An Interview with Louise Bourgeois

Author(s): Susi Bloch

Source: Art Journal , Summer, 1976, Vol. 35, No. 4 (Summer, 1976), pp. 370-373
Published by: CAA

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/776230

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 An Interview with Louise Bourgeois
SUSI BLOCH

Introduction

This interview with Louise Bourgeois proceeded from a re- modern American sculpture, a discussion with the artist rele-
encounter with the artist's early work in the current Whitney vant to the two pieces in the Whitney, and the work of the
exhibition, 200 Years of American Sculpture. Re-encounter late '40s and early '50s in general, seemed timely. The inter-
here does not signify a regained familiarity with something view-of necessity short and problematically circuitous-
known. As often before, confrontation with "examples" of only begins to touch on a few things about Bourgeois' early
Bourgeois' early work-and the curiosity and admiration they work. It does so through some repetition, which has to d
compel-serves to agitate the claim of an existing body of with attempting to locate and focus what one is talking about
significant work that is unknown, inaccessible, and largely and the words being used, in what emerges sometimes a
undocumented. While the two pieces at the Whitney estab- cross-purpose of question and response.
lish themselves within the context of the exhibition as part of
the history of 20th-century American sculpture, it is clear that
they exist as fragments both of this larger history and of the SB Looking at your two pieces, The Blind Leading the Blind
artist's history, which has yet to be investigated and recon- (1949) and One and Others (1951) in the Whitney show,
structed. Moreover, each history is dependent upon the what is immediately interesting and pertinent is tha
other. The larger history, that of American sculpture, remains despite the confusion of the installation these pieces
fragmented precisely because fragmentation has been im- impose an integrity of space; that locked, closed ...
posed upon the other-the history of the artist, the history of LB remote
the artist's work. The circumstances contributing to the inac- SB space and distancing of object that was so imp
cessibility and hence obscurity of Bourgeois' early work are the development of abstract sculpture, particula
complex. They have to do with factors as various as the sculpture, at that time.
seemingly hermetic quality of her work-rendered more LB We have to point out a matter of date. The Blin
hermetic both by the artist's idiosyncracies and the isolation the Blind was exhibited at the Peridot Gallery
of the work from the history of which it is a part-and, more Street in 1949, and the piece, Sleeping Figure, wa
to the point, the practice of history at the time the pieces, that show. Although it has mistakenly been dated
shown and unshown, were made, as well as the practice of was made in '47. My work which was very ellipt
history now. direct at the same time was seen by Arthur Dre
Both artist and interviewer had reservations about the in- was a painter then. He took a shine to it and he
terview as the best format for an investigation and discourse me the show at Peridot. Sleeping Figure was bou
concerning this work. In as much as an extended critical Alfred Barr for the Museum of Modern Art in '49.
essay or monograph would have meant foregoing the imme- SB You began making sculpture in '47, making work that
diate opportunity of focusing on the work in the Whitney as a seems to relate strongly in motif to the etchings and
means of drawing attention to Bourgeois in order to more parables, He Disappeared into Complete Silence, worked
properly and critically integrate her work into a history of on in '46, published in '47.

370 ART JOURNAL, XXXV/4

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 r: I : ~ ] :~ ~ : :I i ...E _ : :- I " < y

Louise Bourgeois, One and Others, 1950-51. Coll

York.

Louise Bourgeois, The Blind Leading the Blind, wood, 7' h., 1947-49.
(Photo: Peter Moore.)

Louise Bourgeois, Sleeping Figure, balsa wood, 74'/2" h.,

1947. Courtesy Museum of Modern Art, New York.

SUMMER 1976 371

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 SB But one's position and identity as 'viewer' is somethin
precisely determined by the structure of the piece. Al-
though I co-habit the sculpture's space, can walk around
it, can touch it, the piece always insists on and maintains
its illusory, psychological distance.
LB Yes.

