Artist Interview - Tumblr Posts

Hey everyone! If you're wondering who that is well that's me, the quiet guy behind the art work on this account. Thought I would take this opportunity to tell you a little about myself, I'm sure everyone is very excited 😏. Born in Portugal Lisbon and immigrated to Canada back in the 90s . . . Actually on second thought instead of reading 30+ years Bio it might just be easier to check out the interview by @thedrake that I did after my artist in residence with them😉.

Interview Link

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Interview #500: Alex Thebez

Alex Thebez is an Indonesian artist, who is currently living in New York. He is fascinated by technology and its capacity to create and distribute visual imagery at a massive scale, and creates work that explores ideas of discomfort and disconnect. In his work, Alex is primarily concerned with images (both moving and still) and their ability to translate difficult emotions and contradictions surrounding themes of sexuality, national identity, home, and collective memory. Alex also runs TAGTAGTAG, an independent journal of creativity and influence.

I first met Alex online when I did an interview with him 10 years ago, and subsequently hung in real life whenever he visited. Such connections are the reason I’ve enjoyed running this platform: when online friends become IRL friends! To mark Nope Fun’s 500th interview, it felt appropriate to speak to him again. We spoke about his latest projects, online spaces and identities. 

Thanks for agreeing to do this! I first interviewed you in 2012! I wanted to begin by asking: how has your approach and relationship to photography changed or not changed? You’ve done quite a few personal projects and commissions since then.

Hi Chang Ming, appreciate you reaching out. Definitely thankful that you are in my orbit because of photography and the internet. The biggest thing for me personally is the fact that I do not necessarily see photography as a craft that would be my primary method of income. I had the wonderful opportunity to create a lot of work that aligns with my personal interest and style, but ultimately I’ve realized that parts of my creative practice may not necessarily be tied strictly to image making. The internet and networked experiences are at the core of my work. I am pursuing this now in my current career, but also had the chance to explore my ideas a bit here through one of my projects - “A Handful of Unfulfilled Wishes.” I’ve become more interested not just in the photograph itself but also systems that enable it and also how everyday people use photography in their day to day experience today.

In “A Handful of Unfulfilled Wishes” there seems to be recurring ideas of anonymity, fractured objects and technology - all in a colourful mess. What was the process of making this project like? There’s quite a mix of elaborate studio set-ups (from what I can tell) and some portraits.

To be honest it was pretty organic. A lot of my work is about disassociation or the fragmentation of memory. In this series specifically, I was thinking about masculine identities, technology and emotional states within online spaces. Usually I have ideas for individual pictures, without necessarily knowing how it all fits together. When working on this series, I would create images without intentionally thinking that they would all fit into the same series. It’s not until much later, when I revisit the images again - together - that they feel as if they fit together. I knew that I wanted to create images that hint at how we interact with technology day to day, and how it evokes a sense of feeling which resulted in the more abstract images. The portraits and figurative photographs, however, refer to archetypes of people or personalities that may be associated with online culture. The work took a while, probably the longest project I personally have ever worked on.

I like how you had a subjective approach to ideas of technology and online space, which may be typically associated with something more impersonal. I also sometimes take pictures based on a certain notion or feeling, then retrospectively make sense of it. Photography can be a way to articulate things we can’t easily put into words. Would you say you had a similar approach for your earlier series “Feelings & Similar Items”?

For sure! Photography for me has always been a method to give form or shape to something that is not tangible. Whether it is a memory, a feeling or an idea – photography helps ground something that is abstract into a visible form based on figures that exist in the world. Feelings & Similar Items was a series that explored a sense of placelessness. In Feelings, I mostly used personal documentary and street photography instead of studio photography.

You also include gifs in your personal and commissioned works which have quite a distinct look. You also did Gif Friends. Going beyond the static image, what about gif/videos are you drawn to? Thinking about how images circulate, do you see it as part of image-making or a form of digital medium on it’s own?

I think the idea of the internet and networked experiences are core to my creative practice. One idea that I was always fascinated with is the fact that digital technology flattens the boundary between different kinds of visual media. Whether it is a GIF, a video or a JPEG, they are all ultimately files - pixels on a screen. I would say that for the most part, my images are made for the internet. As an artist, I appreciate how combining these different elements together emphasize the sense of aesthetic that is only possible with digital technology (both in the way visual imagery is distributed and created.) Digital distribution is how most people create and consume images these days, so really, this is part of the language image-making at large now.

On the topic of images made for the internet and digital distribution, you mentioned you are creating an NFT. I’m curious but admittedly I don’t know much about it. What made you want to do it? What do you think about NFTs and what it means for artists?

ATZ: As mentioned, the internet and networked experiences have been at the core of my curiosity, which means naturally I have been spending time learning more about NFTs and crypto. What makes me want to create an NFT has to do mostly with experimentation. Specifically for my series “A Handful of Unfulfilled Wishes” - the work fits into the way we distribute media online. It may be a bit early to say, but NFTs may enable artists to create new ways to engage with their community while being able to own the monetization of how their work is distributed, which I think is pretty exciting.

You have another project called “Undress”. What’s the idea/process of making this ongoing series?

“Undress” is similar to “Wishes” in that they are both projects that explore identities. I started thinking about clothing and the way that it shapes up who we are. Specifically, masculine identities. I had been thinking about lust, especially homoerotic lust and how it can relate to gestures that may seem everyday. “Undress” is an attempt to look at the moment in between, gestures that may translate to both identity and seduction. For the project, I intentionally placed my models against a white fabric background, shooting them using harsh, slightly overexposed strobe lighting. Most of the bodies featured in the project are either White or Asian as well, as a nod to the liminal space between the two ethnicities especially in the context of homosexual desires.

I like that you bring up this idea of an in-betweenness, perhaps a state of transition between how we present ourselves publicly vs privately, but frozen by the camera. Also, that it is undressing and not dressing, suggesting a removal. Any upcoming ideas or projects?

That’s a very interesting point, that undressing suggests a removal! Especially when thinking about racial dynamics and also how clothing adds (or detracts) from your identity. As for upcoming ideas, I would like to finalize Undressing - ideally I’d photograph a few more people to finalize this series. I am also thinking about projects that can uniquely live as NFTs, in addition to editing a few photographs that I have from my archive more cohesively. TAGTAGTAG has been dormant for a while and I am hoping to start that off again sometime early next year with a different format or approach.

Lastly, any music to recommend?

I have been listening to Ryo Fukui a lot. A friend of mine, Rob Karpay also has this wonderful album that I have been coming back to this year. I tend to make playlists once in a while, and you can find them all on my blog.

His website and Instagram. You can also find his NFTs here.

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