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M.V. Your imagery is very interesting in terms of guns and you talked
about Masonry, too. The symbols in that and the way society uses them
and the way there are other alternative societies. Can you talk a little
about the images you use?
C.K. I’ve always been relatively interested in occultism, so any Masonic
imagery that appears in my art work is as a result of the studies I have
done on the history of the Masons and related secret societies. They all
seem to wrap themselves in mystery and I guess I'm just curious.
M.V So you don’t make an identity between your dropping out and being
alternative?
C.K. No. I dropped out and then dropped back in, but I’ve never been
able to drop fully back in because I believe that artists today are marginalised
M.V.What do you think the value of art itself is to society?
C.K. I believe there are always cultural
visionaries who usually spot whatever’s in the air first, and then everyone
who wants to make a buck off it follows suit. In the history of
the 20th century, look at what happened with the Futurists,
the Russian Suprematists and Constructivists and the German
Expressionists. We can see where their utopian ideas about modernism
were co-opted by power and capital. The catastrophe that resulted from
co-option was World War 2. The new ideas in the air that were ultimately
used as propaganda and mind control were first formulated by the avant-gardes
of the engaged nations.
M.V And do you find that worrying? That implies that art is in fact
intellectual in a broader sense. Coming up with these ideas which are
appropriated and they’re not able to control.
C.K. Most intellectuals are hirelings. Hired intellectuals who’ll come
up with any theory or platform needed to get whatever power or capital
wants done. I’ve been to Sarajevo so I know a little about how Serb intellectuals
promoted the ethnic nationalism in Yugoslavia.
M.V. And how do you feel about that?
C.K. I don’t like it. I think that we’re in an age where ethics have
just been set aside in the name of business. There aren’t any noble people
about anymore as far as I’m concerned. Noble leaders, we don’t have any
they’ve all been bought by big business.
M.V. Your interest and connection to Yugoslavia, do you find that
as an artist you’re connected to the artmakers there or other people as
well?
C.K. Well
they’re very intellectual and very European in their formulation of artistic
agendas. What they did for me was got me to experience first hand how
art can be used... I don’t know how to phrase this but, I had a little
bit of an Epiphany in Sarajevo. Keeping the people that were in this besieged
city connected to the rest of the world through the exchange of cultural
activities was just as important a form of relief as getting them food.
It helped them endure what they were going through. So cultural relief
was just as important as any other kind of relief that was coming in from
outside. You never hear about it but lots of artists went to work with
the artists in Sarajevo in the midst of that war. They were putting
on all kinds of events to keep the spirit of the nation up.
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