LOCATION/TRANSLATION: Joseph del Pesco

The Arts Research Center at UC Berkeley will present the symposium Location/Translation: Art and Engagement from the Local to the Global on September 19, 2012. To jump-start the conversation in advance of the event, the speakers have been invited to respond to the questions "What does 'local' mean to you? How does it get utilized in your work, if at all?" This posting is by Joseph del Pesco,  Director of the Kadist Art Foundation in San Francisco.

I'd like to share this short text written by artist Ben Kimont:

Passing On

“From musical compositions to recipes to instruction pieces, people have been sharing their making, meaning, and authorship with others. When a pianist follows a score, a chef cooks a dish, or a person follows an instruction piece, variations and interpretations are made and shared. In this way a sound, a taste, or an idea is passed on, appreciated, and yet also changed by this new maker, perhaps with new instruments and ingredients and within a new context. Whether the others involved are an audience, those around the table, or visitors to a museum, this experience takes on a broader meaning due to its place in a progression, an atemporal community of makers connected through their consideration of a given idea. But by acknowledging these other composers, chefs, and artists who have worked with the idea before, we can see authorship as residing in a multitude of makers and participants, and perhaps from this loosening of the idea of the single author, we can better get to the content of the work at hand. Perhaps this will make it is easier to say, sit back and enjoy the show, enjoy the meal, enjoy the idea we are passing on.”

BK 2011