Art, gender, power, and the F word: an interview with Coco Fusco.

CC: In your 2005 performance, in Sao Paolo, Brazil, "Bare Life Study," you performed as a military commander ordering "prisoners" dressed in orange jumpsuits to clean the street in front of the American embassy with their toothbrushes. How did this performance come about and what were the various public reactions to the work--from the embassy employees, to the public spectators, to the Brazilian police?

CF: I was invited to VideoBrasil in 2005 and they asked me to create a performance. I had just come from studying with Team Delta and was thinking about military policing as a form of disciplinary choreography. Being forced to clean prison areas with toothbrushes is a standard form of punishment in military prisons.

In terms of public reactions--the festival staff in Brazil were great about bringing press in and getting them excited about the work. I think that the main reason we were not stopped or arrested was because there were so many TV cameras and photojournalists. The coverage was generally positive and the event was co-opted by news commentators as a springboard for a discussion of the treatment of prisoners not only by the U.S., but also in Brazil. Of course, there were artists at the festival who did not like what I was doing because they did not like the idea of an art practice that engaged political issues.

We did not ask for permission in advance, knowing that it would not be granted, but we did plan everything very carefully. The consulate staff did not come out to speak to us, but they did call the Brazilian police to ask for protection. The police arrived but did nothing to stop us. They just stood around and chatted and took pictures of us with their cell phones. I heard from some Brazilians that the locals living near the consulate hate having it there because their lives are interrupted by its presence--the consulate was actually moved to a suburban area in Sao Paolo a few years ago because the Americans were afraid of being targets of violent demonstrations after 9/11. They moved to a building that used to be a pharmaceutical factory in an area that is really not designed for a lot of traffic. I also heard that the Brazilian police don't like the Americans because they are constantly calling and asking for protection when nothing is wrong. This probably explains why they did not stop us.

CC: In July 2005, you took a course led by former U.S. military interrogators designed for people in the private sector who want to learn their techniques for extracting information. The training involved an immersive simulation of being prisoners of war: you were ambushed, captured, searched, thrown in a pen and subjected to several interrogations. Afterwards, in a classroom scenario, the tactics used against you were analyzed and then you were taught to do what had been done to you. This resulted in the documentary film, Operation Atropos (2006), which was part of the most recent Whitney Biennial. Describe your motive for taking the course and some of your experiences.

CF: Originally, I wanted to lake the course so I could have contact with real military interrogators in order to develop a performance character. The experience of training, though, was interesting enough in itself to make a documentary about it. Because I videotaped the training, I was able to study how the interrogators worked and how their behavior changed depending on whom they were with and what they were doing. I was also able to study how the members of my group each responded differently to the tactics that were used against them. I learned a great deal from the experience--probably most importantly, it made me consider just how complex interrogation is, just how difficult it is to determine what torture is, and how to prevent it from happening. It all has very little to do with sadism or the supposedly evil character of the military and a lot more to do with the stress, frustration, confusion, and conditions of uncurbed power that are present in so many warring scenarios.

One of the most interesting results of the experience and of making the video is that I maintained contact with my teachers and have had many more very illuminating discussions with them. Mike Ritz, cofounder of Team Delta, has come with me to some public presentations and has fielded lots of questions from audiences. I was expecting people to be more critical and even more hostile toward him. In general, the reactions have been more muted. Some audiences are visibly afraid of him. Others are angry with me for allowing him to express his position. Some really paranoid people get upset because they don't want to be seen by him. What surprises me the most is that in general, my audiences know very little about the details of what constitutes torture, how military interrogation works, and how military intelligence fits into warfare.

CC: You mentioned that during the filming, there was another film crew on-site from National Geographic, considering piloting a reality TV show based on the military interrogation camp. Entertainment culture is enamored with the military. TV shows like 24 glorify and rationalize torture as a legitimate way to get the "bad guys." What effect does the media have on our perception of war as a game, war as spectacle/entertainment?

CF: Well, most Americans nowadays have little or no experience of real warfare--very few are soldiers or part of military families, and few live or work in war zones. They know war through games, through films, through TV shows. Those representations are sensationalist and trouble-free in that there is no real injury or death. The mainstream news media are limited in the amount of real death and injury they can actually show on television, by comparison to what we saw on TV news during previous wars. So yes, as a result of the limited view of war as a game, and of the War on Terror as a great adventure in which all sorts of government agents use all sorts of means, legal and illegal, to always win against the enemy, we don't have a very realistic view of war as a lived experience or of war as a road to death. I'd say that the dearth of realistic representations of the human dimensions of war result in our being ill prepared to judge the decisions of public officials about the war we are in, and also make it easier to recruit young people who are ignorant of the dangers involved.

CC: You mentioned that you are on deadline with a manuscript. What is your current writing project about?

CF: The book is an essayistic exploration of some of the issues in my performance, specifically about what it means for the state to instrumentalize female sexuality as a weapon in the War on Terror, and why I think that feminists have had such a hard time addressing the question of female sexual aggression.

CC: You have a young child. Has your role as a parent shifted your focus in your art practice? For example--the amount of international travel or the level of risk that you are willing to undergo for your work.

CF: When my son was a little baby, I was on leave from teaching and we traveled most of his first year. It was easier then to move around with him at that stage--he slept a lot and didn't really complain about being in strange places, though his little body had a hard time with environmental changes. Now he is less affected physically by changing environments. I continue to tour and to take him with me, but I have to be more careful about planning and also about finding things for him to do. Last summer we went to Colombia, Argentina, England, and New Zealand. Considering that he was only two years old, he did pretty well on the long flights and just wanted to know where he could find kids and animals when he arrived in each new place. He is racking up a lot of frequent flyer miles. I haven't really felt inspired to make art about being a mother or about my son--it's just not something I am interested in doing right now. In terms of risk--I don't think I have refused any invitations based on potential risk yet. I probably would think twice before taking my son to a war zone. That said, we are planning a trip to Israel and the West Bank for next Spring.

COLETTE COPELAND is a Philadelphia-based multi-media artist, writer, professor, and feminist whose work explores gender and the pervasive influence of media and technology on contemporary culture.