We held a little reception and a party because we wanted to share our art collection with the world. The Danish art blog Kopenhagen interviewed Michael Thouber, Head of Culture at e-Types on the usefulness of art in the everyday, why we are so passionate about it and whether or not you can collect without being a super-billio-millionaire. Read the interview below. It sums up the gist of things pretty well.
Identity and Art – An interview with Michael Thouber
During the last couple of years the Danish design agency e-Types has steadily been building a collection of Danish and international contemporary art. A collection that recently has been opened to the public. Torben Zenth, editor of Kopenhagen.dk met Michael Thouber, e-Types’ art curator.
TORBEN ZENTH: Why has e-Types chosen to start an art collection?
MICHAEL THOUBER: The interesting thing about building e-Types´ collection is that right from the start there has always been a sense of being able to utilize art in the everyday. I believe that this is an interesting perspective, because art is often being dragged onto this plane where it is somehow ”above” the useful. Some would even claim that as soon as art has utility, it stops being art.
At e-Types there has always been an insistency that we can use art for something other than just decoration – and that is paramount to why art is taken so seriously here. During the opening speech at the vernissage, I jokingly said that I was happy that there weren’t to many of our clients that had shown up at that point, because many of them would be able to see where the inspiration for their own identity programmes came from. But truth be told, we don’t really see that as a problem – quite the contrary.
There is a piece by the artist Mads Lynnerup in the collection called “If You See Anything Interesting, Please Let Someone Know Immediately”. I believe that it sums up much of the attitude or modus operandi of e-Types; we absorb a lot of information and then reinterpret it into something that our clients and associates can use. This is where art really comes in as a valuable tool. Partly as pure inspiration for us as a creative firm, but also as something that can inspire others: our clients, friends and colleagues who visit the studio.
TORBEN ZENTH: Do you ever encounter the opposite? Where art becomes so controversial that it ceases to be commercially viable?
MICHAEL THOUBER: Yes. But it is important to stress that we don’t make art for our clients. Our identity programmes are not works of art and were never intended to be. We interpret the inspiration that among other things comes from art, into solutions that provide value and function for our clients. Where art is often about asking questions, design is about answering them.
TORBEN ZENTH: But is there art that you won’t buy for fear of offending some of your clients?
MICHAEL THOUBER: One of the first pieces I bought for e-Types was a photo, roughly poster-size, by Vanessa Beecroft that documents a performance of hers in Germany. She is an American feminist artist – at least that is how I see her. Her point of departure is the role of women in art and in society. Typically she will find 20 to 30 women that all share similar features – blondes, redheads, brunettes and who typically are quite tall so they share the same stature. She’ll strip them naked and give them some sort of prop. In the piece we own, she employs tall blond women, all dressed in identical high-heeled shoes and desert-camouflage caps. She’ll then release all these identical, tall, naked and beautiful women out into the vernissage where they’ll move around amongst the audience. What she is getting at is the female identity. She questions and challenges the male glance, the idea that the female body from this perspective is interchangeable, a non-specific and sexualized reflection of male dominance and lust. Also she is questioning the female identity in art. Women in art are grossly misrepresented and have been so throughout history. But looking at the motifs – what’s actually depicted on the canvases or the plinths - the female body is grossly overrepresented. And is of course, more often than not, also naked.
The photo that we bought documents a fragment of this performance; you see 4-5 of the aforementioned naked women sitting on the floor at the vernissage. I hung the photo in our main conference room, where most of our client meetings are held and it actually created a bit of a debate at e-Types. Can we shove close-ups of naked women at our clients during meetings? What kind of a signal are we sending? And do we run the risk of intimidating anyone?
Two things of note arose from that experience. Firstly, that within two weeks the discussion was dead. Everyone had completely incorporated the photo as a natural part of e-Types´ interior and our personal style and expression. The second thing is that I had an explanation for why I bought the piece and why I believed it coincided well with what e-Types does and stands for. e-Types makes a living from advising our clients on their identity. How they are seen in the world? Which signals are they sending? And that is what this piece is all about; understanding and making sense of the things that you perceive in your surroundings. How are these females’ identities being represented? This became a whole little story we could tell clients, just as a way of sparking their imaginations and prompting them to think about these things. In that way, the photo became more than just senseless decoration only meant to provoke. It became an example of how we work. How we view our relation to our surroundings but also to the field that we work with day in and day out – identity.
