A New Story Every Day: An Interview Of l'Area's Edouard Chueke

The Center of Le Marais’s Social Scene Is A Mom & Pop Restaurant/Bar Serving Lebanese/Brazilian Fusion & Drinks Until Late

 
 

interview by Abraham Chabon
photographs by Kenna Kroge

L’Area tonight, like every Saturday night, has spilled a crowd of well-dressed twenty-somethings out onto the streets. The rain comes down in a light haze, and smokers rotate in groups out of the doors. Some women’s fur coats are being flattened by the rain that rolls off the edges of their slanted umbrellas. The smokers hug the small, flat green face of l’Area and step away from the windows, from which you can see, behind and around them, a growing crowd inside the bar.

L’Area, during the day, is a quiet restaurant that serves Lebanese and Brazilian food on a side street between Bastille and Le Marais. The food feels home-cooked, comforting; it’s rich curries and shawarma, black rice and pita bread, citrusy ceviche, and a cold glass of white wine. You can’t go to l’Area and order just one thing—a meal at l’Area means a table covered in plates.

But at night, l’Area becomes something else—an overflowing bar where you can start or end your night, a refuge from the rain, good drinks and good music, but also one of the hearts of Paris’ youth scene. L’Area attracts artists, students, musicians, and, during fashion week, half of everyone who’s left their afterparties. It’s designed for conversations, for making connections. At l’Area, you can find a photographer for your brand, a writer for your magazine, or a date for next Saturday.

Inside the bar, the soft light feels as if it could all be from the glow of candles. The walls are mostly covered with thick white paint that thins in some important places and cracks in others. On each wall, there are mirrors, tchotchkes, and photos and paintings in thick and thin frames. The bar’s counter is long and shining and turns at one end to meet the wall.

The wall behind the bar has a splash of blue and green tiles. There are glass shelves covered in glass bottles and aluminum cans and corks and towels and art and busy hands and other things that a bar should or shouldn’t have. And the bar’s counter itself is covered in action and movement, the knocking of glass on the counter, the shifting of elbows under thick coat sleeves.

I move with the crowd as the room thins and then pushes out into the bar’s barely larger backroom, filled with a traffic jam of tables, benches, chairs, and people. You have to step over and squeeze past creaking wooden chairs with skinny iron legs. Boot heels catch on coats, elbows brush against the shoulders of drinkers, and backs press against backs. A small projector sends a faint blue glow—cut through by the shadow of the spinning ceiling fan’s blades—against a screen blocked by pots of flowers, a glittering silver lava lamp, and an enormous glass vase filled with coffee beans. Wine-soaked cushions and a floor sticky with Saint Germain lick the soles of boots and Puma runners.

The restaurant's owner, Edouard, steps into the backroom and lights his cigarette from a candle placed on a countertop. Edouard has silver hair and skin that looks like it has spent most of its life smiling. He wears a sweater knit tight like l’Area’s weave of tables and chairs. It is my first time back in two years; Edouard remembers my name.

There is no l’Area without Edouard. You would be hard-pressed to find a kinder man in Paris, and if you did, he would be nowhere near as cool. Edouard creates the culture of l’Area. When he can find a break between pouring drinks and hugging friends, he will pull you aside to connect you with someone he wants you to know. And all night, until the bar closes, through every backhanded glass, late reservation, and declined card, he keeps smiling.

I caught up with Edouard the next day. I sat at the counter as he paced back and forth behind the bar. I had to follow him with my phone so the recording would stay clear.

EDOUARD CHUEKE: It began with the food. Because of that, it began with Lily. People don’t always know this, but she’s the most important person here.

Lily is Edouard’s wife; they fell in love in Rio.

ABRAHAM CHABON: I haven’t met her yet, but you always say great things about her.

CHUEKE: She is completely essential. She arrives early in the morning and prepares everything—the ceviche, the dishes, all of it. She’s in the kitchen from 7:30 or 8:00 in the morning until 4:00 in the afternoon. And that’s the truth.

CHABON: I think you should probably give yourself more credit. You are so important. If someone loves coming to l’Area, part of that is because they love coming to see you. How do you think you’ve you built these connections? 

CHUEKE: Thank you so much. I try to receive people, make them feel welcome, and friendships will just happen from that. For me, that’s the most important thing. The connection first comes from my love for electronic music, photography, and fashion—my wife too. There are a lot of students who come here, as well as some young fashion designers. They come, we talk, we discuss things. It’s a place for that—to meet, to exchange ideas. 

