RICHARD PRINCE
interview by J.G. BALLARD
J.G. BALLARD — You were born in the Panama Canal Zone?
RICHARD PRINCE — Yes. In 1949.
J.G. BALLARD — Panaman? Panamerican?
RICHARD PRINCE — Yes. Something like that. I left with my mother and sister after my father had been detained for presumably stockpiling arms and munitions for what I imagine now was the 19th nervous breakdown invasion in Cuba—this was in 1958. He was later released, moved to Hawaii and from there has been moving to and from the city of Saigon (what is now Ho Chi Minh City).
J.G. BALLARD — Aren’t children born in the Canal Zone called Zonians?
RICHARD PRINCE — Yes. For some years now the canal has represented the concept of unlimited possibility. This year, eleven years after I left Panama, I tried to return.
J.G. BALLARD —…