How An Imaginary Village Altered Irish Tradition | Guggi | Big Think

How An Imaginary Village Altered Irish Tradition

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‘Lypton Village’ was a fictional land occupied by a group of teenagers that went on to create some of the most popular music in the world. Here Guggi, who assigned his best friend the name ‘bono’ in this setting, describes the powerful influence this mythical sanctuary has had on their lives since.

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Guggi:

Guggi is a Dublin based painter and the former singer of the band, The Virgin Prunes. His work has appeared in the Tony Shafrazi Gallery in New York, the Osborne Samuel Gallery in London and the Solomon Gallery in Dublin, among others.

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TRANSCRIPT:

Question: Do you feel attached to Ireland’s rich artistic tradition?

Guggi: Well, yeah. I think some of Ireland's rich, artistic, creative tradition comes from my childhood friends, and there's no doubt about that. Without my friends, I think I'd be probably lost.

Question: How were you influenced by your friends growing up?

Guggi: Well I think when you're -- we always shared -- we took our sense of humor very seriously. It was very important to us. That developed together; our personalities developed together. We talked a lot, we thought a lot, we discussed things and we grew up and our minds developed together. So how does it influence me? I think it completely influences me. I think, to some extent, we are all a product of our experiences. And in the bad ways, of course, I think we've to break that. When we become models, we're responsible for everything we do, but there is no doubt about the fact that my friends have influence me. Of course they have.

Question: What was Lypton Village?

Guggi: It was a name we put to the understanding that we had with each other. It was the place where I think our way of thinking came from, our language came from, our names came from. I guess I see Lypton Village is the word that we put on that; it could have been any word and it happened to be that. I think that's how I say it.

Question: How did you get your name?

Guggi: I was given, when I was a child, my best friend -- I wanted to be a painter and he gave me a painters name, Guggi. And he wanted to be a singer and I gave him a singer’s name, Bono. That's where those two names came from. We were very interested in this thing about finding a word that sounded -- in the way it sounded, it also described the way somebody looked as well as their vibe and I think the word Guggi, maybe, was pretty accurate.