What was your first thought today?
After a night of laughter …  
the thoughts that accompany that grin.

Looking back what do you hear?
D — D — D — DE DE — E — R — R RA — RA — RA — RAC I — I — I — I — I — I — I — I — INNNN
IN – IN – N A – N – A – N – A NA T – NA – TT – T – NA – T – TE TE – EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

Closing your eyes, what do you see?
Shivering giants.

What should happen after death?
The peripheral vision of a shroom-bloom.

Your remedy for gloom?
Depth-dive into the doom-drone-tones to transform that murk to gold.

A poem or song you will never forget?
Klaus what power art thou? That Cold Song.

Another word for beauty?
Gravity and Grace—those beautiful monsters.

What is wrong with reality?
Who’s?

How can you differentiate between lies and truth?
Empathy for all those mythologies.

What knowledge?
Embodied.

Which faith?
All your late ancestors and their friends, sit down at the table. Offer them a drink …

Which words you were fond of have disappeared?
Darn it (miss you grandma).

A question to which „yes“ is always your answer?
Cocktail Chalice?

Valerie Solanas or Valie Export?
Val met Val and they decided to collaborate.

You’re favorite enemy?
The one who remained at the table.  

What would you like to get rid of?
The entitlement of the pathological narcissist.

How do you draw movement?
Systematically buttress abstraction.

How do noted ideas look like?
Flustered symphonies.

What is your center of gravity?
It shifts depending on a point, or many points,
that I choose to be tethered to at any given moment in time.

What kind of lies can you forgive?
Ouch.

Where does the wind blow?
Never Eat Shredded Wheat … and all the spaces between.

Egalité ou sisterhood?
Egalité & sisterhood …

The antidote for meaninglessness?
Myth.

When do you blush?
When someone gets my joke.

How does the mood of love feel like?
Defibrillation.

Poetry or music?
The poetry of music.

Judith or Octavia Butler?
Octavia sipping kahve mit Judith.

Can you describe the face of strangeness?
The pressure to make sense of that which
feels nonsensical.

Artichokes or hand grenades?
Artichokes as hand grenades.

 What would you be if you weren’t you?
Chimera(s).

Why are women always showing one naked breast
on old pictures?
For the chids.

Your favourite stereotypes?
The Specials over Blur, or a solid plate made
from a mold known as a flong.

Which language?
Body language.

What’s the problem with solutions?
Solutions multiply problems.

Can you tell the first sentence of a story that doesn’t end?
They ran ahead to see what all the fuss was about …

Please finish the following sentences:
– as he spoke with his eyes… they saw an end.
– as she saw with her heart… they saw no end.

Do you want to leave a message after this?
Yes. Fail abundantly and with glee, fallible creatures.

IMAGES:
Emma Waltraud Howes,...

What was the first word today?
Words don’t come by themselves in the morning. It must have been something like… it’s still dark outside.

How to write?
Let the hand do the work.

Looking back, what do you hear?
A cacophony of sounds. Am still looking for that red thread.

Closing your eyes, what do you see?
Darkness. I listen.

Welches Buch lesen Sie gerade?
The Faraway Nearby by Rebecca Solnit.

What does why mean?
Never certain.

2 oder 3?
Binary is never good.

What is the problem with solutions?
No multiplicity but a fixed singular avenue to achieve a certain thing.

Peaches or melons?
Watermelon on a field in southern Italy.

Gehen oder Fahren?
Walk – an alternative way of thinking.

Where lies your navel of creativity?
It’s an elusive creature.

Blind or mute?
Blind.

Please complete the following sentences:
– As she spoke to me…
 I wondered whether she’d say it again.

– When I speak to him, he…
listens intentively just to lick my hand in response.
A dog’s love.

Joyce or Stein?
Stein. Tender buttons.
American female writers it must be.

What would you like to get rid of?
Ouf, that’s a long list. Let’s start with hypocrisy, torture, violence, hunger.

Egalité ou fraternité?
Sisterhood.

Are you serious?
Indeed.

The first sentence of a story that doesn’t end?
This is the story of Mucla the worm who went to look for égalité for all sentient beings.

Do you know what you are hoping for?
I think I do until I realize I don’t which would lead you back to the snark.

How to deal with neutrality?
You have to take sides. Raise your voice.

Ihre Lieblingssportart?
Ping Pong.

Lark or nightingale?
Mornings are my dark side.

What drives you mad?
No milk in my coffee in the morning plus the other obvious ailments of the human race.

Your favorite painting? (Please describe)
Hanging  on the wall opposite where I’m sitting. It’s not figurative. Easier to say what is not.
Red yellow blue green black. Held back by gray. Quite small, unassuming, no frame. I love it.
It’s by Anna Bauer.

What is the snark?
If only I knew.

