Artist Interview: Sofia Bonato ‘Postmodernity, Consumerism, Morality in Relation to Art’
“We invest in objects intellectually and emotionally. Human beings need goods to be able to communicate with others and to make sense of what is going on around them, and this form of communication can take shape only in a structured system of meanings. We give objects sentimental meaning and quality, we wrap them in chests of desire or censored envelopes, we frame them in systems of relationships, insert them into stories that we can reconstruct, and that concern us and others building a more or less neurotic relationship with things and the relative sentimental load. The belonging to this opulent society in my work translates in the display of several familiar objects that playfully lead in a comfortable feeling.”
Senem Çağla Bilgin: As a multi-disciplinary artist, you work with different materials and constructions. Your installations, prints, and sculptures question our daily habits, behavioural cycles concerning mass-produced products we use to feel safe and satisfied. How and why did you start to work with these ideas and reflect on them in your practice?
Sofia Bonato: In the last years, I began questioning the idea of retaining identities and cultural traditions in a globalised society. If Nature is the primary arena for the shaping of ideologies, objects were a reading key that helped me to interpret the surrounding nature as a reflection of a personal search for identity.
This research was aiming somehow to overcome the cultural barriers that separated such different identities, aiming for matches and connections. Despite the discrepancies, I started focusing on the consolidated materialistic habit, which traced the reality of consumerism widespread in the Occident and the Arabic culture relating to my two-fold nationality. I began an investigation on the interaction on daily habits and purchasing choices that become almost automatic and I wanted to deepen the reasons for the need to seek instant happiness looking only at the present often without attributing value to the future consequences.
S.C.B: One of your works is called ‘The more it becomes useless, the more it becomes true.’ This title refers to your toothpaste installation. Why did you choose to work with toothpaste?
S.B: I started looking at the repetition of certain daily habits, that thanks to associative learning of regularly encountered contexts, reduce demand for attention. In particular, I looked at the consumption of goods with intense aesthetic qualities that drive away attention from their impact on the environment exploring both the contradictory ideas of guilt and desire. This is why I make use of toothpaste, an everyday companion in the morning and the evening. We spend so much time in front of the supermarket shelves, looking for our perfect match. Could toothpaste have multiple, comforting personalities or maybe be a romantic seductive hero?
Sofia Bonato 'Doing What’s Best For Me’, 2019. Digital inkjet print on mat paper, 84x59 cm (central image)
S.C.B: I did a little research around tooth brushing tools. They’re dating back to 3500-300 BC when the Babylonians and the Egyptians made a brush by fraying the end of a twig. Around 1600 BC, China developed ‘chewing sticks’ which were made from aromatic tree twigs to freshen breath. Natural bristles were the only source until Du Pont invented nylon. We’ve had modern toothbrushes since 1938. Then electric toothbrushes in the 1960s and so on. Do you think is there any angle of a collision between your work and developing technology?
S.B: I believe that my work has been strongly influenced by the evolution of technology and in particular, what stroke me during this research was the idea of medium introduced by Marshall Mc Luhan - The medium is the message. Human beings throughout history have always been equally smart and “evolved”. What changed were their extensions, their media indeed, that reshaped the surrounding society. The transition to the industrial- electric- fast-paced era, accelerated not only the development of our technologies but also the consequences that derive from them. This led to the present fascinating multi accessorised, and multi-tasking goods. Relating to your investigation, it is interesting to look at the chronological coordinates that you pointed out – “proto-brushes” 3500BC, then over 2000 years to revolution the design of it. The modern toothbrush was introduced in Europe in the 16th-century ad after the first chain productions it never stopped updating its design. Now, these days the much accelerated global production caused the prices to fall and encouraged customers to replace as often as never before.
S.C.B: Why do you think that we invest in objects intellectually and emotionally?
S.B: Authors M. Douglas and B. Isherwood point out that personal goods are not only necessary for living and the competitive exhibition, but they are also important to make visible and stable the categories of culture. Human beings need goods to be able to communicate with others and to make sense of what is going on around them, and this form of communication can take shape only in a structured system of meanings. We give objects sentimental meaning and quality, we wrap them in chests of desire or censored envelopes, we frame them in systems of relationships, insert them into stories that we can reconstruct, and that concern us and others building a more or less neurotic relationship with things and the relative sentimental load. The belonging to this opulent society in my work translates in the display of several familiar objects that playfully lead in a comfortable feeling.
S.C.B: You’re interested in Zygmunt Bauman’s texts where he explores postmodernism and consumerism. You once said ‘He detailed how time is produced, or experienced in practice, as a set of short moments – a multitude of “eternal instants” which are not connected.’ How does this statement relate to your artworks?
S.B: It seems that human thoughts only go to the present without attributing value to the consequences or causes of their daily actions. That is why in work, in everyday life, and relationships with other people, nothing or nearly seems to come to an ending near future because the future does not physically exist: at all it can be thought of as a “present “which is coming. In the present culture, the hierarchy of recognised values has been altered: the durability of an object has been downgraded in favour of replacement. The newness is preferred to endurance. Shorten the time between desire and satisfaction, and between it and the waste bin. It is on these bases that my research flowed in the repetition of daily actions. The most intuitive and consistent example in my practice is the use of toothpaste. The language of this object seems to include only its indisputable visual qualities and its vital function. White, NOW. When customers buy a toothpaste, they make sure it is the ideal, the best for their oral hygiene and at the same time it has to be a bargain, - these products can be purchased at irresistible prices; They are pleased to welcome the product and they look forward to its seductive aesthetic extrusion although it is known that toothpaste is used only to make the oral hygiene more enjoyable for its aroma since its contribution to the hygiene is quite inconsistent. But then there is a temptation to turn thoughts elsewhere if it comes to understanding where these products originate and what consequences come from their mass production.
