Plywood, 2x4s, folding chairs, Video 25:08
April, 1st 2011
BroLab presented Platform at the Urban Festival’s Grid Scenes, a partnership of the New School and Art in Odd Places. Platform uses the model of an interview as a public intervention. BroLab placed a white platform on the sidewalk in front of 143 West 14th, at 5pm. A table, and chairs were placed on the platform and AIOP social coordinator Ceasar Jesena conducted an interview with members of BroLab. Documentation was taken in the form of audio video, still and still images. The overall effect is to blur the lines between interview, performance, and art object.
Transcript From Platform:
Cesar
Hi, my name is Cesar and I’m from Art in Odd Places, thanks for having me here. It’s my pleasure obviously to see you guys again.
Last time I saw you guys you were super tired from the 24 hour pump 14 situation, so it is nice to catch up and see what is going on. I do have some questions for you as you were featured on our blog last time. And this is BroLab 2.0 and I’m so excited.
So let’s start, the most important question I have is why do public art? Why are we here?
Ryan
Basically the whole idea of BroLab came out of all of us meeting in the AIM (Artist in the Market Place) program. There really wasn’t the intent to make public art but then we all started to come up with ideas of things to do together, it just led to that. I think the interactive part of what we do is because all of us, in our own careers, make things. A lot of us do installations, sculpture, video, photography, drawing, so when we came together we wanted to do something different, that almost had the need of a group to make it instead of just one artist.
Travis
I think that is why we were excited to participate in the Art in Odd Places [Festival] in the beginning because that sort of festival is all about chance and random interactions, getting art out of the gallery and interacting with the public.
Cesar
I think it is important for everyone to be acquainted with who we are, that we are not just BroLab. How about everyone say their name and what sort of artwork they do so we know how this beautiful thing mends together.
Jonathan
I’m Jonathan Brand, I’m a sculptor mainly, my work encompasses a lot of different things. I’m kind of the engineer of the group.
Ryan
I’m Ryan Roa, I’m a sculptor, I do video and some interactive work.
Adam
I’m Adam Brent, I’m an installation artist and I make work about that is architecturally referenced – that also focuses reflection and domesticity.
Travis
I’m Travis LeRoy Southworth, I make video, sculpture and photo based work, a lot of my projects revolve around confrontations of finitude and the passing of time.
Alexander
I’m Rahul Alexander, I’m a painter for the most part, I’m starting to work in sculpture. I like to think of my projects as percolating these ideas and seeing them take form.
Cesar
Is this just me or… I know there is supposed to be sixth man in BroLab. Am I not counting properly?
Adam
It’s actually more [members]; it fluctuates between six and seven. One of our members, Ken Madore is taking part in a boat building residency in Maine and then another member, Lee Bullock who is our resident writer, is unavailable for today.
Ryan
Our working structure is kind of whoever has the time and can be involved in the project does, so it’s kind of also this thing were we cover each others backs.
Cesar
Like today, this is perfect. So we will go back to a little throwback cause I love to hear the story of how it happened again and when you guys answered the question of how BroLab came upon, I kind of wanted to hear more. So perhaps it is a collective story, so guys started in the AIM program, so I will leave it there and let you build the story…
Travis
Just to clarify, for people who aren’t familiar with the AIM program, it’s through the Bronx Museum of the Arts, the Artist in the Marketplace and it’s a professional development program. It’s nice because a lot of BFA or MFA programs don’t focus on that sort of thing. We all got in the same year, met, really liked each others work and continued doing studio visits which was one of the emphasizes of the program, meeting together and talking about art and supporting each other.
Adam
You will see it on our webpage inthenameofbrolab.org, we not only did studio visits but also we hung out, drank, and discussed art. It almost started as a question of how we will work together. I think before we said “oh lets become this collective” we first questioned how does one begin to be a collective when you already exist as individual artists. So we kind of pounded that out through a series of meetings and decided not to co-opt our individual work, but rather collectively come to these interventions that we have been doing at large and proposing to do in the future.
