interview with peter tomaz dobrila - age of artists...guitar when i was a kid and that’s how i...

Interview

Peter Tomaž Dobrila November 3, 2014

Age of Artists / Interview with Peter Tomaž Dobrila

ageofartists.org 2 / 24

The interview was conducted by Dirk Dobiéy on November 3rd, 2014 via Video

Conference between Maribor, Slovenia and Dresden, Germany .

This text is licensed under Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0

(creativecommons.org).



About

Peter Tomaž Dobrila is an electronic and IT engineer and a

musician who focuses on the creative use of the new technologies.

In 1996 he co-founded the Multimedia Centre KIBLA, Maribor and

was its head. He is a fellow of the European Academy for Digital

Media (EADIM). One of his most important projects since 2006 has

been preparing the winning candidacy for the European Capital of

Culture 2012 for Maribor. Since June 2009, he has been working in

the Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Slovenia, having been

appointed as General Director of the Directorate for Arts and after

he was a member of the Minister's office. From 2011 to 2013 he was

adviser to the director of the MARIBOR 2012 – European Capital of

Culture Public Institute. In 2011 he co-curated the Contemporary

Art from Slovenia exhibition in the European Central Bank in

Frankfurt, Germany. In 2012 he was Commissioner for the

presentation of Slovenia at the 13th International Architecture

Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, Italy. Since 2014 he's president

of the CODE BLUE Association becoming autonomous artists. In

2015 he's employed at the Ministry of Culture of the Republic in

Slovenia in the Minister's office as adviser to the minister.



Interview

Age of Artists: What is your artistic practice?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: My artistic practice varies but basically it is

music. Besides being a musician I am also an IT engineer. When I

do, let’s say, interactive multimedia or intermedia installations

there is always sounds that takes quite a big part besides the visual

aspect. I did several music projects since the late eighties of the

twentieth century, being a part of the Slovenian avant-garde

movement. At that time I also then somehow slipped into the

contemporaneity doing micro tonal music or intermedia

installation.

Age of Artists: How many instruments do you play?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: I play a lot of instruments. As I am a

classically trained guitarist, I play plucked instruments with strings

like mandolin, banjo, the Indian instruments sitar or the sarod,

Chinese instruments guqin, guzheng, ruan, pipa, yueqin, liuqin,

qinqin, Vietnamese one-string zither Đàn bầu, Cambodian chest-

resonated stick zither kse diev, Estonian zither kanel, Javanese

siter, Laos and Thai phin, Turkish oud, tambur, saz or bağlama,

Egiptian lyra, Colombian tiple, Portuguese guitar… so all these

various guitars… Then I play electronic instruments like theremin

and crackle-box, invented by my friend Michel Waisvisz, who sadly

passed away some years ago. I play also a little bit of piano and

violin and its ancestor from Egypt called rababa, and sometimes I

like sound of flutes and ocarinas...

Age of Artists: You did not mention the pictures, for instance in

your water project.



Peter Tomaž Dobrila: Yes, you mean these photos of my

participation in the release of the earth water catalogue project

conceived by Ulay (http://www.earthwatercatalogue.net). This

project comprises several projects that are debating water,

focusing on drinking or sweet water (and not on sea or salted

water), which should last in the public domain and not being

privatized. This is the basic aim of the engagement of several

artists in this artistic project. I did one performance on the

waterfall of the confluence of the river Ganges in India, titled

Water-Steel. I'm preparing some new stuff as well.

Age of Artists: What made you become and continue as an artist?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: I somehow just started to work more and

