Hong Kong
by Ron Lam, October 2003
(excerpts)
1. Would you introduce Fabrica to our readers?
Fabrica was conceived by Luciano Benetton and Oliviero Toscani. Opened in 1993.
In Latin, fabrica means "factory". Similarly, Fabrica is a place of production, where there are no lessons, professors or end of year exams. Yet we do learn, we learn by doing. Ideas are developed, discussed and verified. At Fabrica, creativity is not abstract. Ideas are made reality.
Fabrica is a centre of research, a laboratory where modern means of communication are questioned, mixed up and put back into play. Doubt is the main engine of creativity: we question what we see, what we hear, what we feel.
Fabrica is not interested in art for artists or design for designers; it wants to reach a wider public, using the power of existing channels of communication and the power of ideas and collective intelligence.
Visual communication, photography, video and film, design and architecture, new media, illustration, fashion and music are the instruments of contemporary communication. These are also the departments of Fabrica.
Projects develop in team work. 50 researchers from around the world come together to work on issues such as human rights, social health, global violence, world hunger (to mention only a few of the recent projects). Commissions have come from the International Criminal Court of Justice, the U.N. World Health Organization, the U.N. Refugee Program, and Peter Gabriels Witness project to name a few.
Researchers remain at Fabrica for one year. They are offered a grant, travel and living expenses. The selection process is based first on a portfolio review and then passed that phase on a two week hands-on trial in Fabrica.
Fabrica is located at Catena di Villorba (30 minutes from Venice). Housed in a 17th century villa housing restructured by the Japanese architect Tadao Ando.
2. Why are you interested in working in Fabrica? What aspect of Fabrica attracts you so much? Is it their mission?
It's an institution that pays me to make creative errors. This makes it unique.
You see, our research experiments are very similar to those of a chemical scientist who doesn't know what will happen in putting together for the first time to elements. All the scientist knows is that something surprising will come out. And that surprise (or error), that also be seen as a step backwards, will after lead to two steps forward.
The most important achievement of Fabrica is that it has become a model that many other companies are studying. It's a formula where everybody wins. Benetton acquires in innovation and public respect. The young people who go there learn and grow immensely from working with the worlds greatest artists and from working in total freedom on global-span assignments. When our "students" leave, they are independent thinkers much more than when they arrived.
3. What is your job in Fabrica?
I've been Head of the Visual Communication Department for the last 6 years. My first and most important job is selecting the right people for my department. I look for ideas without disciplinary boundaries but respectful of collective social intelligence. I look for fluidity, humor, irony. I look for restless passion and commitment, curiosity and sensibility to critique.
I set the projects, guide the critique meetings, spur the ideas. I push my people to work hard, our privilege here is to important and 12 months fly.
4. What challenges do you face everyday in Fabrica? How do you overcome these challenges?
A Zen archer doesn't concentrate on hitting the center of the target. He concentrates on how he arms the bow, how he pulls back on the arrow, his breathing. If every single step is perfect, the arrow will arrive on target.
My daily challenge isn't doing great work. Cultivating the wonderful ideas of the wonderful young people I work for is my challenge. I'm sure that if I focus on this I'll do my job properly for myself, them, and Fabrica. And great work will get done in the end.
5. Is it difficult to strike a balance between making money and achieving the mission of Fabrica?
Making money is not our primary goal, even though we develope many profit projects. Fortunately Benetton supports us totally.
6. Fabrica only accepts application of people under 25. Why?
Fabrica is a unique way in between a school and a commercial environment. We want people who are also in this stage in their career.
About Fabrica Features...
1. What do you want to achieve with Fabrica Features?
The Fabrica Features cultural outlet is above all a meeting space for creativity and communication.
It is the starting point of a network that goes from Treviso, where Fabricas headquarters are located, to the rest of the world. The network is a vehicle for a culture no longer made only of books but mainly of encounters, exchange, curiosity, observation and awareness.
Fabrica Features will be a multiethnic, multimedial and multifunctional environment. Concerts, video projections, performance art, lectures, readings, art exhibitions, interactive installations and workshops will become opportunities to gather and meet in a space conceived as a vehicle for communication reminiscent of oral traditions and human contact despite the technology used. For this reason the space can be transformed into an artists studio where the barriers between creation and fruition, but mainly between artist and public are eliminated. This aspect summarizes the premise of a project based on convergence and on the boundary-breaking properties of art and culture outside of the conventional arenas.
In parallel to its program of events, Fabrica Features will give room to those cultural products that define modern life. The space will feature not only Fabricas output, but also a selection of music, books, magazines, videos, design objects and clothing from around the world sharing the same cultural interests.
2. What drives the birth of a Fabrica Features' collection of objects? What will be taken into consideration in designing a Fabrica Features' product?
The multicultural creativity, the courage and energy of Fabrica's people. Their need to do and need to find a response to their work. Respect for collective intelligence. No marketing.
3. Why Fabrica decided to open a Fabrica Features in Hong Kong? How did you position Fabrica in the Hong Kong market? Was it difficult to do so?
The right partnership oppurtunity at the right moment. We're not interested in just opening. We need local partners and environments that are sensible to our culture and dreams.
4. What plans does Fabrica Features have in Hong Kong?
All our shops are at the same time open to influences from all around the world and strongly rooted in the local art and design scene. Each shop has a large amount of freedom that enables us on one side to enhance the regional qualities and on the other side to avoid "western cultural colonization ".
About you...
1. What do you like the most in this world? (Anything)
Time. Time to have a deep talk with an intelligent person. Time to make my loved ones feel I care. Time to make my students appreciate their victories and accept their errors. Time to cook a simple meal for a few friends. Time to just choose what not to do. It's not asking a lot but it's unfortunately so difficult.
But time is more a need probably. What I like the most is human diversity. I'm always fascinated by how impossible it is to categorize people.
2. What catch your attention most lately? Why?
Eccentricity. Eccentric people are the most creative, curious, energetic and positive. They don't care about social conventions and they're full of projects to improve the world. They're not afraid of change or difference
and they need evolution like others need air and water. They're always happy and have strong will. It seems that recent medical surveys demonstrate that all this keeps them very healthy. Even though they make a lot of spelling mistakes.
Why they attract me? I hope eccentricity is contagious.
3. Which city do you like the most? Why?
The other day with my Fabrica students we were asking each other what makes a tshirt cool. "Who wears it" was the answer. What makes a beautiful city? The people who live in it. One hour with a native can influence me more than a week of guided tours, museums, shops and parks.
I grew up in Detroit in the 60's and 70's. A city of labor, industry, Motown and Kiss. My father was a carpenter that worked 12 hours a day, including Saturdays. Like my father would, I also work 12 hours a day, only 6 on Saturday. That's why I'm comfortable with environments where people have working culture. Now I'm living in the Veneto region of Italy, where work is the religion. I feel very good here, maybe for the same reason I also like Tokyo very much.
About GE food...
1. People have been talking about genetic engineering food these years. Some of them say that it will cause genetic disruption, and some of them say it can ease hunger. What do you think? Have you eaten any genetic food today?
Very few studies that test the effects on consumers on a long term basis have been done, but I have the general impression that genetically manipulated food is bad. I believe in progress, risk and good common sense.
Unfortunately too many apply to the "too much is not enough" hedonistic philosophy. Vast areas of our society seem to want the most of everything, always, with the least commitment possible. All this boils down to the fact that we are disregarding posterity. Would things change if we were immortal?
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Fabrica
Via Ferrarezza
31050 Catena di Villorba
Treviso
0422 516235
omar@fabrica.it
www.omarvulpinari.com