SM: Were you surprised to see some of these issues this stirred up, yet once again, in the press commentary?
RP: I didn’t even want to have the show. It was an experiment. I needed convincing. But when it was
hung it looked so good that the “good” was all I cared about. Just the wa y the work reflected off the floor
was good. The fact that it was in the back of a bookstore. And you could see it thru a window from the
street. And at night! I just loved THE FIT. Not sure how else to describe it. The press? I get the NYT’S and
the Post delivered to my door every morning. Getting those subscriptions is like finding a lost wallet.
SM: People may bemoan our cultural status but we have all, in some manner, co created this fiction
by self-promotion, fantasy projection or through voyeuristic consumption. I probably left out a few
other examples! No one on the left thinks Fox News is real news and Colbert is the entertainment for
the liberal. There is no news, there are many news.
RP: There was no announcement. No opening. No dinner. I just hung the work and went home. I
posted an install shot on Instagram the next morning. I wanted it to remain inside my I-phone. Verizon.
AT&T. Samsung. The next thing I knew girls were doffing their tops and taking self portraits in front
the work. The whole thing was virgin territory.
SM: So, it seems that you have been relentless in your mining the truth behind the fiction of our times.
The relevance of your images catches my attention more than ever as politicians, artists and your Instagamers use the technique of Mad Men to present their images to the world. You constantly burst the
bubble of trusting what I see. For me it’s a wakeup call to always question the image. What is it for you?
RP: I know this is going to sound conservative but I really just wanted to make simple “portraits”. The rad
of it, (radical)... was its tradition. I’m not just asking you to be awake but I’m asking you to trust me.
SM: I purposely visited the current contemporary painting show at MOMA before I look another look at
your Instagram works on canvas. The MOMA show was shockingly banal. Twombly, Barnet Newman,
Tapies, Schnabel and Picasso were all there represented by their lesser imitators. The artist’s influences
were more present and more powerful than the transformation. The show looked sad and empty, devoid
of content with an ornamental affect. It seems there should be way more controversy about MOMA’s
sleep walk through the dead zone than with the current state of affairs that you represent in social media.
RP: “Ornamental”. That IS the DEAD ZONE. Stephen King shit. I haven’t seen Forever Now. I’m not interested in what museums are doing. I’m not even sure I’m interested in what the gallery world is doing.
But I still go. When I can. I love getting lost in the Met. And I still love looking at art. I love the history
of art. That will never change. Art is complicated. It’s romantic. It’s spiritual. I live with it everyday. It’s
one of the few things that makes me feel good. I have good memories of the Museum of Modern Art.
SM: There is something banal in the ubiquity of social media and at the same time it seems to be
much more a representation of our time than painting’s escapist nostalgia for itself. As an artist or a
painter, is this something you think about?
RP: I can do it on my phone, in the back of a car, getting a ride upstate. That’s what the social media
is about. The platform is portable. It’s fast. It’s up-to-date. And you can translate what’s on it... if you
want... by touching a button. For me as an artist, it’s another way of touching. Instagram was made for
me. It fell into my lap. I can’t tell you how great it feels when I’m on it. I’ve claimed it, or at least part
of it. TERRITORY. It’s like a zillion magazines and I know, if I look long enough, I’ll find something I
like. What did that songwriter say in Idiot Wind? “I can’t help it if I’m lucky.”
SM: Finally, some of this feels like Arthur Danto’s Brillo Box discussion. It can get pretty squirrely.
Instagram and your re-presentation of Instagram on Instagram begs the question of what’s the nature
of reality and that’s a philosophical discourse.
RP: I actually own one of Warhol’s fake Brillo Box’s. I own a fake. I know that sounds weird, but it’s
true. Does that answer the question?
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