Edouard lights a cigarette for me. 

CHABON: At a certain point, this bar must feel like a part of your family.

CHUEKE: Yes and no. It’s a real love affair.

I’ve had offers—good offers—to open other places, even in New York or London. But the mentality wasn’t the same. That’s why I decided not to do it. Even here in Paris, I had offers, but it wouldn’t have been the same. I’m happy we have this kind of relationship with the people here.

For me, the best part is that whether you come at night or just for Sunday brunch and a coffee, I’m happy you choose my place for that.

CHABON: You’ve told me before you just want to be a Mensch, what does that mean to you? 

CHUEKE: When I say I want to be a mensch, that’s something my father taught me. It means being clear, being correct with people, being honest. To be as honest as possible. To be kind. And not to be jealous. I don’t care if someone opens a new spot down the street. I say, "Thank God." I do my own thing in my own way.

I have friends in this business who make huge money, even with fewer customers than I have. They serve more expensive food, more expensive drinks. But I don’t care. I’m happy here.

People only see the surface of this place. They don’t see the work behind it, everything we’ve created. My wife and I both know—we’re never going to be rich from this. But we’ll have a good life, filled with good things.

Edouard scoops ice from a silver bucket into my hazy yellow glass of Pastis. 

 
 

CHABON: That honesty is what draws people to this place. And you feel it from the design.  It feels natural like it was put together with the intention of being genuine to who you are. You have family portraits, personal touches. Did you or your wife design it?

CHUEKE: My wife, mostly. Everything on the walls—that’s her. If you stop and really look, you’ll see we have pieces from some of the most important French artists, American photographers, even a Paris Photo Prize winner from five years ago. We wanted to bring that here.

Edouard gestures at the art hung in the room, wafting a cigarette through the air. 

CHABON: How did it start? How did l’Area become what it is?  

CHUEKE: There was a French radio station—Radio Nova. After the first two months, they fell in love with this place. They told all the DJs and musicians about it. And people just started coming. And it has stayed like that, always the right people who care about the same things. 

CHABON: Paris has a long history of bars and cafés being hubs for creatives. Do you feel like you’re continuing that tradition?

CHUEKE: I never really think about it like that. When we bought this space we knew Le Marais was on the rise but also it was an old part of Paris, filled with history. That was important to us. I love Paris, and it’s history, but I don’t think I was creating something only French. I think the connections, the creativity, can happen anywhere. I know we’ll be here for a few more years, but when this place is done, I’ll probably open another one. Maybe in Naples, maybe in New York. A smaller one—just breakfast and lunch. But with good music, good people, the same kind of identity as here, and the same people will come, and it will give people the same thing.

We have to pause our conversation; someone has called Edouard personally to make a reservation. 

CHABON: How do you keep going? Running a bar like this must be exhausting.

CHUEKE: It’s in my blood. Every day is a new day—that’s something my parents taught me. And this place, it feels like a movie to me. A new story every day. New characters, new relationships. That keeps me going. Also, I don’t drink much. I sleep four hours a night. I try to take care of my health, but it’s not easy.

CHABON: Do you ever worry about l’Area losing its identity as it gets more popular?

CHUEKE: Never. Because the people who come here, they become part of it. Even the celebrities—they feel at home. That’s what matters. And they wouldn’t come if they didn’t want to be a part of it, you know? 

 
 

Just Thinking: An Interview of Paris-Based Artist Ladji Diaby

 
 


April 11th marked the opening of Preservation, a group show curated by Paige Silveria and Paul Hameline at CØR Studio in Paris. The exhibition brings together a disparate group of artists (including Ladji Diaby, Alyssa Kazew, Mark Flood, Gogo Graham, Jordan Pallagès, Anthony Fornasari, Bill Taylor, Caos Mote, Ron Baker, Cecile Di Giovanni, Simon Dupety, Gaspar Willmann, Wolfgang Laubersheimer, and the late, great Gaetano Pesce) whose work ranges from photography, collage, video, design, sculpture, and more. These works explore the original purpose of our human intellect before it became aware of itself and started to ask the unknowable. They reflect on a time when the self wasn’t yet conscious and only concerned itself with preservation in the most existential sense of the word. On the occasion of the opening, Paige Silveria spoke with artist Ladji Diaby to learn more about his roots in Mali, his creative process, and his relationship to the art scene in Paris.

PAIGE SILVERIA: Can you give us some background on yourself? Where did you grow up? What were you like as a kid? 

