Introduction: Statements

After having worked eleven years in sales and marketing planning, I resigned in 1995 to practice art. The reactions from my fifty colleagues, friends and family was overwhelming, and to my great surprise, enormously positive. This is the most influential 'art work' I have ever made.

When I studied at business school I took a course that examined the paradigm of the marketing world: The set of background assumptions taken for granted and our patterns of thinking about how to do things. We looked at what underlying view points we did not question, e.g. about ethics and aesthetics. This has forever influenced the way I think.

I have seen 'Pretty Woman' three times and shed a tear each time. I have seen more than 3000 mainstream films, almost all with the same narrative structure: Introduction, complications, peak and disclosure. I keep coming back to investigating how that structure influences our way of living.

When I talk to someone I like to ask a lot of questions because I want to know 'where' that person is. What is his/her state of mind, situation, problem, idea, interests, etc? From there the actual dialogue can take place.

You know the situation when you talk to someone at a party without knowing what or who they are? You have to be totally present as you cannot rely on knowledge about your shared past as there is none. I love that situation.

In making art I am interested in working with what happens between people and the formation of social spaces. Therefor I do not see 'selling it' as a given trajectory, unless this 'formation of social space' can be achieved by selling my art.

I am interested in public art. I find it challenging to make something in a place that was not meant for art. That has a 'life' of its own. To enter a context that does not 'help' you as an artist. With this, I mean that an art context always makes the audience look and investigate. In the public domain you do not usually have a designated audience. First, the artwork has to enter and, then, work in the local-social context.

To talk about and consciously work with an 'audience' is taboo in the art world.

When I enter an arena as an artist, e.g. a corner shop, I am in one paradigm, and the shop, its staff and customers are in another. In working with them on a project I do not pursue making an intervention. Rather, I try to create a bridge that will allow an interrelation of our social spheres.

When I helped Jeppe Hein to refurbish the toilet in 'A Supermarket' (please see The Corner Shop Project) and spend four days of hard work I had an extraordinary experience: "Why was I doing this?" I did not get paid, it was not for a friend or family, it would not be an 'appreciated' art piece...it was something else. That 'working' was in another space, of another 'economy' than anything I ever did before.

The greatest challenge that faces us today is to find or unveil alternative and parallel models to today's capitalism.

I find it interesting not to make finished works. I prefer to make something that is so open that the audience feel compelled to participate in the (problem solving) process. Ethically, this is more viable: To show that the artist is not the giver and the audience not the receiver of ideas and solutions, but that we share a common responsibility for finding a way.

I am interested in business. I see many artists 'critique' business and their capitalistic motivations. They often do this without ever having been in business (which is a perfectly valid strategy). I have been in business, and what I do, is to offer that insight to an art audience. I think art can learn from business and that a bridge is as useful as critique.

To me design is primarily about when you can open a bottle without straining your wrist. But also the formation of atmosphere and the way you function in its realm. Style is an added layer with an uncertain ethical place. The idea of "social design" intrigues me: How can design, especially interior design, be used as an artistic material to form a social experience?

Kenneth A. Balfelt