Ryan
There was no initial intent for us to become a collective it just sprawled out of the studio visits and late night drinking…
Cesar
I would say (laughs)
Jonathan
We started with just supporting each other’s individual practices, that was the idea with the studio visits.
Alexander
And we still keep that up.
Jonathan
Yeah, which is important and we are still supporting each others individual efforts but now we have grown to doing things together.
Ryan
It was one day where it was like “I think we are a collective”, and the next thing was “let’s try to make something” and then we saw the call for Art in Odd Places and came up with an idea and graciously you accepted it and that was kind of the start of everything.
Jonathan Pump 14 was a big experience for us, a bonding experience because we felt after we did that 24-hour interaction that we could do anything and it also brought us closer together as a group.
Cesar
Did it feel like a brotherhood? You know I’m going to make a joke about that.
Ryan
Yeah, totally, I think actually in a lot of our projects we’ve noticed that, we are interested in it, there needs to be a group dynamic in everything we do and the things we are doing we want to feel like there is a need for a certain amount of people, not just something one person could do on their own. So a lot of it does become bonding experiences, you know like walking with water for 24-hours and carrying it, hanging out, talking and eating…
Jonathan
And rotating the tires (laughs)
Ryan
Ha, yeah, rotating the tires on a truck, our last interaction, Autopsy, it’s almost kind of like a pit crew.
Adam
Just to echo that, there is a lot of hand and effort in our work so that’s kind of aligned us in this manual sensibility. I think that when you have that common sensibility it is easier to grow from and we all need that outlet. Or at least speaking for myself I really enjoy that outlet and reach for public accessible work.
Alexander
I think it is nice that we conceive of these ideas and that process of being a think-tank is pretty fascinating. We all have specific criteria to an open call that we are responding to but we really have different approaches at looking at a project. It’s that aspect of sitting and developing that idea together which appeals to me.
Cesar
From your past projects, Pump 14, amazing, Autopsy, they seem to be very laborious in nature. Is that the intent of being part of BroLab, I don’t want to say ridiculous but something very…big, very grand I would say. It’s not like oh you know I’m going to stand in a corner and smile but no I’m going to drive a 10 foot truck and change all the tires or deliver water.
Adam
Well, I’ll just say that a conversation that Ryan and I had once on the subway train, just recently actually, is that we all work very hard, we are hard working artists and our work involves a lot of labor so when you put all of us together that magnifies it.
Jonathan
(laughs) that’s exactly what I was going to say, we all have that element to our own practices, you said “absurd” that gets brought up a lot, so it’s just something that keeps going. Although I don’t think every project that we have done has that.
Ryan
A lot of it also goes into process, it’s not necessarily about the idea of labor of making something with that end. We tend to focus on the process which generally ends up being very laborious. But you know, who knows what we will be doing next year. (laughs)
Jonathan
And some of our projects have grown out of ideas that one of us wanted to do individually but couldn’t accomplish alone so it is a lot like some of our practices.
Travis
It’s actually one of the nice things though because we are all very specific in our own practice but we have these extra ideas that may not fit to what one would normally do. But now that can be a BroLab project because our whole system and organization is so open that we kick off ideas with one another.
Ryan
Yeah, it’s like someone wakes up in the morning with an idea, throws it out to the group and by lunchtime it might be something else and eventually it turns into a project. It’s a very interesting way to work because all of us in our own practices, especially after doing AIM, can be very much marketed and driven at times. For me personally, I think of BroLab as a nice escape and we are able to do whatever we want, it kind of doesn’t count, so you can take a chance and make about having fun and exploring again.
Cesar
It’s fascinating to hear the creative process because I wonder are there rules where there is a sit down and people say “I object” but it is nice people are just saying things and keep it going.
So now as a group, you are fairly new, when it comes to going to shows, do you think that being an art collective is an advantage to get into a project? Or do you think it doesn’t really matter?
Adam
Absolutely, I think that when you are going to an exhibition or someone else’s show it’s easier to meet the people involved, that can in help you get shows or establish interest by sheer mass alone. One of us is going to say “I’m talking to so and so and they are interested in BroLab” and then we all chime in, it’s a large advantage because you are kind of a posse all advocating for a common cause.
