claudio parentela volume 2, 2006, #024

claudio parentela is an illustrator, painter, photographer, mail artist, cartoonist, collagist, journalist, and free lance. claudio has been active for many years in the international underground scene, and he has collaborated with many web and print contemporary art and literary magazines, as well as comics. he lives in southern italy.

1. how would you explain 'art' - in 19 words or less? always to be other, always to be the same thing in different ways. to be different, real, the same thing in the same ways in different moments. to be in the same time in different times in the same and different moment. to be prisoner in the time in the times in the space in the spaces. (okay, 57 words is close enough to 19!).

2. what is the first work of art you ever loved? i love all the art that i see every day (and i see a lot of contemporary art every day), really i don't have a specific artistic taste … all art is a wonderful and terrible miracle. however, the first work of art i loved when i was young (about nine years old) was a small head of buddha, all of gold - it was so bight and shining. i've always been interested in the oriental philosophies and spiritual research … to the other side - i've always had a dark and twisted side and interests in my soul. but that is another subject (or is it the same thing?)

3. how important is theory to your art? i think all is in all and all is in all. art is theory, how the theory is my natural artistic madness and how my artistic being is the different being i watch and i feel to be in my veins. i love artistic movements and artistic theories - they're so romantic, violent, sweet, powerful. i feel myself in all the theories, philosophical and artistic theories of all the times and spaces. i have a romantic sick punx heart my dear.

4. describe your ideal art workspace. my new home is perfect - i've a lot of space, a wonderful garden all around full of all my cats, good music all the time in my ears, often good wine...so...i always need music to draw. i listen to everything, especially a lot of experimental, industrial, noise and jazz.

5. describe your current art workspace. it's my new home - but if you want to know more, i hope soon to move to a home even more isolated, with a lot of land, trees, and animals around. i hope soon to go to live in the mountains … i love the mountains.

6. if you could be placed in suspended animation and safely reanimated at some time in the future with the sole purpose being to see how history treated you / your art, would you do it?
i think to be the only responsible of all my life, of the past, of the present, and of the future naturally...so my history is, has been, and it will be only claudio parentela. but … but there is then and first of all naturally the law of karma - god and my relationship with him, and a lot of other boring and true and wise stories.

7. who are some of your favourite artists (contemporary or canonical)? i dream and i listen and i love in this moment only j.p. witkin and diamanda galas. yes the answer is the same in every interview but why should i change my tastes? witkin is pure poetry, pure contradiction, he's the revealed contradiction, he's the end and the start of every war, he's the brain and the mind. he's the illness and the healing. he's the wound. diamanda galas is pure energy, the medicine i need for my poor sick heart. she's sound, thunder, crying.

8. tell us about a gallery (online or physical space) that you think rocks, and why you think it rocks. oh i don't know how to answer, i'm really sorry. there are a lot of galleries i hate, and others that i like much, but how and what and when? i don't know how to answer. the owners of the art galleries should pay for the work of the poor artists … this i think, not always, but sometimes, always!

9. would you choose the baked bean jaffle or the caramelised pumpkin and red onion tart with crispy radicchio and hazelnut salad with apple vinaigrette? no, i love pizza and i eat a lot of pizza, and i choose therefore only pizza!

10. finish this sentence: "the work of art can / cannot be considered separately to the artist because ________." it cannot be considered separately to the artist, because i've to sell my art, because i've to pay all the (honest) persons in this world … it's sad yes, but i've not created this system … so i've to work like everyone else … and my work for fortune is this: my art, and i love art and to be in my art and in art all the time all the days - because i've chosen this way to be and this work, and it's not been easy all this and it's not easy again, but i love it much the same. so i think the problem isn't just mine and i repeat, dear owners of art galleries, please pay our art, so our art will be again and more beautiful, wonderful, shining, and we'll be all happy!

check out more of claudio's work at:
www.claudioparentela.com
claudioparentela.altervista.org
parentelacla.altervista.org/

untitled, ink & pen on paper, 2005

untitled, photos, ink & pen on paper, 2005

untitled, ink & pen on paper, 2005