0:01

Welcome
to In Conversation with Megan Dickie and Kimberly Phillips
for the launch of the publication

0:06

Megan Dickie: Blue Skies The recording of this program
took place on the unceded traditional territories
of the Lkwungen speaking peoples,

0:15

also known as the Esquimalt
and Songhees nations We extend our appreciation
for the opportunities we have to live

0:22

and work on these territories and to continually expand
our understanding of what it means to be on these lands
with reciprocity

0:29

and respect for those whose families have been its stewards
from time immemorial. My name is Nicole Stanbridge,
Curator of Engagement at the Art

0:37

Gallery of Greater Victoria
and curator for the exhibition Blue Skies, presented by the Gallery
in June of 2019

0:45

The accompanying publication
for this exhibition includes a written contribution from Kimberly
Phillips, Director of SFU

0:52

Galleries in Vancouver, who’s
also a curator, writer and educator. Dickie’s invitation to Phillips for
this text was not to write

1:00

a curatorial essay, but
to provide a response to her work And the result is a moving
and insightful exchange

1:07

between her words and the sculptures
and video work shared by Dickie in this installation
called Blue Skies.

1:13

The conversation presented
here is an extension of that exchange shared in the publication
between Dickie and Phillips.

1:23

I guess the way I use it is I like the precision
to be in the making

1:32

But the unpredictability
to be in the movement. In the performance.
And the performance. So if I make something in a way
that I understand

1:41

its possibilities
for movement, then I don’t have to really decide
its movement.

1:48

It’s that space
between the relationship between me
and the object that allows for it

1:57

to have its own agency
and me to have my own agency.

2:02

And… [laughter] And that thing to have its own agency… And things to fly in the wind, for example.

2:09

It’s about not working things out so much
that they can’t transform. But is it? I mean, am I right in thinking that
it’s the rub between the two?

2:18

Like when you view your work, when you’re a viewer
or a participant in it, you can’t help but be drawn
into all of the incredibly

2:26

fine details
that you have worked out in advance, as though you were creating
a performance that was then going to go seamlessly.

2:32

And then there’s that moment where you actually start
interacting with the object and you have then designed
this object so that you can’t

2:38

Is it like that
you can’t or don’t want to choreograph its movements
or orchestrate its movements

2:45

or understand them in advance so that things can happen,
possibly falling apart? Yeah.

2:50

It is that, it is about how they rub
up against each other. It’s

2:57

I see it as being a relationship, so

3:03

I can’t I’m not interested
in deciding for the object

3:08

every aspect of itself,
I want to learn that from the object and the care involved in
that relationship

3:18

is about watching what it does
practicing with it, obviously, but knowing that it is,

3:26

it is kind of a brutal experience
when it’s stronger than me.

3:31

But in most instances,
I’m stronger than it, like they’re objects
that I repair all the time, like that

3:41

And I know its weaknesses and I know how to let it be itself

3:48

I guess, is what I’m interested in. And so that’s also a time based
thing as well,

3:54

like it’s a relationship
that you have over lengths of time that even an audience wouldn’t
necessarily know, but that’s why

4:01

video is so important to you.
Yeah. And the way you actually edit and
build your videos also speaks to that

4:08

like a durational kind of experience
or relationship that you have with the object. Yeah, you nailed it

4:13

there with the time,
because I used to do work that wasn’t video based, and

4:20

I think there’s something subversive
about making something absolutely stunning

4:27

and not keeping it in that precious state. That’s right. Yeah. And I’m interested in that because

4:37

throughout history, women can be
thought of as these precious things to keep in a certain state
and to see something get messy

4:47

and not retain its composure is really exciting to me
because that’s the transformation

4:55

from what you thought it would be to
what is actually doing. Yeah. And then it makes you just reconsider

5:00

your own biases
and things that you’ve seen before and your own desires
even about what you want

5:06

this to come to And that’s also why
there’s really no plots, either. Yeah, it’s not a narrative.
No, it’s not.

5:12

It’s just this repetitive, like,
somewhat disappointing,

5:17

But there’s disappointment
too, for sure, because there’s not Well, it’s extremely frustrating
often to watch you in those videos.