LADJI DIABY: I'm the first born of six children who lived in a communist city named Ivry-sur-Seine in the South of Paris during my entire childhood. When I was a kid, I was very quiet and impulsive. I didn't have many friends and I hardly went out. I was just a nerd who didn't have the money to buy a computer or a console. But I have good memories of this time when my brother and sisters were my true best friends, (they still are), but they would always follow me in my dumbass game ideas.

SILVERIA: What made the city communist? How did communism manifest in your daily life?

DIABY: I don't know, the city has been run by the PCF [French Communist Party] since 1925, the trust is there. (laughs) Above all that, this city has a real respect for the people who populate it and their diversity.

SILVERIA: What did you nerd out on? What were your interests?

DIABY: Manga and video games especially, I was obsessed with the stories they told, I projected myself a lot, that allowed me to tolerate a lot of things.

SILVERIA: (laughs) What dumbass game ideas did you play with your brother and sisters?

DIABY: I had a lot of fun writing new versions of all the fictional narratives that fascinated me, especially the animated ones, it was like writing a play. I would call on them afterwards to give them their roles while explaining the laws of the universe in question and the modifications that I wanted to make, I could be quite tyrannical. (laughs) I was obsessed with that. Nothing made me happier than to project myself into these universes and I thank Allah that my brother and sisters never mocked me for it. Sometimes I tell myself that my practice began at that moment to such a degree that it influenced my entire relationship to reality. I wanted to put my whole life and the other fictions — whether I liked them or not — into this game. I wanted to give a place to everything on this Earth and beyond.

SILVERIA: I read in a press release for a past show of yours that your work is really linked to your family and origins. Tell me about your family and their influence on you and your work. 

DIABY: First of all, I'd like to make it clear that I don't have a subject or theme in my work, it bores me. I only work with what's close to me, what's part of my social reality and what builds me up in my human experience. Most of the time, it's stories we haven't chosen to tell. My family is the closest thing to me and also the most important thing in my life that I didn't choose. I'm the eldest of a family of six children originally from Mali, of Muslim faith, and living in France. So, of course, all of this will come to light. I don't ask myself any questions, I just have the impression that when I execute a gesture with the aim of producing a piece, it's as if my memory were a piece of land and the fact of thinking, of having the will to do something with my hands, ploughs this memory land and brings to the surface stories that are beyond me most of the time. I'm not a very inspired person. In fact, I started collecting objects from the streets or from my family for my productions because the idea of putting money into making “art” made me sick. I needed to set up an attitude, a climate where I could produce no matter what, even if I went broke again.

SILVERIA: You use a large array of materials — like your parents' bed — and processes in your work, can you describe your practice? 

DIABY: When I describe my practice, I often say that going into the studio is like going into a casino; each production is a slot machine. I assemble and I break and I repeat until I find a good combination, a beautiful shape. It's a potential that depends solely on my luck. Slot machines are a potential fortune, my pieces are potential stories. By this I mean that when I use an object I've recovered or an image I've found, I don't actually find it; we meet and they tell me what I can and can't do with them. It's like sampling, you're going to use excerpts from pre-existing samples without understanding the whole story behind them, but your sensibility calls you to a kind of obviousness, I trust this obviousness, which tells me that our history, the actions of me and those I love (family, friends, and heroes) have value and deserve to exist. 

SILVERIA: I love that. The video featured in this show is called “A bird against a window, people see the devil in the clouds.” Can you elaborate on the title and some of the footage you included in it? 

DIABY: I gave it this title because, basically, I don't give a title to my productions. So, I said to myself in an exceptional case I'm going to give it a title that one would never remember, but if we make an effort to remember it, it’s not for nothing. The title simply illustrates my feeling in making this video with images I find that I like and that I know, but once again, I don't understand everything. I remembered myself as a child who understood nothing in English, spending all my time in front of the TV watching rap clips and other African-American visual productions, and trying to project myself, model myself as a young Malian living in France on it — either to dream of a future or to understand a present. The whole point of the video is in this feeling, because gradually I realize that in my work the Ladji emancipate and the Ladji alienate coexist rather well.

SILVERIA: Can you elaborate a bit on “the Ladji emancipate and the Ladji alienate coexist rather well?”

