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AI: The Kiss and Other Warriors is remi-niscent of the iconic Kiss by GustavKlimt.Yours has the same concern withintricate patterns but your version isalmost clinical emotionally. Did youactually have Klimt’s in mind at all?

LA: I certainly thought about the title,and knew that his work would be anunavoidable reference, but I wasn’t reallyinterested in commenting on his work. Iknew my kiss wouldn’t be very romantic.

AI: Could you talk a bit about theWarriors part? A kiss comes into being atthe moment of contact. Is the kiss beingpersonified here as a violent figure?

LA: I think of the Kiss as a character —like a nickname for someone.“Herecomes the Kiss” or “don’t mess with theKiss — he will kill you.” I know it isopen to other interpretations but that ismy personal favorite. I think of the Kissas a warrior.

AI: The Typology series flirts with thegrotesque and the primitive. Even as youallude to visual taxonomy, you seem tobe pushing against the viewer’s ability tomake sense of the figures. Could youtalk more about where and how youstart pushing?

LA: I am interested in how our impulsesto order and gain control bump upagainst the unknowability of people —especially how visual interactions areactually quite misleading, but that werely and trust them as sources of knowl-edge. People also deliberately projectvisual cues in order to manipulate orconvince others to take certain actions,or to keep them from taking action.

AI: The Typology series appeared in a group exhibition in Poland in 2006,entitled “Black Alphabet.”What inspiredthat title? Do you see the precision ofhieroglyphs and pictographs in your workas creating a different sign system like an

HERE COMES THE KISS in conversation with

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alphabet or a new grammar toexplore human relations?

LA: I didn’t choose that title so Iam not sure how the Polish cura-tors were thinking about that. I’mnot sure what I think of that titlein its English incarnation — whenI first heard it, I bristled at it.Thetitle teeters on containing theblack artists presented in an overlysimplistic way. It seemed to be athoughtful show, though. But justimagine that title in the U.S. Ithink, in general, I prefer the title“White Alphabet” — not for thatshow, I just prefer the sound of it.

That being said, I have, at times, seenmy figures as a kind of mysterious alpha-bet or sign system — but not necessarilya black one.

AI: No, the title wouldn’t work in theU.S. However, the title invoked for meBasquiat’s icons and alternative sign sys-tems. I remember I was in your studioperhaps in the early 90s. Back then youwere incorporating words and stories a laJenny Holzer around larger than life-size figure drawings. How has thatevolved into this other sign system ofcryptic figures?

LA: When I was in college, I was veryinterested in creative writing and usedwritten words in my work. I startedweaning myself from that impulse ingraduate school and then stopped using

words at some point. I think the drive toarticulate then came out in the figures,though it wasn’t planned: their crispness,the way I grouped them, how one figurein a group always seemed to be activeand the others more passive or decora-tive. It became interesting to me to seehow much I could push the viewer tobe the one who articulates what is goingon rather than me.

AI: The figures seem to be suspended intime.Why did you want to hint at a nar-rative and not make it more explicit?

LA: I am more interested in hookinginto and playing off of ongoing narra-tives outside of the picture. So, I providecues and one can move from the image,off into one’s own reference system, andback onto the image again.

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AI: You say in one of the interviewsabout the Greenheads series that youimagine yourself as a “removed witness”to the violence implicit in the work.Could you explain this perspective?

LA: Perhaps my terming it a “removedwitness” is redundant because a witnessis already removed from the events thathe or she is observing. I suppose there arewitnesses who are involved but doesn’tthat make them into something else, likeaccomplices, heroes, or victims? I supposewhat I mean by that is I think of myselfand many of the characters in my paint-ings as observers of the misdeeds that goon.They often do not intervene but theysee what goes on, and that has psycho-logical ramifications.They are often fullof what they have witnessed — theycould be brimming with it.The wordwitness has become so bound with ourjustice system that it seems to have aninherent moral character to it, like a witness is a truth teller that can help tomake clear what happened, and thus leadto some sort of rectifying outcome. But

a child witness to domestic violence,for instance, might go on to repeat theviolence. Many times, witnessing has noverbal outlet and lives in the body andmind.Witnessing could be a kind ofbranding — a doomed sort of seeing.

AI: The notion of witnessing without averbal outlet makes me think about theterm cryptic in the sense of a burial, acrypt containing all sorts of unspeakablethings.You refuse to convey direct infor-mation about your figures. How do yousee these witnessed scenes animating theviewer’s own imagination?

LA: I like to think of the work as prodding the viewer to participate, eventhough the level of participation that Iam requesting is really minimal: I wantthe viewer to finally name these events,figures, and the goings-on. I want theviewer to decide what is happening,even if that is only for a moment wherethe assignment of meaning occurs, andthen dissipates.

Arguably, this kind of exchange happens with all art — but the viewer is often let off the hook by didacticinformation that accompanies works, ortitles, or the artist inserting explanationsinto the work that are redundant. I wantto leave that interpretive space open,almost gapingly so.

That being said, I have started to flirt with titling my work again.And Irecently made an artist’s book withwriting in sentences. So, all of thesethings are open to change as needed.

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AI:You’ve mentioned that you like thephysicality and the stillness of a paintingin the world.As a teacher of literature, Ihave always believed in the durabilityand weight of the book. I think that it isimportant for students to live physicallywith the text and the work.You dothis with the production of an artist’sbook with your Greenheads series andnow Notes with Little Illustration.Whatattracts you to this form of your workalongside the exhibition? Or do you seethese books as separate from the workhanging in the exhibition hall?

LA: I see my artist’s books as separate —they are supposed to be able to go outinto the world alone and without propsor institutional context. I like the unpre-dictability of how an artist’s book — andmine are not fancy ones— can travel.I’ve always preferred looking at things inprivate — one is not burdened with theperformance of viewing — so a bookallows for that.

AI: Could you explain the “performanceof viewing”? How do you imagine thedifferent viewing communities that formaround the painting and around the book?

LA:When one goes into a gallery ormuseum to look at art, there are usuallyothers around: viewers or guards, oftensecurity cameras as well. One perceives,actively or otherwise, other people viewing, and so I find that the reality ofother people’s physical presences has tobe reckoned with on some level.Also, thework itself is often given a rarefied orexalted status, even if it is a work that istrying to defy that exaltation. One has tonegotiate the relationship of one’s ownphysical being with the work presented:Distance? Intimacy? Can you touch it? Isit a fast exchange, like a quick hello orsomething more like a kiss, where onegets very close and looks into the work,almost too close? This all can be part ofthe allure of seeing shows in person.

I think that the best works in suchspaces take all of that into account andplay with it. But that’s harder to do withpaintings and drawings, which tend tobe mindful of their boundaries.As forthe book, one can minimize his or herphysical presence.When I read, I oftenfeel that I have no body, or that it is in akind of hibernation as I read. Interactionswith books can allow for an intensiveprivacy that can allow for a less guardedinteraction — perhaps people are morevulnerable and open in that situation.

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