5:24

Yeah. I was also when you were
talking about movement and time and the undoing of a set of presumptions
around preciousness,

5:31

especially in a gendered sense,
this morning, when I was thinking about our conversation,
I for some reason I was remembering

5:39

learning about Duchamp’s
Nude Descending a Staircase and the professor I had
who was hilarious and amazing

5:47

he was talking about
the kind of obscenity of that image the painted image
when it was unveiled in Paris

5:54

was the fact that it was a female
body presumably in motion,

6:00

like moving down a staircase
and the kind of jiggly bits. The jiggly bits. Right. I mean, it’s not moving

6:06

I mean, first of all, movement
it’s hard to attain grace as a moving body in general
unless you’re balletic or whatever.

6:13

But also just the sense of like
how a body descends a staircase and the kind of

6:18

unpredictability of that
and where the body parts go and how that was so shocking And in some ways
I was thinking about your work,

6:25

something is happening there
and that you refuse to allow us to sit in this sort of basking
in the beauty of the object

6:33

It has to be, yeah,
this motion and this sort of pull and push

6:39

and argument with you,
which makes it really fun. Yeah. And I think seeing women

6:45

in stasis or moving

6:51

we’re used to wanting
to see women in a certain way. But to see women move is also enamoring

7:01

to see shine move… Glimmer and like all those things that

7:08

that we want
that we’re used to enjoying.

7:13

And yeah, I’m trying to mash
those together in a way that stops enjoyment
for parts of it

7:19

And then you get back into it again
and then, yeah, so you’re left questioning why and how?

7:27

Because all of the components
are there and we know how we can, you know, we’re kind of geared
to respond to them.

7:32

But then you’re yeah, the mashing up throws a spanner in it. Yeah. Yeah.

7:46

I think as soon as I encountered
your work immediately, I thought of the idea of the zany
and not just any old zany,

7:52

but the way in which Sianne Ngai
speaks about it in her book Our Aesthetic Categories,
which is an amazing text.

8:00

And the thing about this, so
she describes the zany as a an aesthetic category
that is of our contemporary

8:09

condition,
and it’s one that describes our contemporary condition
and the zany she says is all about,

8:14

it’s all about movement,
and it’s all about affective labor. It’s about the sort of weird slippage
between

8:22

kind of playfulness
or comedy and work. And specifically,
I think, as she points out,

8:28

when she’s looking at it through the lens of a kind of post
Taylor, it’s like our kind of current capitalist condition

8:34

It’s about the precarity of labor. And so, you
know, when I think about your work,

8:40

you’re obviously
the zany is always in movement. You know, think of somebody like Lucille Ball as Lucy Ricardo,
and she’s trying to do these

8:49

these tasks and insert herself
into systems, right? As a, you know, as a machinist,
as a ballet dancer, as a hot dog

8:58

vendor, etc. And she’s constantly working too much
and too hard in this scenario

9:05

to try to become inconspicuous
and become part of the system. And she’s failing every time.

9:10

And though I think
what’s fascinating to me is the critique in there
of a number of things, one

9:17

the idea that we’re sort of showing the zany,

9:23

I think throws back into the system
kind of projects back onto itself

9:29

the thing that is most, you know, it’s own conditions
essentially like we produce a scenario where

9:34

all of us are sort of frantically
working and constantly in a state of precarity,
in a state of possible injury also,

9:43

and that the movement which you cannot escape from is something
that’s super interesting.

9:49

And there’s also a kind
of a gendered critique in there, too. I mean, I think Ngai talks about

9:57

how feminine labor was always sort of understood
to be precarious and that was fine.

10:02

Except for now
in our kind of current conditions, all labor
is becoming more precarious.

10:07

And you have to kind of run
around constantly to kind of make things work and you’re always struggling
to kind of hold the line.

10:15

And I think in some ways,
it feels to me that you are
operating this way, you are

10:20

You’re calling out those sets
of questions in your work as well Would you say? Would you say that? Yeah.