There hasn’t really been other pieces that have created that kind of debate since. We also have AES Groups photo-manipulated portrait of the Statue of Liberty wearing a burqa and Jens Haanings double poster with a ”Page 9 Girl” (The Danish equivalent of The Suns Page Three Girls – ed.) opposite a collection of Arabic jokes. Those pieces were entered into the collection somewhat later and nobody really took offence. In general I don’t think that provocation for its own sake is the main concern with us. I think we have reached the point where, whenever we buy a new piece, people are genuinely interested in why we bought it? What makes it special in regards to e-Types? That is a bit of a dream scenario, if you ask me.
TORBEN ZENTH: Does e-Types have the resources to become a player on the local art scene?
MICHAEL THOUBER: Personally I doubt it, but I suppose you really should ask the galleries. We have an annual budget of around 50.000 to 100.000 dkk (roughly between 7 and 14 thousand Euros- ed.), which is not a whole lot. I think our contribution is less in the monetary value of our collection and more in the way we frame and communicate the art that we purchase. Can we for example, reach a different audience? For the opening, we had one of our designers create a catalogue that we’ve tried to stage in a way that suits us. Cathrine Raben Davidsen created a lithograph in a run of 100 signed copies that we distributed in the catalogue. That meant that 100 of our guests received a free work of art. We’ve also created a visual identity that we are proud of and that we feel is relevant to the exhibition itself. Something that we sometimes feel is missing in other exhibitions. That kind of staging is something that is often thought of last in art museums and exhibition spaces, despite it often being instrumental to whether or not people will actually show up. Through this kind of staging, we might actually expose art to people who normally wouldn’t find it relevant. If we can do that, I think we’ve succeeded.
TORBEN ZENTH: But there aren’t that many private collections of note in Denmark…
MICHAEL THOUBER: No and I realise that it sounds somewhat flamboyant having a ”Private Collection”. But I don’t believe that we are a private collection in that sense. We don’t have the resources that private collectors have in the US or Germany or where ever. We aren’t Siemens or anything so we can’t just go out and buy whatever we want. The pieces we buy mustn’t cost a fortune and that is a huge challenge for us, since prices on contemporary art have gone up considerably in the last couple of years. We are fascinated with several of the great international artists like Araki, Holzer and Tracy Emin – people who have fantastic international careers. Acquiring anything by them will easily run you into six figures – money that we quite simply don’t have. But we still love their art, so we buy editions, multiples and lithographs. Works that have been produced in larger numbers, and are therefore somewhat cheaper. For example, we own a Nan Goldin photo, produced in a run of 100. We bought it through Phaidon, a large English publishing house that published the photo alongside a book of Nan Goldin’s work. That cost us 10-15.000dkk whereas a Nan Goldin one-off will normally fetch up towards half a million Danish. It’s a nice example of how, granted that you can get over the fact that 99 others own the same piece, you can collect without having to be a millionaire.
TORBEN ZENTH: Apart from the price, what other criteria are there when you are buying art?
MICHAEL THOUBER: We primarily use art to inspire ourselves. So if you are asking what it is we buy, then the answer is anything that we feel is inspiring to us – which typically means that it needs to challenge us in some way.
That is one of the reasons we collect so much graphic art. Art that falls within our own field. e-Types is originally a graphic design firm, which is why we’ve always had a leaning towards artists who work seriously with the medium. How do they challenge what we do? Where is their departure point? Do they have a different attitude or ideology? Do they manage to convey something through the medium that we can’t?
Also, we tend to focus on art that revolves around identity – which luckily there is quite allot of art that does. Either gender identity like Vanessa Beecroft or national identity like in e.g. Lisa Harlev’s work. Or personal identity – another oft-explored subject among many artists.
And finally, we buy allot of pieces that involve typography – often using slogans and statements. e-Types was founded in the late 90´s by a group of young and very talented graphic designers from The Danish Design School, who all were quite keen on typefaces and typography. Many of our designers design their own typefaces, both on and outside the job. e-Types as a firm is responsible for 200 or 300 unique typefaces. So granted, any given selection of works from the collection will most likely contain some sort of typography. It is natural for us to take note when an artist works with type.
