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Spraygraphic Interview with Artist Filip Jonker
By Spraygraphic | February 27, 2008
Spraygraphic Interview with Filip Jonker
SG: Please tell us about yourself?
FP: I was born in 1980 in Rotterdam, and I currently live and work in Berlin. I started an Industrial Design study in the Hague, I quit it 2 years later because of the compromising environment, bought a one-way ticket to Bombay to see the world, traveled by train and bus back to the Netherlands, crossing Srinagar, Nepal, Tibet, China, Mongolia and Russia. Found the ideal art school, AKI-academy in Enschede, co-organized a number of expositions, made an exchange with the Mucha-academy in St. Petersburg, won an “outstanding student in contemporary sculpture” award in the USA and a Stimulation award in the Netherlands, went to Berlin for inspiration and fresh air and co-organized a big open-air exposition on an abandoned piece of ground in the center of Berlin last summer called “blind spots”. I’m currently working on getting the City of Berlin to sell some weird postwar city-objects to use them as bases for sculptures.
SG: Where do you currently live and work?
FP: Berlin, and on locations
SG: What mediums do you work with?
FP: I work with all materials. But because of the temporary nature of my work, often what’s left is a photo.
SG: Describe your working process when creating a new work.
FP: -I stumble on an issue, a location or something interesting. It’s in my head for days and days, then (often when I’m in a train) it’s “poof” there: an original thought. I start drawing and rethinking the whole lot. At that point I try to subtract parts to get to the bottom, I rarely add something. I do research and ask a lot of advice. I organize everything for what’s needed to assemble the work.
SG: What kind of things do you do when you get blocked or find it hard to create something?
FP: I talk and get drunk with some good friends
SG: Where are you currently finding your inspiration?
FP: On an abandoned unused postwar bridge-pillar in Berlin.
SG: Can you please tell us a little about Clouds. How long did it take to complete? Where was the sculpture installed?
FP: It was installed in a former Stork-turbine factory in Hengelo, the Netherlands. It took a few days to build.
SG: Can you please tell us a little about your choice to construct churches. In what ways do the locations have impact on your sculptures?
FP:vChurches are one of the very few buildings which are stronger than a landscape, they “win” from it’s surroundings. A church creates a centre. Although I’m not strong religious in any way, I like the idea that man can honor God with building a church. And by honoring God, mankind honored itself. If I build a church on a raw unused lonely land, I honor that place. The locations where I placed the churches are abandoned, deserted, no-man-land. The church with it’s location undergo a relation which tells something about the past, the future and the present. Once I build a wooden church in a museum, that didn’t work that good.
SG: Where has your work been seen?
FP: Amsterdam, Almelo, Berlin, Diepenheim, Enschede, Essen, Goor, Haarlem, Hamilton, Hengelo, London, Muenster, Okkenbroek, Wimbledon, Zwolle.
SG: Where will it be seen next?
FP: From 6th-16th march in the Alma Enterprises Gallery in London. And in Berlin probably somewhere in june.
SG: What is your dream art assignment?
FP: Something with huge old rusty cranes.
SG: What is your favorite color?
FP: Orange off course.
SG: Who is your favorite artist? And Why?
FP: That changes often, but I wrote an essay about Tadashi Kawamata. I really like how he managed to get the the location to have the same importance as the work he exhibited.
SG: What book/magazine are you reading this week?
FP: “space craft” (publicer: die gestalten verlag), about artist/architecture, “het bureau” from J.J Voskuil, about an buro which investigates ancient folk-habits.
SG: Ever do a self portrait? Where is it now?
FP: In the first year of the AKI we had an assignment where we had to make 100 self portraits, I can’t remember where they are, pitty.
SG: Where is your favorite place to hang out?
FP: Junk-yards, harbors, remises, bars
SG: Any final words of advice?
FP: The coincidence is bigger when the changes are smaller.
ART:
1 & 2) Harvest, A1Aanzet, Kunstvereniging Diepenheim, 2007,
3) Terra Nullius, 2006
4) Tata truck, 2004
5) Agaves, 2005
6) Terra Nullius USA, 2006
7) Blindspots, Berlin 2007
Urbitopia, Galerie het Langhuis Zwolle, 2007
Topics: Art Installations, International-Art, Sculpture Art |
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