Jesse Richards

Here is the link to the interview (in Turkish):

http://www.bakiniz.com/remodernizm-jesse-richards/

and the full interview in English:

BAKINIZ: Who is Jesse Richards in short?

JESSE: Sometimes it is hard to say, which I guess is part of the reason why I paint and made films and shoot photographs and all of this stuff- to figure things out about myself and the world around me and to share that process of trying to figure things out. Right now I’m really interested in Japanese aesthetics, but tomorrow I might only want to talk about the 1930’s bank robbers Bonnie and Clyde, or maybe dirty vampire movies made in the 1970’s. I can be very unfocused. Or maybe I am focused, but not in a way that I understand. Who knows…

BAKINIZ: First of all, what are the movements of remodernism and stuckism in separate?

JESSE: Well, Stuckism, which I’m no longer a member of, is an art movement that was started in England in 1999 by Billy Childish and Charles Thomson. The idea was to promote figurative painting in opposition to postmodernism and conceptual art. The idea was that figurative painting was a better way to express emotion and experience than these new post-modern types of art. Unfortunately, Stuckism eventually became too focused on protesting the Turner Prize and the Tate and these institutions that emphasize this kind of Post-modern art, rather than actually focusing on changing things through the actual creation of art. That’s not meant to criticize each artist involved with the group, because they’re still a lot of good people involved, like Remy Noe, Joe Machine, Kim Richardson and Phil Absolon; but my real problem was with the way the direction of the group had gone. Too much of the wrong Stuckist art got promoted, a lot of boring, bland stuff. Stuff that looks like dull pop art. It became too much about “why isn’t Stuckist art in the Tate Modern” and all of this stuff that like I said was not so much about making paintings. So I thought it best to leave.

Remodernism, on the other hand, is an attempt started by the Stuckists, to introduce a new period of spirituality and emotion into art. This was to replace Post-modernism, which was seen as bankrupt and cynical. I think this is reasonable. A lot of the things happening in Post-modern art are just re-treads of things done 70-80 years ago by Dada and the Surrealists. It’s nothing new. Anyway, Remodernism has the potential to be applied to anything, art, philosophy- even life in general. I should specify that Remodernism was never about spirituality in the religious sense, it’s about people communicating with themselves and others in an authentic manner. It’s about cutting through all of the bullshit and being real.

BAKINIZ: At which points do those two movements act accordingly?

JESSE: Well, Stuckism started Remodernism, and there are multiple groups that have declared themselves to be Remodernist: my group/movement Remodernist film, the Defastenists in Ireland and France, Joe Machine’s group- the Institute of Collective Remodernism, the Stuckist Photographers, and there’s been a lot of interplay and collaboration between members of these groups, because although we all have different approaches, I think most of us are concerned with making stuff that is authentic, and we are doing our best at it.

BAKINIZ: What does it require to be a Stuckist?

JESSE: I’m not sure these days, since I’m through with Stuckism. I think anyone could declare themselves to be a Stuckist, but if you want to be recognized as a part of the group, you’d probably want to email Charles Thomson in London, through the Stuckism website.

BAKINIZ: You are a painter, photographer and a filmmaker. What is your aim of art?

JESSE: To tell the truth about myself and the way I see and understand (or very often don’t understand) the world. To be part of the human connection, to be more connected into life… At first I started exploring these other creative processes, acting, painting, photography to be a better filmmaker. Now I’ve learned the importance of these other methods of exploring creativity and so now it’s been a while since I’ve made a film because I’ve fallen in love with these other things, particularly photography. I do think it’s time to do some short films again, maybe on 16mm film or Super-8. It’s never easy raising money for films though, so that’s the major roadblock at the moment.

BAKINIZ: Why do you think remodernism implies an importance in art?

JESSE: Because Remodernism understands how necessary it is for human beings to feel a connection with each other, and sharing your creative energy and the creative energy of others, whether through paintings or music or stories, etc, is the best way to establish and maintain that connection.

BAKINIZ: When did you meet with those movements?

JESSE: A lot of the ideas that led to Stuckism were published by punk rocker/painter Billy Childish as a series of statements about art that he called the “Hangman Communications” back in the mid 1990’s. They were published with one of his albums, I think. Anyway I saw these things and they corresponded with a lot of my own beliefs and values, things I’d talked about with people too, back in film school, I think we had a brief idea of starting a new movement called Emotionalism, which would have been very similar to what became Remodernism. Anyway that never happened, but when I saw that Billy and Charles started the Stuckists, I wrote to Charles about joining, and did. Soon after I met Charles during a visit he made to NY, and became a very active member of the group, organizing shows in the US. I stayed with them from 2001 until 2006, when I felt it was time to move on. During that time I started the Remodernist film group. Over this previous summer I wrote a film manifesto outlining a lot of the ideas that go into what I consider a Remodernist film to be.

BAKINIZ: What are some of these ideas?

JESSE: Well, the manifesto explains that remodernist film seeks a new spirituality in film, that spiritual films explore the simple truths and moments of humanity, and that remodernist films are minimal, stripped down and lyrical. Also that intuition, subjectivity, and flaws should be embraced. Japanese aesthetics like wabi-sabi and mono no aware are also mentioned as an important thing to consider when making a remodernist film. You can read the whole thing here:

http://jesse-richards.blogspot.com/2008/08/remodernist-film-manifesto.html

BAKINIZ: As a creator what do you expect from your audience?

JESSE: To be engaged in an authentic manner. To be real with me because I’m being real.

BAKINIZ: What are the best examples of remodernist films in cinema according to you?

JESSE: Well as far as actual remodernist films, there are very few. Ones I was involved in making, like “Shooting at the Moon” and my other short films, Harris Smith’s films, especially “Youngblood” and “Modern Young Man”, the Super-8 short films by ex-Stuckists Billy Childish and Wolf Howard. But I can give you a list of films and filmmakers that were a huge influence on Remodernist filmmaking. For example, some of my favorites are:

“The Foreigner” by Amos Poe
“Zero For Conduct” and “L’Atalante” by Jean Vigo
“The Mirror” and “Nostalghia” by Andrei Tarkovsky
“Tokyo Story” and “Tokyo Twilight” by Ozu Yasujiro
“Ugetsu” and “Life of Oharu” by Mizoguchi Kenji
“In the Mood for Love” and “Chungking Express” by Wong Kar-wai
“L’Eclisse” and “The Passenger” and “Il Grido” by Michelangelo Antonioni
“Mouchette” by Robert Bresson
“The Match Factory Girl” and “The Man Without a Past” by Aki Kaurismaki
“A nos amours” and “Van Gogh” by Maurice Pialat
“Millennium Mambo” by Hou Hsiao-hsien
“Morvern Callar” by Lynne Ramsay
“Odd Man Out” by Carol Reed
“Paranoid Park” and “Elephant” by Gus Van Sant
“Pather Panchali” by Satyajit Ray
“Rebels of the Neon God” and “What Time Is It There” by Tsai Ming-liang
“The Mother and the Whore” by Jean Eustache
“The World” by Jia Zhangke
“Shadows” by John Cassavetes
“Bring Me The Head of Alfredo Garcia” by Sam Peckinpah

also a lot of things by Jean Rollin (like his erotic vampire films) and Jess Franco and Nick Zedd are worth a look- those guys had the guts to explore their fantasies and desires in films, and really that’s not easy to have the bravery to do, because there’s always someone who’s gonna criticize that. Also “Eyes Without a Face” by Georges Franju is a great sort of remodernist horror film. Everything that came out of New York’s No-wave/punk film scene in the 70’s has been enormously influential… I could list movies that I think people should see for hours, so I’ll stop here…