Border Patrol is defined as a contemporary art space in Portland, Maine, that probes the boundaries of government agency and explores the intersection between contemporary art and corporate aesthetics. What is it about the government and corporate formats that appeal to you? What, if anything, are you hoping to subvert?
When we first walked into room 309 of the State Theatre building, we recognized that its architecture was that of an office. A government office or a corporate office, either and both. The distinction (government vs. corporate) is no longer meaningful as these two worlds are now identical. Rather than fight or attempt to alter or "neutralize" this architectural character, we chose to embrace it, to attempt to inhabit it as artists and curators. 1:1 identification becomes a form of camouflage which allows insight and moments of transparency in a structure which is otherwise opaque and seemingly unapproachable.
We think of "agency" as both a noun and a verb: ontologically, how people are ordered or order themselves, how power or control is exerted, the actions that bodies can and cannot perform. We also approach "agency" architecturally, as a physical, bureaucratic, administrative space. What is the relationship between agency and aesthetics? Where are aesthetics located within agency? These are two of the questions which we are continually asking.
"Subvert" isn't a word that we favor in our discussions. We are performing a model with each exhibition and event. Cloaking ourselves in the superficial guise of that which we are trying to dismantle, namely an economic system which is vampiric in its thirst for profit, relentless in its search for the yet-to-be-exploited, and indifferent to all forms of life. This economic system is the shared heart of the governmental/corporate sphere which envelops us all. Capitalism is historical: it has a beginning and it will have an end. We are trying to hasten that end by proposing and exploring alternate models of exchanging, interacting, making, collaborating, working, and living.
Has the nod to the governmental or corporate art world brought in audiences, funding, or interest that you feel is typically reserved for more "official" institutions? Has it turned anyone off? (Maybe it's too soon to tell or it could also be that this question is not particularly relevant.)
It is difficult to specify what attracts an audience. It is also difficult to know if anyone has been turned off by our approach because they wouldn't have come through the door. If by "official" you mean "commercial", the answer is no. Our governmental/corporate nod has not attracted any funding or official interest. We think of our work as experimental and non-commercial for the reasons listed above. We are seeking the fringe, the border, if you will, between that which is visible/invisible, speakable/unspeakable, imaginable/unimaginable.
In terms of funding available to us in the state of Maine, as far as we know we are ineligible. We are not a 501c-3 (no desire to become one) and therefore cannot apply as Border Patrol to the Maine Arts Commission. We are also ineligible for grants through the Kindling Fund as there is a clear conflict of interest with Elizabeth's role at SPACE Gallery. The degree to which we are "official" is irrelevant to our ability to access funds. We are entirely self-funded and plan to remain so, as this allows the greatest degree of autonomy.
Isabell Lorey, in her essay "Governmentality and Self-Precarization: On the Normalization of Cultural Producers" wonders about "the ways in which ideas of autonomy and freedom are constitutively connected with hegemonic modes of subjectivation in Western, capitalist societies." The term "Border Patrol" definitely brings up notions of access, freedom, and autonomy. Where do you see Border Patrol fitting in with practices of institutional/governmental critique?
We are claiming for ourselves the same right which government claims for itself--the ability to name, the privilege of insisting that something is real because you say it is real. We have seen the multiplication of the bureaucratic framework in which new governmental bodies (Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Federal Protective Service, National Infrastructure Protection Center, and dozens more) are spawned in the name of national security with little to no oversight or legality. This is partly due to the nature of bureaucracies in general, their need to multiply and self-divide and splinter, and partly due to the specific goals of the current regime. In any case, we reserve for ourselves the same right. If climate change doesn't exist because one says it doesn't exist, then we are Border Patrol because we say we are Border Patrol. It is a fight for language, an insistence that the words we use must in some way correspond to a shared, collectively verifiable set of experiences. Some might call this "reality."
What do you see as the role of the government in art?
Here we can discuss different levels of government--at the federal level, we see an administration that is the culmination of a decades-long assault on creativity, intuition, collaboration, imagination, etc. The Right defines these pursuits broadly as "culture" and seeks to dismantle it from every possible angle.
We can also look at the role of government at the state level. Elizabeth has spent a lot of time in the intersection between government and art. She worked for several years at the Oregon State Arts Commission in the Public Art Department. Her project ALL RISE was funded through the City of Seattle's 1% for Art Program. She spent a lot of time advocating for funding and was privy to strategic planning sessions that enabled lobbyists to advocate for the department's existence on a state level. She assisted in grant programs that support individual artists and value their labor in addition to siting artworks in the public both permanently and temporarily. We strongly believe that civic identity includes engagement with the arts and in a concept of citizenship that values artists as essential. In practice, though, the government erects unnecessary roadblocks to funding for artists and in doing so incentivizes artists to reflect its agenda.
