Marco Scotini: Let's start from the end. Your most recent work conceived for the “Acción Pasiva/Acción Activa” show focuses simply on building a coffin. A craftsman takes boards of wood and makes a coffin using the normal methods. There is nothing especially dramatic in the process, but perhaps this banality is what is most alarming: the divergence between his silent and imperturbable practice and the violence of the daily spectacle of death. It is an undeniable sign and yet, when expressed in this way, it marks the radical void between the sign and the thing. I was wondering if your work has something to do with the remembrance of the genocide in Guatemala in the 1980s, when the former dictator Rios Montt resumed power or perhaps with the fact that six people are murdered every day in Guatemala between the gangs of organized crime and the government official bodies, no less ruthless, but authorized in the name of social cleansing.

A-1 53167: It isn’t only about the violence in Guatemala. More people are dying every day in Iraq than in Guatemala or Colombia. There is death everywhere in the world. There are countries where people don't die at the hands of violence but where people take their own lives, like in Sweden, Switzerland, France, etc. The issue of death is very complicated. I reflected at length on this work, at a time such as ours where there is so much talk and speculation of life and death. There are several different types of war and violence; there is the "callejera" war - the guerrilla war waged in the streets in Colombia, Guatemala, Brazil, El Salvador, Mexico - and then there are wars organized by governments, like the one being fought by the US and as a result, France, the UK, and Italy. The entire world is involved in this type of war. Lots of men and women are dying and who knows if we’ll ever know if it was really necessary. But this is not a question to pose for the moment. What is certain is that people are dying and - of course - there is pain and suffering. We need lots of coffins for all these dead. In places where there is no industry, coffins have to be made by hand, although this is not the case in a country like Italy. I would have liked to stage the entire factory, but it wasn't possible to set up an assembly line of twenty coffins while the public was watching. The coffin is a bit like a TV advert, because all of us will die: nobody can escape the inevitable. So, my idea is that for the wars that are playing out before our eyes, society needs lots of coffins.

M.S.: Behind this production process, as in other recent occasions, from “El Prestamo” to “Se Vende. Se Alquila. Se Presta. Se Regala” (You sell. You rent. You loan. You gift), I also perceive a strong desire to launch an attack on the global economic system. I’m thinking the inequality that exists between countries that produce wars and others that produce coffins.

A-1 53167: When this idea came to me, I wasn’t really thinking about the economic aspects, but clearly, it’s there, in the work of a labourer who doesn't produce goods for himself, but for others who buy them. Material has a cost. At the end of the day, everything revolves around economic issues. But this wasn't the only thing that I was interested in. More than that, I wanted the public to come and observe without being sure of what was going on and think it was discovering a form when rather something real was being produced.

M.S.: Do you think that your actions and your urban interventions can have… I don't want to say a real political role - this is obvious - but perhaps a cultural effect in Guatemala that has an impact beyond the international art scene?

A-1 53167: Yes, I think my work has an effect. Whether the effect is cultural or viewed as art, it is difficult to tell for sure because people don't always consider art done in the street as "real" art. This is exactly why I like to work on the street, because the street people don’t care if it is art or not. It is a social movement in the making: an incident, an unfamiliar fact and people ask themselves a question and try to find an answer to their query. It is not up to me as an artist to ask myself what it means, because everything that happens doesn't necessarily have to mean something; sometimes it simply "is". And since the artist disappears, the moment people see what is happening there is no further question about the meaning. People think about it and they come up with their own discourse about what they are viewing. For me, this is very important since it makes it possible for reality to exist, for something that exists to become real. It works just like a real experience: like when you say to a child that he shouldn't put his hand on the fire and he does it anyway, then he learns never to do it again.

M.S.: Recently, there have been social movements in the Latin American countries against Neo-Liberalism in the form of mass demonstrations and group uprisings, such as in Argentina by the Piqueteros. Within these events new forms of social activism have come to life. What is going on in Guatemala after the end of the guerrilla war and the peace accords? You also play a role in a sort of countercultural activism, for instance, when you drew a line of coal under the military parade of the 30 de junio, or when you unloaded a ton of books on the main street of Guatemala City in a sort of Smithsonian rundown. Is there a relationship between popular culture, revenge and opposition?