10:26

And I had never
until you wrote the essay. I didn’t really

10:32

consider the term zany, the content of zany
is totally always considered,

10:37

but I never put a word to it, or a concept
named it.

10:43

And yes, it is throwing it back. It’s for me,

10:52

it is about showing the struggle. And I was thinking about this
last night.

10:59

I find that we aren’t comfortable with seeing something
in its actual transition.

11:05

So to me, the zany
or the way I try to use the zany is

11:11

if we see a person and the person be myself
performing move

11:16

from something that we assume
is really controlled and beautiful to look at
in this beautiful landscape.

11:25

And then all of a sudden,
she’s not in control or I’m not in control
the character is not in control

11:32

and we’re physically watching her try to do it,
just to choose to struggle.

11:39

But she’s like the character is learning, and so we’re actually watching
someone learn,

11:47

which is a very messy thing
because there’s a lot of failure. And there’s a lot of repetition

11:53

and it can sometimes go nowhere. So that’s, you know, that’s
what I’m really interested in

12:01

and in terms
of our contemporary society

12:07

I’m interested in movement and the messiness of movement
in contrast

12:15

to this idea of human progress
being forward that to learn or to discover
or to transform

12:23

or to become better It’s always this way or this way.

12:29

And with that project, you know, a lot of these things
were just set up

12:36

by myself as possibilities. Like, if I learn a dance
and if I have a 14 foot tall pole

12:46

And if I’m dressed in this way and
I’m in this spectacular landscape, what will happen? So there’s a messiness with me too,
because I didn’t always know

12:55

what would happen
and it was frustrating or it was amazing,
depending on the location.

13:01

So and then with the sculptures,
I was really adamant about

13:07

those lying down as well,
because once again, to just push against
this idea of why

13:13

does progress always have to be
this one direction? And a lot of the modeling
that make up

13:20

that work are representational from

13:28

monuments that we’ve seen before. And our interest in those those kind of monumental forms
as a marker of progression.

13:37

So, yeah, it totally is zany

13:43

and in relation
to slapstick as well how Buster Keaton could talk

13:50

about what what our own hang ups are.

13:55

Yeah. By doing it over and over again
and having the failure

14:01

over again
or having that struggle, right?

14:07

I was also thinking when you brought up the sculptures
specifically, I was also thinking
that you could read the zany in your work against the grain
or in relation to the history of

14:16

of sculpture of 20th century
kind of monumental, masculinist

14:21

kind of lineage of sculpture
and sculptors. And I think that’s also something
that’s interesting, too,

14:27

is by refusing to allow the object
to simply stand as a monument

14:35

in this kind of spectacular landscape. I mean, you’re making it impossible
for us to kind of like divorce those things.

14:42

You’re kind of pressing a button on the history of sculpture to,
I think, in our desire for it to be,

14:49

yeah,
this sort of state of grace and stasis and power
and the sort of phallic,

14:58

you know, inevitably
sort of these objects that are standing
upright in the landscape as these

15:04

sort of like very western
kind of markers. And I couldn’t help but read in your
and I think I mentioned this

15:09

in the text too You know, you’re choosing these
landscapes for various reasons. I mean, you’re familiar with them
yourself as well.

15:15

But you know, these are landscapes
that have been witness to and have borne
the burden of so much extraction,

15:22

so much violence, so much arrogance. Right. And to kind of call up that in a way,
in some aspects in your dress,

15:31

but also in the sort of,
you know, the history sculpture is very much a part
of all of that arrogance.

15:37

And I think bringing those sculptures
into movement is struggling with them and having this kind
of dynamic relationship with them.

15:44

As you say, like you’re learning
and you’re moving together really undermines
a set of presumptions around how

15:51

not just sculpture,
but sculptors work. Right. And how when something is finished
and complete

15:56

and presented to the world
and there forever in a sort of in a sort
of moment of great stasis, you know?

16:04

Well, and, it’s me grappling with myself
in the place of sculpture

16:10

as well because I don’t know I don’t remember
when I said that I was a sculptor.