But of course, sometimes we just buy stuff because it has that feeling to it - because it hurts or because it surprises us or just has that mysterious “je ne sais quoi” about it. But overall we tend to buy works where the artist challenges the field that we ourselves work in.
TORBEN ZENTH: How long has e-Types been interested in art?
MICHAEL THOUBER: e-Types has always been interested in art as far as I can tell. When the firm was founded, many of our first clients came from the arts or from cultural fields. Typically these are the areas at the forefront. The areas where people aren’t afraid of taking chances and trying out the new and wild designers. So I believe art has always been very close to the core of what e-Types own identity stands for. At the same time, there has always been a certain desire to contribute meaningfully to an artistic milieu. So when we started to have a little bit of extra cash lying around, it felt like a natural move to buy a couple of works. Not long after, we had our first piece in a collection that now contains around 60-70 pieces in all.
TORBEN ZENTH: Do you have a feeling of where this is going? What will be the next developments for e-Types´ collection?
MICHAEL THOUBER: Yes, I think so. Now we have the foundations of a collection. Next step will probably be to create some sort of library system where e-Types employees can ”check-out” an artwork and bring it home. This way the art can take on a life outside the firm. Just like a good book that you pass on to your friends.
Apart from that, we will probably invest more in works that have decidedly different consequences for the rooms that we work in every day. We have just ordered some wallpaper by Jake & Dinos Chapman that we want to put up in one of our bathrooms. And I am in a continuing mail-conversation with Goodiepal about a sound installation for one of our other rooms. These will be permanent additions to our space. Pieces that will define the space and can’t simply just be put away.
TORBEN ZENTH: Have you had any negative reactions to the collection?
MICHAEL THOUBER: Luckily people are so polite that they keep it to themselves if they get angry or upset (ha-ha). If we had naked women and Arabic jokes juxtaposed with Page 9 girls in the States, it would probably have been a different story. Or a veiled Statue of Liberty – that would probably cause a bit of a stir – but in Denmark, we probably just tend to keep it more to ourselves. You’ll just be going down the stairs, thinking, ”what the hell was that all about?” But hopefully we will have given you something, you know? Just enough for you to tell your girlfriend when you come home, or your co-worker or mom and in that way, we’ve contributed to spreading the word just a little further.
Identity and Art – An interview with Michael Thouber
During the last couple of years the Danish design agency e-Types has steadily been building a collection of Danish and international contemporary art. A collection that recently has been opened to the public. Torben Zenth, editor of Kopenhagen.dk met Michael Thouber, e-Types’ art curator.
TORBEN ZENTH: Why has e-Types chosen to start an art collection?
MICHAEL THOUBER: The interesting thing about building e-Types´ collection is that right from the start there has always been a sense of being able to utilize art in the everyday. I believe that this is an interesting perspective, because art is often being dragged onto this plane where it is somehow ”above” the useful. Some would even claim that as soon as art has utility, it stops being art.
At e-Types there has always been an insistency that we can use art for something other than just decoration – and that is paramount to why art is taken so seriously here. During the opening speech at the vernissage, I jokingly said that I was happy that there weren’t to many of our clients that had shown up at that point, because many of them would be able to see where the inspiration for their own identity programmes came from. But truth be told, we don’t really see that as a problem – quite the contrary.
There is a piece by the artist Mads Lynnerup in the collection called “If You See Anything Interesting, Please Let Someone Know Immediately”. I believe that it sums up much of the attitude or modus operandi of e-Types; we absorb a lot of information and then reinterpret it into something that our clients and associates can use. This is where art really comes in as a valuable tool. Partly as pure inspiration for us as a creative firm, but also as something that can inspire others: our clients, friends and colleagues who visit the studio.
TORBEN ZENTH: Do you ever encounter the opposite? Where art becomes so controversial that it ceases to be commercially viable?
MICHAEL THOUBER: Yes. But it is important to stress that we don’t make art for our clients. Our identity programmes are not works of art and were never intended to be. We interpret the inspiration that among other things comes from art, into solutions that provide value and function for our clients. Where art is often about asking questions, design is about answering them.
TORBEN ZENTH: But is there art that you won’t buy for fear of offending some of your clients?