more, not only in the production of art, but also in the conc eption

of the artistic way. I have stepped, as mentioned in the middle of

the eighties, into the Slovenian avant-garde movement with my

musical and performance works and as a writer and editor at the

Student's newspaper KATEDRA. In that era student's newspaper

were most important in constitution of an independent artistic and

cultural scene in Yugoslavia. You might know several groups like

Laibach, who later constituted Neue Slowenische Kunst with

Sisters Scipion Nasice Theatre Group and IRWIN visual artists

group. Of course there were more artists and other cultural

activists, who were contemporary at that point. Also I participated

in the first independent record label in Yugoslavia. You probably

don't know Mario Marzidovšek, who started it under the

Marzidovšek Minimal Laboratorium. There my first two recordings

were released. We were still doing cassettes, you know the small

things, probably almost not used anymore, which were later also

used in the early computer as memory devices. His production was

impressive comprising several hundred recordings including many

international authors. I think it was one of the biggest independent

label in the world. We played many concerts together and did

some tours, so it struck me deeply his tragic death couple of years

ago. He was one of the most creative and enthusiastic guys I met,



also doing his own music, performances, fanzines, mail-art, design

and paintings. To that point, I have made quite a lot of

performances and we have met several artistic groups in a

multimedia center joined by photographers, painters, and

designers all together. The split of Yugoslavia cruelly and clearly

divided us, because at that point we were completely passive for a

couple of years. It was impossible to work on anything as all the

connections were cut and lost. At that point, I also finished my

computer studies, where I graduated as an electronics and

computer engineer. Then there was also the era of the techno

movement in the late eighties and early nineties. Of course, it was

also the rise of the Internet, and of all these new possibilities that

artistic practices or outcomes could use, such as promotion,

distribution and so on. I participated in different initiatives during

my student’s era, and then founded the student radio MARŠ, which

was the first big thing in Slovenia with the new state situation.

After a couple of years, I established the Multimedia Center KIBLA,

which was the first multimedia center in Europe and is still the

biggest in Slovenia or Ex-Yugoslavia, now euphemistically defined

as Western Balkans, and Eastern Europe. It is still going on with

some productions, and of course supports my artistic views.

Age of Artists: So Kibla is a meeting place for artists to develop

their practices independently and jointly?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: Yes, this is one activity, but it is also a

production platform to encourage the artists in doing what they

want to do, so also to support them with projects, to support them

with infrastructure, to support them with know-how, or with

editing, designing, printings and publishing catalogues, DVDs, CDs

etc. They can also benefit from the European networks,

connections and projects. It is somehow a meeting place for

anybody who wants to be there and of course a presentation place

with several programs, from education programs to culture and

also entrepreneurship. KIBLA is a production space with many

facilities and know-how. Besides being a technological platform



only it is also a creative environment, where human interaction and

support from the whole team is of most importance. We are

holding weekly meetings for start-ups in Maribor with new idea

generating, debating... Then of course it is a big artistic space with

regular peer projections, concerts, performances, theaters and of

course visual art shows. It's a co-working space with the longest

history, established in 1996, and lab as in fact we started – KIBLA is

an abbreviation of KIBer LAb in Greek language and it has also

other meanings – a box, a computer, a police van, Gods house...

instead of using English word with no other connotations.

Age of Artists: I would like to rewind a little bit – to use you tape

reference. Rewind to the very beginning. You said you started early

with art. Do you have any idea why?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: It might be because I just had to somehow

balance my ideas and creativity. Around ten years old, you are

trying to find yourself through different areas of activities from

sport to scout, to other social activities... I started to play classical

guitar when I was a kid and that’s how I developed. With my

classical guitar, I have made my first solo concert in primary school

and then it just went on to high school group, into multimedia, and

then into all other activities… People say “I have this in myself it is

in my blood, in my ancestors, my parents”, because I think in

European families we have artistry in our genes. It was not

consciously. It was just my wish and my priority when I was a little

kid.

Age of Artists: You relate a lot to your environment. How important

and why was this environment and the artistic community? How

much did the environment and the artistic community influence

what you did and what you still do?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: Really important and also very necessary is to

establish a common platform or common identities. Indeed, there

is always the thing that the situation you are in, that you’re living,



that you’re surviving somehow builds you, somehow obstructs you,

and somehow shapes you in a way you really want to respond to. In

that point of view, I think that artists have this obligation or this

personal, might be even inner – although I don't want to sound

esoteric as I'm not – call to respond to some contemporary society,

and to be critical in all variations of this word. They also need to

evolve some of their perspectives, some of their issues and their

possibilities of what could happen on some metaphysical level. The

artistic touch is somehow metaphysical. It can’t be explained with

the scientific tools or scientific machines or scientific environment.

It is something that is above, but not in the sense of higher or

more – I don't want to sound mystical as I'm not – but beyond

science and physical knowledge. This is one explanation, why

scientists and artists are collaborating through the history and

most successful periods were those in which they shared ideas and

searched for common ways.

