Martin Creed: ‘I don't call my works art but work.’
Maria Arusoo (3-4/2011)
Maria Arusoo, who made her curatorial debut with aplomb at Tallinn Art Hall, interviews Martin Creed in whose London atelier-studio she worked in 2007–2009
Besides the visual arts, you are also active in other creative areas, including music, contemporary dance, artist presentations – why such variety?
I do not want to get caught by the routine of my life; I need change. I do not separate art from the rest of the world. I do not believe so much in art as I do in the things that people do. I do not call my work art; I call it work.
You have recently moved on to grand musical works – you are currently recording with a symphony orchestra and over the last few years you have staged ballets.
We would not, for example, be able to paint without moving – movement of the body is the first thing we do. So I started to think what would happen if we subtracted painting as such from the process and all that was left was movement. This is how I came to dance. The first from the series was Work No. 850 (2008) where runners sprinted at 30-second intervals through the Tate Britain Duveens Gallery.