We are also drawn to the opposite approach: trying to discern the role of art in government. For example the dependence of administrative bodies upon fiction as a tactic, as a mode of communication and being. The federal government continually uses fiction to precariously prop up its otherwise illegitimate status--we see the creation of a narrative, a teleological trajectory with interweaving plots and subplots and characters. Analyzing the dependence of the government on the very realm which it attempts to destroy highlights this foundational contradiction as well as many other cracks in the facade. It also allows us as artists to discern continued, more effective modes of survival.
What do you think Border Patrol is able to offer that other institutions cannot (or might not want to)?
We can offer a very specific linguistic and architectural framework. We insert a variable between curator(s) and artist(s) that is an acknowledgement of non-neutrality. Some artists find an alignment with our specific intentions, while others find this framework and tension to be productive for their practice in general (formally, intellectually, emotionally). We see this as an extension of our own artistic practices and our proclivity for collaboration.
Where do you see BP operating in the artistic ecosystem of Portland and/or Maine?
In Portland we have been welcomed and embraced within the local and regional arts community. We are continually grateful for that and hope to provide one voice to the ongoing conversation.
How does a performance of government converse with an actuality of government in this border state?
We don't interact with government, we interact with artists. We are an art space first and foremost. We are not changing the government because we are adopting and playing with its linguistic and architectural models--we have no illusions about that. Our personal politics definitely influence the conversations we have in the gallery around the work. Again, we are seeking other modes, trying to find another way or assemble a new model out of the crumbling edifice of the previous. We are most interested not in topical conversations but in exploring, sharing, collaborating, encouraging the manifestation of a model which prioritizes and fosters experimentation, intuition, and non-monetary exchange. In short, grasping and groping for the paths which lead to a post-capital society.
Would you share your thoughts about the idea of patrolling a border of art in Maine?
Borders only exist when they are being performed and insisted upon. They are repeatedly, frantically drawn in sand and blood. A border is a highly militarized zone, a zone of a-citizenship, as in absence of citizenship, nationhood, or belonging. Borders are unnatural and de-humaninzing. Again, as artists the borders we are patrolling are aesthetic: what characteristics cause something to be unrepresentable, unsayable, unimaginable? How can these unknown potentials be represented? How can speech be drawn out of silence and erasure? How can an insistent presence exist in the face of attempts to make absent? These are the questions that exist in between that which has been violently torn apart.
When we first walked into room 309 of the State Theatre building, we recognized that its architecture was that of an office. A government office or a corporate office, either and both. The distinction (government vs. corporate) is no longer meaningful as these two worlds are now identical. Rather than fight or attempt to alter or "neutralize" this architectural character, we chose to embrace it, to attempt to inhabit it as artists and curators. 1:1 identification becomes a form of camouflage which allows insight and moments of transparency in a structure which is otherwise opaque and seemingly unapproachable.
We think of "agency" as both a noun and a verb: ontologically, how people are ordered or order themselves, how power or control is exerted, the actions that bodies can and cannot perform. We also approach "agency" architecturally, as a physical, bureaucratic, administrative space. What is the relationship between agency and aesthetics? Where are aesthetics located within agency? These are two of the questions which we are continually asking.
"Subvert" isn't a word that we favor in our discussions. We are performing a model with each exhibition and event. Cloaking ourselves in the superficial guise of that which we are trying to dismantle, namely an economic system which is vampiric in its thirst for profit, relentless in its search for the yet-to-be-exploited, and indifferent to all forms of life. This economic system is the shared heart of the governmental/corporate sphere which envelops us all. Capitalism is historical: it has a beginning and it will have an end. We are trying to hasten that end by proposing and exploring alternate models of exchanging, interacting, making, collaborating, working, and living.
Has the nod to the governmental or corporate art world brought in audiences, funding, or interest that you feel is typically reserved for more "official" institutions? Has it turned anyone off? (Maybe it's too soon to tell or it could also be that this question is not particularly relevant.)
It is difficult to specify what attracts an audience. It is also difficult to know if anyone has been turned off by our approach because they wouldn't have come through the door. If by "official" you mean "commercial", the answer is no. Our governmental/corporate nod has not attracted any funding or official interest. We think of our work as experimental and non-commercial for the reasons listed above. We are seeking the fringe, the border, if you will, between that which is visible/invisible, speakable/unspeakable, imaginable/unimaginable.
In terms of funding available to us in the state of Maine, as far as we know we are ineligible. We are not a 501c-3 (no desire to become one) and therefore cannot apply as Border Patrol to the Maine Arts Commission. We are also ineligible for grants through the Kindling Fund as there is a clear conflict of interest with Elizabeth's role at SPACE Gallery. The degree to which we are "official" is irrelevant to our ability to access funds. We are entirely self-funded and plan to remain so, as this allows the greatest degree of autonomy.