DIABY: When I work, I start from the idea that each thing that is alienating can perhaps, through an error of understanding, become emancipatory; the stories that I can mobilize, voluntarily or not, always begin with a form of alienation — or maybe an unhealthy fascination with say violence and sex as a reason to love and see films. I don't think it's a noble reason that leads me to make art. I remember wanting to do all that to dominate, to become someone, to betray my own social class and those who look like me to join the elites. I wanted to be respected, it was only a feeling, a desire, but I will never forget because in hindsight, I see what I could have become and it makes me laugh as much as it scares me. But it was time to grow up and realize that I could not be a white man, that the art that I make, and how I think about it, my very presence in France, are a consequence of colonization and slavery. It is important for me to remind myself that my work is also the product of an ultra violent story led and told by the dominant white classes and with which I deal.

SILVERIA: What are your thoughts on the art community in Paris? What's your experience of showing work here? 

DIABY: I don't trust them. Honestly, if I thought about the artistic community in Paris every day, I would have stopped working a long time ago. Too many people are afraid of being replaced. If that's not what makes them so closed and competitive it's because they have the devil in them, I don't know. But thank God I was able to meet beautiful people and I remember that I still take great pleasure in producing things with my hands, there is nothing that makes me happier. As for showing my work, I think it's just time I show it to those who look like me.

SILVERIA: Where and how would you ideally show the work? 

DIABY: I don't have the answer yet, but I am sure of one thing: the exhibition model for our work, the white cube, has largely reached its limits. It's become, if it wasn't already like this, a space for political disarming, as if any discourse whatsoever in this space were the same and could only have the impact of a sword in the water. I think the response has to be collective, multi-voiced and open, so that we shift the political question to the question of disseminating our work, which in my opinion, is the real political bias in an artist's work, and no longer in what we can say in our productions.

SILVERIA: You're in Dakar now for four months. What are you up to? Are you working on anything in particular while you're there? 

DIABY: Just thinking.

SILVERIA: That sounds lovely.

Preservation is on view through April 19 @ CØR Studio 28 Rue du Petit Musc, Paris

 
 

Wombs Beyond Bodies: Katharina Kaminski and Hanne Gaby Odiele on Intersex Creative Power


interview by Chimera Mohammadi

The iconography of fertility holds a timeless power over us. Our paleolithic Venuses defined this obsession, encapsulating fertility as a powerful force of creation, rooted in the divine feminine while remaining paradoxically universal. Intersex artist Katharina Kaminski expands upon this understanding in her new show, Womb, which embraces our individual potentials for transformation and innovation while interrogating our gendered ideas about fertility. As we find ourselves in the throes of a gender revolution, Kaminski reckons with the intersection of gender and creation in her abstractions of the womb: soft vessels fill the Sainte Anne Gallery, distilling the Venus to its core sense of creation and transformation. In recognition of National Intersex Awareness Day, Katharina comes together with intersex model and activist Hanne Gaby Odiele to discuss creating while Queer, finding community, and claiming ownership of the self in the wake of bodily alienation.

MOHAMMADI: How did you two learn about each other? What influence has your mutual discovery had upon each of you?

Katharina Kaminski: I met Hanne at a party in New York. Back then, I already knew that I didn't have a womb and ovaries because I had no period, had gone through surgery at fourteen years old, and had been under hormone replacement therapy since then. But I wasn't informed at all about my ‘condition’ and I thought something was wrong with me—that I was the only one. I felt victimized because doctors encouraged me to hide the truth about my body and didn't feel there was someone who understood enough to speak about it. I had been following Hanne on Instagram before personally meeting her. I read about her activism on intersexuality and I started suspecting, maybe I am intersex too! I started studying about it and all I was reading matched with me. So, I introduced myself to Hanne and said, “I think I might be intersex too!” A couple of weeks later, I went to do a blood test and solved years of uncertainty when I received the results that I have XY chromosomes. Thanks to Hanne, not only did I learn what it means to be intersex, and that there is a beautiful community of outspoken intersex people in the world, but she also inspired me to be proud of it. She gave me the information to understand and the inspiration to speak. 

Hanne Gaby Odiele: We met randomly at that party years ago. I think Katharina already messaged me before on social media right after my disclosure. After that, we kept in touch, and we met again when Katharina was spending some time in New York. We not only bonded over our intersex journey, but she also shared with me her passion for art and her newfound love for her sculptures. 

MOHAMMADI: Do you consider yourselves activists? 

KAMINSKI: I don't consider myself exactly an activist, but as an artist, there is a strong connection between my sculptures, the body and gender, which are issues that have been focal points in my life. If I have the chance to speak to many (like now), and there is someone else who can benefit from that, as I benefitted from Hanne being open about it, then I feel I have the responsibility to do so. 

