Jenna: Our next episode goes to Marco Vinicio Morales, Name on the street: Kultnation, Name to friends: Vinny.

Vinny is a famous designer and director in the moving image industry. Throughout his career he has been chosen to direct the prestigious titles for the OFFF Festivals in Barcelona and Mexico City, he’s worked at all of the top motion design houses in NY and LA, and he’s exhibited for museums and institutions such as Pictoplasma, IdN, and the Type Director’s Club. Vinny is based in Mexico City and outside of work he also teaches budding animators and designers at Universidad Iberoamericana and Centro.

Here’s what Vinny had to say about what he did after he accomplished everything he ever wanted by the age of 33, how work is like talking, and why it’s essential to dive headfirst into “why.” 

Vinny: It’s interesting because I don’t have a lot of memories from my childhood, except colors, shapes or stripes.

Yeah, I know. It’s weird.

I never thought of… that, I think until… well, let me put it this way, I think it was way back in my… inconosciente?

Jenna:  Subconscious. Yeah.

Vinny: I remember from that apartment… it had a wooden floor, a really dark floor. So I would get a yellowish contrast from the light that came into the window. I also remember a lot of orange. My mom used to have these 70s plastic orange chairs, so that’s really in the back of my mind as well.

I remember stripes. A lot of stripes. I guess that’s why I like stripes. I don’t wear stripes in my clothing but I like stripe-y things. My mom had, you know, in the 70s those striped sweaters were very common, so she had… she used to use a couple of those…

I also remember a lot of colors. But most of the time, from that age, those are the things that I remember. I don’t remember that much… moments, or hanging out with people, I remember things more… visually-measured.

Just recently I realized that the love that I have for what I do, it comes from that time.

You know lightning, I love lighting. And now I just made the connection talking to you that… that type of lighting, the orange, yellowish in the morning, or the orange-y from the magic hour, in the sunset, thats the best time that I can be and enjoy because I used to get that lighting in my childhood.

So yeah… I don’t remember that much except those things.

And it’s funny. I try to… scrape into the back of my head to remember more things but just…visual colors, forms, and shapes, and lighting… is what I can find now.

Jenna: Can you describe where you grew up, and from there the industry that you found yourself in?

Vinny: I grew up in Mexico City. I guess that city has changed a lot in the 30-something years since i was born. It’s a very massive city. I guess compared with New York. New York it’s… it’s very even in the way that you can move around the city and you won’t have… it feels exactly the same, around for example Manhattan or even the cities around Manhattan.

Mexico is not like that.

There are some areas that are… I guess I don’t think it’s a government thing it’s just that there are some areas that are better cared for than others. So there’s an area that for example is where I live, it was a nice area. You won’t have crime or anything… local government invests in those areas, but not all of Mexico City is like that because it’s really big, like massive.

So I lived in that area, which most of the middle class from the city lives. I was a middle class person. I was raised in the middle class. I used to live in a neighborhood… the neighborhood is still there, it’s called St. Peter of the Pines, in Spanish obviously, San Pedro de Los Pinos.

At that time it was an old neighborhood. I was raised there until the age of 7, and then my mom and sister and I, because those were the only ones that lived there, we moved to the next door neighborhood, with my grandparents. With my mom’s dad and her mom. Eventually that didn’t actually change a lot, except that I had to swap schools.

It was okay, because the school where I was before moving, I wasn’t doing very good with grades. So when I moved to the new school, I kind of improved my grades, not 100%.

But eventually Mexico City, is a city that is so big, you get lost in between it’s big-ness. And you don’t realize as a middle class student or person that the city is so big, because you hang around… just around certain areas.

it’s like you’re living in a bubble. So you think the world is perfect because you just hang around those neighborhoods that you like. But you never look in between. And the other difference between other cities is that because since Mexico is so big…

Lets say for example the neighborhood where I live, you’ll have in between your neighborhood and some other nice neighborhood you’ll have not so… fancy neighborhoods, I can’t find the word now in my head…. so you’d have to go in between those neighborhoods. But most of the time as a middle class person you wouldn’t look… you were driving but you wouldn’t look into that neighborhood because you know it’s not a nice neighborhood. Sketchy, that’s the word.