SB In the Peridot exhibition where gallery space an

ture were conceived as creating an environm
conceptual reality, analogous to that of One and
in intention, was actually penetrated and dist
the viewer.
LB Well, I would say here that the space of the viewer
becomes the space of the maker. You enter the space
and manipulate objects within that space which is the
privilege of the maker.
SB Was this the intention of your environment-that the
space of the viewer be actualized as the space of the
maker?
LB Yes. This is really the origin of the environmental sculp-
tures, or later the Happenings. That is to say the neces-
sity for the artist to function in a real space is carried on
during the show.
SB Then the space remains a privileged space?
LB It is a privilege that the gallery offered me and that I took
Louise Bourgeois, He Disappeared into Complete Silence, over completely. It was a concession of the gallery to the
plate 2, etching, 1946. artist.
SB You used the gallery space then in a way different than
LB They relate primarily in their symbolic geometry. Geo- was usual?
metrical figures, circles, half-circles, points, lines, vec- LB I took hold of the gallery, of the space that was given
tors . .. were my vocabulary and still are today. The basis me and used it. Instead of displaying pieces the spa
of Euclidean geometry is that parallels never touch. Par- became part of the piece. Peridot worried about h
allelism excludes any kind of touching, distance remains floors. I explained that these pieces had to come withou
the same in time. any kind of bases, coming directly to the floor on one
SB What do you mean by symbolic geometry? point. As mentioned before, the figures, the distan
LB I mean solid geometry as a symbol for emotional secu- between figures, compose a diagram of points. If there
rity. Euclidean or other kinds of geometry are closed had been bases the bases would have isolated the figure
systems where relations can be anticipated and are eter- not only from the spectator but from the other figure
nal. It comes naturally to me to express emotions The figures construct and inhabit their own social spac
through relations between geometrical elements, in two . . . The privileged space has certain characteristics. It i
dimensions or three dimensions.. .. In the Peridot exhi- closed and exactly defined and belongs to the artist
bition the disposition of and relations between the fig- the way the stage belongs to the performer for a certai
ures, grouped in twos and threes or isolated, represents number of minutes. The spectator is no longer merely
a readable floor graph. viewer if he is able to move from the stage of viewing t
SB The Blind Leading the Blind you identify as environmen- the stage of collaborating. . . . Dislocation is analogou
tal; the Peridot show you conceived as an environment.to the state of passivity that is rejected and becomes a
Was the gallery space then understood by you as ideal?state of active being. In other words it is the dislocation
LB Ideal? the transformation of a person who is passive, depresse
SB Well, the idea implies that the disposition of the objects
through a crise de conscience, into a person who be
and the particular sense and abstraction of the forms
comes suddenly active-the passage from death to lif
aimed at creating the same dislocating, psychological
through the creative act.
warp of space that One and Others achieves as aSB
single
One problem of modern sculpture was its necessity
unit. In the gallery there is the complexity of overlap, a
create a space in which it could exist.
confusion between real space and configured space,
LB But the artist was satisfied with academic space. Nobody
between real and configured relationships. asked for anything more until a certain time in America
LB Why confusion? They exist without overlapping. One at is an exact date, when the artist said I am not satisfied t
real space and one is a symbolic space. be an artist, I want to be a participant-an active elemen
SB One and Others excludes this duality. The scaling and instead of being a passive one. So it is a crise de consci-
closed cluster effect a purely illusory dimension of space
ence.

in which the object is distanced. SB Was the idea of environmental sculpture

LB That's because you see it as a viewer and not as a maker.
an environment prevalent at the time of
I see it as a maker. Peridot?

372 ART JOURNAL,. XXXV/4

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 LB No, it wasn't prevalent at all; in fact it was the first one.
There were seventeen figures circulating in the room;
the show was photographed by Aaron Sisskind and was
documented by Alfred Barr. The photographs show the
figures in space as a diagram of positions. Euclidean
geometry turns around the notion of point. As a conse-
quence the line is seen as an infinite number of points.
The vector we can experience as distance, a succession
of an infinite number of directed points. The definition
of a vector is simply a line which is a distance; we have
attached to it the notion of time. All of this establishes
this passion for the security geometry affords, and antici-
pates or explains a certain kind of sensitivity.
SB Why did you start thinking in terms of an environment?
LB The reason was a psychological one. These pieces were
presences-missed, badly missed presences. Now do
you want me to talk about my personal life ... I don't
like to do that.
SB No, not necessarily. We talked about this before-the
question of the sublimation of content where abstraction
is concerned and simply the residue of a resonance of
meaning. More broadly, we also talked about difference
in cause and effect; the difference between the condi-
tions which motivate a solution and the conditions im-
posed by the solution.
LB In this case it has to do with the way the environment
appeared-I was missing certain people that I had left
behind. It was a tangible way of re-creating a missed
past. The figures were presences which needed the
room, the six sides of the cube ... It was the recon-
struction of the past.
SB But even when the "room" did not exist, the individual
figure or presence, and clusters of figures or presences,
as in the photograph of such a group stationed at the top
of the stairs in your house which you showed me, main-
tained their own discrete space, that illusory distancing.
If you wanted to, I guess you could say that the quality of
their remoteness is a condition of their pastness; they
Louise Bourgeois standing beside The Visitors Arrive at the Doors, 1947.
are only present, remotely, as past. . . The move to the The "past" explains the size.
environment of the exhibition, which becomes an
event-this is something very different. attempt at not only re-creating the past but controlling it.
LB The dynamism of the presence in a claustrophobic space SB Does One and Others involve the same idea?
such as the top of the stairs under the roof was muchLB Yes. But it was done later, in 1951. So it was more
more dynamic than the gallery. I accept that. But the abstract and I did not need the presence of people who
gallery would not have permitted me to place my per- were the height of my brother, my parents, they could
sonages in a closet which in effect is the way they were be much smaller.
conceived. The gallery wanted the whole space to beSB One and Others becomes a more abstract distillation of
used. But when you came to the Peridot you went two those earlier figures and environment.
steps down and you had the very strong sense of some- LB Yes, I hope ... I do not say yes, I hope so. In One and
thing going on. You moved within an integrated work Others all distance has been reduced to zero. The forms
rather than around or between isolated works; you touch each other and they function exclusively in their
moved within the social space of the figures themselves. touching, their relation to each other.... There is such
SB The idea of the environment and the locked form and a shock after a show. A show is an experience and after a
space of these sculptures, did this have something to do show the artist is a different person. He moves on-so
with the problem of making sculpture at that time? does the work. So the space that was so indispensable
LB No. I was less interested in making sculpture at the time for me when I needed a real space with real six-foot
than in recreating an indispensable past. The motivation people, that need disappeared completely. It was re-
was extremely strong. I showed you photographs of solved and forgotten ... I could move in abstract
figures on the roof and the way they were grouped space. D
together. The figures on the roof had nothing to do with
sculpture, they meant physical presences. That was an Susi Bloch

SUMMER 1976 373

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