Let me go back a bit to illustrate my points. There was also the

punk influence end of the seventies and eighties, while in Europe

all these firms were experiencing a big crisis in the industrial

segment of the European economy, with a lot of strikes going on

and so on… Then in the eighties, it was the rise of the new wave.

This new wave in Yugoslavia was really much shaped by the avant-

garde movement, because I think this is one of the qualities or the

specialties of the socialist system that we had in the twenties and

the thirties with the so-called historical avant-garde, also in

Slovenia. Like Bauhaus in Germany or the Constructivist movement

in Russia. Then we had in the eighties also what we call neo-avant-

garde and then retrograde movements, we were all trying at that

point somehow to experiment with the environment, with the

society we were part of. These experiments went into our artistic

activities, and also as we were quite a strong community, visiting

each other, supporting each other, working together. By mixing, of

course we have a common influence of that era, of that period. I

would say cultural pattern. It was probably as much environmental

as it was mutually supported by our artistic view. The reality was



quite hard at that time and we were expected, as you can see also

in some of that movies from that era, music and so on, especially

this avant-garde, to incorporate the echo of some industrial past

and to somehow predict the post-industrial informatics age. We

were all trying to play with the tools that we had. Some were like

electronic instruments, often manually manufactured, because we

couldn’t afford actually to buy synthesizer in the shops. So we

were also somehow finding and starting our own do-it-yourself

(DIY) way. Everybody who was part of a group or any collective was

quite strongly doing his or her things, trying to find new ways of

expression, new ways of visualization, new ways for electronics,

how to put different instruments, different generators, and so on.

So playing with possibilities, from instruments building to

composing and making music and visuals, playing, singing,

dancing, and doing fashion...

Age of Artists: If I have to summarize what you said, then it sounds

like what shaped your practice is yourself, your artistic practice,

the environment, and then of course the society you are living in.

You also make reference to the times, the eighties, the seventies

and so on… Now, if you look at that, are they any elements of your

attitude, which stayed more or less the same?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: Yes, sure! It is in the way of approaching time

to the production of things, which I think force somehow the

artistic substance. I think that most of the contemporary

productions or artistic productions are missing “the experiment”.

Or at least lacking it. Lots of things became too predictable,

everything must be planned.. . I think that the first point in the

artistic practice should still be experiments. I am still

experimenting. I am trying to find new ways, new possibilities, new

sounds, new visuals, new technological concepts, and new aspects

of this and that with a complete awareness over the society I am

living in. So living somehow defragments and decomposes society.

I am still allocating the “DIY” principle. That’s why I am quite



supportive of the artistic practices that are using the open source

or the open code in gaining their effects, either on the visual or on

the musical level. I think that there was always a way or a

perspective that other artists feel. When you have some painting or

drawing, book or poem, you always have DIY. Not like in the so -

called computer interactive art, where you have on one side artists

and on the other side you have programmers or engineers, and on

a third side you have some others, like techno geeks, who are

combining then all these things onto a common platform. So still

advocating, and of course not neglecting the other ways, but it is

the thing that I like. What I like also is the openness of the artistic

approach, which means that it can be open or involve several

effects or different ideas in the process of the making. Once it’s

done, it just responses to this artistic statement that it has.

Therefore I also try to support and achieve some artworks that I

was doing and I am still doing, being aware of this group level of

things. I brought this experiment from my early start to today.

The problem of the contemporary society, or political system, or

also the European society, is that the economical pragmatism

somehow suffocated all other parts of the human activities. So the

pragmatism suffocated experiment, because of the sum goals and

the sum results. We are speaking not in quality measures but in

quantity measures. So by debating artworks we always say “What is

your marketing? What is your promotion? What is your PR? How

many audiences do you have? How much income you make? What

is your next activity?” So nobody is asking you “Was this good

artwork or a bad artwork or is it artwork at all and what is it?” In

that way, we are now fighting on this level, trying to achieve these

economic criteria or quantities, and not having in mind the really

artistic quality and allowance or the possibi lity to experiment, not

even thinking of any other results of outcomes and incomes. Art

should also fight to get back, because all of these have been

applications when we are submitting our projects. We have to

respond to all these criteria. I also proposed on one debate that if

we are then for a multidimensional and multifunctional society

with all fields of activity, so economical, artistic, technical; all



equally involved, we should demand from the top managers and

from the politicians to judge their views, their attitudes, their

business plans, their marketing strategies artistically. To see if it

has any cultural perspective and if it is culturally accepted. I am

missing the days where people in industry were supporting art and

not asking for the results. This setting should be propagated as

well as experiment as an artistic way of doing things.

