Jan Fabre, a Belgian artist, set designer, theater director and dramaturgist, a descendant of the outstanding French entomologist Jean Henri Fabre, was born in Antwerp in 1958. The city of Rubens and van Dyck was also the place where Jan obtained education at the Municipal Institute of Decorative Arts and Royal Academy of Fine Arts.
The critics characterize this artist’s style as extreme art behavior. In rebellious 1970 he used his own blood in his painting and arranged “money” performances where he burnt the audience’s money. Fabre’s action Russian Roulette, when he proposed six critics representing various kinds of arts, to shoot at him with a revolver (according to the author, the critics failed) caused a sensation. His actions that have always combined imitative arts and theater are described in the books on contemporary dance and arts.
In the early 1980s, his staging of two of his own plays, De macht der theaterlijke dwaasheden (The Power of Theatrical Madness) and Het is theater zoals te verwachten en te voorzien (It Is Theater As It To Be Expected And Foreseen), made a grandiose impression. Both performances were greeted with delight and, at the same time, with embarrassment, because Fabre tried to challenge the traditions of both classical and avant-garde theater. On the whole, his plays are made up of a number of miniatures that envisage an open, half-improvisatory performing manner. Fabre has also broken the frameworks of the traditional performance, showing so-called living installations that would last for many hours in succession without a break (Real Body in Real Time).
For the past 30 years, the human body in all of its manifestations has remained the object of his research. Such productions as The Sound of One Hand Clapping (1990), Frankfurt Ballet, body trilogy Sweet Temptations (1991), Glowing Icons (1996), examine the physical, spiritual, and erotic aspects of the body. The performance Universal Copyrights, where Fabre made his Flemish fellow choreographer Wim Vandekeybus wander across a museum of anatomy and contemplate plastic surgery, acquired wide recognition.
The last stage of acitivites is primarily made up of the collection of theater monologues created mainly for his muse, actress Els Deceukelier. Fabre calls this kind of performances a “one-man movement.” The mere proof of his recognition in the theatrical world is that in 2005 he was invited to head the world’s most prestigious Avignon Theater Festival.
No less fruitful is Fabre’s activity as a contemporary artist. His most famous works include the Tivoli Mansion entirely covered with ballpoint drawings, The Man measuring the clouds (1998), a bronze sculpture, whose copies are preserved in the world’s most prestigious collections, as well as Heaven of Delight (2002), a work performed at order of Queen Paola of Belgium as a decoration of the ceiling in the Mirror Hall of the Brussels Royal Palace. Unexpectedly, Fabre covered the ceiling with upper wings of 1.4 billion scarabs. The unusual coating reflects the light, playing with all tints, from green to blue. The spectacle of colors is reflected by the ancient mirrors of the 19th-century hall, producing a stunning effect.
Fabre has participated in such notable international art forums as the Venice Biennale (1984, 1990, 2003, 2009), the documenta in Kassel (1987 and 1992), Sao Paulo Art Biennial (1991), Biennale de Lyon (2000), Valencia Biennial (2001), Istanbul Biennial (1992 and 2001), his works have been on display in the Louvre Museum.
Fabre is on visit in Kyiv as an author of the provocation installation Fountain of the World As a Young Artist, where the artist’s dummy in the state of erection lies surrounded by tombs. The Fountain is exhibited within the framework of the current Sexuality & Transcendence exposition running in the Pinchuk ArtCentre.
You are working with many kinds of art. What is the most important thing for you, theater, dance or artistic activity?
“All of this is equally important for me.”
But what is the foundation uniting such different artistic genres?
“Everything is based on the idea of metamorphosis and research of the human body.”
Then what is a human body? An object of research, desire, or inspiration?
“Human body is everything. It is a trap, a lab, and a sensation. This is the measure of everything in terms of politics, philosophy, and society.”
Please tell more about your theatrical experience. When does the performance begin?
“Drawing and text are the basis of a theatrical production. But when I work with a company of dancers or actors, they become the most important objects of my creative work, because namely actors and dancers give the needed gloss to the performance.”
Do you place the work with an actor to the center?
“Yes, of course, because actors make the nerve of a theatrical work. I can be a good stage director, I can write good scripts, make good costumes or decorations, but the play won’t exist unless the actor is professional and talented.”
Is there any possibility of catharsis in theater in classical, Aristotle’s meaning?
“Yes, I believe in the Greek matrix of catarsis. It is not without a reason that my theater is called Farmakon. Farmakon is a Greek word meaning a medicine that can either heal or kill you.”
In one of your interviews you said that you want to create a space that produces movement on its own. How is that possible?
“I think that all of my works are about the space being divided, because space in itself is content, a filling, whereas my works divide this content. For example, you can see an artist ejaculating, you can see this vertical white line, and the space becomes divided, it becomes absolutely different, it acquires the movement.”
In continuation of the topic of your installations, why do you so frequently use insects in your creative work?
“Because I am an amateur entomologist. I think that insects are the most important and oldest computer in the world.”
A computer?
“Because they preserve the largest memory capacity of our planet. If you take away the insects from the planet, it will cease to function. Incidentally, you should know that once you have a really good, nice and clean house, spiders must be living there. Once you take away the spiders, the house’s harmony will fade away.”
What is provocation for you? Is there any need for provocation nowadays?
“In my opinion this word is always used in a wrong way. Once you indulge in a proper analysis to the word ‘provocation,’ you will see that it means an evolution of consciousness. I believe that what artists do is precisely developing the consciousness, helping it to evolve.”
Why is death and violence so frequently present in your works as the leading motives?
“It is not true. What you actually see is death- and life-energy. For example, this work, The Fountain of the World is dedicated to the topic memento mori (famous Latin maximum, remember about the death, which was used as a greeting in the Medival monastic orders. – Author). Here you can also see the Flemish tradition of painting, where an important place was taken by the memento mori tradition. So I come from the country where the oil painting was in fact invented.”
Anyway, death has always been actual. What is your attitude, on the whole, to actuality in art?
“Actuality is news, news is fashion. I am not dealing with the fashion.”
However, you don’t look like a man that pays no attention to fashion.
“No, not in my work. Indeed, I have nice glasses and a stylish jacket, but this has no influence upon my work. An artist should not think about things that are fashionable or actual at the moment. He should simply create.”
The last thing, what is your attitude on the topic of this exhibit. What is sexuality?
“The greatest mover of life, physical and spiritual.”
Then is transcendence something contrary to this?
“No. Love within sexuality is precisely transcendence. When two bodies reveal themselves and become a whole via an act of sexuality, all of this becomes a different thing, transcendence.”
