By Juan Pablo Plata.
Good afternoon, Máximo.
Good afternoon Juan, thank you for being here and for visiting me.
It is a pleasure, we are at Norwood Art and Music Warehouse and the year is starting, but before we were at this moment, where did you study? What is your training and what has been your professional development? Where did you live and what kind of changes do you think there have been in your pictorial language?
Well, I am from Santo Domingo, I studied architecture, I studied journalism too, but notice that what I have dedicated myself to doing, I have never studied, which is art. And I also write, I write for different international media, articles weekly, philosophy, history, anecdotal, and I also wrote a book, a novel, under a pseudonym, it is called Patricio de Todas las Puertas, under the pseudonym of Pat Francis, it is an ad, right? It is on Amazon.
Ok. It is on Amazon, and do you also have it in English or is it coming out soon?
No, I only have it in Spanish. Only in Spanish.
What is this novel about?
In this novel, in a way, I got a lot of things out at that time in my life, I wrote it in 3 months, but it took me 10 years to publish it, and I am very grateful because what I grew up with spiritually enriched that work, which I did under a pressure, I was under a divorce, but there I express everything that I have learned spiritually, it has a lot of humor, it has adventure, it has history, and basically everything that I have experienced, because all the things that I can tell you are not based only on speculation, they are things that have been seen by me.
Is there something supernatural that you tell there that no one would believe you, for example?
Well, the novel itself is surreal, there are a number of elements that appear there, a ghost appears, a lot of things appear, I believe a lot in fate, I think everything is already written, and that the important thing in this life is to learn to flow.
Is there something of the literary that has come to you in painting? And also, before of what I have in front of me, these canvases, these paintings, were you more figurative, more realistic, or have you had a continuous line? Let's say if you did a self-criticism.
Well, I did paint landscapes for more than 20 years. I hated modern art, because I thought it was nonsense, it didn't make sense. But because of those things of fate, they asked me for a commission, which was from a Dominican artist, Ramón Oviedo, and by looking at his book to make a work that someone wanted, something stayed inside me, because one receives messages. What happens is that sometimes, most people don't realize it, but we live receiving messages. That was like a click, like this is what you don't like, but we're putting it there. And it happened that I kept painting landscapes and things, but I flirted with modern art. I flirted, until at one point I left behind all the figurative art, even though in my first works, flirting with modern art, there is a human intention, there are some human figures. But little by little I got rid of all that, and from time to time I can still make a landscape, but I do it with an accentuated language. I'm going to explain later how I consider this to be what we call modern art. For me, this is not art, this is a connection.
When you were talking about the signals and the connection, is this the literary that you lend to painting, plus what you have experienced?
It has nothing... I would tell you that it has nothing literary. There are some works that I have done throughout the years, but it does have this thing about the signals, like a thing...
Who gives you those signals? The ones you were talking about a while ago, where do they come from? Other beings, gods...
No, I'm going to explain. I realized... I was trying to find my own language, to distinguish myself from others. You know that the artist has to find an identity that is recognized, that is you. But that is part of the ego. And one strives to try not to look like others, however, there are influences. When I painted landscapes, I loved Van Gogh, Renoir... And then, when I was in this process, I loved Fernando de Szyszlo, from Peru, Wilfredo Lan, from Cuba, Ivan Tovar, from Santo Domingo, there is another one more important than Tovar, that I liked much more, Tamayo... And all those influences, I had to get rid of them. You look like Lan, you look like Matta from Chile, you look like this one... But there is a moment that... I discover, and then all this enters the plane of speculation. Once I listen to a video of Lan, talking about the Kybalion: the seven principles. And I say, oh, but this man was... He knew about this. Later, I discover Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, who founded the Theosophical School in New York. I discover that in that school, which was a school... It was a group, let's say, pseudo-religious, that mixed science with spiritual connections. They met in New York, in a house, and they used ouija boards to connect with spirits. And in that school was Kandinsky, and Hilma af Klint. Recently they made movie about her.. Hilma was from Norway and she told her nephew that she didn't want him to show some the paintings she had made, but only 20 years later after her death. But he never showed them. Now there's a exhibition of her paintings that has been going around the world, through museums. And art historians say now that we have to rewrite the history of art, because Hilma was making modern art before Picasso. But really what Hilma was doing was what she, the visions she saw, she reflected in the painting. Kandinsky also managed to reach a dimension that he connected with, and managed to bring those drawings, those paintings that no one really knows what they are. So I explain, and I say, what I do, I manage to reach a dimension, at this moment I can reach 6 or 7 dimensions, that has been my spiritual process of growth, through 40 years. I had my work 30 