Welcome to HERO Young Art Week – our essential, multifaceted guide to the new wave of creatives working at the vanguard of contemporary art today. Across a dynamic week of digital content, we’re exploring what’s happening at the epicentre of this global community: from the ground up, the artists themselves and the key figures witnessing the evolution of the ideas, trends and movements defining this art generation.

AA Bronson has seen a lot in his time. A founding member of the legendary art collective General Idea, over the course of the 80s and 90s the artist and shaman became known for his early involvement in punk, AIDS activism and manifestations of ‘other’, while his founding of the NY and LA Art Book Fairs whilst director of Printed Matter (2004-2010) was critical in the re-rise of print as an accessible and innovative communication channel for young artists. Bronson is widely considered one of the most revered and radical artists living today.

After 27 years in New York, Bronson last year made the move to Berlin. That this city is being touted as one of the most innovative, centralised young art hubs in the world pays testament to his continued commitment to the support networks surrounding contemporary creatives.

It was from here that we spoke with AA Bronson a fortnight ago. Just back from the Gwangju Biennale in South Korea, he raved about the level of political activism simmering at surface level across the expanse of the event. His own show, AA Bronson’s HOUSE OF SHAME, took place at a pagoda in the main biennale vicinity, the structure originally having been built “in memory of 241 people who were killed by the police for participating in a pro-democracy demonstration,” as Bronson explains. “This year’s Gwangju Biennale is quite amazing. It was way too political a thing to ever happen in Europe or the US. Not an institution of that scale. It’s incredible, what [director] Jessica Morgan managed to pull off…”

Tempe Nakiska: You’ve just returned from the Gwangju Biennale in South Korea, which was quite a political event. Your exhibition, AA Bronson’s HOUSE OF SHAME, focused on another element of Korean culture – shamanism, yes?
AA Bronson: Korea, along with Mongolia, was one of the two countries where shamanism first started. Until 1895 it was the primary religion in the country. The shamans are all women, which is interesting. And even today, it’s still alive and well.

TN: How did you originally become interested in shamanism?
AAB: Weirdly enough I’ve been interested in shamanism since I was about seven years old. I read everything I can get my hands on to do with spirituality and magic, but particularly shamanism is a big interest. During the AIDS crisis, in the period where everyone was dying, most of my male close friends died… I think spending time with so many people who were dying made me interested in the spirits of the dead.

Marshall Hanwell Speaker £650

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