Talk with Robert Crumb and Daniela Steinfeld, Mai 28, 2004 in Cologne, original english version The talk was attended by Crumb‘s friend Pete Poplaski, and the cologne collector Michael Trier D.Steinfeld In the letter you wrote me you stated that you „basically hate the artworld“. R.Crumb Yeah You also said that compared to the artworld the comic-world is a „peasant farm in rural Yucatan“ That‘s right (laughs) I just wondered what‘s the big difference? In a word: money, money is the big difference. So you think the artworld is all about money? When paintings go for 80 million dollars, it‘s about money, yeah. So, when that much money is involved in anything the bullshit level goes way up, way up. I mean there‘s so much bullshit in the artworld. It all pretends it‘s being about culture and, you know, aesthetic appreciation and that makes it a particular reprehensive kind of bullshit. (laughs) You know Hollywood is crass, the peanut industry is crass, the artworld pretends to be refined and about aesthetics and all that, but if so you don‘t talk that much about the money part of it . See that in 'Artforum‘ it just goes on and on, this conluded talk about aesthetics and breakthroughs and this blablabla, so much bullshit Do you think that it‘s super-hypocritical? Totally, totally . What do you think? Well, that‘s why I asked you to show with me, mainly for the work, but also for your attitude behind that. At least I have some trust that there‘s still something true behind it. There are still plenty good artists around, still plenty of interesting artwork is made, that‘s not the problem. The artworld that‘s the problem, the art pyramid is the problem. Why do you think this pyramid comes into place. There are the artists... Which are at the bottom of it Yes the basic of the pyramid, the most important part of it. And they start from this sincerety. They don‘t all start from sincerety! But many do, perhaps, when they‘re young. Many think that they are, but they‘re not really. What they‘re really at for is glory. They‘re at it to get the glory, and so they do at times what is called the "boho dance". This kind were you pretend that you‘re this rebellious, outrageous, creative breakthrough. Bashing the bourgeois, shocking the bourgeois and all that, but at the same time it‘s courting the bourgeois. Because that‘s where the money is, that‘s where the power is. And if you don‘t get recognition you don‘t get shown, you don‘t get the money and so you need these peoples attention. Okay, so you have to play the game Yes, lots of artists play the game and it‘s a clever way of playing. You speak your mind freely, but nevertheless it seems that exactly that draws all these people who play the game towards you and you‘re into the game 'cause with this big exhibition you‘re just part of the mainstream artworld. Absolutely But isn‘t that a joke? It‘s totally ironic. It‘s irony, but it doesn‘t give me a great satisfaction that I arrived, that I achieved something. I can‘t say that because I come from the world of comics. For decades, for the first ten years I was drawing comics, everybody that thought I was talented that came from the artworld said: „Crumb why do you waste your time with comics, get yourself some canvases and some paint and make art. Why comics?“ that was in the sixties. You know, that‘s a very oldfashioned conception, because now you can do photography, drawing, painting, whatever and it‘s considered to be art But in those days, when I was young and I was trying, the only thing I had going for me was my art. The only thing I had on my side was drawing comics. I had trouble attracting women and stuff, I wasn‘t really good-looking and I was shy. All I had was this art and comics just didn‘t do it. The artists that would excite women were painting oil-painting, even write poetry, something more romantic. Drawing comics just didn‘t make any impression at all. (laughs) But you were super-young and very fast it worked out for you. In the beginning the comics I did went over with the hippies, because it reflected the LSD, the psychedelic drug experience, which a lot of people my generation could relate to. And the comics... what‘s that all about... nobody had done comics like that or very few people. I did it stronger than the other ones had done. So that went over with the hippies. Something funny and kind of unique, a hippie cartoonist. I wasn‘t doing stuff real personal yet. But now I don‘t see that hippie cartoonist. I know Mr. Natural and all that, but I don‘t care so much, it‘s part of history. What I really care for is what you are doing now. Which is this more old-fashioned kind of drawing, but it reveils much more to me and my generation, because when your drawings were in my space the young people that came completely related to that . That‘s amazing And I