years ago, from the beginning, when I started making modern art, and you will realize that those works that look like caravans, the intention of the language, of the message, was there. What happens is that I was like a 2-year-old boy, I learned to write at 3 years old, I love my mom, and I wrote, I love my mom, and you barely understand what the child said. But with practice, that child, in 10 years or less, manages to capture that language very clearly, to be seen. My artistic process has been like this, it has been precisely well. What happens is that you see an artwork of mine 30 years ago, and you see the current one, you will realize that the gesture of that time is the same as now, what happens is that the language is clearer, the language has evolved to the point that the language... So going back to the point of why I consider this not art, but connections, because here (Northwood Art and Music at West Palm Beach), for example, we do exhibitions every Saturday, and people come and ask me if I can do an exhibition, and I say yes. Do you want to see my work? I say no. But why? I say no, I'm not interested, because here we are not judging the artist, we are motivating him, we are giving him the opportunity to really feel like an artist, because it happened to me the first time, I spent more than 20 years doing landscapes, and I never stopped until a friend pushed me to exhibit, and when I did it, from that moment on, every year I do an exhibition. It has been more than 10 years that I do not do an individual, because you also evolve, you get old, and there are things that you leave behind. But what happens? Those guys who come here, some are good, others are bad, for me, but what they are doing, especially when it is modern art, not when there is an intention of a figure, I always advise them that if they want to do figurative things or landscapes, they have to go to study, they have to go to the academy, because that is art. But when it is an abstract work, you will find millions of people who will love that work, because they are connected in that dimension that that person is doing. When they come to see the work, they say, I like it, but they don't know why, but their subconscious is sending them the message that I like this, even if they don't understand it. I tell the artists: do not to try to explain the abstract work, because they are lying. For us it is impossible to describe this language as human beings, we do not have the ability to understand a language that comes from another dimension. It's like if they show you right now a sentence in Russian, you will not understand it. So, as it says up there (Showing a phrase written in his studio), Art exists because life is not enough (Ferreira Gullar said it). There is a point where philosophers, Schopenhauer, Aristotle, mention whatever you want, no one knows the truth of what is the mystery of life. Everyone stays at one point, everything is speculation, everything comes from speculation. Art tries to explain, when we get to that point where we don't know why we are here, what is the meaning of life, art tells you, but it doesn't tell you. Do you understand? So, we enjoy the different languages, each one can do it. Look, last week we had an artist from Spain exhibit here, who came here to paint. He did his thing, and he found three people who loved his work. Connections. Now, as an art connoisseur, having been in a museum, you know other artists, you already know what is supposedly well done. It is well done, has balance, spontaneity, etc. But most people don't, most people just flow. We are a little more enclosed in that aspect, but I don't want to use that kind of judgment, if that word exists, to select artists. I believe in what I'm telling you, I motivate them, and I let them continue developing their language until they eventually develop it, and that language becomes a little clearer. Even if at the beginning, it can be a very rough language, like I did. The best way to explain art is art, for me. That's it. This is connection, this is not art, this is connection, what is abstract art.
But you are not going to do wha Hilma af Klint did: to save the paintings, because you don't want to show them now, because here you give the others a chance, if they ask for your paintings, you will not be saving them for 10 or 20 years, you will not be doing your own play of breaking postmodern art, post-mortem, or something like that?
Look, I don't know if when you came here you realized that there is a pirate flag, I have had the experience of death, and I believe through those experiences, and having seen other experiences, that are all very similar, that there is something true in all of this, this dimension is to live it to the maximum, this dimension is to enjoy it, so I don't want to illuminate myself, there are many people who want to be in spirituality, and want to reach a degree of spirituality. What happens when you illuminate yourself?, Buddha was illuminated, he sat under a tree, but he wasted his moment, he wasted his earthly moment, he wasted this dimension, this dimension is to enjoy it, so I don't care, as Hilma did, to leave the works in one place, I am interested in enjoying this dimension, and I have always said that the artworks are to be shown, anywhere, there are many artists who say, no, I am already at another level, no, art is to show it, for people to see it, for people to grow, it should not be exclusive to one thing.
What are you listening to these days, or what have you been listening to for a long time, in musical genres, what are you reading, or what do you sometimes reread, and in terms of audiovisual, if there is a movie, a documentary, or a series that you are watching. It is very important that a creator tell us his influences, or his most relaxed consumption, not precisely with which you study, or reflect, but with which you have fun, what are you consuming of these three genres?
