Vasco Diogo
Vasco Diogo was born in Lisbon in 1970. He has a degree in Sociology by Universidade Nova de Lisboa, a master degree in Social Sciences by Universidade de Lisboa and a PhD in Communication Sciences by Universidade Nova de Lisboa, with the thesis: "Video: specificity, hybridity and experimentation"(scholarship by FCT, 2008).
From 2008 to 2020 he was a professor at University of Beira Interior teaching mainly cinema directing, new cinemas and experimental cinema.
After being co-founder of Projecto Teatral, works, since 1998 in performance, video art and experimental cinema around themes such as self-presentation, truth and manipulation. In experimental cinema he has won several international awards (more than 70). He has shown his works in several exhibitions and festivals in Portugal, Spain, Italy, USA, Canada, India, Germany, France, Cyprus, Poland, etc.
Your career seamlessly integrates sociology, video art, and experimental cinema. How do you think your academic background in sociology and communication has influenced your approach to creating video art and experimental cinema, particularly in terms of addressing themes like truth and manipulation?
Having an academic background in sociology and communication is important to understand how the notion of reality is a construction not independent from our act of observation and participation. Considering that the main goal of science is to search for the truth about how the world works, we must also admit that scientific views are relative, partial and often reductionist. The truth and the whole truth about the world is that it is highly complex and manipulated and that we will never reach a level of total transparency nor common agreement. Moreover, the more we know the more we know that we don't know. The world is an ambiguous, mysterious, beautiful enigma where, perhaps, art has always been ahead of science concerning the perception and understanding of that enigmatic quality.
My approach to creating video art and experimental cinema has also questioned the dominant false transparency of the image which is an ideological construction based on a technical apparatus. As any image is always a form of manipulating reality, my work makes that illusionary process visible and touchable. Since the beginning, I was interested in deconstructing realism and naturalism by image processing, editing and sound manipulation. For me, It's not a matter of distorting reality and truth and manipulating the viewer. Instead, I'm concerned with an expansion of consciousness that must include the exceptional: interior visions, dreams, altered states of consciousness, visual thinking, states of flux, intuitions, non ordinary experiences, epiphanies and so on.
As I've always worked with digital image and sound in experimental cinema and video, the ontological characteristics of the medium have naturally led me to explore its plastic possibilities, working against the paradigm of the invisibility of enunciation, which is completely manipulative, and approaching my self of painting and sculpture as a way to lose contact with the controlling principle of “realistic representation”.
In your PhD thesis, you explored the concepts of specificity, hybridity, and experimentation in video. How do you navigate these elements in your current work, and could you share how this hybrid approach helps in conveying complex messages through your art?
My PhD thesis is exploratory and trans-disciplinary, which are also concerns in my artistic practice. It formulates, in the contemporary context of human sciences, media and communication theory, history, philosophy, sociology, aesthetics and cultural studies, a theory of video that takes into account its material and historical determination, but also its always evident vocation for hybridization and experimentation.
By specificity I mean the technique, the supports, the machines and their functions, the apparatus and devices characteristic of the video, as well as its inscription in a given historical process, contingent and in continuous and rapid mutation. I'm interested in knowing how this specificity materializes in new dimensions of image and sound, time and space.
By hybridity I understand the insertion of video in a context of multiple media determination, its malleability and diffuse relationship with a plurality of modern media: television, cinema, the computer, installation, performance, etc.. Hybridity is, in this way, already one of the specific characteristics of the video, which is still a paradoxical formulation, or, at the very least, tensional.
Experimentation is both the self-reflexive practice on specificity and hybridity in a given artistic practice (characterized, to a large extent, by an experimental vocation), and the cultural and communicative experience of the spectator/user/participant within a more social and political universe. Experimentation is here, therefore, equally understood as a point of confluence between art and science and between art and communication.
The complexity of the questions I've addressed in my thesis are also main messages in my art: What is the video? What are its historical, institutional and technological determinants, seen within the medial and prosthetic condition of man's experience with his extensions? What are the lines of updating, novelty and creativity that video, as a device, introduces? What are the implications of video, as a medium, in reformulating perception, experience and thought? What is Its degree of autonomy and contamination? What similarities and convergences can be established with other media, with other languages and with other arts? How important is video art in testing the possibilities and limits of a materiality characterized, fundamentally, by the dematerialization of objects? And what is its importance in the emancipation, liberation and literacy of modern and contemporary audiovisual perception and experience.
This set of questions immediately faces three fundamental problems, or rather, three dimensions of a single problem, which are simultaneously difficulties and constituent axes of a central argument: the immediate nature of the video, defined from the its essential system of temporality, apparently opposed to the notion of mediation and medium; the unstable identity of video and its continuous obsolescence, divided between the “electronic revolution” and the “digital revolution”; the plurality of media and medial contexts where video is present, the multiple connections and juxtapositions it establishes and the paradoxes it makes emerge.
