What motivated you to start?
Once we finished art school it was necessary to find a place to keep confrontation and sharing alive. Young, with few experiences and little money, we wanted to live in this society autonomously, making our art. To make a living we decided to do photography. To do photography we needed space. So what if we took a little bit more space, and leave a part to make small shows? We loved the idea that the very fact that we had that space was going to give birth to new processes and ideas.
How do you develop your artistic programme?
We collaborate with curators. There are talented young curators with interesting ideas. If we find an interesting idea, we are going to support it as much as we can, to make it come true. We don’t know if this is the moment to think about development. What we want is to continue. If we can make it, in the future you will see our development.
Could you describe your relation with artists? How do you get in touch, how do you work with them?
We make the stage, and the artist creates the show. We are not a gallery, so we don’t produce artist’s work. The artists are picked by the t-space team, based on their research and projects, without ever forgetting the space in which they are hosted: t-space, a place where works are born, developed and shown.
Our work with the artists doesn’t really follow a structured path, it is continuous, made of research, confrontation and shared ideas. There are times when we just go for it. Someone that sends out a certain spark and you know you want to work with them and you take a leap, because after all it is all about experimenting and trying things out.
What advice would you give emerging artists?
Fall in love not just with art, but try to explore other areas. Put yourself in the position of making a mistake, but do it consciously. All rules are hypothetical in this field, so what will come out might just be a different way of getting to the same result. Or maybe it’ll be crap, but at least you will be the only one responsible for it. There’s no greatness in already walked paths.
What do you think is your most valuable or unique aspect?
We support our artistic activity officially through our own commercial services, like a tiny little art foundation. We are very proud of it.
What do you consider to be your biggest challenge?
Hold on to our independence, surround ourselves with people that sustain and at the same time challenge our way of thinking, of making art. Keep doing what really feeds us.
What do you find the most rewarding?
Being understood, being participated. We are very happy to talk with artists, curators, artisans… Communication improves our research and practice. That makes us think we are not doing it just for ourselves, and convinces us to continue.
What does the future hold?
In a little more than a year we understood that a space like ours needs to be fluid and dynamic to stay alive. The future is simply being open to change, as it is the very nature of things.
T has a life of its own. Long live t-space!
