I was raised by lesbians in the mountains, and I sort of came like a forest gnome to New York City a while back. (Laughter) Really messed with my head, but I'll get into that later.
Fun criado por lesbianas nas montañas e cheguei como un gnomo do bosque a Nova York xa hai tempo. (Risas) Coa cabeza feita un bo lío, pero deixaremos iso para despois.
I'll start with when I was eight years old. I took a wood box, and I buried a dollar bill, a pen and a fork inside this box in Colorado. And I thought some strange humanoids or aliens in 500 years would find this box and learn about the way our species exchanged ideas, maybe how we ate our spaghetti. I really didn't know. Anyway, this is kind of funny, because here I am, 30 years later, and I'm still making boxes.
Comezarei con cando tiña oito anos. Collín unha caixa de madeira, e enterrei un billete, un boli e un garfo nalgures en Colorado. E pensei que algunha clase de humanoides raros ou extraterrestres nuns 500 anos, atoparían esta caixa e aprenderían o xeito en que as nosas especies trocan ideas. Talvez como comemos espaguetes. Eu que sei! De todos modos, ten a súa graza porque aquí estou, 30 anos despois, e aínda estou a facer caixas.
Now, at some point I was in Hawaii -- I like to hike and surf and do all that weird stuff, and I was making a collage for my ma. And I took a dictionary and I ripped it up, and I made it into a sort of Agnes Martin grid, and I poured resin all over it and a bee got stuck. Now, she's afraid of bees and she's allergic to them, so I poured more resin on the canvas, thinking I could hide it or something. Instead, the opposite happened: It sort of created a magnification, like a magnifying glass, on the dictionary text.
Así que, en certo momento estaba en Hawai --gústame ir de excursión, facer surf e esas cousas raras. Estaba facendo unha colaxe para a miña nai e collín un dicionario, esfolleino, e fixen como unha cuadrícula ó estilo Agnes Martin, enzoufeina con resina e unha abella quedou atrapada. Mamá tenlle medo ás abellas, é alérxica, así que boteille máis resina ó lenzo, pensando que podería agachala ou algo. En cambio, sucedeu o contrario. Magnificouse dalgunha maneira, como unha lente de aumento sobre o dicionario.
So what did I do? I built more boxes. This time, I started putting electronics, frogs, strange bottles I'd find in the street -- anything I could find -- because I was always finding things my whole life, and trying to make relationships and tell stories between these objects. So I started drawing around the objects, and I realized: Holy moly, I can draw in space! I can make free-floating lines, like the way you would draw around a dead body at a crime scene. So I took the objects out, and I created my own taxonomy of invented specimens. First, botanical -- which you can kind of get a sense of. Then I made some weird insects and creatures. It was really fun; I was just drawing on the layers of resin.
Entón que fixen? Construín máis caixas. Esta vez, empecei a pór aparellos electrónicos, ras, botellas estrañas que atopaba na rúa, calquera cousa que atopase; porque atopei cousas toda a miña vida, e tratei de relacionalas e contar as historias entre eses obxectos. Deste modo, comecei a debuxar arredor destes obxectos, e decateime de que: Manda carallo! Podo debuxar no espazo! Podo facer que os trazos floten en liberdade, igual que debuxar arredor dun cadáver na escena do delito. Así que saquei os obxectos e creei a miña propia taxinomía de espécimes inventados. Primeiro a botánica, da que podedes facervos unha idea. Despois insectos raros e bichos. Era moi divertido debuxar nas capas de resina.
And it was cool, because I was actually starting to have shows and stuff, I was making some money, I could take my girlfriend for dinner, and like, go to Sizzler. It was some good shit, man. (Laughter)
E foi marabilloso, porque empecei coas exposicións e esas cousas. Gañaba cartos, xa podía levar a miña moza cear, e ir, por exemplo, ó Sizzler. Unha cousa caralluda, tíos. (Risas)
At some point, I got up to the human form, life-size resin sculptures with drawings of humans inside the layers. This was great, except for one thing: I was going to die. I didn't know what to do, because the resin was going to kill me. And I went to bed every night thinking about it.
Chegado un punto, intereseime pola forma humana. Escultura de resina a tamaño real, con debuxos humanos dentro das capas. Foi xenial, excepto por unha cousa: Ía dereito á morte. Non sabía que facer porque a resina íame matar e deitábame tódalas noites pensando niso.
