Interview

O’BRIEN: We were talking about Graham and Pollock, right?

OEHLEN: I think what’s interesting is the difference of the one guy who knows so much and is full of ideas but can’t really make an interesting work—and the other one who is half stupid, and just does it.

O’BRIEN: Well, don’t you think that some artists are more, I wouldn’t say idiot savants, but, you know, more unconscious? So Pollock is in that category?

OEHLEN: It gets difficult. But I don’t know if unconscious is the right word.

O’BRIEN: Well, like an acrobat or a musician or something where it’s not sort of rationalized, it’s more instinctive.

OEHLEN: Whatever it is, I still believe in the unpredictable, in an artist who just has something and overwhelms you with something that you didn’t even ask for. I believe that in the sort of wrong moment there comes a time when someone who no one wanted, just does it . . .

O’BRIEN: Don’t you think there’s less and less of that quality? That it’s sort of been beaten out of people now? Whether by the market or . . .

OEHLEN: Oh, I think there are still those people. I mean, Chris . . . [laughs]

O’BRIEN: He’s very methodical in his madness.

OEHLEN: [still laughing] I think another example, even if you don’t like him, is Matthew Barney, who does something I didn’t ask for with that kind of art, and he’s just so strong. Or even Damien Hirst, whatever it is that he’s doing, it’s such a phenomenon, I don’t want to say it’s stupid . . . Because it’s a big show.

O’BRIEN: Yeah.

OEHLEN: Maybe it’s the wrong example, because it’s really a show. Matthew Barney is better. Because he did something that no one could have expected. That is already something.

O’BRIEN: So what advice would you give Matthew Barney? What rule would you give him?

OEHLEN: [laughs] I haven’t thought about it.

O’BRIEN: [to Oehlen and Wool] So how do you guys know each other?

WOOL: I think the first time that we met was when I was in Cologne, when you had the big bad-painting show at Max [Hetzler]’s new space. Max’s must have been ’88.

OEHLEN: Yeah, and then we were frequently in the same group shows. We did something in Chicago, too.

O’BRIEN: So when did the notion of bad painting come to your attention?

OEHLEN: Very early, when I was a student, it had to with this show that I think was in New York . . .

O’BRIEN: “‘Bad’ Painting,” at the New Museum.

OEHLEN: I just heard the name, and I had no idea who was in it at that time. I liked the name, and then, after years, I realized that no one was using that anymore, but it had a big impression on me. So then I rediscovered that work and thought, Yeah, if that fits . . .