A-1 53167: Yes, this movement is popular in Guatemala. Lots of people are involved in it and there are counterculture publications or counterculture actions. The problem that I have with this idea is that I don't believe that there is any such thing as “counterculture”. Even a counterculture is a culture. It needs rules and regulations, parameters and a means of expression. I wouldn't classify what I do as counterculture but I see it as social art. I make street art and not counterculture art. In Guatemala, there are many social service organizations that work for the community. There are even more in Argentina: Institutions, foundations (many of which scientific).
These types of organizations take up a cause but never seem to provide solutions to these problems. Their interest doesn’t really lie in solving a problem because if the problem was solved, they would have no further function and the people involved would be out of a job. They earn a lot of money because they receive donations from the UN, international agencies, etc. they own cars and homes and live like rich people. They are socialists but they live like capitalists. And they are quite happy to live this way. You can see this mentality in the peace accords signed in 1996 in Guatemala, which are ambiguous and are written in an ambiguous language. At the end of the day, everything is the same, none of the promises have been kept. But it’s clear that many people are dying, like Girardi who submitted a clear and explicit document and paid with his life. But I don't think that people who work for these organizations achieve very much. I have my doubts.

M.S.: Faced with such a conflict-ridden situation, I am curious how you chose the minimal and conceptual culture of the 1960s as a referent for your own work: from On Kawara to Robert Barry, from Manzoni to Smithson. A highly formalized language, whose neutral character you try to “sabotage”. I am referring to the quantities you report in the titles of your works: weights, lengths, indices, numbers but which acquire a special political value in your works.

A-1 53167: I am influenced by it because I like it. An essential element in the 1960s was that a very precise language met a very well defined code. I don't know exactly why I have an interest for the culture of the sixties, perhaps it's because art in those years was a pure art. I mean to say, purity of philosophical thought, a sort of artistic innocence. This type of conversation made an impact on me, in particular, the works of Robert Smithson were very important for me and Smithson represents a "land art de la calle". His practice is minimalism of the street, of public space. This procedure can be used and becomes an artistic language. The language can be used in a very precise form. I think that advertising uses it quite a bit, more than the artists because advertising conveys a message that has to be immediate.
For example, even the "liston negro" which I used for the “Ponte del Incienso” refers to an unequivocal and minimalist code system. The plastic material comes from the garbage bags that we find on the street. The colour black on its own means something; it has an implicit meaning that doesn't need any explanation, like mourning. Then, it is like a Rothko painting that changes perspective if you put it on the street or in any other context. For me, the most important thing is to build something starting from the fact that the object I choose really exists. Then it just means re-semanticizing codes.

M.S.: I think what characterises your art the most is how you associate weel-defined code that preclude any reservation or uncertainty to an aesthetics of risk at its - extreme - like in "El Prestamo" where you ask someone for a loan by pointing a gun at them. Or associating the unexpected or the accidental with a precise geometry like in “La Distancia entre dos Puntos” (The distance between two points) or in “Punto en movimiento” (Point in Motion): where cars and buses design urban trajectories, put to the test by the undermined context of Guatemala. Perhaps these works only make sense in these areas and I wonder if they could viably exist anywhere else.

A-1 53167: Yes, “Punto en movimiento” (Point in Motion) can be replicated. I think that it would make sense in Italy, for example, or in Germany or in the UK. It works in exactly the same way. The important thing is not the vehicle on which the point is designed but rather, the motion and construction. It is as if the present didn't really exist but, like a point in motion, it is only motion. There is no precise moment when you can say "it is here". This concept works in Guatemala just as in any other part of the world. I did it in Guatemala because I live in Guatemala and it was more convenient for me to do it there. But, everything works in the same way all over the world. In addition to “El Prestamo” and “Una tonelada de libros” (A ton of books) another risky action is “Dia de la Paz”.
It is the day of peace. I won't show you the photographs because they just don't do justice to the history of the work. They were organizing a parade of artists and institutions to celebrate the day of the peace agreements and they invited me to participate. I suggested an idea that when I think of it now, it doesn’t seem so good anymore, but at the time, it seemed great. I had found somewhere an extremely heavy chain from an enormous ship. It was in metal and I suggested we work with this chain. They told me that it wasn't a good idea because we were in a time of peace and it was important to remember that: we were all very happy about it. The guy who told me this owned his own home and was very affluent. He owned a car, etc. I don't like to work when I feel that there is no justice and democracy. I didn't want to take part in the peace celebration when there was no real peace to celebrate. It was all a big lie. So, I told them that I wasn't going to participate. I said "thanks, but I think I'll work alone". On the day of the parade, a bunch of us took this enormous chain that weighed a ton and we held it up and carried it from one end of the street to the other while the parade was arriving. We blocked the traffic and so the police arrived. I said that this demonstration was part of the parade and the police let us go. That was enough for me. I only wanted to stir up a little trouble on the day of the peace accords.