ODIELE: I’ve done a lot of activism in the past, since it was important to me to tell my story and bring to light the irreversible, unnecessary, non-consensual surgeries that intersex children can be subjected to. I also wanted to point out that intersex bodies are beautiful and perfect just the way they are. Since my disclosure I’ve seen a lot of new intersex activists emerge. I’ve been focusing less on activism myself. For me, it’s also important that being intersex is just a small part of who I am: it doesn’t have to be a big deal.

MOHAMMADI: Kate Bornstein opens their radical 1994 book Gender Outlaw with the phrase “My identity becomes my body, which becomes my fashion...” Has modeling informed your relationships with gender presentation, identity, and the way that many trans/genderqueer people’s feelings about their bodies range from mournful to celebratory? Odiele especially has spoken at length on their anger toward the medical policing of non-binary bodies. Has this complex emotional spectrum in relation to the body been a theme in your respective creative work?

KAMINSKI: Definitely! My sculptures have these alternative corporealities and I started doing that totally unintentionally. I feel my work is supercharged with that deep complex emotional spectrum. That's why I actually decided to present myself as intersex in connection to my work. Even though it doesn't define me, it is really present in who I am and in my art.

MOHAMMADI: In Man and His Symbols [1968], Jung describes the necessity of “the symbolic mood of death from which may spring the symbolic mood of rebirth.” Did you experience the discovery of your intersex identities as a death and subsequent (re)birth? How did claiming your identities place the act of creation into your own hands?

KAMINSKI: More than discovering my intersex identity, what felt like a rebirth for me was allowing myself to feel fertile and whole.

MOHAMMADI: Does Womb anthropomorphize the womb or render it inanimate? Or might it do both?

KAMINSKI: I am more interested in the ‘womb’ as this energetic center where life and creativity are born, rather than its physicality. It's kind of ironic, because as a sculptor, you normally want to make your subject material, give it a form. In this case, I think because I’ve been going through the process of disconnecting from the feeling of lacking my physical womb, and connecting with my fertility beyond the matter of an actual organ, I wanted to explore deeper understandings of the embodiment of a womb. The exhibition at Sainte Anne Gallery has two floors: on the first floor I am presenting my sculptures for the first time in new mediums: marble and bronze. It’s a more brutalist side of my work and the biggest scale in which I have ever worked. On the second floor, after you walk up the stairs, you enter the Womb: a Light and Darkness installation with ten Light Sculpture Beings in different types of clay. It feels like being inside a sanctuary, or in the ‘womb’ of your mother.

Katharina Kaminski
The Womb (2023)
Clay + fire installation
200 x 180 x 150 cm

MOHAMMADI: Womb forges a non-biological definition for fertility. How does this understanding of fertility feed your creative instincts?

KAMINSKI: Fertility is not only about creating human life, it is about creating. The title of my exhibition is a metaphor for the inner plot twist I allowed myself. From feeling absent and infertile to a sense of abundance and fecundity.

MOHAMMADI: I was very interested in the term “surrealist body language” in Womb’s press release. Can you elaborate on what that means to you?

KAMINSKI: I'm very interested in the mysticism of creating. Through my creative process, I seek to connect with the unconscious. Like a womb, I offer myself as a portal from the spiritual to the physical and I allow the sculptures to become alive. I think the concept of ‘surrealist automatism’ resonates a lot with my way of creating. I find it unnatural to start a sculpture from a thought in the mind, wanting to predict and control a result. I find it uncomfortable and boring. The mind is limited. I'm more interested in going beyond that, where emotions are raw and free and the mind can't comprehend. So for me, creating is a ritual, or a dance between me and the clay that allows the sculptures to become alive in their own unique enigmatic corporealities.

MOHAMMADI: What media exploring non-binary identity do you find particularly meaningful?

ODIELE: I love the art of drag and performance. I think it has helped me accept many contradictions and perceptions I had about gender. Like a wise queen likes to say, “We’re all born naked and the rest is drag.”

Womb is on view through December 20th at Sainte Anne Gallery, 44 rue Saint Anne, 75002, Paris.