It might look a little bit sketchy, so eventually I think that kind of structure, the way that I am, which is like most middle class people in Mexico City, they want to see just non-sketchy places. My mom, I don’t know, she always, she was a single mom, but she worked her way for us to know the world.

So we traveled a lot, whenever there was money, we used to travel a lot. We used to come a lot to the U.S. I think at least once a year we’d come to New York, to Los Angeles. Well, we have family in Los Angeles, so we flew there a lot of times…

I think that kind of, I guess helped in a way trying to build that vision. Coming from Mexico City, you come to the US and you see that everything is more structured, better built, and as a tourist obviously you never go to the sketchy areas. You just go to the beautiful places. So you get the idea that the U.S. is in some way better than Mexico in certain things.

That’s for me. For the industry…

The industry in Mexico. It wasn’t… I was born in 78, so by the time I realized what I wanted to do, Mexico has usually been a 3rd world country.

I don’t like that term. Because most people think Mexico as a third world country would be just people living in the desert and we have basically nothing… But in some ways yeah. We are behind because there are a lot more necessities that need to be covered. And design, or arts, or fine arts, are not at the top of the list. They are like… way below.

So in that sense, Mexico City, at least in the country, in terms of art or design we were really left behind.

So the only place where I could see design, or at least the idea I had of design at the time, was outside of Mexico City.

That’s why I wanted to work and study outside Mexico City because I thought that Mexico didn’t fulfill the idea I had at that time of what design and art would do… would be.

So working in Mexico City at that time was… for example in terms of animation they were just starting, it was at the end of the 90s, and the U.S. had already started. They had 25 years.

Even though Pixar just had released their first movie, there was still a lot of industry in terms of 3D computer animation and before that there was Walt Disney. So there was a lot of animation work done and they had a lot of information and knowledge to be applied.

And in Mexico City we didn’t have, basically anything. So everything was starting. In terms of design in Mexico, it’s interesting because we are a country that, we love…

I think very few countries are so “makers” about what they do. Now that the Maker Faire movement is so strong in the world, Mexico City, has always, at least in Mexico there’s always been this “makers” culture… But we never had a way to specialize in what you do.

Design in general is about making and building, but it’s also about making your work unique and special. In that way Mexico never had… culturally, we never put in the time to make people specialize in what they do.

So design was just… There was design, people were doing design, but it was just starting as well.

So for me it was difficult at that time trying to find where it’d work and or what I would do.

Jenna: What was it like being an art kid in a place that wasn’t to focused on art?

Vinny: I think… I guess it was interesting because… [sighs]

You always get influenced by your world, and that’s something you can’t avoid.

So what I just said, just a few minutes ago to explain where I was coming from, that doesn’t mean that I still believe that.

But at that time I used to believe that… the only way to build yourself as an artist was going outside. That’s what I used to believe. That’s something I don’t believe anymore. Because…

I think the only way to build yourself as an artist is to look into yourself.

Most middle classes, we don’t like to look into ourselves. We are always looking, in front of us. We are always in this career, trying to get better, trying to get more money, trying to go up in the social scale…

And at that time I used to draw a lot, but I used to draw what I thought was cool, which was comics, when I was a kid and a teenager. I used to praise a lot of anglo-saxon work and I used to even reject my own culture.

But in the end, I said it before, that is something you cannot erase. Because it’s in you. You were raised in a country, and that culture, it’s in you.

In the end, no matter how hard I tried to mimic or replicate the work that I liked, it would end up looking different from what I wanted, because I am different in that way, because I was born in a different country.

So at that time it was kind of frustrating. To be straight with you. With a straight answer. It was frustrating. I didn’t enjoy that time.

And I think that frustration got me to where I am.

Which is… basically…

I had this frustration. So I basically made this list of things and places that I wanted to do. I was very determined about that. Because I didn’t have access to all those things. So this frustration actually gave me…

I said “Okay well I don’t have this, so that means I’m going to get it. How am I going to get it?”

And I think it helps. It helped me to have an opportunity to do other things that I think that without that frustration would not have been possible.

