WEBVTT

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
[Fred Wilson: Beauty & Ugliness]

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
Beauty...

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
Beauty, beauty, beauty...

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
I'm really interested in beauty.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
[Venice Biennale, 2003]

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
I'm interested in beauty

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
if you think of beauty as

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
"an ultimate visual experience."

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
But I'm also interested in beauty

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
in that it can hide meaning.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
The world is complex,

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
and often we try to

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
separate out all of these experiences.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
"This is beautiful." "This is ugly."

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
"This is a beautiful experience--that's all it is..."

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
"...there is no meaning."

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
"Or, the meaning is not important."

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
People have to deal with the fact that

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
there is meaning in beauty--

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
there is meaning in ugliness.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
[The Studio Museum in Harlem, 2004]

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
And so, in a lot of my work--if I can--

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
I try to bring out that tension.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
The whipping post and chairs is a perfect example

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
because chairs are really beautiful;

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
that whipping post is certainly not.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
Whipping post and chairs were from the first exhibition I did

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
with museum collections.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
It was at the Maryland Historical Society in 1992.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
It's a very traditional display in a certain way.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
There's no manipulation of the objects

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
other than their positioning.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
And that changes the meaning,

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
or the relationship,

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
or how you think about them.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
And this is everything that I'm about

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
when I'm working with museums

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
and quite often when I'm working in my studio.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
Looking at high-end decorative arts in the chairs

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
and the whipping post,

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
they have a very different history,

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
but it relates very directly in that

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
those people who sat in the chairs

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
had some relationship with

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
those who were on the whipping post.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
Not acknowledging that things are complex--

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
that beauty is complex--

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
I think that that's the problem,

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
that people want to do that.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
So, I enjoy making it complex for people,

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
[LAUGHS]

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
because that's my world, you know.

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
[LAUGHS]