Andres Serrano, an American artist born in 1950, seems to have been inextricably linked to "out of line." In 1987, he became famous for a photographic work called "The Immersion of Christ in the Urine." In this work, the crucified Christ is submerged in an approximately red translucent liquid—Serrano claims to be his own urine—and "The Immersion of Christ in Urine" was widely resisted and protested by religious figures when it was exhibited. In addition to urine, Serrano is also interested in other types of bodily fluids. He has photographed his own semen and the mixture of semen and blood, a series of photographs that were used as covers for last century albums Load and Reload by the well-known American heavy metal band Metallica.
In addition to bodily fluids, Serrano has a constant interest in the human body and sex. His series, History of Sex, was protested by neo-Nazi groups when it was exhibited in Lund, Sweden, in 2007. In the face of all kinds of doubts, Serrano disagreed, believing that he was neither desecrating nor sensationalistic. These creations merely represent different stages in his artistic career, while at the same time his goal as an artist is to "find beauty in the unexpected."
He has photographed the homeless on the streets of New York, the human bodies in morgues that have lost their lives for various reasons, and the daily lives of residents of Cuba in the socialist country. In 2017, he was invited by the Red Brick Art Museum in Beijing to come to China as an artist-in-residence. Over the course of two weeks, he shot the Made in China series. Starting with traditional Chinese wedding dresses, Serrano photographs individuals or couples wearing traditional costumes in an attempt to explore marriage, love, relationships, and the absence of relationships in the middle and Chinese contexts.
On November 5, Andrés Serrano's solo exhibition "An American Perspective" opened at the Red Brick Museum. The exhibition includes a series of classic works from the early days of creation to the present, as well as his latest creation of the "China Series". It synthesizes two important threads of Andrés Serrano's creative career, one is a work that explores social taboos such as sex and religion in an almost provocative way, and the other is a work that records social issues such as marginality, poverty, and race in a way that is closer to documentary photography.
On the occasion of the opening of the exhibition, Interface Culture (ID: Booksandfun) conducted an exclusive interview with Andres Serrano. In the interview, Andres reviewed his creative process and the transformation of ideas over the past three decades, responded to various controversies in his works, and also talked about the ideal distance and relationship between artists and politics in his eyes.
Interface Culture: Do you seem to have a strong interest in topics like religion, human and animal bodies, excrement, and sex?
Andres Serrano: In addition to that, I'm also interested in race and the human condition, including poverty, the bottom of society, homeless people, and so on. Arguably, I'm interested in things that aren't usually considered beautiful or artistic, and interested in real things on a daily basis. I don't do art related to art, I don't pay attention to art theory or complex language, I'm not interested in art language, I'm interested in character language.
Interface Culture: What do you personally think of your "Immersions" from 1986 to 1990 as radical and controversial?
Serrano: I think the "Bodily Fluids Series" that preceded the Immersion Series was radical. I call some of the works that preceded the "Body Fluids Series" such as "Heaven and Hell" "tableau photography", that is, there are backgrounds, props, models, which are very traditional photographic works. And when it came time to create one of the works in this exhibition, Milk and Blood, I wanted to go in a new direction for myself and for photography. The picture in this work is of two liquids in a container, one is milk and the other is blood. There are no models, no backgrounds, no foregrounds, and no vistas in the collection. I'm trying to point to very specific paintings,abstract paintings—and at the same time want to do something "anti-photographic," or what we now call "fake paintings."
Interface Culture: Why did you think of creating with bodily fluids?
Serrano: I was visited by a curator at the New Museum in New York at the time, and he was curating an exhibition called Fake: A Meditation on Authenticity, which focused on artists who were creating fakes to explore the question of authenticity. It was the mid-1980s, and he hired a lot of so-called postmodern artists, like Cindy Sherman. But I'm very different from those artists, who are very loyal to theory and the language of art.
I thought my work was not suitable for this exhibition, but I came up with a series of works that looked like pseudo-paintings, which was the beginning of the "Bodily Fluids Series". Its practical bodily fluids were very abstract, and then I tried to put objects into liquids, trying to re-point to the concept of "representation" in my work, just like my previous works, so the "Immersive Series" began. The only difference between the two is that the "reproduction" in the "Immersion Series" is discussed in the context of bodily fluids.
The first work I created in this series was Piss Christ, and it was also the most controversial—the claim that I was a controversial artist all started with it. But I don't see it as provocation or grandstanding. I've had a habit of creating religious images before, so it's only natural for me to combine previous themes with today's themes in one work.
Interface Culture: But this work has been widely criticized from all walks of life.
Serrano: The theme of this work is about the crucifixion of Jesus and religion, but it is by no means sensational, and I see it as a religious work from a Christian artist. I was often attacked and labeled anti-religious or anti-Christian, but that was not my intention, because I had always been a Christian and grew up in a Catholic environment. People often accuse me of making me look like an outsider, but I am not, and that is my religion, my belief.
Interface Culture: Why are you so interested in religious topics?