Age of Artist: There were two things I would like to briefly follow

up on. You talked about experiment and then used the example of

the open source movement. Is experiment for you a metaphor for

freedom?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: Yes, it is. In a way. It is free in the way of

“allowed of doing things” but also once you are doing art, you can’t

be free in relation to the tools that you are having, because you are

somehow limited with them or by using computer, visual art tools

or musical instruments or whatever. By experimenting, you can

learn and you can get more out of them, as you are trying to find

some ways that are not presented in the first trial, but you have to

find the ways by yourself. Maybe they are the other side of the

sounds, of the visions… You can maybe play with some interface,

some software to achieve these goals and then to somehow

synthesize and combine all this into a common place. I think

experiment could be somehow a synonym for freedom. Freedom

could be just “form without a cause” or “form without the content”,

but experiment is a “form with the content”, because it demands

some attitudes or views of the environment. I think freedom is

maybe a too loose expression to somehow grasp the excitement of

experiment. Experiment has its aim. Freedom is somehow aimless

in a way. So with experiment you can also discover some new parts

in space.

Age of Artists: You talked about measures beyond revenue such as

cultural relevance. It is a bit contradictory to us as you say that we

should invest without any regard to the outcome but at the same



time you are competing with this world where everything is

measured. How would you describe the cultural value of something

that is not measurable? Do you have any ideas or recommendations

on how this measurement would take place?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: We have to somehow confess that we are not

just like outsiders or outlaws doing whatever comes to our minds

or into our hands, and we are still part of the system whatever it is

or whatever we are or whoever we are. I just think that at some

stage, the art should be left more autonomous. I just mean in a

simple way that we should interfere with the big systems and try

to get into their business plans with cultural values, cultural issues,

and artistic practices. We are also using the expression of social

responsibilities, social awareness. There should be also the cultural

responsibility and artistic awareness. This means that these

companies should support the cultural institutions, or there should

be always a part of the institutions’ budget allocated to support

art. As we know that the economic institutions are more or less

buildings of considerable size. They could also host more often

artistic projects, not only exhibitions but also concerts and so on.

What happened with post-modernism in the eighties, even though

it was somehow starting earlier, is that there was a big amount of

cultural institutions that arose with big concrete buildings, which

were a bit out of the usual society area, a bit like the religious

temples. They were specially made for culture and where people

should go for their rituals. With this kind of alienation of culture

spaces, also came somehow alienation of the cultural activity or of

artistic practices to the contemporary society. In consequence

managers are somehow educated and raised in different ways.

They don’t know anything about culture or about social

constellations, or anything about quite obligatory or compulsory

social flows through different systems. We are a society as a

whole, and every system should support each other! Something

that artists can do, something that sportsmen can do, something

that educators can do, something that of course businessmen can

do, and everything should be articulated to get the breath of life.



That’s why I think that some should just be taught to support art

and not asking what it’ll bring, maybe just by trying to organize art

events, either regularly or temporary, or only on some occasions.

Also show their awareness, their profile and their interests into

something else than purely money, purely business. In this post-

financial society, the question on how to raise society could be

discussed and debated. Societies have to be brought back to

balance.

