Babak Ganjei is a London-based artist who might just change your life. Or at least make you laugh a lot. He has an exhibition at Darren Cullen’s WAR Gallery from the 19th January. So go and look at it.
How you doing, Babak? Up to much?
Hey, I seem to be perpetually busy, yet never really going anywhere. There’s a painting on the go, there’s a T-shirt going into production, a script that hasn’t been written yet, and some exhibitions coming up that need organising.
How would you describe your art?
I once said I wanted to get to the point where I would just go to Sainsbury’s and that would be the work. I think I’m getting pretty close. The worry now is that everyone else in Sainsbury’s is also a secret art piece.
Tell us more about your movie pitches project thing.
I never really understood how to use Twitter so over the last few years I used it to pitch Film Ideas. The 140 characters is handy for keeping things punchy. Anyway they generally got ignored there so one day when I was ill and stuck at home I decided to start writing them out on large sheets of paper. It turns out they weren’t Tweets. It’s Art.
What work will you be showing at your show?
A few years ago I was selling items with no real (or a very fixed) value on eBay. Unused scratch cards, a £1 coin, hand-written lyrics to the theme tune of The Fresh Prince Of Bel Air. It culminated with a set of twigs from my neighbourhood, which got in the papers and ended up selling for £69. Except the buyers refused to buy it and it ended up costing me £8 in the commission. I’M NOT BITTER, but I thought it would be nice to take the twigs back out for a road trip and utilise the shop front as a greatest hits of items, which will be available to buy via eBay while the show is on. This will hopefully include a painting of my credit card which is one of the ways I have been trying to pay off its debt, it’s not working but you know how the saying goes, “if at first you don’t succeed try again on a bigger scale but exactly the same.” The rest of the show will comprise of paintings and text work I’ve been making over the last two years. This is the more serious part of the show where you will be required to place your finger on your lips and wonder. Stroke a beard if you have one, or borrow the fake beard provided if not. I’ve called the show, “It’s Really Not Funny” to make it abundantly clear that my work isn’t a joke, but I don’t think the message is coming across. Is this a therapy session?…
Where can we see more of your work?
I have a website here.
Interview: Josh Jones
Photo: Tom Medwell