wonder why is that? I don‘t know, I have no idea. Maybe it comes from being alienated, feeling alienated by culture. So that a lot of alienated young people can identify with it. When the „Crumb“ film came out it reached a much bigger audience than anything I ever did with my comics. It‘s really divided between the people that could relate to where I was coming from and those who couldn‘t. The reaction to that came from the people that could relate to, that also felt alienated somehow and I heard those who couldn‘t relate were the ones well adjusted in the culture the way it is, you know. Probably they‘re in certain ways healthier, they can hop in cars and go surfing every time but the ones who can‘t do that relate to my work (laughs). So there‘s a kind of young people in your space that feel inspired by my work,I don‘t know, maybe... that‘s the only kind of explanation I can think of. Do you think it‘s necessary to do a deeper kind of artwork to feel this kind of alienation? To not be so well adjusted with everything that‘s going on? To have some distance to the culture you gotta be an outsider, you know. If you‘re in there, too much successful in adapting to the way the culture is, you‘re not outside enough to be able to (pauses)....I don‘t know, maybe that‘s not true. I just try to get an example of somebody who‘s really well adjusted, gets along very well, is very successful and is also doing interesting artwork. What about Picasso? Yeah, maybe, I don‘t know if he was so well adjusted. He just had a very forceful will, a very willful personality, very successful, a good looking guy, all that. But that was a different time. I don‘t know. In the press conference yesterday you said when you came back from Cannes your esteem in humanity went another 5 points down Or more. Thousands of people packed into the streets, pressed against each other like sardines, gawking at the stars. Looking at their faces, they were just there looking at the stars, they‘re just sheep. It‘s disgusting, I was horrified there, observing people. It‘s literally with that thing like that that there‘s no hope, no hope for these hordes. (laughs) What do you think is missing there or what do you think they're looking for there? I have no idea. They come there, they stand there looking at the stars, all that indicates to me is that they're so bereft of something more substantial in their lives for real, that means something to them. But the movie stars are even not close enough, they‘re far away, little figures that distanced are going up that red carpeted steps. What satisfaction they‘re at, I don‘t get it. That‘s sad. So do you think they‘re not trying to develop anything substantial inside of them ? Not trying? Not even aware that something is missing. They‘re so far gone they even don‘t know where. Aline and me left the building after seeing the movie, we came out of the 'Palais de Cinema', we wanted to go back to meet people at this Café. We had to push our way through this packed crowd of people who wanted to see their stars going on the red carpet. Packed, blocks and blocks and after a while you just want to start shuffing them really rudely. I didn‘t of course because I didn‘t want to get into a fight. I can‘t fight. There‘s much disgust and anger and contempt for this people. Lambs to the slaughter, ready for fashism or anything. I don‘t know what, just that‘s just the kind what I call "friendly fashism", that sort of mass media , the thing where these people are just turning into these sheep, gawking at the stars. Your drawing, is that a tool for you to develop something inside yourself, to learn about yourself? Once I got alienated as a teenager, once I realized I was an outsider, when I was 15, I felt I couldn‘t make it into this teenager world, I can‘t be part of this, and I was aware of this at that time, I immediately started to develop my own feelgood things, my own tastes. I was free then to presume my own play, my own appreciation for the kind of music I really liked, my own appreciation for the kind of women I really liked. I no longer felt pressure to conform to the standard type female that was popular at that time . I was free to enjoy my own view. But you must have changed I did change. It was so painful at that time to be an outsider, that I didn‘t realize how free I had become, you know. Just later on I could appreciate that more and more. Then you realize, yeah it could be cool with you, actually cultivate your own personal truthful way of observing the world. It‘s in your best interest doing that, because we all have this capacity to observe and to analyze with our intelligence what we see around us. And it‘s in our interest to use it as much as we possibly can and not just be ashamed and passively accept that stuff that is thrown at us all the time by the mass