Age of Artists: At the very beginning, we talked about the non -

rational and non-quantifiable, and now we talked about non-

measurable. Let’s talk a little bit about this idea of art and

emotions. If you look at your art practice or art in general, what

would you consider the emotional elements or important elements,

when it comes to the non-rational side?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: In my point of view the emotional part of art

is when you are really executing some artwork. When you are

working on it, or when you perform it, because the rational part to

it is somehow the artistic concept and also the installation of an

artwork (the installation of the space, what equipment do we need,

how it will look like and so on). In musical terms, it is the

composition. The composition of members, the orchestra, so why

you are having such a band, why are you using this and that... This

is the rational part and anything else I think is the emotional and

non-rational part of the artistic process. When the work actually

starts, it has a lot of emotional elements in that process, because it

has also a lot of experiments. Regarding all this different steps and

evolution of the artwork, you decide which one to keep and in the

end you have got the final result. This is supported by the fact that

anytime you do it live, it is different, you can’t repeat it. So I think

this is non-rational, even though you would like to play according

to the notes. The notes are only some kind of written symbols t hat

are representing sounds, not presenting the sound wave, the call,

which is the concert show, or the gallery where the exhibition is

taking place. When I am doing exhibitions, I always somehow try to



do them according to the space where I am in and then I adapt. If I

have one project and I see the space, and it is not appropriate for

this work, I don’t say “let’s just move away and find something

else”. I try to adapt to the space, of course try to involve all the

little elements located in situ. When doing music, we have of

course the composition. We have the patterns. We have the

instruments that are used in different ways, and then we just try to

fill the space according to the scenario and due to our emotional

and non-rational response to the actual environment, to the

audience. We try to adapt to the audience coming and going, to

audience sitting or participating in the project and so on…

Age of Artists: Since you have already started, please tell me about

your working process. If I would spend a couple of days with you,

what would I see if I observe you when you work on a piece of art?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: Most of the time I am moving around with

different instruments. I am playing with different sounds just

around the space where I am, just anywhere I can be. If something

interests me, I try to repeat it with sound. I also play different

instruments and when playing with them I am getting into certain

patterns and then I try somehow to remember those patterns.

Those that I remember I think are still valuable, things that I would

eventually use on the next level. Lot of this already fades at this

first step and doesn’t get through the filter that I apply to myself.

It also depends on what the frame of reference is. In October 2014

we had the opening of one installation in the Ludwig Museum in

Budapest and I made one short composition titled “Looking

through a window on the river Danube”. So I asked myself how

something would sound if you look at that river. At that point I just

had some kind of a composition in my head and then blindly

picking up several instruments that I think would be useful in the

process to make the composition. I had the melody in my head at

that point and then it was just somehow the scenario or maybe the

“mise-en-scène”, to look through the window on the river and how

to use different tools, different instruments to underline this view



that I think could be appropriate at least for myself but also for the

audience, for viewers as it was a visual arts show and for listeners,

who wouldn't see it. And my colleague recorded me and edited

four instruments together, each on each, and the composition was

done. So this is one way. The other is by playing instruments – I

have quite a wide selection of different instruments with strings,

and some are electronics like the theremin, and so on – I try to use

some instruments, and when I get into the sound theme that is

interesting on the musical level, then I am switching instruments,

and I try to see how it works on others. If yes, then I am trying to

evolve it, even by staying on one instrument through the

composition, or sometimes by overlaying different instruments to

make more orchestral sounds. Sometimes I make it as a member of

a band, with some other guys playing other instruments. Last years

I'm mostly involved with the audio-visual cabaret Byzantine

Cadillac. Sometimes some of us are coming with a finished

composition and the others are playing on with it. I am quite slow

because when it happens that I have this kind of interest, I am

trying to test it on different instruments and different sounds.

Then I am trying to evolve it. As I am a classical trained musician, I

am also obsessed with the classical structure of the symphony, of

the concerto and of the string quartet. Something that is not a

short composition, but something like a string quartet, which is

takes 45 minutes. This for me is the ideal of a music piece.

Age of Artists: You talked about the window on the river Danube as

a conceptual idea from where you went straight into action. This

fits very much your DIY mind-set. Is this searching and reflecting

happening for you in small iterations at this stage?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: Yes, I think that you are right. It is both,

raising questions, getting answers, making sense out of things. My

intermedia installation that was called “Iron”, was actually about

the idea of ironing and was an audio-visual installation with

audience participation. I made an interface on the computer, an

iron was transformed into the computer mouse and by c licking on



it you can – beside ironing clothes – by selecting from the menu

make pictures, images, and draw and you can choose in the other

menu different sounds and you can make music. So by ironing you

can make images and you can make music.

