• Hanne Mugaas talks to Willy Wonka Inc.

    Date posted: January 9, 2008 Author: jolanta

    Hanne Mugaas: How did Willy Wonka Inc. start and develop?

    Willy Wonka Inc.: In 2005, we curated the exhibition With Us Against Reality or Against Us! (the title referring to Bush`s With Us or Against Us politics). A lot of people came to see the show—the opening was literally a riot. Our goal was to make room for and inspire a different art scene in Norway. We showed young American, European, and Russian artists, among them Dutch artist Erik Van Lieshout’s paintings and a huge installation by Norwegian artist Bjarne Melgaard. He had been thrown out of his flat in Berlin and he brought its entire contents: cases and piles of his artworks, huge paintings, personal photographs, books, custom-made sofas, and sculptures.

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    Willy Wonka Inc. is a collaboration between artists Ida Ekblad, Anders Nordby, and others. Together they make artwork, run a gallery and artist space, and curate. They describe what they do as art, utilizing the role of the artist, curator, gallerist, or collaborator as needed. Hanne Mugaas is an independent curator who was born in Norway, is based in New York, and is a frequent collaborator of Willy Wonka Inc.

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    Hanne Mugaas: How did Willy Wonka Inc. start and develop?

    Willy Wonka Inc.: In 2005, we curated the exhibition With Us Against Reality or Against Us! (the title referring to Bush`s With Us or Against Us politics). A lot of people came to see the show—the opening was literally a riot. Our goal was to make room for and inspire a different art scene in Norway. We showed young American, European, and Russian artists, among them Dutch artist Erik Van Lieshout’s paintings and a huge installation by Norwegian artist Bjarne Melgaard. He had been thrown out of his flat in Berlin and he brought its entire contents: cases and piles of his artworks, huge paintings, personal photographs, books, custom-made sofas, and sculptures.
    In the aftermath of the show we got some great reviews and several offers to curate similar shows at other institutions, but we realized we were not tempted by this idea at all. The maximal, intense, colorful, energetic, and sexual content made us—weirdly enough—drift into the doldrums, a search and craving for depressive, almost ascetic art and music. Ida went on to make a solo exhibition around the act and art of suicide and Anders performed Dérives around Amsterdam before we collaborated again on projects in Los Angeles, Amsterdam, and Oslo.

    HM: You are artists, curators, collaborators, and gallerists. You simply take on the role that is the most appropriate for each project. Your attitude loosens things up, critiquing the “seriousness” of art. An example is the exhibition you recently curated in Zurich, The Corny Show, a.k.a. The Art is in the Heart.

    WWI: Yes, we do not think that there is such a big difference between the different roles. That said it might be easier for us to do some kind of weird projects like going to San Francisco to live with one of the members of The Cockettes, whereas a curator would probably choose to live in a hotel and keep a distance from their subjects. We have always loved to do research in many different fields like art, film, and music, and different projects come out of this research, whether they be video screenings, dance nights, our or other people’s works—it doesn’t matter. In the end we consider it all to be part of our art project, and we always have to function as artists because even if we are not showing our personal artworks, we want to present the works in a special way, we want to draw, design, and produce the invitations, posters, books, and zines made in relation to the different projects ourselves.

    HM: Tell us about your research and interests at the moment.

    WWI: Apart from classics like Paul Thek and Marcel Brouthaers, we are very inspired by everything that The Cockettes and The Angels of Light were connected to, like the films of Alejandro Jodorovsky, Steven Arnold, and Michael Kalman. The fashion design of the late Kaisak Wong who did costumes for Luminous Procurecess and who hung out with The Cockettes in the 60s. The music of one of our best friends and Willy Wonka Inc. associate Nils Bech, who is working with his first solo album and always sends his recent studio results by email (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQIiRhmItt0), as well as Soft Machine, Cornelis Vreisvijk, Augustus Pablo, Ariel Pink and John Maus, The Residents, Skip Bifferty, Bob Trimble, Charles Manson, Jem Targal, Boredoms, etc. In Oslo we are fond of visiting old museums like the Folk Museum, The Viking Ships, and The Arctic Museum with their gloomy air and old-fashion style.

    HM: Your current project is an upcoming exhibition in Oslo of The Cockettes, the psychedelic drag queen group which was active in the 60s and 70s in San Fransisco. You are also working on a Cockettes book. The project is happening because you went to Los Angeles in 2006, where you met Rumi Missabu, one of the members of the group, who became a friend. Can you tell us more about how this came about, and about the recent trip you made, staying at Rumi’s house in Berkeley?

    WWI: The first time we met Rumi Missabu was on a screening of Gregory Pickup’s Pickups Tricks at The Yerba Buena Center of The Arts in San Fransisco. We had read about the Cockettes and were fascinated by their oeuvre and legacy. Rumi invited us to his house in Berkeley and that is how we started to work on this show. It is quite incredible that their work has been exposed as little as it has. Somehow it feels like what they did is still a precious secret. We went back to Berkeley and stayed with Rumi this summer. We watched lots of underground videos, listened to old casettes from The Cockettes’ shows, and rummaged through his extensive archives of Cockettes-related photography, original posters, and paraphernalia. Rumi has an encyclopedic memory when you ask about people or art or shows from back in time. We also got to meet Cockettes and Angels members Sweet Pam, Tahara, Harlow, Billy Bowers, Jilalah, and Fayetta Hauser, who all kindly opened their homes to us and talked about their work and showed us their archives.

    HM: You are soon leaving Norway to go to Los Angeles, to spend three months at the Mountain School of Art. Will you start up a Willy Wonka Inc. space while you are there?

    WWI: Maybe we should set up a booth at Venice Beach and sell airbrushed Troll sculptures?

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