Jenna: What was on the list and what did you cross off the list?

Vinny: There were a lot of things.

One of them… I always loved Japanese culture. I always wanted to be a martial artist. I tried it a lot of times… one of them was becoming a black belt.

The other one was… I wanted to work in hollywood. Doing animated work. And not necessarily hollywood, but in the U.S. I wanted to study abroad. I got this scholarship to this school in Vancouver. I found out about it and I was really… amazed by the work of the students. So I said “I want to study in that place.”

I also found out about this festival, in Europe, in Barcelona. In 2001, and I started to see all the new work that was being created outside of Mexico City though the use of computers, so I was super excited about that. I said “I want to go to that festival and be a part of it.”

I think those are the main items. I wanted to do animation as well…

So basically, those were the first items. And all of them have been checked.

I started taking aikido lessons when I was a teenager and I did it for six years. When I got my black belt exam it was something really fun. And interesting. Besides trying to be… I always… when I was a kid I used to watch a lot of ninja movies, so that’s where it comes from.

For me it was like “Cool. Now I am a ninja. I can master now the power to control people with. one. finger!” [Laughs] You know, that kind of thing. In the end it was not about that.

It was about me, myself and… my spirit.

I found in marital arts there’s a lot of spirit, and a lot of spiritual thinking. At the end, that’s funny because my original idea was something, and by the time I got there, it completely changed.

Then I won this scholarship that gave me the opportunity to study at the University I wanted, the Vancouver Film School. So I went there, and studied there, and then when I came back to Mexico City after my 1-year program I had the opportunity to work in animation for a year, and then I was invited to work at this place with one of the most important designers in title sequence, which is Kyle Cooper, in L.A.

I worked there, I went there. I worked there. And… It was great because all those things that my frustration… all those things that were created by my frustration I had already done them.

Eventually after four I think… it was 2007… so probably four years later, I was invited to be at the festival in Barcelona to present and be one of the artists that presents their work there. So.. it was great.

I had the opportunity of finding all the items in my list… marked. Which is very unusual.

The funny thing was that I thought those items would be more expanding during my life span. I used to think my last stop would be at that festival in Barcelona. Probably by the age of 60. I so I’m done. I can go rest and retire, that kind of thing.

It didn’t happen, obviously.

Jenna: What did?

Vinny: What did happen was that I was there… it wasn’t…

I think the beauty in life is that you always think about things.

You always think about things. And there’s always one thing that you never think about.

And that’s what makes life interesting.

Because…I’m going to say it like this, you go into a room and you’re always thinking, “Oh I’m going…right” you’re coming back home and you’re always thinking that “I’m going straight to bed because I’m so tired” but you never think that you’re going to bump into someone. You know. And life is like that.

So I had this idea and it wasn’t what I expected. In all cases.

And that’s what builds, I think, character.

The way that you understand that single thing that you never thought of, from one goal, one situation, whatever… you name what you want it to be, but…

So it wasn’t what I expected, it was different.

I had this idea, and what I basically had to deal with was the fact that I was 33, and I came to this point where I thought my life was over.

I didn’t see beyond that festival.

And as I mentioned it, I thought in my original idea, I was very determined and said “I want to work with this guy, in this studio. I want to study in this university. I want to go be invited to this festival, and when I’m done. When I have done those things…” I used to say… “I can die now.”

The problem is… the problem was… and that was the thing I never saw. “What will happen… what are you going to do if that happens when you are 33?”

And it was.. now I feel it, it was so cool that happen now because now I get a lot of time to do a lot more things. At the time it was very difficult for me because I couldn’t find a way to deal with it. For me it was really hard suddenly not being able to know what to do next.

It was complicated and it was hard trying to find a path… a new path.

So It think that’s what really happened.

Jenna: Oftentimes artists take their life experience and they translate that into their work. You’ve been producing work, since ever. What was your work like up until that point when you were 33 and how has it changed afterwards?

Vinny: I see work as… it’s…

It’s like talking.

As a child the only way you learn is by repeating, repeating things. And trying to mimic what your mom and your dad does, so when your mom comes to you and says “Who’s your mommy? Who’s your mommy?” You say “Who’s your mommy? Who’s your mommy?” And that’s how you learn.