“In the present culture, the hierarchy of recognised values has been altered: the durability of an object has been downgraded in favour of replacement. The newness is preferred to endurance. Shorten the time between desire and satisfaction, and between it and the waste bin. It is on these bases that my research flowed in the repetition of daily actions. The most intuitive and consistent example in my practice is the use of toothpaste. The language of this object seems to include only its indisputable visual qualities and its vital function. White, NOW. ”
S.C.B: How would you describe the terms – globalisation, modernity, postmodernity, consumerism, and morality - understand your works?
S.B: These complex, multi-layered concepts are frames, a little bit like in a pinball game. My work attempts to hit all those ideas in a single strike. This is why I feel the need of translating my research in different media, video, 3D, 2D, kinetic, sound, printmaking, drawing. Our post-modern neurotic society manifests itself through abundance, confusion, fast connection, entertainment. It deploys countless stimulus, and people are absorbing much more intense data packs that previously in history
S.C.B: How is your relationship with sustainable life as an artist? Is there anything specific that you do to reduce the use of the Earth’s natural resources and personal resources?
S.B: I will have to admit that I do surround myself with a ridiculous amount of stuff. Of course, I do whatever my city life allows me to do to be more sustainable but I am as well seduced by what has been around me since I was born. This is why I address topics like desire-fetish but always juxtaposed with the idea of guilt. I previously stated that nature is the arena for fabricating ideologies and that made me question whether the most difficult aspect to overcome if we will have to revolution our consumeristic lifestyle, is to stop replicating what is already there and causing so many problems.
S.C.B: You did a residency at Dolomiti Contemporanee recently; working on a project related to climate change following the disastrous storm that happened in the northeast of Italy. Can you tell us a bit more about that project?
S.B: The project at Dolomiti Contemporanee started in 2015 when in collaboration with the artist Matteo Valerio, we decided to transform an industrial ironing machine in a printing press. We were both individually researching ideas like re-generation, restoration, and attempting to respond to environmental issues. After transforming the ironing machine, we founded “Obsolete studio”, an experimental printmaking workshop aiming to fuel a space of interaction with other artists and to perpetuate an independent production of garments, Zines editions, artworks. We wanted to open a space inside Dolomiti Contemporanee and in line with their statement, as a reaction to the useless, the idea of something that had to be forgotten just because it was broken. Besides this topic, we wanted to surface the microscopic word that surrounded the area, and so not only looking at the several ingenious ways to reinterpret a space or an object but also bringing out the same meticulous analysis for what we called “Non-permanent-Invisible worlds”. During this year’s residency, following the disastrous storm that dramatically destructed the landscape, we wanted to reflect on one of these invisible realities, such as the proliferation of a kind of insect, Bostrichus typographus that massively colonises environmentally stroke woods, initially eating the barks of the suffering trees and then moving to the healthy ones putting in danger the entire surrounding ecosystem.
S.C.B: There is an interesting book about climate change called ‘The Prophet and the Wizard’ by Charles C. Mann. “The Prophets, he explains, follow William Vogt, a founding environmentalist who believed that in using more than our planet has to give, our prosperity would lead us to ruin. Cut back! was his mantra. The Wizards are the heirs of Norman Borlaug, whose research, in effect, wrangled the world in service to our species to produce modern high-yield crops that then saved millions from starvation. Innovate! was Borlaug's cry. Only in that way can everyone win!”. When we look at the current situation, do you think the world moving in the right direction towards global sustainability - environmental, economic, and social perspectives?
Sofia Bonato, Deep In Clear Blue Water (Detail), 2018, Screen print on board
“We are inundated with articles that show how mass production and exploitation of our natural resources are destroying our flourishing world. In ‘Deep In Clear Blue Water’, the screen-printed backgrounds depict environmental disasters from the Marunda river in Jakarta in 2008 and the Tiete river Brazil in 2015, where chemical waste from cosmetic factories generated huge walls of foam.”
S.B: Technologies and innovation should serve human scopes. These days we can see how risky it could be losing control of our media and production when all these things that we desire are an obstacle to our future survival. These mechanisms are interestingly explored by Lauren Berlant in her book “Cruel Optimism” where she is questioning the relationships that are being built when what you want becomes an impediment to personal growth. I think that the more information about what causes the major environmental disaster is spread, the more individual starts tackling those issues in their everyday life. Lately, the main information channels and social media contribute to the circulation of news on these issues, helping also in clarifying which are the strategies to reduce the impact on nature. There is a constantly growing number of publicly exposed personalities that campaign to raise awareness and this favours these problems to become mainstream, almost viral which I believe is positive. I think that this attention gives the audience the impression of being less lonely and helpless in a battle against something so big that is hard to target clearly. But there is still the contradictory relation between human desire and what causes their destruction.
For more information: www.sofiabonato.com