Ryan
For us, we all came to this a bit seasoned, we didn’t all just start right out and say “we are going to be a collective and this is what we are going to do”. We all still have our own practices and are all showing so it’s those networks that are now joined together. If you have a mailing list of 500 then now that is multiplied by 7 so now it’s 3500, (laughs) I mean there’s probably some crossover.
Travis
Well, plus it’s the weird thing too, when you are going to galleries you might not just go up to someone to tell them directly about your work but somehow it’s a lot easier to talk about the collective because there is other people involved and it becomes less personal.
Adam
It gets back to that chance kind of notion were you don’t have as much to risk. It is starting to take a bigger place in my career; I feel the larger sense of desire to make successful work with this collective. I think it grows more important the more we do things.
Ryan
I think it affects our work as well, I’m certainly more familiar now with how Jonathan would do something or how Alexander or Travis. So now I start thinking about it in my own studio, so things are melding in an interesting way.
Cesar
What do you think, now that you have explained the greater process of how you guys work, what do you think the advantages and disadvantages are in being part of a collective. Lets start with the disadvantages.
Jonathan
One disadvantage is it’s harder to communicate, we have these enormously long email chains. I just moved out of the city so it’s harder for me to make all the meetings because it takes me an hour and a half to get into the city. Another disadvantage is if you need something done fast sometimes it takes a while to get it done. There has been instances where one of us will say “yeah you run with that” which is fine but if there is something that requires everyone to sign off on it, it takes a little bit more time. We have kind of stream lined it and it has been pretty good.
Travis
Well…we are still getting there
Jonathan
(laughs) Unfortunately yeah some of us have been saddled with more administrative work.
Travis
I feel like half of my emails now are all BroLab stuff (laughs)
Jonathan
Right, I went to a flight to Chicago and had my phone off for three hours and I turn it on and there is twenty-one BroLab emails.
Adam
I’d say the other disadvantage is, we all have jobs or some of us are in school so we all have our job career, then we have our art career, then we have our BroLab career. So that is a lot to juggle.
Jonathan
We all handle it well, we all have a sense of humor. A lot of our emails are one word jokes (everyone laughs) responses…
Ryan
Or fifteen page tangents
Jonathan
…I don’t mind, I just laugh, because Ryan responds to everything. Like even if it just a “Y” for yes. He has a blackberry.
Cesar
Crackberry, that’s what they call it. (Laughs) So when it comes to advantages I know we touched upon how the distribution of work can be easier, are there other things?
Ryan
It’s also the support and the friendship because it is different when you are working on something completely by yourself. It’s one thing and it’s on you. You have all these questions. When you are bouncing things back and forth with one another it’s kind of like a pinball game, like the way we come up with ideas. The other day we were sitting around and we wanted to apply for this residency. What is the idea? We just came up with something out of nowhere; I don’t even know how it started.
Jonathan
A lot of times we will have an idea and someone will ask whose idea it was and no one knows. Which is pretty good, we can’t actually remember who put it out.
Travis
The answer [is] it’s a BroLab idea because it changes so much through the process.
Jonathan
Someone asked us that question for Pump 14 when we did the Jamaica Center for the Arts talk and we couldn’t remember who originally voiced the idea.
Ryan
It doesn’t really even matter because the original idea ends up being so far removed from what happens. I think even [with] a lot of the things, especially working with public interventions; we don’t necessarily know what is going to happen, until it does [happen].
Jonathan
And even if it is, say my idea, and Ryan does it, it will be different. So things grow because we each add our own experience to it.
Adam
I think, when you are writing down ideas in emails [together], something changes just as much as when you are making them together. I look at it as a very powerful tool; sometimes I try to imagine how I would write about things personally. If the email wasn’t there, how would ideas really be affected and grow [without] compounding our concepts so quickly?
Cesar
So after that heavy handed questioning I had, I think I’m just going to go back to something more candid and fun. Maybe you can help me, your name is BroLab and I always make fun of this. I had this joke for a headline that I told Adam that apparently no one liked.