So I think my work, until I was 30, it was very similar to that. I was trying to mimic something. That I wanted to be. And it was great because I learned a lot. Thats the only way to learn. Trying to mimic and trying to be, something. And that’s how for example drawing works.

You go outside and you draw people. And you start looking at their eyes and their noses and you start analyzing and figuring out their faces you know… and then… then you copy them.

That’s the first step in creativity or at least in arts.

The second one is once you copy that, you already have a vocabulary. And that’s when you start talking.

And when you start talking then you are very fluent, and you can say lot of things. But then I think there comes the most… it’s not about important… but I think it’s a different stage, which is,

What are you going to say?

And I think up until 30 it was me. Learning, copying, understanding, and getting fluent. And gathering all the vocabulary I could learn.

And right now, I think it’s learning how to talk, and start saying things.

The difference now is that, today, I look more inside of me and my country and I look less about the rest of the world. Which is something that changed in the past 3 or 4 years. I am more interested in my country, and it’s culture than I was, when I was a teenager for example.

I still love certain things from Japan, and the U.S., because that makes me who I am. But I am no longer “flashed” by it.

I know that my country has very specific things that make it unique. Those are the things that I want to be focused on in the next few years. Trying to find that fluency, that fluency in the words that I say.

And that resonates more now. And I think that’s the difference in terms of work, and what I do.

Jenna: Specifically a lot of your work has included a giant shape in the middle of an open space. Can you talk a little about where that came from, and do you still find that in your work after learning so much about yourself? Is that still there? Or what have you been working on lately that is different?

Vinny: That was a dream.

When I was a kid I used to get this nightmare, a constant nightmare that I was standing inside an enclosed room, not very well lit, and I was standing right next to a massive figure… I guess it was a figure it wasn’t a creature it was just, amorphous.

And I was really scared about it. Because it could change shape. And also I was really really small, and I used to get scared because of the size, of this amorphous object that was next to me because it was really big.

And this nightmare haunted me for my entire childhood. And every single night I would dream exactly the same thing.

There’s something about space and scale.

I still can’t name what it is. But there’s something about it.

When I found out about 3D animation I basically realized that I could recreate what I had in my mind. And that, those ideas where filtered… I didn’t make that conscious. I just sat there like… I guess any other artist would grab a white canvas and start placing brushes… I started doing exactly the same thing. The first thing that came out and popped out was building a space.

I still get the same… now it’s not a fear… it’s more like an obsession. Whenever I go into a museum, for example, a gallery, I love those spaces. There’s something about that… that I just… I don’t know its very hard to explain…

I was telling a friend of mine the other day that I would love living inside a gallery space and just having one, single… just one mattress in the center of the floor and be there inside a huge space.

For example hangars, that kind of feeling where the place is eating you, that’s what I’m talking about. That same feeling… That’s the same feeling I had in my nightmares.

So it was that and now there is still that idea. Sometimes I want to try and go back to that idea but I know that I’ve done it. But there are still things about the ideas of space and scale that… I can’t get out of my mind.

Right now it feels a little bit different because I’m starting to explore different things. Like for example drawing. I think what I do was always related to form, light, space, and scale. Those sorts of things. In those previous times I focused more on space, and scale, and maybe light, and now I guess I want to focus more on form. That’s why I draw that much now. Now I enjoy analyzing the shape of everything.

And it’s… it’s amazing.

Especially people. That’s something I wasn’t that interested in that much before. Now I’m so interested in people.

And there’s this obsession… for example now…. I used to take photos… I always liked photography but I used to take photos of abstract things, walls and letters and signs. But know I’m taking photos of people because I think they’re interesting. Their expression, their look, their noses.

I think it’s about that. I don’t think I’m going to stop thinking about space. Because that will always be there. But now maybe it’ll be…

I have this short film that I haven’t finished. Which is unusual for me, because when I have an idea I just go ahead and produce it… it’s just that it… I try to follow my instinct in a way, if it’s not working now, just don’t push it or put pressure on it.