As someone deeply involved in new media, how have you seen the landscape of video art and experimental cinema evolve over the last two decades, especially with the advent of digital technology and social media platforms?
Twenty years ago experimental cinema and video art were not so much similar media as they are today, Experimental cinema tradition was still attached to the possibilities and limitations of the analog while video art had a much shorter history related to the “electronic revolution”. The possibilities that video introduced, namely in the domain of temporality with real-time video, closed-circuit and video-surveillance were not a technological evolution from cinema but rather a shared innovation with transmission technologies such as radio and television. With video, the image became a signal ready to be transmitted, manipulated and integrated in any space. The advent of digital technology comes essentially from this electronic revolution and has nothing to do with cinema. Cinema and experimental cinema adopted a new technology, that was imannently linked to video, in the more recent context of digital convergence.
Even though nowadays It is sometimes difficult to distinguish experimental cinema from video art, I think that both new media and the advent of social media platforms share a common background with what was happening in the beginning of video art. This evolution is inseparable from a democratization of access and a de-hierarchization of practices, blurring the frontiers between popular culture and the legitimate field of “high culture”.
Your work often incorporates spoken word, which adds a distinct narrative layer to the visual experience. Could you elaborate on the process and challenges of integrating spoken word into visual media, and how it enhances the storytelling aspect of your films?
Integrating spoken word into visual media doesn't have to be a narrative nor a storytelling dimension of a film. First, I use spoken word as speech awareness and self-reference but rarely to tell a story with a fixed and closed meaning. It's not even a divergent narrative but something closer to free speech and poetry. The spoken word is an element among others, with the same importance, and it doesn't command the experience of experimentation I'm living and sharing. I'm not trying to make sense talking, but reflecting about the act of talking itself. In the same way, I'm using my voice as a musical instrument but I'm not singing. Also, in works such as anexperimentalviralvlog, all spoken word is improvised, so it expresses the here and now, an experience of instantaneity that I like to heavily manipulate in the editing. In these works the spoken word is addressed directly to the viewer both as a confession and an interpolation.
I'm now working on a new project which is deeply influenced by the spoken word musical genre and the point of departure is exclusively sound. This happens for the first time in my work. I'm spending a lot of time writing and organizing texts that will be sound recorded only. The texts were mainly influenced by the hip-hop lyrics structure but also by dadaism and surrealism. They transmit personal experiences, emotions, sensations, spiritual insights, processes of self transformation, but also try to establish conversations with imaginary interlocutors, adding a positive change to the world. How these recordings will be integrated into visual media I will only know later.
With a prolific background that includes a vast array of international exhibitions and awards, how do you maintain originality and freshness in your projects? Can you discuss any specific artists or movements that continue to influence your work?
I try not to follow contemporary trends just because they have become “fashionable”. Even if subjects like political resistance, feminism, post-colonialism, gender-trouble, art in the community or eco-anxiety are relevant for dealing with the problems of our time, my projects follow a deeper planning that goes beyond any “agenda setting”. First, because I often work in series and in a succession of series: my future projects always deal with something I did before and that wasn't completely finished or solved. Then, I like to integrate my work in my daily life most often in a self-reflexive way. Finally, my projects take time and I like to think they are ahead of our time.
Just to mention one specific artist and one specific movement, I would like to say that Jonas Mekas and Primitivism/Outsider Art continue to influence my work a lot. Joan Mekas is important for his broad activity as an experimental filmmaker, video artist, poet, film critic and curator, who has become most known as one of the most important developers of the diaristic forms of cinema. Jonas Mekas kept during all his life his own aesthetical and ethical principles, always producing a lot “on his own”. Primitivism/Outsider Art is important for the spontaneous and free production of art outside any legitimate institutional context, where technical ability, academic formation or a relation to a market are secondary.
Considering your themes often challenge viewers' perceptions of reality and truth, what kind of reactions do you aim to provoke in your audience? How do you measure the success of such interactions?
First, I'm proposing perceptions that may leave the viewer with the need to watch again, or watch over and over again. I almost never pretend to provoke reactions that are strictly based on analogies with real life. The viewer must learn within the artistic proposal how to think about it, considering structures and processes, while having the liberty to experience whatever emotions and sensations arise. Consequently, all interactions are valid. But the more viewers understand that my themes are not illustrative and have always a deep formal meaning the better. My themes are often about contexts that raise problems and my work is to solve those problems. I always hope that the audience may produce free associations and consider that sometimes I don't know exactly or rationally what I'm doing and that's the purpose of doing it. From there comes the ideas of strangeness effects, direct provocations, irony, humour and deconstruction of truth. There is also the need to connect with the audience on a spiritual level which transcends any simplistic meaning. Ideally, the viewer is supposed to expand its own consciousness and be open to change its thinking paradigm, even if sometimes the immediate reaction is one of rejection, violence and hate.