Adam
What was it again?
Cesar
It was “bros before hose” because you guys were doing Pump 14 right, you were using the yokes and pumping water with hose, so I said “oh your doing bros before hose” and people were like “oh I don’t want you to use that”.
Ryan
We were amused but we just didn’t want to offend anyone.
Jonathan
We’re not excluding anyone
Cesar
(laughs), well it was going to be spelled “H-O-S-E”, it’s a pun! I didn’t know BroLab was so uptight.
Ryan
(laughs) Exactly, and for us you know… we are a group of guys, we did come up with the name BroLab, which is comical.
Alexander
It could also mean “Bronx” Lab.
Ryan
Right, we did come out of the Bronx Museum AIM program so it does have that double connotation. It kind of came from a humorous place. You know Holly Block, who is the director of the Bronx Museum was very involved in CoLab. She would talk about it a lot and one night when we decided that [in fact] we were a collective, we talked about CoLab and we thought, well, I guess we are BroLab, we liked it and it stuck. We liked how it wasn’t a very serious name. I think a lot of people try to point to a theoretical perspective.
Cesar
Not me (laughs)
Adam
I’d like to think that we are bigger than the collective itself, we have ideas of being a resource for artists, we are curating, we have Friends of BroLab. You know, anyone can work with us, we largely encourage people to work with us. As fun as it is and as fun as the name is, we also like how catchy it is, but within it can be serious… hopefully.
Travis
And in some ways it catches people off guard, humor is an easy access, so “ha ha… BroLab” even some of my friends made fun of it for awhile and now they see that we are serious.
Cesar
How about on your website, it says “In the Name of BroLab”, and this morning I thought it had this religious undertone to it so why “in the name of”?
Adam
I think originally we thought of BroLab as this kind of character, that we are all built up as in a way.
Travis
In the beginning I think we also wanted it to be much larger than us.
Jonathan
I thought it was because brolab.com was taken? (everyone laughs) No, it was because the original idea was supposed to be that BroLab like Adam was saying; that we are going to curate shows. So everything that we did that wasn’t us was going to be “In the Name of BroLab” so we could have a show that none of us were in, it would be “In the Name of”, which was also kind of a joke but then it got registered as our domain name and now we have it.
Cesar
Who did that, oh now no one is going to admit it. (laughs)
Adam
I think we collectively agreed but it was Alexander who registered it.
Alexander
I think it is kind of disarming, though we have this serious undertone and well thought out ideas.
Jonathan
…and it worked too because you thought about it. (laughs)
Cesar
It just feels wrong typing in thenameofbrolab.org, is brolab.com really taken?
Travis
Yeah and brolab.org
Ryan
It’s a laboratory or something.
Cesar
Oh, okay. Well now we are onto my final question. What is the future of BroLab? I feel like you guys are just starting. So what is happening next?
Ryan
After we did Pump 14 for Art in Odd Places we were immediately asked to do a talk at the Jamaica Center for the Arts. We did a lecture on the project and then Autopsy came up, an independent curator asked us to do that for Site FEST, Bushwick [Brooklyn]. And now we are currently participating in the Urban Festival, at this moment. And to come we have a few things on our plate.
Adam
We are partnering with AIOP for the New Museum’s Festival of Ideas for a New City on May 7th. We are doing the Wassaic Project in July, we might be participating the Bronx Museum Biennial. Along with the Bronx River Arts Center in August, the Congress of Collectives at Flux Factory in October.
Ryan
And Jamaica Flux [biennial] in 2012
Adam
…and there are some other things in the fire too.
Cesar
Oh really, cause that’s not a lot (everyone laughs). Well it sound like you guys are really going to be busy over the next year. I’m happy to be able to get to know you, that’s all I have today and keep us posted on your upcoming projects and thanks for having me here.
BroLab
This was great, thanks so much, we couldn’t imagine a more proper project and appropriate person to interview us.
Cesar
It’s a team effort, I consider myself part of BroLab now (laughs). Thank you guys.
Platform
Platform from BroLab Collective on Vimeo.