Age of Artists: So you gamified ironing?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: Yes! This is a consequence of my

experiments. I was always told that ironing is not for men, and that

it is for housewives and wives. On the other hand, I have been told

during my life that technology is not for women, because they are

housewives, so cooking and so on. So somehow I feminized the

technology by using the computers for this house tasks like

ironing. Each of the housewives should learn how to use computers

and interfaces. I masculinized the use of ironing for men. As they

use the computer they should not only look into their notebook but

also do something necessary for the family and iron. Going further

the installation has the possibility for connecting with other

devices. You can have this ironing computer in your home and do it

for yourself, or it can be connected via a server. I had this server

installation realized with a band so you could have four ironers and

each of them is scanning their own music and their own picture.

Then all together are joined into the same projection. An iron

concerto! Connected via Internet, it could be like a social activity,

because you can do it online. Ironing is a bit boring so you can go

online, and exchange music and images with other people

connected, you can also overlap it, doing composition together

and so on. This is somehow what I was trying to experiment by

knowing the technology, by knowing how it works. We did many

performances, demonstrations and concerts around the world,

Prague, Brussels, Helsinki, Ningo in China, New Delhi in India...

Age of Artists: In that case, I suppose the concept phase is much

larger in contrast to the musical composition that you described

before. In any case I would like to understand as to whether the

concept phase is previous to realization or iterative along with your



experimentation approach. How much of the concept is explored

while “you walk” as we say?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: To my point of view, the concept is always

integrated in the artwork and always of a very big importance but

it is not the only thing that is important. Here I have, let’s say,

some issues with contemporary art because there is very often

only a concept and nothing else. I am still old fashioned artists in

that regard, I would say. A concept should be really a vital part and

integrated part of the artwork, but there should be also artwork, a

product that is really artistic or that is metaphysical and that

stands beside or above anything else.

At the beginning of the twenties (1920’s) we know of some debate

between two guys, who I think quite strongly influenced art in the

twentieth century. One was Marcel Duchamp with his conceptual

approach, and the other was Clement Greenberg with his

modernistic approach. Clement Greenberg was advocating, “A rt is

artwork”. Marcel Duchamp’s vision was “Art is made by artists”. I

think the truth is somewhere in the middle. And elsewhere. I think

the good artwork, at least a complete artwork, should have a

strong concept. It could also somehow be the document or the

image of anything, but it should be the mirror of something. I think

today we are more and more aware that attitudes of some artists

were important in history. It’s not really about the painting or the

music, but also about individual achievement: To be different, to

change an orchestra, to change the use of colors, to add new

material, to bring perspectives into paintings, to bring new

instruments, to bring electronics into the mix, to make different

music or to make abstract paintings. I think this is important

notice: The concept and content are important in artworks. In this

era, what is very strong here in Slovenia, but might be also in other

regions, is that we have more and more so-called “discursive art”,

which means that people are speaking about art, talking and

discussing, not making it. Maybe this is needed, but I am quite



alert or trying to alarm everybody that we speak too much and that

we don’t do anything. Let’s combine concepts and work!

Age of Artists: Two words came to my mind: concept and content.

Is this similar to meaning and material? Purpose and product, to

use business-related terms?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: When you mentioning “content” and

“concept”, I think there is a third part and that is “context”, which is

the environment, the society, us in the most substantial, variable

and abstract sense. So there are always things that depend on the

context. You mentioned the business world and the product. There

is of course awareness and emotion some products create but by

knowing the cu ltural level of that target group or, you’ll be also

able to sell better products, because you will know more about

how to handle the audience, they will know more how to use them,

they will get more out of them. One of the most important changes

in history from my point of view: the information society and the

internet has been automatized and segmented. What is now

fragmented should be more connected. Today I think it is really

disconnecting the real society on that level, but I think that we

should somehow reconnect the society by using now the

information and the equipment we have. We have now good

products, so we can be good customers. If we had excellent

products, we could be excellent customers and so on. I think

business people should therefore invest in the society as a whole,

because by educating and investing in society, they will also be

able to growing their customer base for their products.