A poem or song you won’t forget?
“You Want It Darker” by Leonard Cohen.

Birds or cats?
Birds.

Qu’est-ce qu’un miroir sans regard ?
Ben voilà la question du moi.

Wald oder Wiese?
Wald.

Your remedy for gloom?
See Laurie Anderson and Philip Glass at the Barbican in London (as if they played there all the time).

A question to which “yes” is always your answer?
Would you like to come for dinner?

Do you want to leave a message after this?
Always.

Images:

I Say (2017)
3  audio channel 1 screen installation
Duration 15 mins, excerpt shown 5 mins
Performed by Anna Tierney, Patricia Langa and Kip Johnson
Dance choreography Patricia Langa
http://nicolebachmann.net/work/i-say/

Hush Now Ha Part Two (2016)
Performed by actor Anna Tierney
at Eastside Projects, Birmingham.
Duration 10 mins
http://nicolebachmann.net/work/hush-now-ha-part-two/

Was war heute Ihr erster Gedanke?
Aufstehen? Oder liegenbleiben? Wahnsinn oder Genie? An was will ich überhaupt noch glauben? Brauchen wir Glauben? Und wieso sehe ich in Bern nie tote Vögel auf der Straße? In Los Angeles war das anders. Da gab es Road Kill überall!

Are you serious?
Very serious … to the point that people think I am lying or making fun of them.

Los Angeles oder Berlin?
Ich liebe L.A., weil die Stadtwüste und ihre Menschen immer noch so teuflisch schwierig zu »lesen« sind. Berlin ist mir zu soft geworden. Vielleicht fehlen dort die wirklich kranken Köpfe.

John McEnroe or Martina Navratilova?
Borg was my guy. But then I realized that McEnroe was the smart one. And Borgʼs image of the iceman
was just a sign of dullness. That was very disappointing. When I was 16, I thought Navratilova really looked hot. But I was afraid to tell that to anyone.

A question to which “yes” is always your answer?
Want to play some basketball, one-on-one?

Fahren oder Schwimmen?
Fahren. Der Blick durch die Windschutzscheibe bedeutet Kino, ein Raum, in dem fantastische Ideen zu Realitäten werden. Mit Nina hatte ich immer die schönsten Gespräche beim Fahren. Es floss einfach so aus uns heraus, und es gab kein Entkommen im Wagen.

What is the problem with solutions?
Everybody seems to be happy with solutions. Not me. I love chaos. My belief system tells me: only conflicts, disfunctionality, troublemakers like me, scandals, and more drive us forward, create progress …

Was macht Sie verrückt?
Stress. Zeitdruck. Arbeiten.

Blind or deaf?
Deaf … but nothing against blindness!

Welche Götter?
Film-Regisseure waren für mich Götter. Jedenfalls jene Autorenfilmer, wie man sie damals noch nannte, die an einer neuen Filmsprache arbeiteten.

Is it true?
No idea.

Wann werden Sie rot?
Wenn ich gelobt werde, für gute Eigenschaften, die ich eigentlich auf gar keinen Fall preisgeben wollte.

Your favorite image?
That scene in Stranger than Paradise by Jim Jarmusch when John Lurie and his friends stand at an empty beach, all is grey around them, and they reach a point of existential boredom. I like that human condition, and I think the deeper you can sink into nothingness the deeper you can dig into great ideas …

Vor was fürchten Sie sich?
Abgründe. Ich habe schreckliche Höhenangst. Dabei bin ich ein waghalsiger Skifahrer. Sobald ich auf
Ski stehe, bin ich mutig und wage mich an die brutalsten Steilhänge. Aber ich kann nicht von Hochhäusern runterschauen.

Please complete the following sentence:
As he looked at her…
… she hesitated for a moment. But it was crystal clear that they belonged together … forever.
 

Where is your center of gravity?
Kreativität.

Wer schützt Sie vor sich selbst?
Manchmal Freunde. Aber in erster Linie das zweite »Ich«, das man sich erhalten hat.

What does “home” mean?
Eine Wüste.

In die Zukunft schauend, was sehen Sie?
Mehr Autoverfolgungsfahrten. Mehr Selbsthilfegruppen für UFO-Entführungsopfer.
Eine Ehrenmedaille für meine literarischen Leistungen als Pionier im Zeitalter der alternativen Fakten.
Noch mehr Menschen, die in der Porno-Industrie arbeiten. Mehr streunende Tiere auf deutschen Straßen.

Remembering, what do you hear?
Beach Boys, Pet Sounds.
Die Stimme meines Vaters, der mir erklärt hat, dass man sich nicht neu erfinden könne. Niemals.
Man bleibe immer derjenige, als der man geboren wurde. Und wer was anderes erzählt, lügt.

Apfel oder Zitrone?
Pink Lady.

What should happen after death?
I want to be pulled into a vortex of...