Plywood, 2x4s, folding chairs, Video 25:08
April, 1st 2011
BroLab presented Platform at the Urban Festival’s Grid Scenes, a partnership of the New School and Art in Odd Places. Platform uses the model of an interview as a public intervention. BroLab placed a white platform on the sidewalk in front of 143 West 14th, at 5pm. A table, and chairs were placed on the platform and AIOP social coordinator Ceasar Jesena conducted an interview with members of BroLab. Documentation was taken in the form of audio video, still and still images. The overall effect is to blur the lines between interview, performance, and art object.
Transcript From Platform:
Cesar
Hi, my name is Cesar and I’m from Art in Odd Places, thanks for having me here. It’s my pleasure obviously to see you guys again.
Last time I saw you guys you were super tired from the 24 hour pump 14 situation, so it is nice to catch up and see what is going on. I do have some questions for you as you were featured on our blog last time. And this is BroLab 2.0 and I’m so excited.
So let’s start, the most important question I have is why do public art? Why are we here?
Ryan
Basically the whole idea of BroLab came out of all of us meeting in the AIM (Artist in the Market Place) program. There really wasn’t the intent to make public art but then we all started to come up with ideas of things to do together, it just led to that. I think the interactive part of what we do is because all of us, in our own careers, make things. A lot of us do installations, sculpture, video, photography, drawing, so when we came together we wanted to do something different, that almost had the need of a group to make it instead of just one artist.
Travis
I think that is why we were excited to participate in the Art in Odd Places [Festival] in the beginning because that sort of festival is all about chance and random interactions, getting art out of the gallery and interacting with the public.
Cesar
I think it is important for everyone to be acquainted with who we are, that we are not just BroLab. How about everyone say their name and what sort of artwork they do so we know how this beautiful thing mends together.
Jonathan
I’m Jonathan Brand, I’m a sculptor mainly, my work encompasses a lot of different things. I’m kind of the engineer of the group.
Ryan
I’m Ryan Roa, I’m a sculptor, I do video and some interactive work.
Adam
I’m Adam Brent, I’m an installation artist and I make work about that is architecturally referenced – that also focuses reflection and domesticity.
Travis
I’m Travis LeRoy Southworth, I make video, sculpture and photo based work, a lot of my projects revolve around confrontations of finitude and the passing of time.
Alexander
I’m Rahul Alexander, I’m a painter for the most part, I’m starting to work in sculpture. I like to think of my projects as percolating these ideas and seeing them take form.
Cesar
Is this just me or… I know there is supposed to be sixth man in BroLab. Am I not counting properly?
Adam
It’s actually more [members]; it fluctuates between six and seven. One of our members, Ken Madore is taking part in a boat building residency in Maine and then another member, Lee Bullock who is our resident writer, is unavailable for today.
Ryan
Our working structure is kind of whoever has the time and can be involved in the project does, so it’s kind of also this thing were we cover each others backs.
Cesar
Like today, this is perfect. So we will go back to a little throwback cause I love to hear the story of how it happened again and when you guys answered the question of how BroLab came upon, I kind of wanted to hear more. So perhaps it is a collective story, so guys started in the AIM program, so I will leave it there and let you build the story…
Travis
Just to clarify, for people who aren’t familiar with the AIM program, it’s through the Bronx Museum of the Arts, the Artist in the Marketplace and it’s a professional development program. It’s nice because a lot of BFA or MFA programs don’t focus on that sort of thing. We all got in the same year, met, really liked each others work and continued doing studio visits which was one of the emphasizes of the program, meeting together and talking about art and supporting each other.
Adam
You will see it on our webpage inthenameofbrolab.org, we not only did studio visits but also we hung out, drank, and discussed art. It almost started as a question of how we will work together. I think before we said “oh lets become this collective” we first questioned how does one begin to be a collective when you already exist as individual artists. So we kind of pounded that out through a series of meetings and decided not to co-opt our individual work, but rather collectively come to these interventions that we have been doing at large and proposing to do in the future.