Thats the way I think I’m training myself in areas that I didn’t do in my previous years.

Jenna: If a timeline was governing your life up until the age of 33, where you had a list of things that you wanted to accomplish, and you had this idea of this linear progression, what is governing your choices now, after that timeline blew up?

Vinny: I guess learning.

I think that’s the thing that is governing now.

I always… since I was so determined, I always knew what I wanted. What I didn’t actually know is,

Why.

The difference now is that I am more focused on why, than what.

And I think learning is that. It’s answering why.

And it’s beautiful because if we were focused more on why, and what. I think life would be easier. Or at least my life has been less difficult, when I started looking at why instead of what.

Because what is the simple version of why. What… it’s just the product. It’s just going to buy or get something.

But why is more essential, it’s more human. It makes you… it fulfills you really into your inner self.

But most of the times we never want to know why because why is also complicated. And it requires a lot of thinking and reflection and saying “Why? Why do I want this? Why… am I living this? Why was I born like this? Why…?”

Why it’s…. it seems at the very beginning harder than what. But at the end, what, it’s harder, because it’s easier to get and accomplish. But once you get into what, you say “Okay… so?”

And I think the motive now is why. It’s learning. It’s trying to understand the reasons I am doing what I’m doing. The reasons…

I guess… it’s not about the purpose in my life, because I don’t think… I don’t see life that way. But more like “Why I am doing this? Why I want to learn, why the world is the way it is. Just answering all those why’s. And…

I think that’s about it. It’s about just going into the why’s.

Jenna: Why are you a professor at a university?

Vinny: Why. Hm. I think it’s about one thing. Which is… my dad was never at home. That means my parents were divorced when I was born. So I never had a father figure. I was raised with three women. My mom, my sister, and my nanny.

So I never had this idea of… I guess the idea of a mentor.

Someone who could guide you through the dark tunnel.

My dad when I saw him, he wasn’t that.  He was completely… [laughs] I don’t know he was something weird. And I love him to death, but he was probably anything but a guide in a black tunnel.

So eventually when I was a teenager. I wasn’t problematic, I don’t know, but my mom sent me to a psychiatrist.

I guess the first time I had a guide in a tunnel was my psychiatrist. He was a man. He was there so that I could get answers to all the questions that my mom couldn’t answer in terms of gender.

It was my space, it was my comfort zone. It was the place… My own little castle where I could go in and talk about my stuff.

So I never had that mentor. And I think mentors are important in life.

Because sometimes you just can’t… it’s difficult for someone to find an answer.

And then when I went to college, at the uni in Mexico, and found out all these things missing in terms of the industry.

If the industry is weak, that means education is weak. It’s a simple as that.

If I couldn’t find updated programs, education systems, or ways of process, creative processes in the industry, then that means that the university was also left behind.

In that way I had to deal with the fact that I attended an expensive university in Mexico, but they were not updated, so I basically had to learn a lot of things myself.

I still teach in that university. The difference now is I enjoy it because now I have knowledge. And the knowledge I acquired I can transmit it to them.

And I like to be, I guess, as cliche as it may sound, the father, or at least that mentor that could help people through those dark tunnels.

I never thought it would have been that big for example, because I love doing that.

I love helping people. I love when people find their path, and they realize. They have this look when you say… “Oh my god yeah it’s true”. And when they find light in that dark tunnel you see it in their eyes.

And I get a lot of care and love from my students. They are super caring with me. They talk to me and they get really close. And that’s something that makes me feel good. It makes me feel good that they are always there and in some way I am an inspiration to them.

I never… going back to that same example, from this, I never pictured exactly that.

That I would be someone… that I would inspire people. I never thought about myself as someone who might inspire so many students to start do things, to start working, to go outside and pursue a dream.

I never thought I would be someone like that.

But I like when I go into class and they learn. That’s the thing. That’s why I love teaching.

Now, I see it more like a mentor. I think we must have more mentors than teachers. There’s a difference in that.

For me, the why is because I like looking at their eyes and seeing that spark when they say “Oh yes, I’m learning. And I know what I want.”