16:18

Yeah, actually,
that’s a really good question. And but

16:24

Having to constantly
claim that space, because it’s so easy for my work
to be squeezed out,

16:30

to be squeezed out,
especially since I work with textiles and jewelry based kind of
processes, and the feminine form

16:39

and movement it is very easy to be like,
Oh, are you still a sculptor?

16:44

But you know, in I’d like to think

16:51

like when I was performing that in talking about

16:57

our histories of terrible things

17:02

in relation to Indigenous peoples
in the lands that we call our home

17:07

When I was there in those spaces You know, all by myself
with this object,

17:15

so conspicuous, yeah, you know, you think about those things,
of course.

17:21

I mean, just to be there
and looking at the landscape, is ridiculous
and there’s a lot of gratitude there

17:31

But while I was doing that,
it’s like, I’m there and I’m doing this,
but it’s temporary.

17:36

I’m here. I’m here to have this conversation
with this space and like assert myself
at that same time.

17:46

But it’s a transitional thing. Once again, it’s not It’s not like Smithson and like Land Art.
and I don’t want that,

17:53

You’re not carving
stuff out to be forever Yeah. That’s interesting. And so that is, I mean, that’s
deliberate and still very much

18:01

that things are temporal or that,
you know, a lot of my work

18:06

doesn’t last a long time because it’s been used in performances
and stuff like that.

18:13

But the last thing I like to say in terms of that
zany thing, like the zaniest

18:18

to me, the zaniest part,
and that was so gratifying and if I could be Lucille Ball,
this is what I would feel is

18:28

the whole ridiculousness
of the phallic thing and that this is a shape
that we should aspire to

18:37

to have this massive form and the only thing that was keeping
it up was me was hilarious to me

18:46

and to feel it too,
yeah, like to feel Oh my god, I’m keeping,
I’m trying to keep up

18:52

masculinity
like this is really weird, especially
because it’s like holstered in and it felt like,
it felt like it too because of where

18:59

the holster was It was hilarious and strange.

19:05

And… Is it empathetic then
in that way? Do you, did you find I did have some empathy
like, you know, that Seinfeld

19:14

thing where Elaine’s like,
“I don’t know how you guys walk around with those things?” Yeah, it was like, yeah, you can’t. This is ridiculous.

19:21

Like to try and keep up that masculinity is a lot of work
a lot of labor extension a lot of affective and other labor

19:29

[Laughter]

19:55

I think this ties back
into zany too like

20:01

I mean hanging on
is about struggling or trying to survive.

20:06

Yeah, it’s about survival and to help others try to survive the struggle and

20:14

and that is also linked to this freneticness of labor and work

20:21

which is linked to the zany I mean, I just thought of something too Do you think that there is Is that performance then

20:29

in your work, which we would call
zany in some respects Is that an act of empathy because I
was thinking about these performances

20:38

by these comedic geniuses like
Charlie Chaplin, Lucille Ball, etc. and Buster Keaton?

20:44

There is something about, you know, in performing
that kind of ridiculous failures constantly of being in the modern
world

20:54

it offers you the viewer It signals that it’s OK to fail, like
it’s not possible to succeed

21:02

Or it may be like,
at least I’m not going to lose as badly as them. Right. So do you find
is there an element of that?

21:08

I mean, is that,
could that be considered empathy? And would you argue that?
Is that there? Do you think in your work?

21:14

It’s there. I would say maybe I might call it
vulnerability. I’m vulnerable.

21:20

Someone might be feeling empathetic
for my vulnerability

21:27

And I want to be vulnerable. And it’s interesting You can’t unlink all these questions
that we’re talking about.

21:35

I want to be vulnerable to show
that I’m in transition.

21:41

If I was strong, I would have transitioned,
right?

21:47

And not… Yeah, I would have arrived. I would have finished. And that’s why nothing is ever
complete in the movements, either.

21:57

I mean, hanging on I’m interested in seeing that as a powerful thing
and same with vulnerability

22:06

that if you were able to put yourself in a situation of uncertainty

22:14

and survive, there’s a power to that.

22:19

Like, there’s a power to knowing that you can go through ups and downs
and you can go through turmoil

22:29

and that you have a confidence
in yourself to hang on while you’re doing it.

