Interview with:Christian Barnes [carbinestarnish]
ART
 | What do you do? How do you define yourself as an artist? I slip in and out of it. I constantly struggle with conviction and relevance. Art is as hard as it gets. Artists who say otherwise are shallow. |
| What is your message? My work is about landscape. There is no message it just is what it is. |
| Your biography in four lines. Phase 1 Art Galleries
Phase 2 Curator
Phase 3 Public Art
Phase 4 Owning what I do |
| Do you upload your work to the web? If so, where could we see it? www.vistaprojects.co.uk |
| How is an idea born? For you, what is inspiration? Ideas are easy I ignore them until they begin to develop mainly through the passage of time and arguement. The prospect of development is what is interesting. |
| What role does technology play in your creative process? Its a tool |
| What is art? Art exists to develop the psychological contract between the individual and the context in which they find them selves. |
| When do you get your best ideas? When there is nothing else happening |
| How do you evaluate whether an idea is good or not? I give it time |
| When and how did you begin to see yourself as an artist? About 2006 |
| Why do so many artists and creators have such volatile personalities? I don't think they do |
| Do you consider yourself postmodern? How could it be otherwise? I'm postrenaissance too! |
| How should a work of art be evaluated? By thoughtful and informed people subjectively |
| Must an artist reinvent him/herself everyday? No they must not |
| Which artists do you admire and how do they influence your work? I don't think about what other people are doing. |
| What do you think about public funding for the arts? I think it needs rethinking more fundamentally than is currently possible |
| Is art necessary? Not to everybody |
| Does it pain you to let go of a piece you have sold? No |
| Is a work of art purchased, or is it better said, that it is the artist who is bought? This might apply to some but not all purchases |
| In art, there is no guide. How do you know what the next step is? Are we walking or climbing? Why make progress? |
| How do you feel about the fact that the pieces exhibited in contemporary art museums are often of artists already deceased? I don't care but perhaps those museums should change their name? |
| What role have the figures of art dealer, gallery owners, representatives, and intermediaries in general played in your career? Not enough. I have worked more through collaboration and partnership |
| What types of jobs do you usually do? All of them |
| Which of your jobs or tasks do you most enjoy? No simple answer |
| Do you personally collect any items? Yes |
| What advice would you give to those just beginning? Understand value and how to achieve it |
CULTURE
| What do you currently have in your MP3 player? Von Sudenfed, The Happy Mondays, Easy Star All Stars |
| What books are you currently reading? Tristram Shandy and Ben Nicholson the Vicious Circles of his life and Art (Because I discovered that I'm credited with suggesting the idea to the author in the foreword about a decade after publication) |
| Places in the world that you have visited recently. Just Holidays in the Sun |
| What is that special film you never tire of watching? Citizen Kane |
| What do you use: Mac or PC and why? PC (Historically because I have worked a lot with the public sector and using a mac has been 'difficult' for them.) |
| What is to come after consumist society? 'Consumist?' Is that a word? The challenge for politicians in the West is to manage (and sell) a decline in consumption to their populations. We have been borrowing money we don't have to pay for things we don't need (or even want) and the price we have paid for those things does not reflect the social and environmental damage their production has caused.
Here it is 'Individual Freedom' prized so highly in the capitalist west comes at a price to society. It is a necessary condition of being rich that someone else is exploited and impoverished.
I expect to see the kind of economic chaos in Europe and the US that we saw before the second world war as our money goes through significant changes. I don't think we currently have a political culture that can cope with or express what is to come. |
| Do you find the saturation of advertising in the media excessive? No |
| Do you believe there is excessive sex and violence in the media? No |
| What were your favourite subjects when you were in primary/secondary school? Biology, History, Geography, English, (The art courses were rubbish but my teacher was great and what I learned outside the curriculum with her help has given me the life I lead now.) |
| Do you think video games, chat rooms, etc. have a dangerous addictive
effect on teenagers? No |
| Has there been a personal-growth book that has transformed your life? Rich Dad Poor Dad |
| Have you ever bought works of art? What type of art? What compels you to purchase art? When I instinctively know its important. |
| Do you defend urban graffiti? No view |
| What magazines do you frequently read? Art Review, Art Monthy, Yachts and Yachting |
| Piracy continues to grow: What will happen to the music and film
industries and culture in general? It will change and adapt |
| What sports do you play and how often? I race sailboats three or four times a week |
| How do you explain the rise in "fame" culture? Its for stupid greedy people with no access to ideas worth having. |
| What do you have in your wallet right now? £15.23
3 x debit/credit cards (One for my company two for my wife and I)
Membership Cards, RS Association Racing, Friends of the Lake District, Lowther Castle Annual Membership and a card to top up my elder son's phone. Two photos of my children and a Christmas card from the little one. |
| How do you kill time? I have no time to waste |
| In which city do you live? What are your favourite and least favourite things about it? I live in an upland rural area. I work a lot with architects and I remember bringing one here to work on a project as we gained altitude he looked out and said "There's nothing here". He meant buildings of course, Its not 'nothing' to me. I like being remote from people but ultimately there is a price to that in terms of isolation. I have committed to paying it. |
| A YouTube video about something that was significant to your life. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqZ8428GSrI. I came of age when Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister in the UK and Ronald Reagan was President of the US and Leonid Brezhnev/Michael Gorbachev in the Soviet Union and the cold war was coming to an end. The changes made then were the foundations on which our society now rests. In the UK the government supported growth in the service economy and failed to take measures to protect our industrial and agricultural economy. There was mass unemployment. This takes me back. |
| Where have you thought of going for your next holiday? I'm going wild camping with my kids a few miles from home! |
| 
275 visits Whohub
Christian Barnes
Cumbria
|
99701 interviews created
![[carbinestarnish] Christian Barnes](http://www.whohub.com/_pics/96555.jpg?1369559745)
INVITE YOUR FRIENDS