Interview: Irma Blank
Julia Langbein, Artforum
October 2014
The word is deceptive. Since the literary critiques of the 1960s, faith in the word has been largely lost. We see it still today: words, words, words that say nothing. The word is emptied of its meaning. I try to retrieve the space of silence, the unsaid.
The pieces in this show go back to the beginning. I work in cycles of about ten years. I have to go back to the primordial sign, back before it became language. In Eigenschriften, I decide to write for myself; those works are directed to myself. When I was done with the Eigenschfriten, I wanted to speak to others. Our depths are part of the collective depths. When one looks introspectively, it is not only individual introspection but also collective. […]