Artist Talk ? Digitale Kunst: Gudrun Bielz

Art is top dog, or at least it barks like a dog (Art doesn?t want to be top dog)

Gudrun Bielz is a media artist, born in Austria, alumna of the University of Applied Arts Vienna and has a PhD from the University of Reading, She has been teaching art for years at different universities in Great Britain. She lives and works in Greater London, UK:
?If I hadn?t become an artist, I would have been a lunatic, a banker (I worked for a bank a long time ago) or a physicist. This might have allowed me to discover something new, a particle, a star or a universe. On the other hand, I could have had a boring, tedious job in an institution. So, becoming an artist was a bit like throwing dice. I did not throw a six but managed a five. Pretty good, eh!

I believe that I am more of an art educator, teaching others and myself, making art, writing texts, doing nothing, worrying about life and money, loving to discuss students? projects, exploring stuff, meeting people and procrastinating. I also wrote, lived and exhibited a practise based PhD, called ?Arctificial Territory?, which I finalised last year. Currently I am living by the river Thames with its tides - the Thames in London is a tidal river, as so close to the sea - and occasionally I contemplate what it means to be an artist. In the UK artists often are defined as professionals who work in and for the arts industry. Somehow industry is used as synonym for (commercial) working life. This implies that artists (should) work in a useful way within an economy. Am I working in the industry? Yes and no! Apparently I am an artist, though I have struggled with this definition for quite a while. I am not a dog, this is certain! I?d like to say that art is top dog. Nevertheless, art doesn?t want to be top dog. Sometimes it barks like a dog!? (Gudrun Bielz).