Portrait of Kenneth Robert Lum,

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Kenneth Robert Lum is a 2020 winner of the Governor General’s Awards in Visual and Media Arts. Directed by Eva Madden.

Co-production of the Canada Council for the Arts and Madden Media. Presentation of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Independent Media Arts Alliance.

The Canada Council for the Arts is a federal, arm’s-length Crown corporation created by an Act of Parliament in 1957 (Canada Council for the Arts Act) “to foster and promote the study and enjoyment of, and the production of works in, the arts.”

For more information, visit ggarts.ca

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Transcript:

The unknown that is before you is always interesting.
It is worthwhile because it gives you a chance to invent yourself anew, always test yourself anew.

Reinvention is always interesting.
And it’s always hard—I’m not saying it’s easy.
But I’ve done it many times and it’s always worked for me.

Being complacent, I think, is not a good thing, but that’s also the way we’re taught [to be].
To be complacent. To conform. To be a good citizen. To act as one.

We’re supposed to accept the way the world is—the distribution of power and how power is exercised over people.
And we’re not supposed to question it because that’s just the way it is.
Somehow, even more perniciously, it’s the best possible world.

I don’t believe in that.
I believe treating others with respect no matter where they come from is the first step towards having a deeper understanding of what’s wrong with the world in terms of questions of social justice and equity.

Do I want to be happy? Would I rather be happy than unhappy? Yes.
But I also want to have a rich life. A fecund life. A life full of meaning.
I’m happy when I have a deeper understanding of the world and I have greater experiences of the world.
It’s a happiness based on being able to commiserate with others in situations of despair and trauma, which I don’t take pleasure in.
I want people to lead better lives.

I know there’s this romantic notion that being an artist is a continuum. That you are always an artist no matter what.
And that gives primacy to art over everything else.
And art is very important to me, but my family is more important than my art.
I think it’s important to have some remove from art, if only to be a better artist.
Because if you’re totally immersed in art and only thinking that art is the only thing that matters on a scale of a totality, then you have no remove, no possibility of having sagacity drawn from distance and perspective from art.

I’m always looking for the next chance to reinvent myself, so I haven’t given that up, right?
So maybe Philadelphia is just a seven-year interregnum in terms of the next stage of reinvention.
The city is complex. The city is not easy.
All the best and worst things you can imagine about the world [are] here.
Of course, I don’t want things to be bad. I’m not saying that. Because a lot of tragic lives are being lived here.
But I’m interested in being in the middle of that because I feel I can make a difference.

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