Ryan
There was no initial intent for us to become a collective it just sprawled out of the studio visits and late night drinking…
Cesar
I would say (laughs)
Jonathan
We started with just supporting each other’s individual practices, that was the idea with the studio visits.
Alexander
And we still keep that up.
Jonathan
Yeah, which is important and we are still supporting each others individual efforts but now we have grown to doing things together.
Ryan
It was one day where it was like “I think we are a collective”, and the next thing was “let’s try to make something” and then we saw the call for Art in Odd Places and came up with an idea and graciously you accepted it and that was kind of the start of everything.
Jonathan
Pump 14 was a big experience for us, a bonding experience because we felt after we did that 24-hour interaction that we could do anything and it also brought us closer together as a group.
Cesar
Did it feel like a brotherhood? You know I’m going to make a joke about that.
Ryan
Yeah, totally, I think actually in a lot of our projects we’ve noticed that, we are interested in it, there needs to be a group dynamic in everything we do and the things we are doing we want to feel like there is a need for a certain amount of people, not just something one person could do on their own. So a lot of it does become bonding experiences, you know like walking with water for 24-hours and carrying it, hanging out, talking and eating…
Jonathan
And rotating the tires (laughs)
Ryan
Ha, yeah, rotating the tires on a truck, our last interaction, Autopsy, it’s almost kind of like a pit crew.
Adam
Just to echo that, there is a lot of hand and effort in our work so that’s kind of aligned us in this manual sensibility. I think that when you have that common sensibility it is easier to grow from and we all need that outlet. Or at least speaking for myself I really enjoy that outlet and reach for public accessible work.
Alexander
I think it is nice that we conceive of these ideas and that process of being a think-tank is pretty fascinating. We all have specific criteria to an open call that we are responding to but we really have different approaches at looking at a project. It’s that aspect of sitting and developing that idea together which appeals to me.
Cesar
From your past projects, Pump 14, amazing, Autopsy, they seem to be very laborious in nature. Is that the intent of being part of BroLab, I don’t want to say ridiculous but something very…big, very grand I would say. It’s not like oh you know I’m going to stand in a corner and smile but no I’m going to drive a 10 foot truck and change all the tires or deliver water.
Adam
Well, I’ll just say that a conversation that Ryan and I had once on the subway train, just recently actually, is that we all work very hard, we are hard working artists and our work involves a lot of labor so when you put all of us together that magnifies it.
Jonathan
(laughs) that’s exactly what I was going to say, we all have that element to our own practices, you said “absurd” that gets brought up a lot, so it’s just something that keeps going. Although I don’t think every project that we have done has that.
Ryan
A lot of it also goes into process, it’s not necessarily about the idea of labor of making something with that end. We tend to focus on the process which generally ends up being very laborious. But you know, who knows what we will be doing next year. (laughs)
Jonathan
And some of our projects have grown out of ideas that one of us wanted to do individually but couldn’t accomplish alone so it is a lot like some of our practices.
Travis
It’s actually one of the nice things though because we are all very specific in our own practice but we have these extra ideas that may not fit to what one would normally do. But now that can be a BroLab project because our whole system and organization is so open that we kick off ideas with one another.
Ryan
Yeah, it’s like someone wakes up in the morning with an idea, throws it out to the group and by lunchtime it might be something else and eventually it turns into a project. It’s a very interesting way to work because all of us in our own practices, especially after doing AIM, can be very much marketed and driven at times. For me personally, I think of BroLab as a nice escape and we are able to do whatever we want, it kind of doesn’t count, so you can take a chance and make about having fun and exploring again.
Cesar
It’s fascinating to hear the creative process because I wonder are there rules where there is a sit down and people say “I object” but it is nice people are just saying things and keep it going.
So now as a group, you are fairly new, when it comes to going to shows, do you think that being an art collective is an advantage to get into a project? Or do you think it doesn’t really matter?
Adam
Absolutely, I think that when you are going to an exhibition or someone else’s show it’s easier to meet the people involved, that can in help you get shows or establish interest by sheer mass alone. One of us is going to say “I’m talking to so and so and they are interested in BroLab” and then we all chime in, it’s a large advantage because you are kind of a posse all advocating for a common cause.
