Interview with Marcondes Dourado

Marcondes Dourado is a young Brazilian artist (Irecé, 1973) who expresses himself in an interdisciplinary fashion. He does not feel particularly linked with any specific artistic medium, but looks again and again for an entirely individual, innovating aesthetic. His ideas have been incorporated and expressed in photography, theatre, dance and video productions. He also makes combinations, in which different creative media are used. Then, very special performances, or 'spectacles' as he himself calls them, come into being, which are evidence of a strong personal vision. He was discovered at the 11th International Videobrasil Festival in Sao Paulo (November 1996) where he won first prize in a video competition. He is describes as a very promising talent who dismisses traditional concepts and, as an independent talent, calls every authority into question. At the 15th World Wide Video Festival, he is represented by his video work Ogodô Ano 2000, a non conventional portrait of the carnival festivities in Salvador and with Bardo, a multimedia performance based on texts from Antonin Artaud (1896-1948). This French poet/writer/film actor and critic suffered from a number of mental illnesses throughout his life and spent long periods in various psychiatric institutes in the south of France. He was an important literary figure in the intellectual life of Paris at the time of Surrealism and he worked among others with André Breton, Balthus and André Masson. Artaud is best known for his Manifeste du Théâtre de la Cruauté (1932) in which a primitive ceremonial experience is recalled which comes from the human subconscious. The performance Bardo by Dourado is more in line with another of Artaud's works, namely Le Théâtre et son double (1938). In this the actor and the audience come together in a magical form of exorcism; movements, Sounds, strange stage sets and lighting are brought together to create a new language which is superior to words. A language that disrupts logic and forces the viewer to see the baseness of his world. The performance Bardo continues the influence of Artaud's work on the forming of present day culture (his works have also inspired artists like Georg Baselitz, Jean Dubuffet, Kiki Smith and Nancy Spero). The main part in Bardo is played by the Brazilian dancer Sandra del Carmen.

Marieke van Hal: In the videotape Ogodô Ano 2000 we see slow-motion close-ups of people in the gay scene of Salvador joyously celebrating carnival. The shots show an ironic vision about the universe of popular aesthetics. Where does the title come from? How do you see this work in relation to the idea’s and themes that concern you?

MvH: Both in Ogodô Ano 2000 as in Bardo dance is central. The attention of the viewer is directed towards the people who move physically to sound/music. Brazil is renowned as a land of dance, where in fact dance is practised as an art. Do you have a special affinity with dance? What meaning does dance have in Ogodô Ano 2000? And how should we interpret the (almost impossible) dance movements by Sandra del Carmen in the performance Bardo?

MvH: Bardo is being performed in a setting which seems far from ideal for dance. The atmosphere is a little chilly, also because of the water, the cold aluminium basins in and through which the dancer has to manoeuvre and the nature of the video images being projected on a large screen in the background. Does this have anything to do with the title of the performance? And why do you create such a disagreeable atmosphere? MD: The title of the performance was taken from the Tibetan Book of the Dead. It means an intermediate state of consciousness, between life and death. Bardo has a strong sensorial appeal. The scenic elements that are used (metal basins, water, hair), the videotape with fragments of the human body and the performer totally naked and hairless bring the audience in contact with forgotten powers in the contemporary world. This is the role of the theatre thought of as a ritual: to resume experiences with the body which will make us question our way of life.

MvH: Bardo is based on texts by Antonin Artaud, who, in the thirties, attempted to replace the classical ‘bourgeois’ theatre with his ‘‘Théâtre de la Cruauté’, a primitive ceremonial experience to liberate the human subconscious and reveal man to himself. Artaud: “It has always seemed to me that the true theatre is the exercise of a terrible and dangerous act, where not only the idea of theatre and spectacle, but also the whole idea of science, religion and art are eliminated. The act that I am talking about aims at the true transformation of the human body, both organic and physical. The theatre is not this scenic parade where a myth is developed virtually and symbolically, but the melting-pot of fire and real flesh where anatomically, through the despising of bones, of limbs and of syllables, the bodies are restored.” In what way are his ideas reflected in the way you direct this performance?

MD: I search for intensity in art. When I mix theatre, video, Music and text, I think of all these elements as a ritual. It is this ‘music’ that will affect the audience. The idea of the performance was brought to me by a text by Antonin Artaud called: ‘Madness and Black Magic’, where the French thinker describes a period when he was confined in psychiatric clinics. The therapeutic methods, like the electrical shocks, and the ways modern medicine finds to annihilate the powers of life. The experience of the electrical shock is an extreme violence to the spirit and makes medicine an accomplice of the most sinister magic.

– Marieke van Hal