Consumerism is the most dangerous behavior we have, it seems

very individual, when targeted from the companies, but it's really

utterly social as groups of population all want to have same

products tailored for you only and specially. Individualism is a

hoax. When speaking about individualism, I always remember

Monty Python's movie Live of Brian, when masses of believers

come to Brian and he's telling them, "You're all individuals" and the

masses reply, "Yes, we're all individuals" and Brian continues,



"You're all different" and the masses reply, "Yes, we're all different”,

when a distant voice in the crowd is heard, "No, I'm not.” This tells

me much.

A cultural idiom, which is very important but very often forgotten,

is something like literacy. We talk now about digital literacy. We

can of course agree that this is a cultural idiom. It represents

cultural characteristics, because we learn to read and write,

through different artistic and cultural achievements. First, with

kids’ books which are illustrated and have only some sentences.

We see the audio-visual information, and then we go through other

and bigger books, to our professional reading and so on. We grow

into a much more complex person. Of course, a lot of people grow

up and forget about the cultural substance on how they actually

learned to read through culture and art, so through reading. On the

other hand, it becomes a social characteristic and an economical

characteristic, because through the level of literacy we measure

the development of the society and the economical capacity of the

society. So it means that more people are literate, the more

products you can sell to them. It means that you have to raise the

cultural level of the society to get to your intended result. This is

now the point of the human evolution that we should really

observe, because in the past twenty years, we were just selling the

European industries and technologies to the so-called

“underdeveloped” markets or “underdeveloped” states, and we

moved there or built factories, in Africa and Asia for example, to

produce at lower costs and now as a consequence we have the

problem of unemployment in Europe. A lot of states now are

thinking that it is better to have a bit of production with a slightly

higher price to maintain the social integrity of our society instead

of just selling products. In a complex world it is much more valued,

to take “concept”, “content” and “context” into account than focus

on just one thing. Being focused on something is fine, but you

should be focused with awareness of everything. Otherwise you

would be like an elephant in a porcelain shop.



Age of Artists: I think there is a very important point in what you

just said and I would like to confirm that with my own words. If you

say that our early education stems from culture and we now see

ourselves in a society where we need to integrate “context”,

“concept” and “content” even more than before; does that mean

that we need to educate ourselves further on artistic practices in

order to be able to reach that next level as a society?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: Culture generates evolution. Culture is a

generator of the Evolution was also my motto when I was working

for Maribor as the European capital of culture 2012. People that

come into certain positions in business or in big multinationals are

forgetting why they came into that position. They got their

because of culture in a way. They should be highly educated. They

should know a lot, and of course in my point of view, they should

have some kind of a social impact. I am always thinking that it is a

privilege to be a leader of an institution. I think too many times

this is forgotten. We should just think that if we are here it is

thanks to culture, thanks to the fact that we are literate, that we

can communicate among ourselves, thanks to the fact we have

cultural values such as the fact that we are able to cohabitate with

each other, at least in some territories. Then of course, other

cultural values form the family, the social systems that surround

us, also offices and factories. We should remember that over the

course of our life. When we have the opportunity to be in charge of

a big system, we should also invest in culture, invest in education,

invest in all these social activities without questioning them,

without trying to quantify their outcomes, but simply believe in the

quality that they will bring. If we believe this is all solved by having

art academies we will fail. This is the most important point because

now all these connections are cut between the different social and

cultural subsystems, between economy, art, and so on. Like you

mentioned, I would completely pursue this idea that we should

work on ourselves and develop culturally further to get to a better

society.



Age of Artists: Another Renaissance?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: It could be because many in society got the

basic knowledge about technology, we should get into courses and

trainings about culture, about art, about civilization in other parts

of the world. We don’t know a lot about what is going on in Africa,

what is going on in Asia, apart from catastrophes and wars. There

is a lot of the garbage that this contemporary technology

produces. Every two years we change the smartphone, the

computer, because it breaks. It is not solid and can just last for a

couple of years. I think we should educate ourselves and educate

our society once we have the possibility. We should educate our

neighbors with discussions, formal or informal or non-formal

processes.

Age of Artists: I would like to get back briefly to your work process,

because I think we have talked about the idea of the musical piece

and then how you iterate it. Let’s talk about the next step and

particularly towards performance as you also mentioned that

performance is not the same like a recording or listening to a

recording over and over.