media through all the years - all this propaganda .The world wants to put you in a box and keep you there. So this watching and analyzing is a kind of way to cope? Yes, it‘s true. We‘re all personal survivors in the world in our own way, you know, using your own intelligence and awareness, it‘s in your best interest to do that. It makes you free from the less succeptible forces that always are trying to control you, always want to manipulate you and use your energy for their selfish benefits all the time, just can‘t help it. It‘s a predatory universe, it‘s nature, the beast. It‘s not personally, we can‘t take it personal. By stop taking it personally it‘s also a step forward you stop being so angry about it. I was really angry about it until maybe ten years ago. So that changed, and what did do that change? Meditation helped a lot to put a distance toward the anger , and I stopped taking it so personally.But we‘re not raised to understand the nature of the beast. People are constantly outraged and offended by the world around them, all of us are. We feel hurt and offended by our fellow men, by the way they mistreat us or ignore us (laughs). But we‘re not allowed to show it Of course not. It‘s not attractive to show it, but everybody that walks the earth by the time they get old they start to be quite bitter. Life‘s not been good to them , life has given them a raw deal. So is meditation, as you just said, a way for you to not get bitter? The more detached you are, you‘re taking it less personal, you start to see that it‘s just a predatory universe, you‘re part of it, all this predatory hierarchies somehow. We bloom because something else dies. The more detached you can get from that, the better off you are. Most of us end up angry and bitter, ya. You can deal with it, you recognize it, you don‘t want to become paranoid either . I used to feel paranoid all the time, fearful. It makes you less afraid, you learn to deal with it, you know the strategies. It‘s not simple, it‘s not easy. I think if you do this kind of inner work it must affect also the way you see and that must affect the way you draw. Yeah, thats right And Pete said yesterday something interesting. He said that a work of art has to be an object of magic. I wonder how your inner work transforms into your outer work. An artwork has to be an object of magic. The more magic it is, the more direct and straightforward it is. The more of yourself you put into it, the more simple and truthful is it . I embrace magic. Even in a very simple object, primitive object even. The more magic is contrived to try to convince you of something, to basically get your money, get your energy somehow, it‘s manipulation, it‘s not magic. It‘s a kind of black magic. The better they are at it the scarier it is. So in a way you put your soul in your work for everybody to see Yes, thats right. And with soul I don‘t solely mean the revelations and confessions in your work, I also mean something more subtle Yeah, all of that, the revelations and more subtle things. Trying to keep free of one thing, being an automatic, of having a „shtick“ . I try not to have a „shtick“. One of the biggest dangers in cartooning is, that almost always it get‘s into a rud, they have a formula, it becomes very dull and uninteresting. Magic.....A lot of cartoonists loose the magic over time. As you get older that‘s a hard thing, to keep the magic in your work. It also involves allowing the spontaneity, the revelation of your subconscious coming through. That‘s part of the magic. I call it the alchemy of art. Even great artists have lost that past the age of fifty. Lots of artists of history were dying young. We don‘t know what would‘ve happened to them if they would have lived to old age. Breughel was fourtysix when he died, I dont know what would‘ve happened . Paul Klee or even Picasso, lots of guys, their later work is not so interesting. They keep doing it out of a kind of momentum, their ego wouldn‘t let them stop. Maybe they should have, I dont know. Getting tired of just keeping turning it out. Ego.... So do you try through meditation to get rid of ego? Yeah, sure, of course. I try to get rid of self-importance. It‘s a big job (laughs). I have a big ego. And the only way you‘re gonna be able to do spontaneous work, if the ego does not get in the way. It‘s like to move a house out of the way sometimes. You know, let that spontaneous thing happen, let the alchemy happen. Sometimes you just have to stop, stop doing it, maybe you think you‘ll never be doing it again. Let it go, that helps sometimes, you know. To go back to a fresh start, a fresh approach. Where there‘s recognition, where there‘s expectation and stuff like that, analyze and thinking, worry about what you‘re doing, that doesn‘t help for the magic to appear. Do you think that in great