It’s something that is very hard to explain or replicate in terms of words, trying to explain that. But for me it’s a unique feeling.

Jenna: Why is your Mexican identity important to you?

Vinny: My Mexican identity… I guess it’s because…

First of all I am Mexican.

There’s something about Mexico. Just like any other country we have our things and our way of thinking.

For me I guess it’s important… because I get to look at the things that most people don’t look. At least probably the answer I’m going to give now, at least most people in Mexico don’t like looking at their own identity or country.

I think my identity is about that. Trying to be inspired by something that’s within me.

And that’s something that I still haven’t fully completed. In the way that I’m still working on it.

Trying to figure out how to express these words… Going back to that same analogy, trying to find a fluent way of developing this identity, of myself.

It’s hard because I spent almost 30-something years not trying, not developing that. For me, my identity is about looking at the world I live in and trying to understand it.

First looking at it, then documenting, then analyzing it, and then doing something with all that information.

For me right now it’s… my identity is a place where I can be inspired, and be unique.

Because the only way of being unique is to look into my own country… not necessarily my own country… but…

Finding a way to….

Like I’ve always said it in my class.

It’s not about what you see, but how you see the world.

It’s not about being Mexican, it’s about why… how you are Mexican.

I think that’s what I think I want to focus on now. That’s why it’s important because I want to find out exactly how being Mexican makes me different, or at least unique. That vision.

Jenna: Lately you’ve been spending many hours illustrating a children’s book. What is that process like and do you find yourself thinking through your own childhood as you are illustrating those pages?

Vinny: The process has been like… overwhelming. And unexpected.

I never thought illustrating a children’s book would take so much time.

But it’s been great because I’ve learned in the past four months I think I’ve learned probably what I didn’t learn in the past four years.

It has been such an amazing learning voyage about everything. About materials, paper, ink reaction between paper, trying to understand lighting through hair and forms.

And in a way I never saw… it’s interesting because since I do animation… usually when you do animated work, at least with computer animation, which means 3D animation, you get a lot of freedom within the software to do camera movements, and that type of thing. And distortions produced by a lens.

When I started this children’s book, the first thing that came into the pen was that. Seeing the children’s book as a camera.

I started telling a story, so I basically story-boarded an entire book.

For me I guess it was building, making an animated project in frames.

The only difference is that through computer animation I am confident about the time… I know the time I take in computer animation to do things. With traditional illustration I was not aware of that time.

So it’s been taking a lot more time than I expected.

But in that way yes, it has been great because I have learned so much about drawing. I have been able to… to think about things when I was a child and trying to put them in the illustration work.

Trying to follow the original vision from the story, from my friend Lola, and then trying to make a balance between her vision, her childhood vision, with my childhood vision.

I think it has been great because with her it’s a very well-balanced work environment.

She comes with the story and I read it and I say “maybe we should improve this.” And she says “oh great, you know I love that idea.” And then she sees the illustration and she says “maybe we can improve this.”

And that’s something that you don’t get that often. That balanced work where no one wants to go on top of the other one. It’s been great because of that. Because I get to get a balanced look, a balanced childhood vision, with someone else.

And it’s been great. We’re thinking about finishing this soon, and I can’t wait ’til people look at them. It’s something that completely puts me outside of my comfort zone. It’s completely different than what I’ve been doing the past five years.

And that’s why this challenge has been so great. It’s because I placed myself outside my comfort zone. And that’s something that we humans sometimes don’t like to do, because that requires a lot more things.

But at the end, when things go easy, that means that we need to put ourselves outside the comfort zone. When life starts becoming easy, and less complicated in a way, not in the way of problems, but worrying more about the essence of life.

I think that’s why when I had this opportunity I took it because I needed to place myself outside of the comfort zone, and learn different visions and ways of producing the same work.

For me this children’s book… now I understand it’s like doing another animated project. The only difference is it’s not going to be moving, but in a way it’s like that.

Jenna: You just spoke to the essence of life, or kind of touched upon it. If an essence could be something plural, I guess, and you’re looking at “essences of life”… It’s apparent that you’ve done a lot of good thinking on where you’re at and your creativity and what you want to accomplish next after accomplishing everything else… what would be those things, what makes the list on top of “getting yourself out of your comfort zone,” what’s 2, 3, 4, 5, 6  in that new list, not of these material “what” goals but moreso the “why” goals?