Ryan
For us, we all came to this a bit seasoned, we didn’t all just start right out and say “we are going to be a collective and this is what we are going to do”. We all still have our own practices and are all showing so it’s those networks that are now joined together. If you have a mailing list of 500 then now that is multiplied by 7 so now it’s 3500, (laughs) I mean there’s probably some crossover.
Travis
Well, plus it’s the weird thing too, when you are going to galleries you might not just go up to someone to tell them directly about your work but somehow it’s a lot easier to talk about the collective because there is other people involved and it becomes less personal.
Adam
It gets back to that chance kind of notion were you don’t have as much to risk. It is starting to take a bigger place in my career; I feel the larger sense of desire to make successful work with this collective. I think it grows more important the more we do things.
Ryan
I think it affects our work as well, I’m certainly more familiar now with how Jonathan would do something or how Alexander or Travis. So now I start thinking about it in my own studio, so things are melding in an interesting way.
Cesar
What do you think, now that you have explained the greater process of how you guys work, what do you think the advantages and disadvantages are in being part of a collective. Lets start with the disadvantages.
Jonathan
One disadvantage is it’s harder to communicate, we have these enormously long email chains. I just moved out of the city so it’s harder for me to make all the meetings because it takes me an hour and a half to get into the city. Another disadvantage is if you need something done fast sometimes it takes a while to get it done. There has been instances where one of us will say “yeah you run with that” which is fine but if there is something that requires everyone to sign off on it, it takes a little bit more time. We have kind of stream lined it and it has been pretty good.
Travis
Well…we are still getting there
Jonathan
(laughs) Unfortunately yeah some of us have been saddled with more administrative work.
Travis
I feel like half of my emails now are all BroLab stuff (laughs)
Jonathan
Right, I went to a flight to Chicago and had my phone off for three hours and I turn it on and there is twenty-one BroLab emails.
Adam
I’d say the other disadvantage is, we all have jobs or some of us are in school so we all have our job career, then we have our art career, then we have our BroLab career. So that is a lot to juggle.
Jonathan
We all handle it well, we all have a sense of humor. A lot of our emails are one word jokes (everyone laughs) responses…
Ryan
Or fifteen page tangents
Jonathan
…I don’t mind, I just laugh, because Ryan responds to everything. Like even if it just a “Y” for yes. He has a blackberry.
Cesar
Crackberry, that’s what they call it. (Laughs) So when it comes to advantages I know we touched upon how the distribution of work can be easier, are there other things?
Ryan
It’s also the support and the friendship because it is different when you are working on something completely by yourself. It’s one thing and it’s on you. You have all these questions. When you are bouncing things back and forth with one another it’s kind of like a pinball game, like the way we come up with ideas. The other day we were sitting around and we wanted to apply for this residency. What is the idea? We just came up with something out of nowhere; I don’t even know how it started.
Jonathan
A lot of times we will have an idea and someone will ask whose idea it was and no one knows. Which is pretty good, we can’t actually remember who put it out.
Travis
The answer [is] it’s a BroLab idea because it changes so much through the process.
Jonathan
Someone asked us that question for Pump 14 when we did the Jamaica Center for the Arts talk and we couldn’t remember who originally voiced the idea.
Ryan
It doesn’t really even matter because the original idea ends up being so far removed from what happens. I think even [with] a lot of the things, especially working with public interventions; we don’t necessarily know what is going to happen, until it does [happen].
Jonathan
And even if it is, say my idea, and Ryan does it, it will be different. So things grow because we each add our own experience to it.
Adam
I think, when you are writing down ideas in emails [together], something changes just as much as when you are making them together. I look at it as a very powerful tool; sometimes I try to imagine how I would write about things personally. If the email wasn’t there, how would ideas really be affected and grow [without] compounding our concepts so quickly?
Cesar
So after that heavy handed questioning I had, I think I’m just going to go back to something more candid and fun. Maybe you can help me, your name is BroLab and I always make fun of this. I had this joke for a headline that I told Adam that apparently no one liked.