Memphy in Paris: An Interview Of Designer Sintra Martins


photography by James Emmerman 
styled by Sintra Martins
makeup by Mical
modeled by Memphis Murphy
interview by Camille Pailler

Sintra Martins may be from Los Angeles, but her designs are quintessentially New York and they are taking the city by storm. The recent Parsons graduate interned for Thom Browne and Wiederhoeft before launching Saint Sintra in 2020, presenting her first collection at NYFW in 2021, and her sophomore FW22 collection was just presented at NYFW earlier this year. In the last two years, her sculptural designs have walked the line between costume and ready-to-wear with S-curved horsehair filaments, sheer maxi skirts, colored feathers, English shetland tweeds, sparkles and bows, and so much more. Not only has she established herself as a master of disparate materials who takes inspiration from far and wide, but her designs have become instant favorites to everyone from Olivia Rodrigo, to Sydney Sweeney, Willow, Cali Uchis, and Kim Petras. We asked Martins to style model Memphis Murphy for a special editorial and sat down to ask the emerging designer a few questions about her process.

CAMILLE PAILLER: Can you talk about the way that you incorporate absurdism in your design?

SINTRA MARTINS: Absurdism is really at the core of the brand’s identity. It starts on the boards, collaging imagery until I recognize traces of the dissonance that arises when I lose track of what I’m trying to say. I think the best work exists just beyond the edge of familiarity, like a cartoon cliffhanger. 

PAILLER: You went to Florence and fell in love with the city. How did this experience influence your latest collection?

MARTINS: Florence is heaven on Earth, a Disneyland for Renaissance art history nerds, and home to some of the most incredible artisans in the world.

Our FW22 collection was more directly inspired by armor, I’m really interested in the engineering of articulation, and how a material so rigid and inflexible as metal can take on the human form in all its complexities. It was also fascinating to see the legacy of the Medici family in person. I’m really interested in the idea of feudalism as it mirrors to our current political landscape, and how beautiful it can look despite all its humanitarian shortcomings.

So often I ask myself, what is the purpose and meaning of fashion? I think Europe has a rich cultural and anthropological legacy of fashion, which is evident in their culture in a way that I really admire and value. Spending a few weeks in Paris and then Florence was a refreshing reminder of the importance of fashion in a cultural sense, not just as a niche hobby, or content fodder as it can sometimes feel here in New York.

PAILLER: You worked in the Parsons archives. I’m curious if you have a favorite period in fashion history?

MARTINS: Favorite questions are so hard. There’s something nostalgic about anything that was ever fashionable. I do love to see exposed stitches on an antique garment, it’s a beautiful reminder of the labor and love that went into making it. If I had to choose I’d say the transitional period between what’s considered Edwardian and Deco, though I’m not sure it has a name.

PAILLER: You're fresh out of school and have hit the ground running. Who influenced you most as a designer while you were in school?

MARTINS: I take inspiration from some cliché amalgamation of McQueen, Galliano, Marc Jacobs, Westwood, and more contemporary designers that have managed to break through the post-graduate slump. 

PAILLER: The beaded dress Memphy is wearing has a very precise cut and ornamentation. Can you tell me more about the manufacturing process and the reference for this dress?

MARTINS: The Memphy dress was inspired by a Cardin carwash dress I saw in a vintage shop, and I thought how cool would this be if it were sparkly? Ultimately it looked horrible, and I had to scramble to fix it, so I decided to sew the strips into tubes, and my assistant and I played around with it until it didn’t look so horrible. Ultimately I think it came out much better than I’d imagined, but totally different. Like I mentioned earlier, innovation is just outside the comfort zone.

PAILLER: Can you tell us anything about what to expect from the upcoming collection?

SINTRA: No! Top secret.

A Fatal Personality: An Interview With Brian Kokoska On Knives and Poison IV

Brian Kokoska, who can often be found with a knife clutched between his teeth or with a devious, wide-grinned smile, is one of our favorite artists working today. His paintings almost look like they belong to the hand of a child in art class working out some kind of trauma caused by alien abduction, but when you look closer, there is unexplainable magic going on. Perhaps Kokoska’s paintings are mirrored reflections of our own demons, or the artist’s – who really knows or cares – but what you will find amongst his crude oil painted visages is a sense of primordial familiarity. Maybe these creatures are our friends, or maybe they are out to kill us. What’s most interesting is the way the artist presents the work – it is never in the typical brightly lit gallery with white walls. Quite the contrary. What he does is create a totally immersive environment that is bathed with a single monochromatic hue – the walls, the carpet, the paintings, the sculptural props and found assemblage (like stuffed animals or toy cobra snakes), and, of course, knives – all one color. In one exhibition, it was a Pepto-Bismol pink, in another it was bug zapper blue, and in another it was a shade of codeine cough syrup, or purple drank. For his new solo exhibition at Valentin gallery, entitled Poison IV, the New York based artist creates a bath of swampy pale green where his evocative countenances interplay with knives and mannequin torsos that clutch green stuffed animals. It’s a complete ‘fuck you’ to the senses. Autre got a chance to catch up with Kokoska before the opening of his exhibition to talk about knives, his inspirations, sex, violence and his current must see show in Paris. 

