Fucking Good Art started as a newsprint newsletter/arts publication and quickly became a critical voice for Rotterdam’s arts worlds. It’s a must-have arts journal which investigates a different local contemporary art scene in every issue. Their Berlin, Copenhagen and Swiss editions were instrumental in making us decide that one of the goals of Proximity would be to share research and critical ideas from outside our own personal networks.

We met Rob Hamelijnck and Nienke Terpsma, the publishers of FGA, in their remarkable studio space that sits off an old harbor in Rotterdam. Ed and Rachael Marszewski, Aron Gent and our trouble making buddy Jan De Bruin hunkered down in Rob and Nienke’s studio/office and drank way too many beers while we talked shop. Below are excerpts of a longer conversation that gives one frame of reference about our new friends’ work.

Ed Marszewski: Tell us why you started Fucking Good Art. Rob Hamelijnck: Actually, it’s the same reason why you started Proximity, because there was nothing happening in Rotterdam. There were no publications, there were no magazines, there was no press; there was no media coverage. Nienke Terpsma: And all the writers writing about art for the newspapers are located in Amsterdam. They are not going here, especially not to the small places. And then we went to Chicago and we met Michael Bulka. Ed: Oh my god, you know Michael? Nienke: Our first editorial explained how we got to this title and what our inspiration for this was, but we attributed it only to Michael and there was a photo of him in the first issue and two years later, we got an e-mail from a man named Pedro Vélez. Rob: It turns out that there were two people doing this, but it wasn’t that much, just a photo-copied thing. Our friend Tom introduced us to this Michael guy and we were totally impressed. Nienke: When we were in Chicago we went to all the artist-run spaces and I don’t know how it is now, but in those days, there were spaces popping up everywhere. In a half a year, they could be gone, it was really super-exciting. Rachael: It’s still like that now, they pop up and go, but there’s a lot. Rob: It was super-exciting, really inspiring. So that’s why we started, well actually three years later... Nienke: So there were things starting and ending and Michael came here and he had this leaflet, this really sharp, personal publication. But it was also kind of sour with very harsh little reviews. But he wanted to help. He wanted it to improve, for it to be good and to challenge everything. Ed: That is rad about Michael Bulka being an inspiration for FGA. So what is the role of your publication for Rotterdam? Nienke: One of the things I see now that we’ve travelled a bit more is really only important in the Dutch context, because Dutch art education has really, really little theory or writing or putting your own stuff in context. It is mainly focused on intuition and not on contextualizing. And we had the feeling that it was really only the academics writing on art, whereas artists have a different perspective because they make things as well. So we try to get artists to write. And now we see that in other countries it’s totally different.  In art education there’s a very different approach. Rob: In the first issue we did in another city, Munich, which was a year after our first issue came out. We realized what Nienke is explaining, especially about Germany. In Germany, theory is quite strong, so probably the art education is a bit better and maybe even on a university level.  They have a lot of theory and a lot of notion of the position of an artist within art, but also within society, in Germany and the world. Ed: You would not have realized what these other art worlds are like if you had not decided to go there?  How did you decide to go to Munich? Rob: We were invited by a small art institute called Kunstverein Munchen on the invitation of curator Maria Lind who also did show the Teasing Minds. Nienke: Well, I think it would have taken us more time to realize that we could do it in other places. At first it was really a thing on the side and then we realized that there were all these worlds out there. Of course, we knew that, but we thought it belonged to being in space, doing it in a space where you know everyone, where the other writers are your friends, that it’s really from this private network, this small thing. But then we realized that its got so many new aspects when you are an outsider in a city, but an insider in the contemporary artist coalition.  Of course, its super interesting to see that in different places the system is different and the education is different. Ed: When you’re in a place, how do you guys choose your topics?  Is it based on the relationships of the people around you? Nienke: It varies. Sometimes there are the usual suspects of who we should talk to and then we end up not going there. We try to make sure that we’re not ending up in one circle of people. Ed: How would you map out what’s happening in Rotterdam?  Who is helping promote and fund artists and artists’ spaces? (See 79 zones for contemporary art in Rotterdam on page ) Rob: The whole issue is about the cultural politics. And it’s about these institutes that provide energy or the impulses or the money. Ed: So give me a brief overview.  Is it possible?  You have the CBK (Centrum voor Beeldende Kunst – centre for visual arts ) who helps fund individual artists. What about the institutions? Rob: Where to start? So every four years there’s a new cultural policy. In 2008, we just entered the next four years. The last 4 years were, let’s say, the traumatic times. In 2004, the government decided that the whole bursary system and the whole subsidy system had to change. Why? Because they thought that it had to be centralized. There were a lot of offices where you could apply for money. It was maybe a bit too much, but it worked quite well. It worked on a city level, it worked on a provincial level and it worked on the state level. And then they decided that it needed only one office. Individual subsidies were banned. Well, not all individual subsidies. Only the state ones stayed. Ed: What was the effect of this? Rob: Not many people had assignments as artists, using the assignments as a loophole to get individual funds. Even if they had a great idea they couldn’t go there for funds. Rachael: And that’s not the way artists always work, they don’t always have a plan ahead of time.  It’s a process, you can’t just write out on a sheet of paper and say, “In six months we’ll do this thing,” because when you work on something... Rob: And there is another thing. I also work for money, so it’s not that all the artists in the Netherlands survive because of the bursary. People have jobs. It’s normal. What also changed was that the money was still there, but where did it go to? The money went to the institutes and something that is called “city collection” which actually started in ‘87.  It was really important for the Rotterdam-based artist because it was sort of a breach between the local and the international art world. So, they would invite local artists into their museum and by getting invited, you could sort of step into the international realm. Ed: And that’s gone? Rob: It’s still there, but because of this change and this money flow, it also changed and its mission changed. The whole ambition changed in all of Rotterdam. All of the institutions began doing the same things as each other. The curators really went nuts and it was a fight. The last four years have been a fight. Ed: How was there fighting? Aron: Because they were in each other’s turf. They didn’t know what to do. Ed: This financial change fucked everyone’s roles up? Rob: Yes, because the state also demanded that everyone had to privatize. They were forced to operate under market influences. ‘How many people are coming through the gallery? Are you generating enough money to cover expenses?’ Now it is settled again. The city collection of two normal curators who will probably stick to the mission of ‘87, maybe go back to the original. Ed: One last question, how do you get funding for your magazine? Nienke: For the small ones, we just pay for it. Rob: This one [ the Swiss issue] is a little more complicated because for this one, we had an assistant in Switzerland and she applied for 20 or so grants of which we got two. Nienke: And only one of those before printing. Rob: There are several parties involved. First of all, the museum Kunsthaus Zurich that invited us to make an issue for the show Shifting Identities – (Swiss) Art Today. Then BINZ39 who gave us a residency for four months, the dutch arts council Fonds BKVB (The Netherlands Foundation for Visual Arts, Design and Architecture), and the arts council DKC (dienst kunst en cultuur – office for art and culture) Rotterdam.  When it was finished in June 2008, our economy was dead, but that’s the point, that it doesn’t sustain us for a year, it’s only for a moment. Ed: We haven’t broken even on our magazine yet; we’re always pouring some of our own money into it even with advertising. Rachael: And we have newsstand sales, subscriptions and fundraisers. We definitely hope to re-coup some of the money in sales. Because we publish it through our non-profit organization, we also accept donations to help pay for the costs. Ed: There’s really just no money for the printed publications. Rob: Really, in the end, just get rich friends. by Ed and Rachael Marszewski