art something bigger than the personality is coming through? Of course! Absolutely. The bigger thing is complicated, it‘s not a simple thing. You are as an artist embodied in the culture of the time and all those forces are at work that are so big that you can‘t possibly understand. And if your world declines, maybe because something is happening in the culture... (pauses) Otto Dix, a great artist, great artist. His work he did after the war was completely mediocre, but before the war in the twenties and early thirties it was fabulous. The culture went through this terrible changes here, that just shattered the guy, and other artists of his time too. All of those guys... the changes that happened were so rough on these artists. Really, they could not longer deal with the changes. George Grozs was a great artist, he did great work. And after a little time period during the war in Germany and after that he became crazy. It turned their minds upside down. It was such a big energy, whole Europe was destroyed Terrible. The fact is, that there is forces that are so big they cannot be controlled, they can‘t. I know that the time of the sixties and all that had a huge effect on my destiny and my work, I couldn‘t have controlled that, I can‘t. Your time as a child and young man, as it was shown in the „Crumb“ movie, is this still a great part of you? Yes it is. Was there never a point were you had the feeling that you freed yourself from your past? No, I don‘t think so. You can detach yourself to some degree, but there are just layers and you keep adding more layers. If you keep cultivating consciousness and detachment and awareness, that helps, those things you know. You can kind of graduate to a different level. I used to think I could totally free myself, but it‘s not possible. But you can get a different perspective on things, if you keep working at it. Meditation is really good. I started meditating in 1996 and every time I do it, it‘s good every time.You know, it's practise, like all other arts. Everything is an art, everything is a practise and a repetition of some kind, if you want to get good at it. And meditation is like that, the more you practise it the better you get at it. It‘s a long slow process. No computer, or suddenly a great flash and white light and angels start to appear or anything like that. If you meditate do you believe in something like an afterlife or something bigger than human existence? I didn‘t when I started, but now I do (laughs). Now I know there‘s something bigger . Definitely. I couldn‘t characterize it or define it. And if you get along with it more and more, you start getting interested in it more and more and want to connect with it more and more. That‘s an amazing process. I‘m surprised.... Do you start thinking of death? Of course. Death is your advisor. If you get older death becomes a companion. You know it‘s going to take you pretty soon, getting closer and closer and you want to prepare for that. The more in control you are of your death the hour it happens, the better off you are. The point when the time is right you know how to deal with it, you know, professional (laughs). I want to go through this transformation of death the best possible way I can. I don't want to go through it screaming „ahhhhh“ (laughs) But that can happen Yes it can.. All these meditation things... it‘s kind of tabu. Many people find it embarassing to talk about that Of course. I find it embarassing to talk about it pretty much. I don‘t really talk about it very much. Because people start thinking of me as I‘m a kind of new age nutcase, talking about something like meditation. You make yourself vulnerable. And a lot of books you can read recommend that you better not talk about it because of that. You get very disturbed. But people are so different, you can‘t judge other people. I don‘t know if meditation is for everybody, if everybody would need to meditate. I do (laughs). It preserves my sanity (laughs). If you do something so personal as an artwork, which might be more personal than working in a bank..... Might be, might not be, depends on the individual. Charles Bukowskis way of dealing with all things was to drink, the way he got through the day was drinking. He was a great writer, it worked for him, it wouldn‘t work for everybody, it would‘ve killed me, but it worked for him. But I heard that secretly in the last years before he died he started meditating. Oh he did? Bukowski? That‘s what I heard, yeah (laughs). He never admitted it . I heard that. That could kill every perception people had of Bukowski, that he was meditating sitting in the lotus-position....