WEBVTT

00:00:07.442 --> 00:00:12.274
[Fred Wilson: Beauty & Ugliness]

00:00:13.136 --> 00:00:13.909
Beauty...

00:00:14.139 --> 00:00:15.312
Beauty, beauty, beauty...

00:00:15.312 --> 00:00:17.704
I'm really interested in beauty.

00:00:19.132 --> 00:00:20.099
[Venice Biennale, 2003]

00:00:20.099 --> 00:00:21.400
I'm interested in beauty

00:00:21.400 --> 00:00:23.103
if you think of beauty as

00:00:23.103 --> 00:00:24.980
"an ultimate visual experience."

00:00:25.157 --> 00:00:27.167
But I'm also interested in beauty

00:00:27.167 --> 00:00:32.947
in that it can hide meaning.

00:00:37.270 --> 00:00:38.676
The world is complex,

00:00:38.676 --> 00:00:40.305
and often we try to

00:00:40.305 --> 00:00:42.136
separate out all of these experiences.

00:00:42.410 --> 00:00:43.611
"This is beautiful." "This is ugly."

00:00:44.073 --> 00:00:46.464
"This is a beautiful experience--that's all it is..."

00:00:46.464 --> 00:00:47.482
"...there is no meaning."

00:00:47.482 --> 00:00:49.444
Or, "the meaning is not important."

00:00:57.830 --> 00:00:59.841
People have to deal with the fact that

00:00:59.841 --> 00:01:02.938
there is meaning in beauty--

00:01:02.938 --> 00:01:04.915
there is meaning in ugliness.

00:01:04.915 --> 00:01:06.137
[The Studio Museum in Harlem, 2004]

00:01:06.137 --> 00:01:08.779
And so, in a lot of my work--if I can--

00:01:08.779 --> 00:01:12.640
I try to bring out that tension.

00:01:17.623 --> 00:01:19.464
The whipping post and chairs is a perfect example

00:01:19.464 --> 00:01:20.986
because chairs are really beautiful;

00:01:20.986 --> 00:01:22.688
that whipping post is certainly not.

00:01:25.170 --> 00:01:28.134
Whipping post and chairs were from the first exhibition I did

00:01:28.134 --> 00:01:29.779
with museum collections.

00:01:29.964 --> 00:01:32.980
It was at the Maryland Historical Society in 1992.

00:01:36.074 --> 00:01:38.809
It's a very traditional display in a certain way.

00:01:39.275 --> 00:01:40.874
There's no manipulation of the objects

00:01:40.874 --> 00:01:42.304
other than their positioning.

00:01:42.935 --> 00:01:44.536
And that changes the meaning,

00:01:44.536 --> 00:01:46.242
or the relationship,

00:01:46.624 --> 00:01:48.074
or how you think about them.

00:01:48.074 --> 00:01:49.578
And this is everything that I'm about

00:01:49.578 --> 00:01:50.966
when I'm working with museums

00:01:50.966 --> 00:01:52.979
and quite often when I'm working in my studio.

00:01:55.733 --> 00:02:00.305
Looking at high-end decorative arts in the chairs

00:02:00.305 --> 00:02:02.242
and the whipping post,

00:02:02.242 --> 00:02:04.014
they have a very different history,

00:02:04.014 --> 00:02:06.284
but it relates very directly in that

00:02:06.284 --> 00:02:08.012
those people who sat in the chairs

00:02:08.012 --> 00:02:09.843
had some relationship with

00:02:09.843 --> 00:02:12.767
those who were on the whipping post.

00:02:18.936 --> 00:02:21.379
Not acknowledging that things are complex--

00:02:21.379 --> 00:02:22.579
that beauty is complex--

00:02:22.579 --> 00:02:24.674
I think that that's the problem,

00:02:24.674 --> 00:02:26.411
that people want to do that.

00:02:26.411 --> 00:02:29.383
So, I enjoy making it complex for people,

00:02:29.383 --> 00:02:31.035
[LAUGHS]

00:02:33.225 --> 00:02:35.505
because that's my world, you know.

00:02:35.505 --> 00:02:36.570
[LAUGHS]

99:59:59.999 --> 99:59:59.999
Fred Wilson: Beauty & Ugliness | "Exclusive" | Art21