Serrano: Because I'm a Christian, and that word is a not very good expression in the art world. I don't think I need to talk about my own religion, and you don't see religion in my work unless I sometimes mention churches, religions, or images of Jesus in my work. I care about my own career and respect the choices of others.
Interface Culture: Regarding this China project, why did you decide to focus on the topic of marriage and personal relationships in the first place?
Serrano: I only had less than two weeks to shoot and I've always been interested in theatre, theatre and historical and cultural significance, so I chose to focus on the traditional dresses Chinese wore when I got married. At the same time, I try to use these costumes to explore and emphasize marriage as institutions and the loss of intimacy.
Interface Culture: Why are traditional Chinese costumes so special and attractive to you?
Serrano: For me, not only are these costumes special, but the people I photograph are also special. Except for some extremely abstract works, most of my works are actually portraits, and they are usually very distinctive and characterful characters. I myself went to the models for the Made in China series, either working in restaurants or teahouses, or old people I met on the street or in villages, and then photographed them in an environment very different from where they usually are. As an artist, I need to place real people in more artistic, dramatic situations that come alive with the reality of the person. It doesn't matter who they are, when I shoot, I want them to look heroic and noble.
The clothes I chose for them had a sense of nobility, combining imperial authority with traditional beauty. Strictly speaking, I wouldn't call them costumes, because they are traditional wedding dresses, and the dramatic elements of their colors and classical aesthetics are impressive.
Interface Culture: What did you learn from this project?
Serrano: People all over the world are similar, the difference is in the Chinese faces that I capture from them, in the strength, the elegance and the personality that I see in these models – they are the embodiment of the individual and the soul from China.
Interface Culture: As you just said, your works often embody a solemn classical beauty, is classical aesthetics important to your work?
Serrano: It's very important, which means there's beauty in the work. Many contemporary artists like to create ugly, meaningless works, and I like to find harmony in terms of composition, color, and beauty. So from this point of view, I am very traditional, very classical, and I appear to be "deviant" only because I have photographed some unorthodox subjects. Art can't just repeat itself, so I try to develop my own language—it's a language about beauty, looking for beauty in unexpected places, beauty in places that people don't usually think of as beautiful.
Interface Culture: Your work is easily reminiscent of politics, what is the relationship between art and politics for you?
Serrano: When you become an artist, the relationship between art and politics needs to be managed with care. If you create a very politicized work, people are likely to see it as a form of political propaganda and ignore it; if you want to emphasize politics from an artistic point of view, you have to create it in a less obvious way. I often say that I'm not a political artist, I tend not to care about politics, but I'm socially conscious. I like to do works that are not considered political, but people can read political in detail, and I also hope that my works can be interpreted from many angles. Even if I have a personal opinion—whether religious or political—it's a less obvious one.
Interface Culture: In 2000 you created a group of works, The Interpretation of Dreams, was this inspired by Freud? To what extent has he influenced you?
Serrano: The title "Interpretation of Dreams" was chosen to show the inconsistency between the works under this title. Usually the themes of the exhibition are uniform, such as sex or religion. In the Interpretation of Dreams series, I exhibited a set of unrelated images, which is a very creative attempt.
My interest in Freud stemmed from childhood. When I was a child, I was under the impression that my mother had experienced several episodes related to psychoanalysis, so I began to read Freud at a very young age, trying to understand my mother's ideas, which had a great influence on me. Sometimes I can't tell the difference between fantasy and reality, and I can't tell the difference between mental normality and insanity, because to me, although I know that they are different, in my mind they are essentially no different. If, from Freud's point of view, they are interrelated, something crazy for one person may be normal for another.
Interface Culture: You said you never considered yourself a photographer, why do you say that?
Serrano: It starts with Marcel Duchamp. As a teenager, I studied at an art school, and Duchamp had a great influence on me. He liberated me, and of course he liberated all the artists after him. He told everyone that everything— including a photograph — can be a work of art. I often say I'm not a photographer because I studied painting and sculpture in school. However, after graduating from art school, I decided to adopt photography as a way for my artistic practice. I operate photography like an artist, using it as a means for the artist rather than a photographer; I still use film and have never learned how to print photographs. I think the biggest difference between an artist and a photographer is that the photographer takes pictures for some reason — for magazines or portfolios, for fashion or advertising — while the artist takes pictures of himself and he doesn't have to answer the questions that others ask. That's what I think is the main difference between being an artist and a photographer, meaning I don't take pictures for anyone but myself.
Interface Culture: In your opinion, what is the relationship between painting and photography?
Serrano: When I first showed my photography, I was well aware that many people thought photography was not art, and that's why I made my photographs into specific large sizes. I want them not to be exhibited in photography galleries, but in regular galleries and museums, along with paintings and sculptures. Now, thirty years later, the line between art and photography is blurring, and the artistic practices of people such as Cinti Sherman and Andreas Gursky, although photography, are no longer regarded as photographers, but are considered artists. In the Western and Chinese art worlds, there is a growing awareness that photography can be an art, and some collectors who previously only collected paintings and sculptures are also collecting photographs.
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