22:35

I mean, it’s also depleting
at the same time But I think in general, most of us

22:41

are interested
in seeing someone not be perfect and not and be closer

22:47

to themselves,
the person that’s viewing. So to show vulnerability
and to show that you’re trying still

22:55

while you’re in this chaotic
state is somewhat hopeful.

23:01

Yeah, I was thinking
that there’s an optimism there. Maybe.

23:07

I mean, I was also wondering when I was thinking
about this question myself. How do you? There’s a different
I mean, there’s hanging on

23:15

because you need to survive
and it’s the only thing you can do. And in some ways,
like you could argue, hanging on

23:20

means that you’re simply
allowing the system to perpetuate

23:26

the conditions
that are so depleting to continue. But there’s also a way

23:31

I mean, I think maybe this is what artists are capable of doing
when they’re working really well

23:37

is that you’re demonstrating
you call attention, you bring it into such high relief,

23:42

the conditions around
which we are working. So that’s why Lucille
Ball is so amazing, right? Is that everything snaps
into kind of clarity,

23:51

not the ridiculousness of her,
but the ridiculousness of the system in which she has to insert
herself in order to survive.

23:58

And I mean, your work is
doing that too, I think in some ways. So it is like it’s a mode,
and I guess it’s

24:04

a way of trying to get at this…
at the end of one of those texts Like it’s a way of not only,

24:11

you know, indicating the system itself,
but also throwing a bit of a spanner into the works.

24:17

So you’re kind of subverting something
or undermining it

24:23

and by actually calling it
into view in a way that otherwise we wouldn’t necessarily see.

24:32

I mean, it’s
funny where my head went, because when you asked
if I would write for this

24:37

beautiful book and the first thing you told me
was like, Please don’t write a curatorial essay,
don’t write a straight text,

24:45

just respond creatively. And of course,
that’s a terrifying prospect.

24:51

It felt that way for me, because how do you? I mean, I don’t know
whether any other writer feels this but it’s

24:58

the things that I enjoy writing about
are the ones that are really difficult
to write about, that you have a hard time
finding words to rub together

25:06

that it takes a lot of work
to kind of find the right words to. And yeah, just actually

25:12

come anywhere close
to the experience of the work. And for some reason, as I sat

25:19

with that invitation, it came to me just,
I don’t know, out of nowhere

25:26

I was just thinking
about my grandmother and maybe it was because I mean,
you and I had talked about, we talked about jewelry,

25:32

we talked about being women,
and we talked about lineage and inheritances that you have
that you’re burdened with

25:43

You know, we all have those. And yeah, I just

25:49

I for some reason went there
and was thinking about other ways

25:54

that I had witnessed women
holding things up, you know, and

26:00

in for sort of long durations,
like for their whole lives, essentially
and the way they take on roles.

26:07

I was thinking about your
your costumes, this sort of incredible care
that you bring to the garments

26:14

that you perform in
and how it’s true many of the women

26:20

who are older than me and my family
that I’ve observed that is a performance and all of
those choices are so carefully,

26:29

yeah, brought together and And when I thought
about my grandmother in relation to your work
it was like I was thinking of her

26:35

trying to find ways to be seen
by dressing in a way
which was really too ostentatious

26:44

too glimmering, too encrusted
with stuff with jewels and things. It was all costume jewelry,
of course,

26:50

but it was just too much for her Her position, her place,
but it was really the only It was really the only
voice, maybe, that she had.

26:58

And then I also had a conversation with another artist who I love dearly
Vanessa Brown, based in Vancouver

27:03

And she makes work,
she’s a sculptor also, you know, her work. She works with steel often,
and she’s very interested

27:10

in the history of sculpture
similarly to you in the sense that it’s been such
a masculinist enterprise.