Adam
What was it again?
Cesar
It was “bros before hose” because you guys were doing Pump 14 right, you were using the yokes and pumping water with hose, so I said “oh your doing bros before hose” and people were like “oh I don’t want you to use that”.
Ryan
We were amused but we just didn’t want to offend anyone.
Jonathan
We’re not excluding anyone
Cesar
(laughs), well it was going to be spelled “H-O-S-E”, it’s a pun! I didn’t know BroLab was so uptight.
Ryan
(laughs) Exactly, and for us you know… we are a group of guys, we did come up with the name BroLab, which is comical.
Alexander
It could also mean “Bronx” Lab.
Ryan
Right, we did come out of the Bronx Museum AIM program so it does have that double connotation. It kind of came from a humorous place. You know Holly Block, who is the director of the Bronx Museum was very involved in CoLab. She would talk about it a lot and one night when we decided that [in fact] we were a collective, we talked about CoLab and we thought, well, I guess we are BroLab, we liked it and it stuck. We liked how it wasn’t a very serious name. I think a lot of people try to point to a theoretical perspective.
Cesar
Not me (laughs)
Adam
I’d like to think that we are bigger than the collective itself, we have ideas of being a resource for artists, we are curating, we have Friends of BroLab. You know, anyone can work with us, we largely encourage people to work with us. As fun as it is and as fun as the name is, we also like how catchy it is, but within it can be serious… hopefully.
Travis
And in some ways it catches people off guard, humor is an easy access, so “ha ha… BroLab” even some of my friends made fun of it for awhile and now they see that we are serious.
Cesar
How about on your website, it says “In the Name of BroLab”, and this morning I thought it had this religious undertone to it so why “in the name of”?
Adam
I think originally we thought of BroLab as this kind of character, that we are all built up as in a way.
Travis
In the beginning I think we also wanted it to be much larger than us.
Jonathan
I thought it was because brolab.com was taken? (everyone laughs) No, it was because the original idea was supposed to be that BroLab like Adam was saying; that we are going to curate shows. So everything that we did that wasn’t us was going to be “In the Name of BroLab” so we could have a show that none of us were in, it would be “In the Name of”, which was also kind of a joke but then it got registered as our domain name and now we have it.
Cesar
Who did that, oh now no one is going to admit it. (laughs)
Adam
I think we collectively agreed but it was Alexander who registered it.
Alexander
I think it is kind of disarming, though we have this serious undertone and well thought out ideas.
Jonathan
…and it worked too because you thought about it. (laughs)
Cesar
It just feels wrong typing in thenameofbrolab.org, is brolab.com really taken?
Travis
Yeah and brolab.org
Ryan
It’s a laboratory or something.
Cesar
Oh, okay. Well now we are onto my final question. What is the future of BroLab? I feel like you guys are just starting. So what is happening next?
Ryan
After we did Pump 14 for Art in Odd Places we were immediately asked to do a talk at the Jamaica Center for the Arts. We did a lecture on the project and then Autopsy came up, an independent curator asked us to do that for Site FEST, Bushwick [Brooklyn]. And now we are currently participating in the Urban Festival, at this moment. And to come we have a few things on our plate.
Adam
We are partnering with AIOP for the New Museum’s Festival of Ideas for a New City on May 7th. We are doing the Wassaic Project in July, we might be participating the Bronx Museum Biennial. Along with the Bronx River Arts Center in August, the Congress of Collectives at Flux Factory in October.
Ryan
And Jamaica Flux [biennial] in 2012
Adam
…and there are some other things in the fire too.
Cesar
Oh really, cause that’s not a lot (everyone laughs). Well it sound like you guys are really going to be busy over the next year. I’m happy to be able to get to know you, that’s all I have today and keep us posted on your upcoming projects and thanks for having me here.
BroLab
This was great, thanks so much, we couldn’t imagine a more proper project and appropriate person to interview us.
Cesar
It’s a team effort, I consider myself part of BroLab now (laughs). Thank you guys.
BroLab
Thank you Cesar.