OLIVER KUPPER: Let’s start off with talking about the faces that appear in your paintings...how would you describe these faces, creatures…do you imagine them in your head or nightmares before you paint them? 

BRIAN KOKOSKA: They are basically just from my imagination and I guess from my own life experiences. When I begin a painting there is no real clear vision for how it will turn out. So sometimes they go through multiple phases and different layers of faces and symbols are painted over and over until something new happens and then I leave the painting alone.

OK: There’s a clear evolution in your work from more detailed work to more symbolic, representational work…how would you describe this evolution? 

BK: I think it's just natural for ideas to shift and to find different ways of expressing that through the work. For example, I get sick of things really easily so I try to challenge myself by bringing in new elements, particularly sculpture and installation. The paintings are something I'm passionate about but I don't see them as the key element in my work. They are only 1 factor.

OK: Who were some artists that influenced you or inspired you to be an artist? 

BK: Early in school I was looking at a lot of German artists; Albert Oehlen, Jutta Koether, Isa Genzken, Kai Althoff...and then I started getting into American artists who I could relate to even a little better, like Mike Kelley, Paul McCarthy, Cindy Sherman. I've always been drawn to nasty, raw, harsh work that is still totally genuine. Because I think there's too much fake shit right now (or always?).

OK: I want to bring up your fascination with knives…you have a lot of selfies posing with some scary knives…where does this fascination come from? 

BK: Yeah, I just love knives. Aesthetically I think they are so beautiful. And I love how they can be so gentle and seductive yet also super violent and fatal. I collect rare knives but probably in the pics you are referencing I'm sourcing them for sculptures most of the time.

Even when I was a child I remember loving knives. Slasher films. And my uncles used to give me the coolest dagger-rings.. like Hells Angels shit.

Here in Paris we just went to this beautiful old knife shop called E.Dehillerin and the knife maker got concerned for my safety after he saw how into the knives I was. He kept explaining how like "this one's for meat, this one's for fish...". It was nice. 

OK: You have started to do really comprehensive installations with your exhibition, choosing a single monochrome color, your last exhibition was Pepto-Bismol pink and your upcoming exhibition is sort of swamp green…can you describe your process of choosing a specific color? 

BK: I get obsessed with particular colors and then it becomes this restriction in my head that I find nice to work with. Like, putting together a show in shades of one color (or perhaps a second color, black), it feels very rewarding in some weird way. It is similar to stage design or something.. where I would imagine you get a strange thrill of creating an environment that can psychologically affect an audience.

"...I have a fatal personality so I think sex and violence are probably heightened in my work because of that."

OK: Let’s talk about your current exhibition…the title is Poison IV…what is the concept behind this show? 

BK: I had been doing a series of shows like you just mentioned in shades of one color. I was using mostly baby-colors...pale muted versions of colors that I like. So it went from baby blue to baby purple to baby pink and now baby/swampy green. For this show it will be my first solo version; in the past I've always asked another artist (Debo Eilers, Zack Davis, Chloe Seibert) to join my installation.

Poison IV will be my last iteration of the baby-color thing. I'm excited about this show because I've had the chance to make more sculptural works to go alongside the paintings.

OK: Symbols are a big part of your practice…where does this sense of ritual or symbolism come from…your paintings seem like they belong to a strange cult or religion? 

BK: I tend to use whatever symbols are stuck in my head. Like, I'll keep seeing reoccurring numbers or symbols, so then when I get to work they'll just appear because it's what I'm thinking about. They usually build up in gestures to form the "face" paintings. A lot of the imagery is sentimental to me and comes from childhood experiences or memories. But I also borrow a ton of visual language from things I collect. 

OK: This is your first solo show in Paris…are you going to do anything fun besides your exhibition while you are out there…are you more of a tourist or do you like to blend in? 

BK: Mostly just been slaving on the show so far. I love Paris though, it's so romantic. I wander the streets and it's like I'm in a movie or something. Everybody just hanging out with baguettes. I like the pace here…nobody is really faking it...they're just enjoying life. I think that's really important, ya know?

OK: There is a distinct sense of sex and violence in your work…where do you think these themes come from? 

