I can’t begin to tell you. I am
filing for German citizenship right now.
I’m a British artist, but I’m very much a
European too, and I don’t want to not
be British anymore. What really upset me
about the Brexit argument was that not a
single positive word was said about Eu-
rope. I am ashamed of Britain and I think
it is just awful.
Tacita Dean is on view at the Museo Tamayo,
Mexico City, from 5 November 2016 until 12
March 2017
Espace Louis Vuitton Munich, Maximilianstr. 2a,
80539 Munich, from 14 October 2016 until 25
March 25 2017
“YOU CAN IMAGINE WHAT I THOUGHT
ABOUT BREXIT… I CAN’T BEGIN
TO TELL YOU. I’M FILING FOR GER-
MAN CITIZENSHIP RIGHT NOW”
“I’M CHAMPIONING 16MM FILM…
ITS OBSOLESCENCE HAS BEEN
CAUSED BY LABELLING IT A TECH-
NOLOGY. TO ME IT’S A MEDIUM”
Hünengrab, 2008
Blackboard paint on fibre based photograph, mounted on paper, 238 x 456 cm
Copyright the artist, courtesy Fondation Louis Vuitton
Photo: LOUIS VUITTON and Christian Kain
Purple Steering Wheel, 2016
Courtesy Marian Goodman Gallery, New York/Paris
JOURNAL
43
TACITA DEAN
SLEEK №52