(laughing) The last few years of his life, you know. Not before that, just when he was quite old. Probably he felt the end was coming soon (laughs). Perhaps he started to feel to get ready for that. I don‘t know. I probably should have started earlier, I don‘t know. I tried to do it, but I couldn‘t do it when I was younger. Would you advise people to start meditating? I would. Maybe not in your twenties. They‘re to restless, they still want to conquer the world too much. Meditation is suffering, it‘s painful for them. Maybe in your thirties or forties. I wish I‘d started ten years earlier. I‘m thinking of some important question I could ask you before stopping this. I dont know if there are some expectations what people would like to know Like what kind of pen I use? After the press conference some TV teams jumped on you with questions and I had the feeling you answered quite mechanical. You said something about being obsessive compulsive. Do you have some standard answers in these situations? To give them what they want to hear? Well I gave enough interviews, but it‘s not that I give them what they want to hear, it‘s an easy answer. It‘s an easy answer to a tough question. I had enough time to come up with some easy answers, to develop an interview-style. (laughs). A big crowd like that is scary. A big crowd is intimidating. There must be more to your life than being obsessive compulsive Sure there is more. But I‘m an obsessive, compulsive person. I wash the dishes with the same attention to detail like I do my artwork, I can‘t help it. But when you‘re confronted with a whole lot of media people and all those cameras and stuff, you really have to deal with this, keep your thoughts controlled. To have easy answers, that helps you getting through all that stuff. The media is a big hungry beast. I never saw it like that in real life, the microphones were pointed at you like weapons Yeah. The media is an animal. It needs constant fueling. It‘s never enough, it always needs more. All those people with those microphones, to be the object of that....It‘s not pleasant for me. Coming back to the first question, in your letter you also wrote that you expect the artworld to collapse, as people will be so fed up with being cheated. So what would be your advise to change this, and what would you advise to young artists to make things more essential again? Everything is born out of regional culture, genuine regional culture. The most beautiful works of art, of music derived of regional culture. An individual approach. Handcrafted works. But in our days showing in New York, showing everywhere... don‘t you think that's a good thing, the global culture? I think it can be good. We know other people better, we can relate to their cultures what may keep us from killing them. We know what they‘re about, we see enough of them through our TVs or through communication on the internet or whatever, we might not have to fight them. On the other hand the creation of culture was always regional. Almost all the interesting stuff I like comes from regional cultures, the best music, interesting artwork. I think somehow you have to get back to the individual work. You just can‘t have some big corporations who make music for the whole world. It‘s terrible, it‘s contrived, it‘s artificial, it‘s aggressive, obnoxious. Like all these plastic-loudspeakers in all these restaurants, it appalls me and makes me want to jump on them and smash them. Just one more question, I would be interested in. Was there any difference for you in showing in my small space or in a big museum show or doesn‘t the space matter at all? I have to think about that. Because it‘s a big museum show it‘s more difficult to deal with. My initial impulse was yeah, sure you know, always go with the little guy. I like the small places. For me it all comes down to the print size. What I really like is as cheaply as possible simple printed comic-books. It‘s there where I see my art really is, in difference to those who like to see my art on the wall. I especially like your original drawings, I can much more relate to them. I don‘t know if its „auratic“ or your personal touch or whatever. But I know your in it for the cheap comics Yes .But in a world of six billion people the only way they can have that is comics Yes, its democratic It has to be community based and people create their own culture for their community. Otherwise you have these museum where hordes of people are running to see it. I wanted to see Hieronymus Bosch in Rotterdam and I couldn‘t even see the paintings. There were like ten people in front of me, crammed. Crouds, hordes, forget all this, look at a book! It‘s not worth it going there and fighting with the crowd. All the museums in the world are like that now. These exclusive, considered great works of art....I can‘t help it. Looking at originals, it‘s good for the artworld, but not for the works, they are destroyed by too many people. ©R.Crumb + Daniela Steinfeld 2004, all rights reserved