PP: We finally sit down to talk…
RR: Yes, I’m sorry about last time, we made an appointment but I didn’t make it.

PP: Yes, that was weird, what happened?
RR: Well to tell you the truth I was looking forward to meeting you but I had just fallen in love with my girlfriend and we were up till very late…

PP: I understand. How unprofessional of you…
RR: Indeed, that’s me. I always have oceans of time and I’m always late. It’s strange how you can be taking it easy all day and all of a sudden you’re in a rush. Makes me think time moves in waves.

PP: You have a lot of free time? That’s something I rarely hear!
RR: Yeah… I’m not sure why everyone is always so busy.
I think an artist is supposed to have more ideas than time. Me, I have a lot of time. I actually feel guilty about it sometimes. Do I make the most of my life? Do I go all the way? But it’s just my way of doing it.
As long as I can realise my ideas It’s OK. Everything else is just random.

PP: So let’s begin at the beginning: How did you end up on the internet?
RR: For me it was never a question. It has always been very obvious to me that this is the place. For me it’s a chance to do something unique. I made a bleeding website. Actually it doesn’t bleed until you touch it. As far as I know I am the first one to make that. We have seen blood represented in many forms, in drawing, painting, photography, cinema, literature, performance. It’s important to represent what is close to you. But interactivity is another dimension of representation. When we look into the world we don’t just look with our eyes, we also use our hands.
So the internet is like this vast new open landscape ready to be discovered. Most people though, put old things on the internet. I always wanted to make something that didn’t exist yet.

PP: You sound pretty sure of yourself…
RR: In some ways I am, because rationally, I am right. But I know novelty alone is not enough, you need many more layers. Whether or not my pieces have that, I can not say, it is very subjective. It’s a big issue for me.

PP: Rationalizing?
RR: No, subjectivity. How do you know if what you did is good? How do you measure it? If you look at the world, the worst things are the most popular, so you can not trust the public. So who do you trust? Your self? Your friends? It’s not like running a marathon and you measure your result in milliseconds. I spoke to many people about this. Some people say history will tell you. Some say it doesn’t matter. My feeling is, it is up to me, I decide. No one can prove me wrong. Like Nikola Tosic said: ‘I am best, fuck all the rest.’

PP: Do you feel like a product of your time?
RR: The obvious answer is yes. Technology created the internet and opened a door for me to walk in. The strange thing is, most people don’t care about this door at all. So that means either I am in the wrong time or they are. It’s this feeling I have when I walk around exhibitions and see all these heavy objects and I feel so light, knowing that my entire body of work fits into a single email.

PP: Do you ever miss the sensation of physical objects?
RR: Actually I hate objects. They can break. You can’t break a song or a movie, or even a book. They live on because people copy them. And now we have the chance to make art that is available to everyone every second of the day at any place. Imagine in 500 years you don’t have to stand in line with fat tourists to see the Mona Lisa of the future. That’s actually what I am very curious of: Times are changing, maybe even too fast for people to realize. So what will happen in art? Classic subjects in new formats or new subjects in classic formats?

November 04, 2008