I don't watch a lot of movies, the music that I have always heard, since I was about 11 years old, it was a social, I call it protest music, but it has been a music that has been my teachers, Serrat, Sabina, well, I discovered Sabina barely 20 years ago, Silvio Rodríguez, Pablo Milanés, Luis Eduardo Aute, they are such special messages, people think they are communists, no, no, it is a poetry, it is a way of life, they are giving you encouragement to be able to bear the dramas of life. As for literature, I don't read much anymore, and I am very glad that, as I write, it is very good that, it is very interesting that a person who starts painting, for example, has not seen anything, that he does not have any kind of influence, to see what happens. In my case, as I write, most of my writings are anecdotal, or as I told you before, and when I use philosophy, psychology, philosophy, I am glad to discover that many of the things that I thought for myself, that I had discovered, other great people had already said. For example, the other day, I will share this with you because I think it is very interesting that people listen to it, the meaning of life. What is the meaning of life? People look at this, look at that, look at that, look at the other, and I, sitting here, and look at what the signals are, that's why I believe so much in all these connections, all these things that happen to me. Sitting here, some guys came to tell me, look, you have to select the best artists, sometimes I bring some artists so that they also see them, but they wanted me to start selecting in curatorships and to charge. And I told them, look, when you give, when you are giving all the time, you keep the positive energy. It's like you are in a crowd, and you are, you walk through that crowd, but you are surrounded by a positive energy because you are constantly in well-being. And then I think, the meaning of life is to give, because all this is going to end, all this ends, there is nothing here that one retains. And learn to flow too, because people, dramas are what make people sick, but that same night, after I came to that conclusion, that the meaning of life is to give, I am watching a documentary by Tolstoy, the Russian thinker, who was about to commit suicide, because this is dangerous, there are people who, when you don't have a project in life, when you have discovered everything, that you think you already know everything, life no longer makes sense, you get bored, you feel miserable, and you want to commit suicide. Tolstoy came to the point of almost committing suicide on several occasions, he had a miserable life until he saw some peasants, and he began to observe the peasants, to interact with them, and at the end of the documentary, he says, he discovers that the meaning of life is to give, and it makes a lot of sense, because everything is energy, everything is vibrations, when you act in well-being, when you are giving, so many paths open for you, another example, they tell me, but what do you gain by doing this every Saturday, this exhibitions at Northwood Art and Music? If you don't get a penny from the artist, you don't get anything, what do you gain? The relationships that I know, people come and hug me, and love me, because I am showing them solidarity, I am contributing to the world a better way of life, but I have received a lot of well-being, because many of those relationships have been gallerists, or interior designers, who have started to sell my work, and they have given me a well-being that I would not have achieved if I had only been here selfishly presenting my artworks.
But here, people come and want to see my work, I show it to them on the phone, and I tell them, if they want to see it in person, I give them an appointment, and I show them the work, but I don't have that rush. Do you understand? You reach another mentality. I read a book, La Luz de México, by Cristina Pacheco, many years ago, where she interviewed several masters, like Botero, Tamayo, and I remember, because I always read a lot, you can read a whole book, but there is something that always stays with you, and I remember what one of them said, something I told you before, that at the beginning you look for recognition, you have a desire, when you are starting, you want people to know you. But there comes a moment when you forget all that, and the most important thing is to create, to work, to be in contact. For me, this is my temple, this is my church. I come here, I sit down, sometimes other artists come, and I tell them to leave, and when they leave, the other one comes, but I have accepted to be tolerant, to influence.
Maximo, as usual, in our interviews, leave a perverting message, or edifying, or whatever you want, for the readers without me asking the question, please.
I think that through all I have said, I have said a lot of things, for the people, but in what aspect do you want me to say it? The artistic aspect?
No, the message that reaches you.
Well, I think that, I will continue the same, I think that people must understand that there is a destiny, that no matter how much you want to change it, you will not be able to, because everything is programmed. It is programmed through Zodiac, people do not believe in that, but if you realize, observe your friends with the same Zodiac signs, you will see that everyone has a program, they act in a certain way the same, which can indicate to us that we come here programmed, for me that was the most convincing proof that something exists. How is it possible that each one of us comes here programmed, with a computer to act in a certain way, which also tells me that it is so that you can act according to the destiny that was assigned to you, with that uniform, with that weaponry, because everything that you are going to go through on that path, you need to make peace, and in the same way that people understand that they are not going to change anyone, that there are people who came, and excuse me, since I get a little bit of the ethical, there are people who came here to fuck, and there are people who came here to be fucked. So you have to see this as a movie, sit down and enjoy it, because this is a comedy, and do not take drama, because you are going to get sick. Every time you take a drama, all that energy stays in your body, sends communication to all your cells, and you go crazy and develop cancer. You have got to flow and accept that one dies the last day.
With you, Máximo Caminero, on the JUPITER AMERICAN POST. Thank you, Máximo.
A pleasure, Juan. Thank you very much.
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