Self Select Project has created a sensation in Nairobi.
The STANDARD, one of two biggest newspapers in Kenya featured Self Select Project on the second page. 28(Sat), March, 2009
1) What is the Self Select project
Self Select Project is to exchange clothes with pedestrians at the street and to take pictures of those who wear exchanged clothes.
I started this project in Paris, France, 2007 and this time conducted it in Nairobi.
I think Self Select Project as my lifework and I want to continue conducting this project all over the world.
2) Why that name?
To exchange clothes is to exchange your own image.
If you select your clothes at shops on your sense, you cannot exchange your image in a real mean. But if you select your clothes among real pedestrians' clothes at the street, I think, you can change your image to very different person.
3) Why clothes and fashion, are there various types of clothes
In my childhood, I was not good at talking, so I came to appeal myself by wearing prominent, colorful clothes. Gradually I came to find that every clothes expresses every message and got interested in communication through clothes.
4) Why exchange clothes of anything else?
I want to exchange clothes like ordinary people exchanging their language to communicate.
5) Why the Self Select project?
Self Select Project is the most simple artwork among all of my works, and so more people are able to participate, and I can show my artistic concept to more people.
6) What was your intention? What did you hope to achieve
In general, those who communicate with you are limited for different reasons. Those reasons are because of the same class, the same company, the same family or something else.. When you in foreign country, your communication relationship is more restricted. My intention of this project is to break those restriction against communication and to create new relationship which you can create only by exchanging clothes.
7) What was its reception here in Nairobi...how did people react when you asked them to give you their clothes?
Those who exchanged clothes with me made comments like "I exchanged my clothes because it's new idea" "because you can laugh at this project" "because interesting!". Their strong curiosity really surprised me.
Those who rejected my idea were few than in Paris, and although they rejected, they seriously listened to my explanation.
8) How is this art...after all you are a contemporary artist?
In my definition, contemporary art is to create new human relationships, not to create objects like painting and sculpture. So my artworks related to creating communication through clothes are related to contemporary art, and I'm a contemporary artist.
9) How is Nairobi different from the other parts of the world you tried out?
In Paris, I felt that people guard their own image more strongly by their own clothes, they are afraid of breaking those image by exchanging clothes with me.
On the other hand, in Nairobi, people can easily think exchanging clothes as a sort of new games.
10) Tell about exhibition
When it comes to exhibition, people usually think that they can see those artistic exhibition only inside museums. We, however, held our exhibition “Self Select in Nairobi” in the public cafe, which different people can visit as a part of daily life. Then, even those who aren’t interested in art could happen to see our exhibition and were so surprised. The simplicity of this project enabled those who came to this exhibition to react and understand what we did on the street and those concepts.