Moret: Did Ms. Clarke share any accounts about the ghost?

Jibilian: Ms Clarke says that she felt his presence often in the first few years of living in the house. Lights would go on and off inexplicably, the sounds of footsteps or something being dragged would fill the house. It seems he was often seen in the bedroom upstairs, either standing at the foot of the bed, as a sort of gelatinous figure in overalls or standing in the window. There are also stories from previous tenants of paintings being hurled off the walls, stories of a more restless ghost. It seems that his ghost is not restless anymore and that his presence is not felt as strongly as it once was. I wanted that to come out in the photos, that this was not a restless ghost, but one who was comfortably situated in this in between place of here/not here-- you might say a restful ghost.

Moret: I am aware that the photographs are not accounts of the Gorky’s ghost stories but a meditation of the “in-between” nature of his being. What dichotomies about Gorky were you particularly drawn to?

Jibilian: What fascinated me most about the ghost stories was the idea that Gorky’s place in the after life was in this in-between state, absent yet present, dead but still making himself known to the living as ghosts are known to do. This seemed to parallel the dichotomous nature of his life. Having been displaced from his first home, Van, and then coming to America, Gorky lived in an in-between state of exile, part refugee and part citizen, as many immigrants do. To further disconnect him from these places, he chose to further distance himself from his first home by not even claiming it as his own, by changing his name and taking on a false Russian ancestry.

Moret: Did you consider these accounts when composing the photographs? Or did you consider the photographs from the 1948 Life Magazine shoot and consider the notions of inside and outside, the fragility and invisibility that a glass house affords?

Jibilian: My main interest was in the Life magazine photos of him in the house. That photo shows Gorky silently, staring out through the grid of windows onto a blank sheet of snow. The image conjured up in my mind a romantic image of Gorky standing in his studio confronting a blank canvas.

I read in Hayden Herrera’s biography about how Gorky did not like living in this house. Despite its beauty, peace and solitude it offered, he found the modern structure of the wall of windows oppressive. According to Herrera he commented on how although it allowed the light in during the day, at night it allowed the darkness to enter absolutely. In trying to describe this restful ghost, I decided to only photograph him in the early and late light of the day. I didn’t want to do photos at night, as that’s what we normally expect of a ghost, and for Gorky in particular, in life it seemed he was more at peace during the day.

Moret: How did you prepare for the photo shoot?

We studied Gorky’s physical posture in archival photos taken of him. There are photos of Gorky dancing with a white handkerchief, which gets directly referenced in one of the images. It’s said that when Gorky drank too much, he would begin to dance around madly in the old Armenian style, he would let loose and reveal a part of himself in these uninhibited moments. I gave Aaron some brief lessons in Armenian solo dancing, but was more interested in seeing how Aaron would directly interpret the postures from the photos. I wanted there to be serenity in the dancing, not so much wildness that one would expect.

We also spent time just reflecting on the particular nature of Gorky’s suffering, his specific situation before he killed himself. One of the intriguing things about a Glass House is that it does not have the power to conceal. Like Gorky’s ill body, his personal life also began to show all the disease of his past. During his last year in Sherman, CT, he suffered a studio fire in which he lost a number of his paintings, he had this car accident which left his painting arm virtually paralyzed, and on top of everything it came to light that his wife was having an affair with Matta, a fellow surrealist, and one of his best friends. This would be a lot for anyone to bear and it was important to us to respect this history, not to sensationalize it. We tried to reflect on what comes after, imagining the epilogue as it were.

Aram Jibilian with Aaron Mattocks as Arshile Gorky’s ghost
Gorky and the Glass House, 2010
22 inkjet prints, Approx. dimension of each print, 23"x16", Complete work installed, 8' x 9'
Installed in the exhibition Blind Dates: New Encounters from the Edges of a Former Empire
Pratt Manhattan Gallery, New York City, Photograph courtesy of the artist

Moret: How long did you spend actually photographing at the house in Sherman, CT?

Jibilian: About 7 hours. 

