1
00:00:07,442 --> 00:00:12,274
[Fred Wilson: Beauty & Ugliness]

2
00:00:13,136 --> 00:00:13,909
Beauty...

3
00:00:14,139 --> 00:00:15,312
Beauty, beauty, beauty...

4
00:00:15,312 --> 00:00:17,704
I'm really interested in beauty.

5
00:00:19,132 --> 00:00:20,099
[Venice Biennale, 2003]

6
00:00:20,099 --> 00:00:21,400
I'm interested in beauty

7
00:00:21,400 --> 00:00:23,103
if you think of beauty as

8
00:00:23,103 --> 00:00:24,980
"an ultimate visual experience."

9
00:00:25,157 --> 00:00:27,167
But I'm also interested in beauty

10
00:00:27,167 --> 00:00:32,947
in that it can hide meaning.

11
00:00:37,270 --> 00:00:38,676
The world is complex,

12
00:00:38,676 --> 00:00:40,305
and often we try to

13
00:00:40,305 --> 00:00:42,136
separate out all of these experiences.

14
00:00:42,410 --> 00:00:43,611
"This is beautiful." "This is ugly."

15
00:00:44,073 --> 00:00:46,464
"This is a beautiful experience--that's all it is..."

16
00:00:46,464 --> 00:00:47,482
"...there is no meaning."

17
00:00:47,482 --> 00:00:49,444
Or, "the meaning is not important."

18
00:00:57,830 --> 00:00:59,841
People have to deal with the fact that

19
00:00:59,841 --> 00:01:02,938
there is meaning in beauty--

20
00:01:02,938 --> 00:01:04,915
there is meaning in ugliness.

21
00:01:04,915 --> 00:01:06,137
[The Studio Museum in Harlem, 2004]

22
00:01:06,137 --> 00:01:08,779
And so, in a lot of my work--if I can--

23
00:01:08,779 --> 00:01:12,640
I try to bring out that tension.

24
00:01:17,623 --> 00:01:19,464
The whipping post and chairs is a perfect example

25
00:01:19,464 --> 00:01:20,986
because chairs are really beautiful;

26
00:01:20,986 --> 00:01:22,688
that whipping post is certainly not.

27
00:01:25,170 --> 00:01:28,134
Whipping post and chairs were from the first exhibition I did

28
00:01:28,134 --> 00:01:29,779
with museum collections.

29
00:01:29,964 --> 00:01:32,980
It was at the Maryland Historical Society in 1992.

30
00:01:36,074 --> 00:01:38,809
It's a very traditional display in a certain way.

31
00:01:39,275 --> 00:01:40,874
There's no manipulation of the objects

32
00:01:40,874 --> 00:01:42,304
other than their positioning.

33
00:01:42,935 --> 00:01:44,536
And that changes the meaning,

34
00:01:44,536 --> 00:01:46,242
or the relationship,

35
00:01:46,624 --> 00:01:48,074
or how you think about them.

36
00:01:48,074 --> 00:01:49,578
And this is everything that I'm about

37
00:01:49,578 --> 00:01:50,966
when I'm working with museums

38
00:01:50,966 --> 00:01:52,979
and quite often when I'm working in my studio.

39
00:01:55,733 --> 00:02:00,305
Looking at high-end decorative arts in the chairs

40
00:02:00,305 --> 00:02:02,242
and the whipping post,

41
00:02:02,242 --> 00:02:04,014
they have a very different history,

42
00:02:04,014 --> 00:02:06,284
but it relates very directly in that

43
00:02:06,284 --> 00:02:08,012
those people who sat in the chairs

44
00:02:08,012 --> 00:02:09,843
had some relationship with

45
00:02:09,843 --> 00:02:12,767
those who were on the whipping post.

46
00:02:18,936 --> 00:02:21,379
Not acknowledging that things are complex--

47
00:02:21,379 --> 00:02:22,579
that beauty is complex--

48
00:02:22,579 --> 00:02:24,674
I think that that's the problem,

49
00:02:24,674 --> 00:02:26,411
that people want to do that.

50
00:02:26,411 --> 00:02:29,383
So, I enjoy making it complex for people,

51
00:02:29,383 --> 00:02:31,035
[LAUGHS]

52
00:02:33,225 --> 00:02:35,505
because that's my world, you know.

53
00:02:35,505 --> 00:02:36,570
[LAUGHS]