Ben Ross is this young guy who made drawing cats his profession--you may remember his drawings in our No Photos Issue. He’s drawn so many of them that by now he is kind of fed up with them, so he decided to publish them all in a fanzine and rid his...
Ben Ross is this young guy who made drawing cats his profession--you may remember his drawings in ourNo Photos Issue. He's drawn so many of them that by now he is kind of fed up with them, so he decided to publish them all in a fanzine and rid his system of them for good. We met him to discuss protest, anger, Berlin, party kids, and politics.VICE: Hey Ben, you're straight edge, right? Ben Ross:Bullshit. There is no thing like straight edge at all. I just don't drink alcohol or take drugs. But I am totally into sex and meat. Only chicken though, even if I'm no Islamic extremist. But did you know that Islam is already the new big thing?
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The obligatory hate?Yes. I am a really big hater. Especially 'cause I now moved from Vienna to Berlin and I am stuck with 24 hours of Germany in my mind. That's why I have to document everything, and by doing so I am mostly taking pictures at the moment. Especially Berlin, where so many people run around but nothing really happens.Right. Berlin is a dreadful city. I actually don't want to live here either.Well, I moved here without any expectations, even though Berlin was always the place it was all about. But at the moment I'm still searching this abstract picture, this utopia of a city, but what I find isn't necessarily a battlefield of creativity but more like a camp where everybody just hangs around. Berlin simply isn't New York and New York isn't Barcelona.
Berlin is a big parade of self-exposers. This must be a wonderful source of inspiration for you.The party kids series was that kind of a reflection--a reflection about how self-exposure and politics work and intersect without you even realizing it, and without having any real message attached to it. These party kids are the losers of capitalism. People generate attention that should really be directed somewhere else. They consume, consume without realizing it, and consume in a totally bizarre way until it doesn't make any sense at all anymore. That's what I try to point out with my pictures.
We need the revolution and the guillotine?
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Pah, everyone is talking about revolution but the system is made in a way that all anger bottles up and at some point just deflagrates. Nothing is happening at all. That's why these cat pics are pretty much over. My new stuff is closer to the person itself. The Mickey Mouse noses are still left but nothing else. My most recent drawing is of William Broder, this hedge fund guy who was ripped off by the Russians. Another loser of capitalism.You are self-publishing your fanzine, is that your way out of capitalism?Independence was important for me. The fanzine will cost money but is limited and will be published in three issues, which will feature three different artists. Apart from me there will be a feature each of Philippe Gerlach, a photographer, and Jakob Vreba, a visual artist. The next thing will then be a poster zine in oversized format.
Something else coming up?There will be a new performance but I don't want to speak about it right now because I am superstitious about such things. I can only tell you this: 1928, the new Germany, Austria, Europe, Islam.And what's the sense behind all of this?No comment.
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