Rafael Rosendahl

Photo: Matthew Stone for Dazed&Confused.

Matthew Stone and friends interview Rafael Rosendahl.

Matthew Stone:  What do you have faith in?

Rafael Rosendahl: I think I am a very calculating person. So faith is not something I am concerned with. I look at something’s past and then i try to think what direction that could go to. I don’t think that’s faith. When it’s about me, I don’t know if my fate is decided or if i have a say. I try to spin it for the good. Sometimes my good intentions backfire, but overall I feel blessed. Knowing that things worked out in the past makes it logical to assume that things will work out in the future.

Catherine Borra : Out of all the possible languages (English, Latin, Spanish, visual, sign, irony, empathy, facial expressions, music, archetypes etc.) available on this earth, which one do you feel you express/would express yourself better in, and why? 

RR: I have not yet really found something. I’m not very good at expressing myself. My work has nothing to do with expression. And when i talk to people I usually dont do a good job at translating my own feelings to words. I start talking too much and wrong things come out that hit much harder than the right things. Language is a world of its own which has nothing to do with my feelings. Thats hard, because there are a lot of things inside that want to find their way out.

Scottee : Solitary or Collaboration?

RR: I like making the decisions. And I love never having to explain a single anything. That happens when you work alone. Sometimes it is scary being confronted with the boundaries of your own imagination, but still I love working alone.

Susanne Oberbeck : What is your vision for a future society, I mean in terms of political system, families, human relations, architecture, reproduction and so on?

RR: I calculated the following: If we have ultimate communication tools in the future, it does not matter if you are right next to someone or if they are on the other side of the earth. If you divide 6 billion people equally over the earth’s land surface, we are all 160 meters away from our closest neighbor.
 
Iphgenia Baal : What is the one thing about you that undermines all the opinions you have made above?

RR: Language is a very primitive technology desperately in need of improvement. I feel very limited because of it. Only a few times in my life have I succeeded to feel free from language and that involved a lot of drugs.