So I tried using glass. I started drawing on the layers of glass, almost like if you drew on a window, then you put another window, and another window, and you had all these windows together that made a three-dimensional composition. And this really worked, because I could stop using the resin.
Así que tratei de empregar vidro. Comecei a debuxar nas capas de vidro, case como se debuxas nunha fiestra, e logo pos outra fiestra, e outra fiestra... e tiña todas esas fiestras xuntas formando una composición tridimensional. E isto realmente funcionou porque podía deixar de utilizar resina.
So I did this for years, which culminated in a very large work, which I call "The Triptych." "The Triptych" was largely inspired by Hieronymus Bosch's "[The] Garden of Earthly Delights," which is a painting in the [Museo del] Prado in Spain. Do you guys know this painting? Good, it's a cool painting. It's kind of ahead of its time, they say. So, "The Triptych." I'll walk you through this piece. It weighs 24,000 pounds. It's 18 feet long. It's double-sided, so it's 36 feet of composition. It's kind of weird. Well, that's the blood fountain. (Laughter) To the left, you have Jesus and the locusts. There's a cave where all these animal-headed creatures travel between two worlds. They go from the representational world, to this analog-mesh underworld, where they're hiding. This is where the animal-headed creatures are by the lighthouse, and they're all about to commit mass suicide into the ocean. The ocean is made up of thousands of elements. This is a bird god tied up to a battleship. (Laughter) Billy Graham is in the ocean; the Horizon from the oil spill; Waldo; Osama Bin Laden's shelter -- there's all kinds of weird stuff that you can find if you look really hard, in the ocean. Anyway, this is a lady creature. She's coming out of the ocean, and she's spitting oil into one hand and she has clouds coming out of her other hand. Her hands are like scales, and she has the mythological reference of the Earth and cosmos in balance.
Fixen isto durante anos, o que culminou nunha grande obra que chamei <i>O tríptico</i>. <i>O tríptico</i> estaba inspirado en boa medida por <i>O xardín das delicias</i> de Hieronymus Bosch. Un cadro que está no museo do Prado, en España. Coñecédelo? Si, eh? Está moi ben. Disque está adiantado ó seu tempo. Entón <i>O tríptico</i>. Vou falarvos un pouco sobre esta peza: Pesa 11.000 kilos. Mide 5 metros e medio de longo. Ten dobre cara, o que veñen sendo 10 metros de composición. É rariño. Ben, esta é a fonte de sangue. (Risas) Á esquerda temos a Xesús máis as lagostas. Hai una cova onde todos estes seres con cabeza de animal viaxan entre dous mundos. Van dun mundo de representación a este inframundo de rede analóxica, onde se agochan. Aquí están os seres con cabeza de bicho xunto ó faro, a piques de suicidarse en masa botándose ó océano. O océano está composto por centos de elementos. Este é un deus paxaro atado a un acoirazado. Billy Graham está no océano; o Horizon o buque do derramo petrolífero; Waldo; o refuxio de Osama Bin Laden. Unha chea de cousas raras que podedes atopar buscando ben a fondo no océano. Esta é unha especie de muller-bicho. Está saíndo do océano e está a cuspir petróleo nunha man, e ten nubes saíndolle da outra. A súas mans son coma balanzas é un tipo de referencia mitolóxica da Terra, o cosmos e o equilibro.
So that's one side of "The Triptych." It's a little narrative thing. That's her hand that she's spitting into. And then, when you go to the other side, she has like a trunk, like a bird's beak, and she's spitting clouds out of her trunk. Then she has an 18-foot-long serpent's tail that connects "The Triptych." Anyway, her tail catches on fire from the back of the volcano. (Laughter) I don't know why that happened.
Esta sería unha parte d'<i>O Tríptico</i>. Un pouco unha narrativa. Esa é a man na que está a cuspir. E entón, cando pasamos ó outro lado, ten unha trompa, coma un bico de paxaro, e cospe nubes por esa trompa. Tamén ten 5 metros e medio de cola de serpe que conecta <i>O tríptico</i>. Secasí, o seu rabo préndese lume tralo volcán. (Risas) Non sei por que pasou iso.
(Laughter)
(Risas)
That happens, you know. Her tail terminates in a cycloptic eyeball, made out of 1986 terrorist cards. Have you guys seen those? They were made in the 1980's, they're like baseball cards of terrorists. Way ahead of their time.