BK: Ha ha.. Probably from my own life I guess, and from past experiences. I'm a scorpio and I have a fatal personality so I think sex and violence are probably heightened in my work because of that.

OK: What’s next? 

BK: Party in France. Gonna check out Venice quickly then back to New York. I'm gonna be working on a solo for LOYAL in Stockholm which opens mid November. Before that I'm making a baby sculpture in collaboration with DIS Magazine for their new issue DIStaste.

Brian Kokoska: Poison IV will be on view until October 10, 2015 at Valentin gallery in Paris. Photographs by Sylvie Chan-Liat, courtesy of Valentin and the artist. Text and interview by Oliver Maxwell Kupper. Follow Autre on Instagram: @AUTREMAGAZINE

Searing Eroticism: An Interview with ELVIS DI FAZIO

He's already shot editorials for some of the top magazines, but with his distinctive style, searing eroticism, pop art sensibilities and sometimes eccentric art direction in broad hommages to bygone eras and cinema, Australian based Elvis Di Fazio is definitely an auteur of the fashion photography genre. I've been following Di Fazio's creative endeavors over the past five years and it is certainly fascinating watching the evolution of an artist. Studied in the art of silkscreening, I first spotted some of Di Fazio's early prints.  The designs were original and genuine only because the influences were blatant, without being blindly derivative –indicative of an artist with a voice searching for a voice. And what you will learn in the following interview is that it was these exact influences that tangentially pushed Di Fazio, fatefully, into photography.  With Diaries of Smutographer – a blog showcasing Di Fazio's more deviant editorials the photographer fashions himself the identity of a playboy – sexually omnivorous, but slanting more towards the homoerotic, the Diaries, combining photography and video, are a provocative, orgiastic exploration of human sexuality.  Demand for Elvis Di Fazio is high these days and the chances of getting an interview are thin, but thankfully he answered a few of our questions. 

Fleeting-Fancies-7-elvis_di_fazio

Can you remember the first image you ever took?Hmmm no I wish I could but I can’t, if I were to guess it was a family picnic and I was using my dads camera.

What brought you to photography?   To be honest I have such a love for the arts but I don’t have the patience to start a project from scratch, being able to tell a story through photography was a natural progression after several years studying fine arts and working with slow working mediums like oil on canvas.  In my course I majored in silkscreen painting where I would re-work the existing, de-collages of images lifted from old fashion magazines from the 50’s / 60’s family portraits, bed sheets, impasto jel, household paints from the hardware were amongst my favourite mediums for my art at the time.  After being questioned by one of my art teachers about the originality of my work and why I didn’t use my own images to screen print I took that on as a challenge and taught myself how to perform some dramatic looks through hair and makeup and styled my own shoots featuring friends, relos and street cast strangers which would sit for me while I turned them into fictional characters to be used in my New works of art. (you can see these on my website under old-world). I got so good at the photography element that I dropped the screen-printing all together.

Can you tell us a little bit about Diaries of a Smutographer? Well, I’m kinda obsessed with sex and sex culture. It was only a matter of time until people were gonna be like that’s not fashion or art, that’s just smut… so I beat them to it. If I was going to create erotica and use the fashion world as a platform there was no point playing it safe (for my blog anyways.) Creating the blog “diaries of a smutographer” was a way I could be true to myself with out scaring potential advertising clients. Girls gotta make the money, you know what im sayin?

What's one thing you've never told anyone before? Zooomagadoo do kee…. I know I’ve never told anyone that before because I just made that up then.

On your website you say that there is "no better combo than sex and humor" - can you elaborate on that? There’s no better combo then sex and humour “for me” sex and humor takes you far far away from your problems and stresses of life but it makes you feel so alive at the same time. If you can mix them together what a recipe for FUCK-YEH!

Any one thing exciting that you're working on now? Well I’m obsessed with these second generation Lebanese kids that invade our Sydney beaches during the summer. They live on the outskirts in the western suburbs, they have the most amazing mullets and a very unique way of dressing that is KINDA like a London chav but not at all. You can’t find any pictures of these guys but f you could you would see why I find them so fascinating. They seem to have a bad wrap in our society so If I could create something beautiful from that it would bring me a lot of joy. So right now I’m shooting stories that create humorous parodies of these characters that I’m sure they can laugh with too because I have no interest in making them a brunt of a bad joke.

What's next? Well summers around the corner so…. Maybe this project with the Lebanese kids?

elvisdifazio.com