Speed Date / MATÚŠ BURANOVSKÝ, graphic designer
Phasebook 2019, photo: Lenka Glisníková.
Where are you from?
Like Peter Nagy, I’m from a small town near Košice, Prešov.
Where did you study?
Product design at prof. Marian Karel at the Faculty of Architecture CTU in Prague. Graphic design at prof. Petr Babák at UMPRUM in Prague, then for a while at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw and at SeoulTech in Seoul, South Korea.
Who was your best teacher?
The best lessons I got from Milan Kundera or Milan Lasica, who take humour deadly seriously.
Who were/ are your parents?
My parents are the best in the world.
What don’t you enjoy in design?
Relying on pragmatic solutions. They all have sold souls, a million responsibilities and no time for beautiful decisions.
And on the contrary, what do you?
There are always a few who manage to do it properly, differently, strangely, virtuosically.
What do you listen to?
Folks, this is a wonderful opportunity to introduce you to my kinda silly, kinda melancholy, kinda romantic playlist Melancholy Hill on Spotify. You’ll find all sorts of hit songs there, but also mystical things that are sort of bridges between those hit songs. What I’m extra proud of, though, are the Slovak songs that I’ve stashed in the playlist. Peter Nagy – Spánok???, Laco Lučenič – Z tých dní???, Ali Ibn Rachid – Irma mi volá, že chce ísť do kina???, the highlights.
Your favourite film or cartoon?
Movies: Dancer In The Dark, Maps To The Stars, Napoleon Dinamite
Cartoons: Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away, South Park
Series: Curb Your Enthusiasm, Twin Peaks
Who do you respect as an authority in and out of your field?
Virtuosi Martin Groch and Michal Landa. I don’t understand at all how something so worldly appeared in our latitudes.
What thing did you last buy?
When my brother was visiting and he was making beef stroganoff using an old Russian recipe, I bought this amazing French cognac to go with it.
Do you buy professional literature? What was the latest book?
I last read Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism by Fredric Jameson, and I can confirm that it is scholarly literature.
Do you vote?
I do.
Who throws the best parties?
Since I’m an adult I don’t even know anymore. And I still prefer to sit in at concerts.
Your favourite dome?
My favourite dome is in Il Gesù in Rome because of the mystical 3D paintings.
Party dress. Made by…?
Party dresses are handled by people who were either born privileged, screwed someone over, or, of course, it can happen, they’re smart and they gave it a go. This whole thing was just a brief entrée to writing that the best party is the one without a dress.
Your hero from the past?
Mike Ehrmantraut.
Best/nicest house?
We still buy some on our walks with Johanna, sometimes we even buy whole streets… but then, on the way back to our rented apartment, I gradually forget about them.
Do you have any stereotypes when you work? How do they show?
I think it’s the thousands of hours spent stereotyping that makes us smart human beings… I definitely have stereotypes, but I can’t list them, but I enjoy everything outside of them all the more.
What’s on your desktop?
I intentionally make as much of a mess on my desktop as possible and wait to see if anyone notices. Then the enthusiastic question comes up that how do I navigate through it. The answer is simple, I view the files from my desktop in Finder.
Best exhibition, work of art?
The best work is the one where I experience a strong feeling of envy, even jealousy, that I didn’t create it. That feeling when I smack my forehead, not understanding that I didn’t think of it. But I wish it for them. The feeling is so intense that if there were more than a few of these works in one exhibition, I probably wouldn’t survive. Fortunately, I’ve only experienced a few in my lifetime. Otherwise, I like the exhibitions where I meet the most friends.
What do you respect both from the local and foreign design scene? And why?
Enthusiasm, or if the enthusiasts in question don’t get frustrated if they can’t do it for a while.
Ethics or money?
Everyone is a hero when they only have to answer… but how do you behave when it comes to breaking bread?
Extraordinary book?
The most exceptional book in the world is Papier v knihe, created by finkner_books.
Optimist, pessimist, nihilist?
An enthusiastic pessimist – as if the huge boulder, which, after all, everyone carries on his shoulders, doesn’t just throw me off balance.
Do you have any hobby?
I challenge all readers to a swimming race. Whoever beats me, I’m paying for dinner.
Solo or in a collective?
First we sweep at our own doorstep, then we can negotiate.
Slovakia as the Promised Land?
Slovakia, it’s paradise. I realized it the second I moved across the border. I think that’s why I’m so nostalgic, homesick on a daily basis, but I’ll endure.