Marcel Broodthaers. Interview with the Cat
This work by Broodthaers is very relevant. Any clever, poignant or pressing questions about the nature of art today and artistic practice can be resolved with just one miaow.
Broodthaers had a keen feeling for that time when any serious or philosophical enquiry is doomed to fail. Questions might still get asked, but getting answers is not so easy. And artists are not necessarily meant to look for answers. Perhaps communication is still possible, but at a level that the human ear cannot register. However, we have the magical opportunity to put on headphones and hear the voice of Marcel Broodthaers himself.
Marcel Broodthaers: Is that one a good painting?…Does it correspond to what you expect from that very recent transformation which goes from Conceptual Art to this new version of a kind of figuration, as one might say?
Cat: Miaow.
MB: Do you think so?
Cat: Miiaaow..mm..miaow..miaow.
MB: And yet this colour is very clearly redolent of the painting that was being done in the period of abstract art, isn’t it?
Cat: Miaaow..miaaow..miiaow..miaow.
MB: Are you sure it’s not a new form of academicism?
Cat: Miaow.
MB: Yes, but if it’s a daring innovation it’s still a contestable one.
Cat: Miaow.
MB: It’s still…
Cat: Miaow.
MB: Er…It’s still a matter of markets…
Cat: Miaaow.
MB: What will the people who bought the previous things do?
Cat: Miaow.
MB: Will they sell them?
Cat: Miiaow..mia.
MB: Or will they continue? What do you think?…Because, at the moment, a lot of artists are wondering about that.
Cat: Miaaow..miaow..
MB: In that case close the Museums!
Cat: MIAOW!
MB: This is a pipe.
Cat: Miaow.
MB: This is not a pipe.
Cat: Miaow...
…
MB: This is not a pipe
Cat: Miaow.
MB: This is a pipe
Cat: Miaow.
MB: Pipe is not
Cat: Miaow.
MB: This is a pipe.
Cat: Miaow.
MB: This is not a pipe.
Cat: Miaow.
МБ: This interview was recorded at the Museum of Modern Art, Department of Eagles, Burgplatz 12, Dusseldorf.
Cat: MIAOW!
Interview with a Cat, 1970
Audio file, 4’ 59”