MICHAEL THOUBER: One of the first pieces I bought for e-Types was a photo, roughly poster-size, by Vanessa Beecroft that documents a performance of hers in Germany. She is an American feminist artist – at least that is how I see her. Her point of departure is the role of women in art and in society. Typically she will find 20 to 30 women that all share similar features – blondes, redheads, brunettes and who typically are quite tall so they share the same stature. She’ll strip them naked and give them some sort of prop. In the piece we own, she employs tall blond women, all dressed in identical high-heeled shoes and desert-camouflage caps. She’ll then release all these identical, tall, naked and beautiful women out into the vernissage where they’ll move around amongst the audience. What she is getting at is the female identity. She questions and challenges the male glance, the idea that the female body from this perspective is interchangeable, a non-specific and sexualized reflection of male dominance and lust. Also she is questioning the female identity in art. Women in art are grossly misrepresented and have been so throughout history. But looking at the motifs – what’s actually depicted on the canvases or the plinths - the female body is grossly overrepresented. And is of course, more often than not, also naked.
The photo that we bought documents a fragment of this performance; you see 4-5 of the aforementioned naked women sitting on the floor at the vernissage. I hung the photo in our main conference room, where most of our client meetings are held and it actually created a bit of a debate at e-Types. Can we shove close-ups of naked women at our clients during meetings? What kind of a signal are we sending? And do we run the risk of intimidating anyone?
Two things of note arose from that experience. Firstly, that within two weeks the discussion was dead. Everyone had completely incorporated the photo as a natural part of e-Types´ interior and our personal style and expression. The second thing is that I had an explanation for why I bought the piece and why I believed it coincided well with what e-Types does and stands for. e-Types makes a living from advising our clients on their identity. How they are seen in the world? Which signals are they sending? And that is what this piece is all about; understanding and making sense of the things that you perceive in your surroundings. How are these females’ identities being represented? This became a whole little story we could tell clients, just as a way of sparking their imaginations and prompting them to think about these things. In that way, the photo became more than just senseless decoration only meant to provoke. It became an example of how we work. How we view our relation to our surroundings but also to the field that we work with day in and day out – identity.
There hasn’t really been other pieces that have created that kind of debate since. We also have AES Groups photo-manipulated portrait of the Statue of Liberty wearing a burqa and Jens Haanings double poster with a ”Page 9 Girl” (The Danish equivalent of The Suns Page Three Girls – ed.) opposite a collection of Arabic jokes. Those pieces were entered into the collection somewhat later and nobody really took offence. In general I don’t think that provocation for its own sake is the main concern with us. I think we have reached the point where, whenever we buy a new piece, people are genuinely interested in why we bought it? What makes it special in regards to e-Types? That is a bit of a dream scenario, if you ask me.
TORBEN ZENTH: Does e-Types have the resources to become a player on the local art scene?
MICHAEL THOUBER: Personally I doubt it, but I suppose you really should ask the galleries. We have an annual budget of around 50.000 to 100.000 dkk (roughly between 7 and 14 thousand Euros- ed.), which is not a whole lot. I think our contribution is less in the monetary value of our collection and more in the way we frame and communicate the art that we purchase. Can we for example, reach a different audience? For the opening, we had one of our designers create a catalogue that we’ve tried to stage in a way that suits us. Cathrine Raben Davidsen created a lithograph in a run of 100 signed copies that we distributed in the catalogue. That meant that 100 of our guests received a free work of art. We’ve also created a visual identity that we are proud of and that we feel is relevant to the exhibition itself. Something that we sometimes feel is missing in other exhibitions. That kind of staging is something that is often thought of last in art museums and exhibition spaces, despite it often being instrumental to whether or not people will actually show up. Through this kind of staging, we might actually expose art to people who normally wouldn’t find it relevant. If we can do that, I think we’ve succeeded.