How do you perceive the role of experimental cinema in the broader landscape of the film industry today? In what ways do you believe it challenges or complements mainstream cinematic forms?
Experimental cinema is closer to art than to the broader landscape of the film industry as it challenges not only mainstream cinematic forms but also all forms of “independent” or even “auteur” cinema destined to have a commercial distribution. Even if there are overlapping regions between all kinds of cinema, experimental cinema will always be in a position of non conformity to a set of rules, processes, standards and assumptions about what is supposed to be cinema. The most interesting experimental films must assume a position outside the space of any recognizable trend, forcing the viewer to understand cinema with naked senses and an empty mind. Experimental cinema is an “Anemic Cinema” to quote Marcel Duchamp's film from the twenties. It defines its own role from a position of weakness regarding other cinematic forms that most often exclude its existence on an institutional level, from history and criticism to financing, distribution and exhibition. Mainstream cinematic forms and its protagonists, including the viewers, usually ignore, attack and mock experimental cinema as something unbearable to watch or discuss or simply as something that is not cinema. What is experimental isn't easily legitimized outside its own sphere of influence. Mainstream cinematic forms and its subversive exceptions are too powerful to risk being contaminated by a completely free cinema which has never had a set of fixed directives. I'm very skeptical about a peaceful coexistence between so radically different forms of cinema. So, experimental cinema and its internal diversity must be properly protected inside an autonomous field which has always been in direct communication with contemporary art and its institutions.
Where do you see the future of video art heading, particularly in relation to new technologies like VR and AR? How do you plan to incorporate such technologies into your future projects, if at all?
New technologies like Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality expand the shift, already present in video art, from representation to presence, dissolving the stable position of the viewer, which becomes an active participant, and notions such as interior/exterior, real/virtual and subject/object. Both time and space are affected and the reference to reality is completely changed.
VR opens new possibilities for real time interaction with a simulated world as a unique experience that is dependent on who experiences it both on a physical and sensory level. It's not only a movement towards complete immersion but also a demand to act, but still inside a previously constructed virtual environment. Right now, I don't plan to incorporate VR technology in my own projects. I must confess that from my experience as a user it makes me a little bit dizzy and I don't feel much comfortable with the head-mounted displays.
I'm more interested in AR than VR as its main focus is the notion of mixed reality, that is the coexistence of the real world with computer generated objects. Regarding the future of video art and the world we live in, there will be an increasing destabilization of what the real world means with risks and potentialities. The idea of different ontological levels of reality coexisting in the same image or experience has always interested me in video art. I'm starting to experiment that idea with AR mobile devices applications most often to deconstruct any possible illusion, in the same way as in a collage. I think it is more interesting to work on an idea of collision rather than on an illusory continuum between the real and the artificial. Overlaying all sorts of visual elements over the physical world in real time opens up many interesting possibilities which I'm only now beginning to understand.
Having spent over a decade teaching cinema directing, new cinemas, and experimental cinema, what key lessons or pieces of advice do you find yourself repeatedly emphasizing to your students about the field?
First, there is the importance of defining a work ethic and core values concerning how you position yourself in the world and how you relate yourself with others and the problems of your time. That is not possible if you don't work on your own personal development as a human being. Understanding that is essential for following your distinctive path and getting to know who you really are and what you really want to do. As important as to know what you want to do is to define what you don't want to do. Learning is a never ending process. If you reach a level where you think you already know everything, you're completely wrong. Then, you can't make cinema outside technical and production determinants. Knowing and accepting those determinants will increase your chances of being free. In working with a team you will have to trust each other's roles and be truthful yourself. Quantity is as important as quality: you will have to gain experience and learn from mistakes to evolve. Persistence and resistance are also essential: you will have to have a strategy of survival and never give up on your dreams.
For making experimental cinema and video art it is particularly important to adapt ideas to resources and don't let your (failed) work be justified by a succession of excuses. There isn't only a single way to do it. Maybe you will find a way that has never been done before even if it seems completely absurd. Finally, you don't need to do perfect things, what you do is already good enough, so keep on doing it.
Could you walk us through your creative process, from conceptualization to execution, especially how you balance spontaneity and structured planning in creating a piece of experimental cinema or video art?
I already know what I'll be doing in the next few years and conceptualization is always a slow process that most of the time comes from reading. Then, I think a lot about those projects and take notes if necessary. Even if my projects are highly structured there is a considerable difference in the making: there I like to have space to freely experiment within the idea and I'm much more intuitive. If the project has more determinants of production or is more collaborative I have less freedom and spontaneity, but usually transport processes and ideas from that project to future ones.