Isabell Lorey, in her essay "Governmentality and Self-Precarization: On the Normalization of Cultural Producers" wonders about "the ways in which ideas of autonomy and freedom are constitutively connected with hegemonic modes of subjectivation in Western, capitalist societies." The term "Border Patrol" definitely brings up notions of access, freedom, and autonomy. Where do you see Border Patrol fitting in with practices of institutional/governmental critique?
We are claiming for ourselves the same right which government claims for itself--the ability to name, the privilege of insisting that something is real because you say it is real. We have seen the multiplication of the bureaucratic framework in which new governmental bodies (Department of Homeland Security, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Federal Protective Service, National Infrastructure Protection Center, and dozens more) are spawned in the name of national security with little to no oversight or legality. This is partly due to the nature of bureaucracies in general, their need to multiply and self-divide and splinter, and partly due to the specific goals of the current regime. In any case, we reserve for ourselves the same right. If climate change doesn't exist because one says it doesn't exist, then we are Border Patrol because we say we are Border Patrol. It is a fight for language, an insistence that the words we use must in some way correspond to a shared, collectively verifiable set of experiences. Some might call this "reality."
What do you see as the role of the government in art?
Here we can discuss different levels of government--at the federal level, we see an administration that is the culmination of a decades-long assault on creativity, intuition, collaboration, imagination, etc. The Right defines these pursuits broadly as "culture" and seeks to dismantle it from every possible angle.
We can also look at the role of government at the state level. Elizabeth has spent a lot of time in the intersection between government and art. She worked for several years at the Oregon State Arts Commission in the Public Art Department. Her project ALL RISE was funded through the City of Seattle's 1% for Art Program. She spent a lot of time advocating for funding and was privy to strategic planning sessions that enabled lobbyists to advocate for the department's existence on a state level. She assisted in grant programs that support individual artists and value their labor in addition to siting artworks in the public both permanently and temporarily. We strongly believe that civic identity includes engagement with the arts and in a concept of citizenship that values artists as essential. In practice, though, the government erects unnecessary roadblocks to funding for artists and in doing so incentivizes artists to reflect its agenda.
We are also drawn to the opposite approach: trying to discern the role of art in government. For example the dependence of administrative bodies upon fiction as a tactic, as a mode of communication and being. The federal government continually uses fiction to precariously prop up its otherwise illegitimate status--we see the creation of a narrative, a teleological trajectory with interweaving plots and subplots and characters. Analyzing the dependence of the government on the very realm which it attempts to destroy highlights this foundational contradiction as well as many other cracks in the facade. It also allows us as artists to discern continued, more effective modes of survival.
What do you think Border Patrol is able to offer that other institutions cannot (or might not want to)?
We can offer a very specific linguistic and architectural framework. We insert a variable between curator(s) and artist(s) that is an acknowledgement of non-neutrality. Some artists find an alignment with our specific intentions, while others find this framework and tension to be productive for their practice in general (formally, intellectually, emotionally). We see this as an extension of our own artistic practices and our proclivity for collaboration.
Where do you see BP operating in the artistic ecosystem of Portland and/or Maine?
In Portland we have been welcomed and embraced within the local and regional arts community. We are continually grateful for that and hope to provide one voice to the ongoing conversation.
How does a performance of government converse with an actuality of government in this border state?
We don't interact with government, we interact with artists. We are an art space first and foremost. We are not changing the government because we are adopting and playing with its linguistic and architectural models--we have no illusions about that. Our personal politics definitely influence the conversations we have in the gallery around the work. Again, we are seeking other modes, trying to find another way or assemble a new model out of the crumbling edifice of the previous. We are most interested not in topical conversations but in exploring, sharing, collaborating, encouraging the manifestation of a model which prioritizes and fosters experimentation, intuition, and non-monetary exchange. In short, grasping and groping for the paths which lead to a post-capital society.
Would you share your thoughts about the idea of patrolling a border of art in Maine?
Borders only exist when they are being performed and insisted upon. They are repeatedly, frantically drawn in sand and blood. A border is a highly militarized zone, a zone of a-citizenship, as in absence of citizenship, nationhood, or belonging. Borders are unnatural and de-humaninzing. Again, as artists the borders we are patrolling are aesthetic: what characteristics cause something to be unrepresentable, unsayable, unimaginable? How can these unknown potentials be represented? How can speech be drawn out of silence and erasure? How can an insistent presence exist in the face of attempts to make absent? These are the questions that exist in between that which has been violently torn apart.