Moret: Aaron Mattocks plays the role of Arshile Gorky’s ghost, wearing a mask inspired by Gorky’s “The Artist and His Mother.” Gorky himself was an outsider, oscillating between cultures and heritage. Aram, you are Armenian but Aaron is not thus a duality emerges about an artist playing the role of a man who is “in-between” and removed from a culture, when the artist is actually unfamiliar with Armenian heritage.

I like this observation. Yes, its true, Aaron is not Armenian (he does have some Hungarian ancestry, and Hungary was a part of the Ottoman Empire). I think it was important for the ghost to be performed by someone without Armenian ancestry. Gorky wrestled so much with issues of nationality and background, and he wove a complicated web for people to get lost in. By not having a strong connection to one particular background, Aaron was able to be a blank canvas on which to draw Gorky. Also, I think when we pass from this life to the next one, we shed some of the identities and labels that we carry in this life--I think our national and ethnic backgrounds might be one of those labels.

Moret: The structure of the glass house is rather deliberate and linear, very similar to the grid structure that Gorky used in creating his works. In total there are 22 inkjet prints in the show?

Jibilian: Yes, there is an inkjet print that directly correlates to each pane of glass, made to scale. The windows of the house are actually about 28” x 40”, and my prints are about 16” x 23”.

Moret: Did you construct the photographs to resemble the architecture of the house? Herein lies another great duality in re-creating the glass house in a gallery space. It is a temporary construction, as it will be taken down once the show ends. I really appreciate the ephemeral quality of your glass house and the way it creates a new experience of the site for viewers who have never visited the real place, and maybe never will.

Jibilian: I like that observation on the ephemeral nature of the piece, but indeed although the house has been there for a long time, it would be a miracle if it stayed there forever. Yes, we wanted the viewer to have the experience of standing in front of the window and taking in the view, well the particular view that we wanted to offer. Since the perspective of the photos changes, from being on the outside looking in, to being on the inside looking out, viewers can have the experience of being on both sides of the house, in and out. 

Moret: There are two types of photographs present in the show- the first were Gorky occupying the space and the second were of the panes of glass and the nature beyond the house. Why was it important to capture both? There is a wonderful sense of the past and the present are momentarily connected, as if this is the world that Gorky would see if he were still alive.

Jibilian: Yes, well put, that’s definitely part of the idea. I mentioned above about seeing the house as a living and changing thing, it tells its own story, not only Gorky’s story, but that of all the residents and guests who have come to live there. I wanted to have this close examination on something physical next to the more narrative photos of the ghost, which lie more in the realm of the spiritual.

I wanted to capture the windows in particular because I was fascinated by the fact that the glass is the original glass from when the house was built for Gorky and his family. It was through these same windows that Gorky stared. Glass has a contradictory nature...both revealing and concealing at the same time it is both fragile and can be dangerous to the touch. It reflects us back to ourselves even while we struggle to see what’s going on the other side. It’s a barrier where we can safely look out onto the outside without having to interact or relate with it. This can clearly be a metaphor for how Gorky lived his life, protected/threatened by a glass house that kept him a part of yet apart from the world around him.

Moret: Why do you feel that the notion of “home” relevant to Gorky?

Jibilian: Because of his response to trauma, which was to cover and create ambiguities, Gorky seemed to lack a real home. He stayed in a state of exile, and from there translated his memories and desired experiences of “home” onto his canvas. Through painting, Gorky was able to connect with loved ones from the past, as in the painting of his mother and paintings of his sisters. He was also able to organize and communicate his tortured history in a way that he couldn't in his relationships with others. We can see Gorky's placement of home on his canvas through the names that he chose for his paintings, "Khorkom", "Garden in Sochi", "The Plow and the Song", and one of my favorites “How my mothers apron unfolds in my life”. Working within the edges of the canvas, he was ultimately able to reconnect with his lost family and homeland.

Aram Jibilian with Aaron Mattocks as Arshile Gorky’s ghost
Gorky and the Glass House, 2010
22 inkjet prints, Approx. dimension of each print, 23"x16", Complete work installed, 8' x 9' 
Installed in the exhibition Blind Dates: New Encounters from the Edges of a Former Empire
Pratt Manhattan Gallery, New York City, Photograph courtesy of the artist