27:17

And she works with very heavy, hard
materials. But she thinks
about the history of jewelry

27:22

and especially nomadic societies,
where that’s how wealth was often bestowed
or carried forward, and privileges

27:29

and stories were handed down
through objects that were worn and could be packed up
and carried with you

27:34

when you need to go and would
go down through the matrilineal line So somehow those things sort of
called up for me, but I don’t know

27:43

How did you read it?
How did you read that text? Well, I instantly thought of that
first studio visit

27:49

we had a few years ago, and I remember
after I drove you to the next studio

27:55

visit and talked to somebody
and they said, “What was it like?” I’m like, “I didn’t have to explain what it was
like to be a woman and my interests

28:03

to Kimberly.” It was OK to have those interests
and OK to think the way I thought

28:11

about our material world or what
I’m interested in, in the material world And when I read the essay,

28:19

it’s hard
to remember how I felt at the time because I had a lot of things going on, but

28:25

it was like, you got it even deeper than I had imagined.

28:31

And it was, you know, I think that my interest
in making sculpture

28:38

comes from my interest in metals
like and metals as

28:43

a small piece of material that is lasting,
that can be attached to the body

28:51

in a very discrete way or a very loud, inconspicuous way.

28:59

And so when I make work,
I almost always do that. I almost give my sculptures jewelry

29:07

by just giving
a little edge of brass or aluminum or steel.

29:13

And it is It is about the fineness of it
and the tension

29:19

and the care that goes into fineness But it is a language
that is somewhat,

29:28

you know, in our contemporary society and maybe less now

29:34

but it used to just be
an internal language for women.

29:40

And the memories
that I have associated with, you know, every piece

29:47

of jewelry that my mom owns like I know every piece. There
are stories around it. Yeah,

29:54

or just the memories
of going into the jewelry box and that imaginative state
as a young person, but still,

30:04

you know, like just last summer,
my mom sent me a pin of hers

30:09

that I’d always loved
and like it was way better than any other gift just because
she knew my attachment to it.

30:17

I knew her relationship with it. And now we’re
linked with that one piece.

30:25

It’s just a very special thing. And I know
I’ve tried to talk to others

30:33

about what it is about jewelry
and its power.

30:39

It’s almost like language can’t express its history
and its meaning.

30:47

And, you know, even when you see it
on the Antiques Roadshow, how like a really ugly chair is worth
ten times more than a ruby ring

30:56

because maybe it’s too personal
to have monetary value,

31:01

unlike a chair. I guess it’s…
I was really touched by that

31:07

and inspired by it too that, that could be written about,
I guess, because we don’t,

31:16

you know, there’s fashion history. But we’re not reading about jewelry
in contemporary art

31:23

unless the artist instigates
it like Vanessa.

31:30

It’s not
a starting point for many things, many points of discussion,
because it’s maybe in part

31:36

because it’s seen as peripheral
or an accessory like even the notion of an accessory,
right? Something you’ve done to finish.

31:43

It’s not the main event. And again,
like there you go with the whole the kind of centrism
and sets of presumptions around

31:51

what is worth our,
you know, our gaze and what is worth spending time

31:57

what’s worth, investing in. The chairs, that is the thing, rather
than the set of earrings or whatever.

32:03

But it is interesting to think. I mean, I can think of
many different artists now who are considering that, which is like
just the wallpaper on the wall.

32:11

It’s all things on the background that in fact, like we feel they’re innocuous or we they seem innocent or,

32:18

you know, inconspicuous. But in fact, they tell us,
they actually draw together

32:23

so many intense histories
and they tell the story in the marginalia of things
that otherwise we don’t hear.

32:30

So when you attend to them and maybe, yeah, I have noticed that
with your sculptures like you will,

32:36

you will take the extra time
to finish them in a particular way. And it’s like sometimes it’s
just the edge.

32:41

Yeah. And you could easily have not done that. It’s almost only for… it
feels like it’s for you.

32:47

It’s most likely for me. But also it is It is a signal, right,
to attend to those edges

32:54

that otherwise
maybe get lost because the edge is actually where… I mean the edge is
where you’re working.

33:00

I think you’re always working on
that edge at the edge of sculpture, the edge
of performance, at the edge of theater.

33:05

You know, these things, so And that’s
where you actually find, that’s where you pick up
all the interesting bits

33:11

is when you
attend to that, that edge.

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