Mario Brondo is a Mexican artist and filmmaker who lives in Mexico City. In this interview he talks about art, the major influences in his work, and the concept behind the his latest film and art projects.
Art has always been a part of your life. When did you know you would become an artist?
I was raised in a family of artists and scientists. Painting, sculpture, and photography were immediately available. I started my artistic practice at a very young age. My first oil-painting was done when I was only 3 years old. Music has always surrounded me. In my mom’s womb I listened frequently to Beethoven. After my birth, I spent my weekends with my grandma (painter Rosa Martinez) in concert halls. When I was a teenager I went all the way into photography, which eventually lead me both to filmmaking and contemporary art. Thereafter I studied both film and art professionally. I discovered, however, that the level of freedom in the contemporary arts is way beyond cinema. So I started producing art mainly, but using the cinematic resources that I love the most.
You know you are an artist when people refer to you as such. It happened to me after a couple of art shows. I always knew my professional practice would be into the field of arts. I have always been interested in languages, to the point that it is maybe still my main field of research. Eventhough, art might not be regarded as a structured language, the structure of my works can state that all human expression might be regarded as texts, as they expose ideas.
As a contemporary artist, who influenced you the most?
Many artists have influenced me throughout my artistic carreer. Surprisingly my most important source of inspiration is classic art. I love sacred art, although I am not religious. Some other great influences come from cinema. I can mention among these Werner Herzog, Michelangelo Antonioni, Aki Kaurismäki, Albert Serra, and Chantal Akerman. Conceptual art and theory is the last piece to fit into the puzzle: On Kawara, Paul McCarthy, and Umberto Eco. Intelligence and humour are some of the greatest values I find in my favourite works of art.
How has your style evolved over time?
My style has changed a lot during my professional years. At first, when I was entirely dedicated to visual arts, I was very centered on breaking the composition canons. When I integrated the moving image to my work, I was mostly concerned about time, simultaneity and duration; only to later evolve into breaking the rules of genres: mixing theatre and documentary, fiction and hyperrealism. At this point in my career, I am mostly concerned with the relationship between order and chaos, artificial intelligence, the archival and any other combination of science and aesthetics. My works of art have become interdependent and transmediatic. Please visit my website for further information.
What is the concept and mission of your latest art project, Cacopedia?
The idea of a Cacopedia has been developed by many artists and theoreticians throughout the last centuries. Rabelais and Umberto Eco have set some parameters. The Cacopedia is mostly about constructing a corpus of un-knowledge, useless information and paradoxical impossibilities. Cacopedia is for me a way of ordering and archiving all of my works, through rational rigueur, aesthetics and humour. The “mission” of such an idea could only be to set the semiological limits of useful knowledge and the absurd, while unveiling the mindset that we humans have when it comes to the obsession of schemes and order. It has been also a way to break the limits between a useful epistemological method (encyclopedia) and the useles, mischievous, corrupted knowledge and its doubtful sourcing.
Who did you work with on Cacopedia?
I have been working with urban animals, porn actors, street artists and performers, had the advice of Google Maps technicians, but mostly I have worked with friends and curators through the sharing of ideas and the possibilities of showing it. Each has had a central role either on the structure of the project or on the tone of each work.
You’ve recently had an art show at Franckesche Stiftungen zu Halle, Wunderkammer. How was the show received?
It has been very successful. The curator, Nike Bätzner, did a great job on gathering both, premium established artists, and emerging talents. The project is now being exhibited in other venues, along with other events. It is also to be shown at the Sinop Biennale in Turkey in 2016. Please visit my website to know more about the show.
Are there any plans for future shows?
I am working together with galleries and curators at the moment in order to present the first 5 volumes of Cacopedia. These include Animalia, Atlas, Artificialia, Erotica, and Solemnia. Each show will include photographs, video and happenings. I am also working in Sunshine and Gasoline, a project centered in the ever on-going Middle Eastern conflict, and the release of the gallery version of Villa Cisneros, and The 4 Deaths of María.
In today’s digital world, how does an artist “survive”?
I consider the advent of the digital a great opportunity to artists. Both production and distribution methods have suffered a radical change. While self-distribution opens the doors to many unknown, worth-to-follow artists, it has also become great a challenge for many art professionals while curating and deciding on the target markets an artist will be promoted to. The chance to produce faster and cheaper opens a great path to improvisation. The availability of tools and the possibility of producing faster may also threaten the quality of the works, many worthless “ready-mades” come out at a high rate.
Money is technically less of a constraint. Anyone with some aesthetic taste and technical experience could produce art. That leads to the fact that many artists have also faced the competition of non-professional artists that can suddenly have great ideas and even become viral.
I believe that there is an artist in every human being, and the possibilities of expression are every day more accessible. I celebrate it. The digital is becoming central for new talents. On the other side, artists are producing so many works that would be unimaginable some years ago. Interactivity and virtuality are now to shape our world.
