Hi there Art Baby Art visitors! This is a sample of a monthly column I write for a free online satire magazine called Idlefish. The magazine thinks I'm joking, but if you're a practitioner or a student like myself, then you'll know all this is for real...
"Wow, just look at
that!" That's what someone said, don't know who, as we all sat around the studio
space. We looked at it for ages. No-one said anything. A few of us squinted or
nodded. Those at the back weaved their heads around to get a peep through the
circle. Someone who couldn't see properly whispered "What is it, can you make it
out?" Jake went to say something, but the thought escaped him as quickly as it
arrived. Which is what I want to talk about. What I want to talk about is that
none of us art students know billy-oh about talking about what we're doing. It's
a scandal! Everyone thinks art is all talk and no art. If only you were here.
Which you're not. Then again, you are, 'cause you're with me, aren't you? Which
is where? Oh yeah, Juergen's piece.
Part of introducing ourselves to each other has been
through showing our work. Nightmare City. On wheels. No-one but no-one wanted to
go next. I've survived (see last column) so I should be able to sit back and
enjoy. But instead you squirm with everyone as they begin just as you did when
you began yourself. Except Juergen. He just strolled right on in and got on with
it. Those of us with the benefit of being down the pub the night before cackled
at everyone's reaction to what he brought in. If you know about the previous
night it makes more sense.
He leaned over his beer and told us: "Where I come from is
difficult to have a voice. You are too much just a part of society. Not only
this but we have strict licensing laws and drink is expensive so it's like
you're not allowed to relax. So sometimes I'm feeling censored and this makes me
feel doubled-up and sick. I find this hard to get this across so I think it is
good if I can find some measure so people can relate to my sickness. Then it
occurs that I need to, literally, you know, measure my sickness."
"So one evening I get so drunk that I suddenly feel
bad, quickly snatch an empty glass, and then, you know, ..." and at this he
slunk his tongue out while making a sound like slowly saying 'earth'. Apparently
his drinking pal, name of Pål by coincidence (how we laughed - it seemed funny
after a few pints), was apparently very civil about this and helped Juergen down
to the toilets so he could sort himself out. When they got down there, Juergen
was splashing his face and wiping it on his sleeve when he got beguiled by the
endless reflections of the glass of sick. It was a sublime moment, he said, "of
reflection, literally."
He tried to discuss this feeling with Pål, to marshall his
thoughts around the subject, to find the words that fitted the moment. It was
then that a local walked in. What he saw as he took his pee was Juergen on the
floor looking like a drunken wretch talking up to Pål about how hard he found it
to put in words his feelings about this moment while gesturing with a glass of
puke. Juergen didn't say what happened next. He looked glumly into his glass. He
mumbled something about Neanderthals having no critical tools. We figured
something bad had happened. We didn't ask.
But we didn't believe him anyway. If this sort of thing
happened in pubs then why hadn't we seen it before? "The glass was warm to
carry" he said, as if this was the irrefutable evidence we were looking for. We
looked incredulous. "I just carried it home under my trenchcoat." Too simple. We
doubted and continued our individual conversations for that last hour. Ignore
him, he's bullshitting, I think we thought. So as the landlord rang the bell and
some of us caught a glimpse of him cradling his glass while wobbling off to the
toilets we knew our doubts were in themselves doubtful. Those of us who saw at
first hand bear witness to this repeat performance.
Ah, but, remember, he showed it the next day to
all. So how he got it home and, as Shakespeare might say, thence, to our merry
little gathering and discursive, is, as Wet Wet Wet might say, a sweet little
mystery. I've thought long and hard about how it could be done and have to say:
don't go there. Suffice to say that artists are skilled where necessity is your
invention's mum. We might not necessarily be able to paint, but what use is that
in circumstances like these? Getting a glass of sick to home and then to college
is a truly unique skill.
What we do know though, is that work on one of these sick
pieces got Juergen evicted from his last bedsit. Apparently, another tenant, out
of curiosity, opened one of Juergen's tupperware containers in the fridge. I
mean, really. Too many people over-react when they confront art. They should
realise how good art questions your values. What right did he have to look into
someone else's property for instance? And if you want to know the unknown, what
else can you expect but the unexpected? There was a lesson in that tupperware.
But only for minds open to receiving it. And with eyes with which to see
it.
And Half-measure really has lessons in full
measure. Like how it takes drinking much more than just a half-measure, an
excess if you will, to get into a state where you puke. Also, I suppose it says
stuff like how we put stuff into us that's supposed to be good but turns out bad
and makes us sick. And maybe it's a bit like how we're all sick inside, you
know, deep down, and it takes something, I dunno, a catalyst or whatever, like
alcohol, to get all that sickness and badness out so that everyone can look it
straight in the eye and say "It's cool, we're not afraid anymore, 'cause we can
see we can get it out of our system." And maybe underneath all this need for
excess is a kind of malaise. It's like being choked up with your stomach in
knots, not knowing what to say, but knowing something's wrong, so the only way
to express it is to puke.
And everyone knows art is a way to get something out of
your system that needs expression. Whatever it is will find its way out. Take
the Mona Lisa. It's now known from overlaying computer images that she's none
other than Da Vinci's self-portrait as a woman. Mona is his feminine side. Or is
it a Freudian slip, somewhere between self-castration and self-empowerment, a
conversion from paternal to maternal phallus, Da Vinci's way to come out of the
closet, to tell someone apart from a lover about his sexuality? In this way,
Juergen's puke sits beside the Mona Lisa, continuing a long tradition, enacting
a catharsis for our time.
But it's a Marxist paranoia too. It's about how soldiers
were treated by their ruling classes during the first world war. Some of them
came back from the front unable to speak. The horrors they'd seen left them so
shell-shocked that they were tongue-tied. And silence was the only rebellion
possible against their overlords. But this was before the authorities admitted
soldiers suffered post-traumatic stress. Have you seen the film Brazil? No? Well
the next bit is soOOoo Brazil. The army got doctors to electrocute the soldiers'
mouths to force them into speaking. Sick ain't it? Cured. Back to the front. And
so it is with alcohol. Slavery to corporates rather than governments and their
armies. Down to the bar instead of the machine guns. Tightly squeezing your eyes
from the chucking up instead of the oral electrocutions or a slow death. It's
all the same thing. And so artists like Juergen are like soldiers on the Western
Front. It's duty and sacrifice. A cry for help in a world that doesn't
listen.
I asked Juergen if these were his intentions in the piece
and he smirked a little so I think I'm reading him well. He just modestly
shrugged his shoulders and said 'I dunno really, I'm no good with words'. Which
is why he did the piece. And you can see how it says so much in so little.
That's art.
And it's art that his art Institute, or Kunst Institut or
whatever, wouldn't display for health and safety reasons. I mean health and
safety what? It's healthy and safe enough to be made in the studio space and
then be put forward for marking. Mind you, it would have niffed a bit after a
day's exhibition. But I'm sure he would've happily given it a refill from time
to time.
And speaking of refills, in a way, Half-measure
symbolises the first few weeks at college because we've spent most of them down
the pub. I think we've had to overcome our initial nerves with a few pints. Like
troops at the front I suppose! And like troops, we don't like to talk about what
we do.
Anyway, is that the time? I've been going on for ages! See
you next month.
Yours queesily,
Wibble*
*The names have been changed to protect the
innocent.
.
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and emailing them for a free subscription. See you soon.
