Artifacts: Preserving the Stories of Underground Culture
Courtesy of Company Agenda.
Writer and historian Steven Watson has always been intrigued by the downtown culture of the ’60s and ’70s: the circles of writers, artists, and performers who were at the helm of a cultural revolution in New York City. Watson began interviewing these circles and has accumulated over 200 video interviews with the revolutionary thinkers who make up the cultural mosaic of the American avant-garde.
Now, Watson shares those interviews with us as part of his latest project, Artifacts. The non-profit video archive features curated film interviews highlighting fundamental movements, events, and personalities that have shaped New York's artistic evolution. From John Cale to Marsha P. Johnson, Artifacts showcases pivotal figures and provides access to previously unseen archival material. Watson sat down with IMPULSE writer Colleen Rodgers to share his inspiration for starting the ambitious project, discussing why it's important to preserve the voices of the past to help us better prepare for the future.
Colleen Rodgers: Artifacts aims to preserve the voices of avant-garde, queer, and underground movements by making your interviews free and accessible to all. Was there a particular moment or interview that sparked the idea for this archive?
Steven Watson: It goes back a long time. I am also a writer, and initially, the interviews came out of projects I was working on. Particularly, I was working on a book about the Gertrude Stein opera Four Saints and Three Acts. I did all the research and tracked down the all African American cast from 1934 and interviewed them. I immediately got the sense that recording interviews was much more interesting and tangible in person and being able to see these people. I hired someone and we shot interviews in 1987, and it became a PBS documentary in 1999.
Because of that experience, I immediately said to myself, “Record people when they're alive and when their minds are good, and you can decide later what to do with it. But you can’t do the reverse.”
Courtesy of Company Agenda.
CR: Storytelling is a privilege that a lot of people take for granted, which is why this project is so important. You keep artifacts free and accessible to everyone. Why was that an essential part of creating this project for you?
SW: Partly because it's just important for it to be free and accessible. But also, the alternatives are to make it into a book, which is probably a small press edition that is not very available, or to work on creating a regular documentary, which requires years of raising funds. I also don't want to think about whether this person is worthy of a full documentary. Many of these people are very important in a small way. I think of this as a cultural mosaic: every voice is a part of that larger picture. The importance of this project was to see the connections between people and the movements and trends between them. I always believe it's not about individual genius but circles of people who support one another and help them grow.
CR: Why do you think this is important for future generations, and how can we learn from these people and their stories?
SW: I think it's always good to learn about what came before us. Our present culture stands on the shoulders of other people. I've always been interested in the generations before my own. That was the initial impetus to begin shooting people and interviewing—to capture the knowledge that came before me, and not just because I'm virtuous or anything, just because it's really interesting. It's also important to realize that things evolve, to know there was a drag tradition before RuPaul.
Courtesy of Company Agenda.
CR: Was there anyone you had an inkling would be an iconic figure in their space?
SW: That's a good question. Many of them had already achieved some renown—for example, Laurie Anderson is included in my portfolio Artifacts at the End of a Decade. She was already pretty big at the time, but I thought, Lauren Anderson is it.
CR: How did you come about meeting these people? Were you friends with them first, or did you meet them during your time as a writer?
SW: It's all about knocking on doors, and it's all about networking. I can't overemphasize the importance of networking and having someone else introduce you, having both the curiosity and the guts to approach people. So, by no means were they all friends or even remotely. Once you get into a circle or constellation of people, it's much easier. Once I was published, that was a great opener because I could say, “This is who I am.”
CR: You've spent decades assembling this archive—can you share some of the most rewarding moments in curating this collection of interviews?
SW: I would say there are several stages. One was getting a video camera, a tripod, and a microphone, and realizing I can become my own studio. I can get on a plane and travel with my equipment. There's a tremendous freedom about that.
I would say that was one step. When I did the Silver Factory interviews, I really went in depth. I have a real trove of dozens of interviews. That was an experience where I could really bounce off one another. I then started this interviewing process that I called “Tap Talkback,” where I would download onto a laptop segments of what other people might have said about Andy, or might have said about the person I'm interviewing, and I would say, “Listen to this and react.”
