Irene Coremberg
is a multi-disciplinary artist from Argentina.
Her video “The Hole” is part of the exhibition ://selfportrait – a show for Bethlehem
Her video “Colour Renaissance” is part of the selection “identity of colour”
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Interview: 10 questions–>
1.
Question:
Tell me something about your life and the educational background.
Answer:
Before arriving in arts, I had gone through many ways. From the birth, my first love was the expression through image and music, both the same. But when arrived at the age of deciding what to study, the familiar pressure leads me by other ways. “Art is not work†“you will get hungry if you follow this way†“we will not support such a choice†and other reasons like that. So, I allowed to be lead by other ways… and became an agronomic engineer advised by my family.
Nevertheless, I found this trip through science very interesting not only on developing my mind, but also I found a sense for all that. At that time I decided to study and work against the hunger.
First, I specialized in genetics in order to improve the yield of vegetables. Soon, I understood that this only made richer people and companies that already were rich. And poor people remained poor.
Then, I learned a lot about little organic farms and worked on teaching the people, participating in ecological organizations. I learned to love the nature.
I knew and worked with very interesting people from who I learned a lot, like Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, our Nobel prize of peace. I worked during three years with him and his people in an organic farm of his organization, for children who had no family or home.
Meanwhile, in my free time, I participated in a musical group and worked on painting by my own.
Some years later, one day, I woke up crying after a dream because I suddenly understood that Arts, my first love, had gone away. Indeed that day I decided to return to my way in arts, and then began to study.
But all that life left deep tracks on my art expression and subjects nowadays.
My educational background began in traditional arts. I studied at two arts schools here
(Escuela de Artes Visuales de General San MartÃn, Instituto Universitario Nacional de Artes Visuales (IUNA)), and also photography (Asociación de Fotógrafos Profesionales de la República Argentina (AFPRA) and FotoClub Buenos Aires).
Later, I continued studying with local artists on painting, drawing and sculpture (Marta Córdova, Gabriel Microzsnik, Alberto Arregui). Also, I participated in workshops about video in the Palermo University.
About new technologies, I studied computer technologies with local teachers (C. Fabian Frances), and studied New Media Arts in Instituto Universitario Nacional de Artes Visuales (IUNA) and with Anahà Cáceres.
The studies about traditional arts, the theory of the art and the study about the great artists, gave me the basic concepts about the color, the space, the shape, the movement and the message, all concepts that nowadays I can apply to digital art.
I often use 3D and animation, so the knowledge about sculpture and video helps me on manages virtual spaces and the 4º dimension: the time.
On studying New Media I understood how all arts can integrate among them.
My diploma of agronomic engineer is still at the University… I never returned to look for it!.
2.
Question:
When, how and why started you filming?
Answer:
I don’t work on pure filming really; my videos are made entirely by digital media, with 3D and 2D animation and sound. I began by 2002, when looking for a media which allowed me to transmit images from the unconscious with the best possible fidelity. I saw that those images or impressions lived and changed permanently in the time, so digital media and working with time seemed to be a good solution.
But now I looking for some more…Nothing is not enough.
3.
Question:
What kind of subjects have your films/videos?
Answer:
Sometimes the subjects are dreams or impressions from the unconscious, obtained on vigil. Also, I’m interesting on metaphysical themes, because I’m trying to discover some simply mechanisms under the reality that can explain this world.
Other subjects are, of course, the nature, that is under the human reality and supporting it, and also the social contents. I would like to be a voice more from the oppression, against the high voice that shouts lying through the publicities, the films, the TV, the media….
4.
Question:
How do you develop your films/videos, do you follow certain principles, styles etc?
Answer:
I think I’m working in a field that lives in a frontier where pictures finishes and the film begins.
Perhaps there are mixing styles. I’m not sure really. All people is influenced by the environment in where they live, although are not conscious of it.
Often I work first on paper, and left my mind to work free. When an image appears, I quickly design them, perhaps with a written explanation about behavior, sound or movement. Some days later I have a paper with many images that can seem chaotic, like necklace pieces. Finally, I use my conscious mind in order to thread the pieces and to turn them in an artwork.
When I start with a proposal, I use the same way.
5.
Question:
Tell me something about the technical equipment you use.
Answer:
All is computer. Is a PC Pentium IV processor 2.23 GB with 512 MB RAM. 80GB HD, monitor 17’’, DVD R RW.
Software for image, sound and video editing, and for 2D and 3D animation, graphic and web design, Internet.
6.
Question:
What are the chances of new media for the genre film/video in general
and you personally?
Answer:
The new media makes film and video realization more ductile than ever before. For me personally, it means also the economic possibility to do it, thanks to the accessibility of a personal computer.
7.
Question:
How do you finance your films/videos?
Answer:
Finance???!!!! Well, here not only some of my relatives but almost all society thinks “art is not workâ€. There are very a few possibilities for financing here; and this few organizations generally provide money for materials but not for salaries… Art is not work, so artist don’t have to receive money, may be the idea.
So, I finance my production with other works, on teaching and design. But often I find economic limits to produce.
Here is also thought that teachers need to get thin….
8.
Question:
Do you work individually as a videoartist/film maker or do you work in a team?
If you have experience in both, what is the difference, what do you prefer?
Answer:
Often I work individually, but recently I made an experience with collaborations in 2D animation and a translation made for a person who I don’t know personally… she help me through
E-mail.
Now I’m looking to work with a musician.
The result to work in a team may be very rich, especially if is allowed enough freedom and faith on creation… and you like not to foresee absolutely the results. You can be grateful surprised.
I prefer both, depends on the work.
9.
Question:
Who or what has a lasting influence on your film/video making?
Answer:
I believe that the talks with my father, in past. He was a scientific research on physics and engineer, and ever since I was a little girl, I remember him to talk a lot about the time, the reality, the matter, the universe… and I found traces of those concepts in all my works, also in the social ones, and I think this influence is stronger than other artistic or stylistic ones.
10.
Question:
What are your future plans or dreams as a film/video maker?
Answer:
Dreams… are free by now!. So, I would like to work on video installations and to experiment with holograms, perhaps with spatial interactivity. Always thinking on transmitting the impressions from the unconscious… I believe that if I made a scenography that involves absolutely the public-participant, there were not external distractions, so the messages could travel among the unconscious minds more easily, trying to diminish the filters from the conscious.
Dreams by now; there are not still the resources!
My immediately plans, to find a digital musician for future works in a team.