Estas cousas pasan, xa sabedes. A súa cola termina no globo ocular do cíclope feito de tarxetas terroristas do ano 1986 Sabedes cales digo? Dos anos 80, eran como os cromos de Panini dos terroristas. Moi adiantadas ó seu tempo.
(Laughter)
(Risas)
That will bring you to my latest project. I'm in the middle of two projects: One's called "Psychogeographies." It's about a six-year project to make 100 of these humans. Each one is an archive of our culture, through our ripped-up media and matter, whether it's encyclopedias or dictionaries or magazines. But each one acts as a sort of an archive in the shape of a human, and they travel in groups of 20, 4, or 12 at a time. They're like cells -- they come together, they divide. And you kind of walk through them. It's taking me years. Each one is basically a 3,000-pound microscope slide with a human stuck inside.
Todo o cal lévanos ao meu último proxecto. Atópome entre dous proxectos: Un chámase <i>Psicoxeografías</i>. É un proxecto de 6 anos, para facer 100 destes humanos. Cada un é un arquivo da nosa cultura a través dos nosos medios e materiais esnaquizados, tanto das nosas enciclopedias como dicionarios ou revistas. Pero cada un funciona como un tipo de arquivo de forma humana e viaxan en grupos de 20, 4 ou 12 á vez. Son como células: xúntanse, divídense. É case como camiñar a través delas, está levándome anos. Son básicamente 1300 kilos de láminas microscópicas cun humano atrapado no interior.
This one has a little cave in his chest. That's his head; there's the chest, you can kind of see the beginning. I'm going to go down the body for you: There's a waterfall coming out of his chest, covering his penis -- or not-penis, or whatever it is, a kind of androgynous thing. I'll take you quickly through these works, because I can't explain them for too long. There are the layers, you can kind of see it. That's a body getting split in half. This one has two heads, and it's communicating between the two heads. You can see the pills coming out, going into one head from this weird statue. There's a little forest scene inside the chest cavity. Can you see that?
Este ten unha pequena cova no peito. Esta é a cabeza, aí temos o peito. Podemos entrever unha entrada guiándonos corpo abaixo, vedes? Hai unha fervenza saíndolle do peito crubrindo o seu pene, ou non-pene, ou o que sexa, unha especie de cousa andróxina. Fareivos un resumo destes traballos porque non podo determe moito a explicalos Aí podemos distinguir as capas. Este é un corpo partido pola metade. Este outro ten dúas cabezas e estanse a comunicar entre elas. Podedes ver as pílulas saíndo, chegando a unha das cabezas desde esta figura estraña. Hai unha pequena escena forestal dentro da cavidade torácica. Podedes vela?
Anyway, this talk's all about these boxes, like the boxes we're in. This box we're in, the solar system is a box. This brings you to my latest box. It's a brick box. It's called Pioneer Works.
En fin, esta charla fala sobre todas estas caixas, como as caixas nas que vivimos. A caixa na que nos atopamos, --o sistema solar é unha caixa. Isto lévame á miña última caixa. A caixa de ladrillo: chámase <i>Pioneer Works</i>
(Cheers)
(Ovacións)
Inside of this box is a physicist, a neuroscientist, a painter, a musician, a writer, a radio station, a museum, a school, a publishing arm to disseminate all the content we make there into the world; a garden. We shake this box up, and all these people kind of start hitting each other like particles.
Dentro desta caixa hai un físico, un neurocientífico, un pintor, un músico, un escritor, unha emisora de radio, un museo, unha escola, unha unidade editorial que difunde o contido que facemos ó resto do mundo, un xardín. Nós axitamos esta caixa e toda esa xente comeza a chocar entre si, como partículas.
And I think that's the way you change the world. You redefine your insides and the box that you're living in. And you come together to realize that we're all in this together, that this delusion of difference -- this idea of countries, of borders, of religion -- doesn't work. We're all really made up of the same stuff, in the same box. And if we don't start exchanging that stuff sweetly and nicely, we're all going to die real soon.
Eu creo que este é o xeito en que cambiamos o mundo. Cando redifinimos o que somos e a caixa en que vivimos para decatarnos de que estamos todos aquí, xuntos, de que esa ilusión de que somos diferentes esa concepto de países, esa idea de fronteiras, relixión... non funciona. Estamos feitos da mesma materia, na mesma caixa. E se non comezamos a intercambiala de forma doce e amable, todos ímos morrer axiña.
Thank you very much.
Moitas grazas.
(Applause)
(Aplausos)