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: In my production work, it is the same process

as I’m trying to follow myself, my principles, because until now

they have proven to be successful. When composing a musical

theme is done, I am trying somehow to build, to structure the

wider composition around it. Sometimes I come sooner or quicker

to the end, so it means after a couple of minutes I decide “this is it”

and I finish by documenting it. Then I recorded it. But it also

depends on the mood that I have. Sometimes I try with some on

the theremin, or I play bass, sometimes I do some kind of a string

melody and so on. Then I include several people that are doing

these engineering types of things, and then we are trying to layer

all these different instruments into a common composition. Most

of the time I try to play different instruments by myself, but when

there are some instruments that I don’t play or that I don’t want to



play, then I call friends to play them. It is quite a cinematic

process, because after having some snippets, some parts of the

composition, I am getting to the montage phase, to organize them

into the composition. Also on another level, I have this idea, like

mentioned before, of whether a composition will be short or more

complex like twenty, thirty, forty minutes. The latter brings all the

necessity, which such a long “estocade” has. It includes some basic

themes, basic melodies, with some different harmonies,

alternations, some kind of red thread, and some kind of MIDI play

that can be used to jump to another model. Sometimes I do the

text or I invite some singers or some poets to sing, or to tell their

text on the top of my music, or we play together, or they sing it

without anything. Then I am layering them with different

instruments, different music into the common composition. I send

it to them and they tell me if they are ok with it. It is a process of

at least couple of months to one year. Then I am deciding if I am

happy and satisfied with the result, or the song that is done, and

with the whole composition. This is not the case with a short

composition, but with more complex works I need couple of

months to be satisfied with all the little things.

Age of Artists: When you completed the work and recorded it,

would you then call your work complete?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: On some level, yes. But I always have this

other exit: the concerts, the performances, the installations. Those

are always something different than a recording. But regarding

completeness, yes.

Age of Artists: So you do perform your music also alive?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: Yes, I do.

Age of Artists: In all your process steps, you did not mention your

audience at all. When does the audience come in?



Peter Tomaž Dobrila: Whenever! I also have my audience in my

workshops or before the whole set up is done. Because we are

quite used to different stages, from rock and roll stages to the

galleries, to the small stages. So we have these different

experiments to let people personally in, or incorporate them to get

some experience and then to change. Also on some occasions

where we had little experience we locked the room, didn’t let

anyone out, and then we just made big noise (laughs).

Age of Artists: Is this called a feedback loop (laughs)?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: Sometimes. I also use other sounds. What

was quite funny is that the police came and stopped couple of

concerts, because it was too loud.

Age of Artists: What do you think that business and society can

learn from art?

Peter Tomaž Dobrila: I think we should all be learning from each

other. We should not only be talking but mainly listening to each

other and we can all, I’m sure, learn from each other. Business can

learn from art. Art can learn from business. I think now lots of

artists are business experts. Regarding businessman who don’t

know much about art – they say “I don’t care” or, “I don’t know

anything about nothing, so I don’t want to have anything to do

with it” - this fear should be overcome. It is not a problem really.

You have paintings on your wall that you like you are always

listening to music in your car, or in the street, or in a restaurant

and so on. I think that business could learn a lot from art, not only

non-rational things, but also purely rational aspects. About the

artistic system, about the artistic work and about the artistic social

role, that it got through the history of humanity. About aesthetics.

About beauty. I think business should learn about art at least this:

Artists were present during all the human history and they will be

present also in the future and they should be supported. We should

also overcome the idea that everything that is selling is good. It is



the contrary in art; sometimes the less it sells the most potential it

has. It may be not the same, but you see the idea. As you said,

there is also the idea of the Renaissance and what happened af ter

that. Our generation has the possibility to somehow reconnect

society, to reconnect social groups or different interest groups, or

different groups of activities, and somehow to again make the

society unite in this most precious world.

In political terms we have “position” and we have “opposition”. On

the artistic level, we have “composition”. We should try to get

“composition” - “position” and “opposition” try to work together,

and to involve what’s needed for the survival of our society, from

the tiniest elements, to incorporate all little ideas and each and

every human.

interview with peter tomaz dobrila - age of artists...guitar when i was a kid and that’s how i...

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