TORBEN ZENTH: But there aren’t that many private collections of note in Denmark…
MICHAEL THOUBER: No and I realise that it sounds somewhat flamboyant having a ”Private Collection”. But I don’t believe that we are a private collection in that sense. We don’t have the resources that private collectors have in the US or Germany or where ever. We aren’t Siemens or anything so we can’t just go out and buy whatever we want. The pieces we buy mustn’t cost a fortune and that is a huge challenge for us, since prices on contemporary art have gone up considerably in the last couple of years. We are fascinated with several of the great international artists like Araki, Holzer and Tracy Emin – people who have fantastic international careers. Acquiring anything by them will easily run you into six figures – money that we quite simply don’t have. But we still love their art, so we buy editions, multiples and lithographs. Works that have been produced in larger numbers, and are therefore somewhat cheaper. For example, we own a Nan Goldin photo, produced in a run of 100. We bought it through Phaidon, a large English publishing house that published the photo alongside a book of Nan Goldin’s work. That cost us 10-15.000dkk whereas a Nan Goldin one-off will normally fetch up towards half a million Danish. It’s a nice example of how, granted that you can get over the fact that 99 others own the same piece, you can collect without having to be a millionaire.
TORBEN ZENTH: Apart from the price, what other criteria are there when you are buying art?
MICHAEL THOUBER: We primarily use art to inspire ourselves. So if you are asking what it is we buy, then the answer is anything that we feel is inspiring to us – which typically means that it needs to challenge us in some way.
That is one of the reasons we collect so much graphic art. Art that falls within our own field. e-Types is originally a graphic design firm, which is why we’ve always had a leaning towards artists who work seriously with the medium. How do they challenge what we do? Where is their departure point? Do they have a different attitude or ideology? Do they manage to convey something through the medium that we can’t?
Also, we tend to focus on art that revolves around identity – which luckily there is quite allot of art that does. Either gender identity like Vanessa Beecroft or national identity like in e.g. Lisa Harlev’s work. Or personal identity – another oft-explored subject among many artists.
And finally, we buy allot of pieces that involve typography – often using slogans and statements. e-Types was founded in the late 90´s by a group of young and very talented graphic designers from The Danish Design School, who all were quite keen on typefaces and typography. Many of our designers design their own typefaces, both on and outside the job. e-Types as a firm is responsible for 200 or 300 unique typefaces. So granted, any given selection of works from the collection will most likely contain some sort of typography. It is natural for us to take note when an artist works with type.
But of course, sometimes we just buy stuff because it has that feeling to it - because it hurts or because it surprises us or just has that mysterious “je ne sais quoi” about it. But overall we tend to buy works where the artist challenges the field that we ourselves work in.
TORBEN ZENTH: How long has e-Types been interested in art?
MICHAEL THOUBER: e-Types has always been interested in art as far as I can tell. When the firm was founded, many of our first clients came from the arts or from cultural fields. Typically these are the areas at the forefront. The areas where people aren’t afraid of taking chances and trying out the new and wild designers. So I believe art has always been very close to the core of what e-Types own identity stands for. At the same time, there has always been a certain desire to contribute meaningfully to an artistic milieu. So when we started to have a little bit of extra cash lying around, it felt like a natural move to buy a couple of works. Not long after, we had our first piece in a collection that now contains around 60-70 pieces in all.
TORBEN ZENTH: Do you have a feeling of where this is going? What will be the next developments for e-Types´ collection?
MICHAEL THOUBER: Yes, I think so. Now we have the foundations of a collection. Next step will probably be to create some sort of library system where e-Types employees can ”check-out” an artwork and bring it home. This way the art can take on a life outside the firm. Just like a good book that you pass on to your friends.
Apart from that, we will probably invest more in works that have decidedly different consequences for the rooms that we work in every day. We have just ordered some wallpaper by Jake & Dinos Chapman that we want to put up in one of our bathrooms. And I am in a continuing mail-conversation with Goodiepal about a sound installation for one of our other rooms. These will be permanent additions to our space. Pieces that will define the space and can’t simply just be put away.
TORBEN ZENTH: Have you had any negative reactions to the collection?
MICHAEL THOUBER: Luckily people are so polite that they keep it to themselves if they get angry or upset (ha-ha). If we had naked women and Arabic jokes juxtaposed with Page 9 girls in the States, it would probably have been a different story. Or a veiled Statue of Liberty – that would probably cause a bit of a stir – but in Denmark, we probably just tend to keep it more to ourselves. You’ll just be going down the stairs, thinking, ”what the hell was that all about?” But hopefully we will have given you something, you know? Just enough for you to tell your girlfriend when you come home, or your co-worker or mom and in that way, we’ve contributed to spreading the word just a little further.
Read the interview in Danish here