It takes the interviewer out of the picture. It's a much more visceral connection and experience.
CR: How do people react to that?
SW: Oh, they love it. It’s like reconnecting with old friends. There's something about taking the “media” medium of the interview out of the picture and letting people directly and viscerally respond, so that was a great discovery of sorts.
Then, when I actually started working with a team of editors, it was wonderful because it's not corporate or bureaucratic—it’s a really human-sized experience. The editors add their own layer of imagination. And particularly, we have chapters and areas where visual interpretation makes a big difference. So to suddenly feel that I'm not working alone, to send something out and have it come back with something new to respond to, is a really wonderful, wonderful feeling: It’s a much more collaborative experience. You know, Andy had a film factory turning things out very quickly, and I aspire to that.
CR: Why is that?
SW: Because, number one, I want to be fresh. I don't want to dwell on one figure too long. And I think it's really important to get this project out so that you see the richness of the mosaic. What you're seeing now is some exemplary figures, but we’ll include probably five more Factory figures within the next few months, and you’ll begin to say, “Oh that person fits with that.”
Courtesy of Company Agenda.
CR: What types of people are you working with for your new interviews?
SW: The Skirball Center at NYU is coming up on their 25th anniversary. The director, Jay Wegman, approached me primarily because he loved my books. But in talking, he said, we're working on this project, and I said, well, oral history definitely should be part of that.
I have already interviewed a number of downtown performances, but now, I want to focus on the directors. For example, that's the series that Laurie Anderson will hopefully appear in. We've done a number of directors, including Richard Schechner and JoAnne Akalaitis, who used to run the Public Theater. We’ll be interviewing performance artists that come out of Franklin Furnace, which is a whole other genre that really did not start so much until the mid to late ’70s. I also hope to cover the beginning of video art.
CR: Do you have anybody in mind you want to speak to about that?
SW: Oh, I'd love to talk to Joan Jonas. I would love to talk to the people that ran The Kitchen. I want to shed light on some of the institutions behind video art. You know, it doesn't happen in a vacuum. That's an overriding mantra: things do not happen in a vacuum.
CR: Were there any voices in your interviews that you felt you wanted to prioritize in this first set that you launched? And how did you make that decision?
SW: That's a good question. I wanted the first three sets to show the range of this project. So we have one about a particular historical period, The Silver Factory, and the Gender Bender series which goes internationally about an evolving conception of gender. And the third one, Underground Press, again, ranges widely. This spans from underground publications to zines. This is an extremely important area in terms of how people get their toe in the water and how you can get material out there.
CR: What do you think these individual stories can teach us about resilience and cultural evolution?
SW: In some way, most of these people were “outlaws”—they were certainly not on the mainstream. They dealt with not being accepted, creating their own lives and forging their own path forward. It took a lot of courage to do that, and it took ingenuity and it took humor. You have to be able to make light of it to keep moving.
CR: What’s next for Artifacts? Do you envision expanding the project, or are there new stories you hope to include in the future?
SW: Well, I want to see it growing, and I want to see it growing beyond myself. In terms of thinking of thematic issues, the topic of downtown performance art is major for the expansion of this project. The growth of video art is a major one, because at this point, some of the real pioneers that began it are still around. Joan Jonas is a great example.
In terms of themes, we are working on a series about the Pyramid Club which was a dynamic, ad-hoc performance club in the East Village. I also want to work with people like Laurie Anderson, Meredith Monk, and Ralph Lemon. I would love to interview Kate Vaugh, who's part of the Wooster Group and a really important figure. I mean, surely more will come to mind later.
CR: How can viewers and the broader public support the continued growth and preservation of Artifacts?
SW: We have a contribution page where people can donate. I think what I'm trying to do is document a community over several generations. It's not all about me. This should be something that other people want to have saved because it's part of their life and part of what they came up with.
CR: How do you feel now that the project is finally out there?
SW: Oh, I feel exhilarated and terrified. I do hope the interviews will send people into deeper studies and if they can open portals to expanding, then I love that.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