Vinny: To be honest, I don’t know.

And I think for someone who was so determined, not knowing where this is going for the first time, it’s getting myself outside the comfort zone. [Laughs]

I’ve thought about it, and sometimes I get really stressed about not knowing where this is going.

But, I guess you know the only thing that I try to avoid, or not fall into, is getting… staying too much in this “I don’t know where this is going.”

Because you might, or at least me, I might get lost, in between. And stay there for 15 years. Which, it won’t happen…

The essence is still there which is producing work. That’s for sure. So I guess the next point in the list is yeah, producing work. The only difference is that it’s not about what type of work, but why.

So I’m going to keep producing work. I’m going to be looking into more about myself. And I want that this new work resonates more than the other work.

So I don’t know the specifics, but I know the essence. Producing more work.

And I think it’s also a fun ride, now I don’t get to know… now I don’t have spoilers of the movie.

So I’m more open about what will come and what new things I might bump into.

I didn’t, I’m not creating an expectation. I at least try not to create an expectation of what this will be.

I think that’s wonderful because that is more essential. And that feels more honest. And more essential, more towards me. That doesn’t mean life has to be like that, it’s just for me that’s what now works.

Trying to be honest, trying to be honest with myself, trying to be…

Producing work without that expectation of anything. Just producing it.

It’s hard because you know when you suddenly stop producing work and then start producing work it’s aways complicated because you get the “aaaaaahhhh…..”

You know? It’s like when you’re taking a cold shower. You just put your hand in and say “Oh no it’s really cold. I don’t want to go in there!” and you’re like playing, trying, wishing suddenly the water goes warm somehow so that you can just fully go in.

But life is not like that, you just have to go into the cold shower. Eventually your body temperature will adapt to the water and the cold water might not feel that cold.

So that’s the part that, recently has been a little different. I’m like “ehhhh its cold” but it’s more like now I’m training myself in the things that I think I need to produce this essential work.

Jenna: For people that haven’t gotten to that point that you got to, of accomplishing everything that they wanted to, right. [Laughs] What is your hope for those types of people, at that period in their lives? Something that they should realize or, what is your hope for them?

Vinny: If I am understanding what you mean by hope…

First of all, be patient. I’ve always said it – I don’t know what is worse, not having what you want or having what you want.

Everything has its strengths and… usually we are struggling as human beings, in this lovely contemporary society, struggling with things that we want that we can’t. have.

So I might say be patient. Things will come if you put hard work into it.

I’ve always, not always, but I just recently understood, especially with art… I think it comes with art and communication…

For me art has to communicate something. So basically, this analogy might work for every form of communication:

So we have the world. That is moving at a certain rate. So the world is moving really, really, really, really fast.

And here comes someone that is moving really slow.

When the world is moving so fast, and you have someone that moves so slow, they’re going to clash. And it’s impossible for them to actually establish a form of communication.

But the world is cyclic. So if the world is moving really fast right now it doesn’t mean that in five years it won’t slow down its rate.

So my point is, be patient. It doesn’t matter if you’re moving really slow. The world eventually will slow down.

And by that time, if you are patient enough, by that time you will be able to communicate what you want, and establish a form of communication with the world.

That’s what I would say, because it takes time.

We have to wait for the world to either slow down, or go faster, in its moving rate. So that we can actually communicate. And I think that’s what happens with art.

You know the first time Ai Wei Wei presented something, the world wasn’t moving at his rate.

Now, it’s moving at his rate. But it took him a while. And that happens in any form of communication.

In order for people to understand what you’re saying you have to wait for them to slow down or “fast up.” So I would say patience, you will get there in time.

And don’t forget from everything that you have in there, there will be something that you will not see.

So focus on being prepared for that thing that you will not see. Because…

it might get just different. It doesn’t mean that it’s going to be bad or good. It’s just going to be different. Your experience is going to be different.

And I think that’s what I would say to them. • 

October 19th, 2015