Bags of Fun: Stuart Bird's Seminar
Thursday, July 03, 2008
It's the end of a long day of the Big Seminar, and I've done the full monty from boredom to enthusiasm to anger to intense depression to having a good cry to throwing up. Why does it feel so fucking gloomy and horrible to talk about art all day? It's not like anyone seriously believes it means anything, and it's not like there isn’t something deeply sexy (aka jouissante) about utter disillusionment. And once you've come to terms with all of that, all there is left is mindless glamour which of course is the erotic thrill behind this entire godforsaken business we're in.
To sum up very quicky:
Thembinkosi Goniwe says destroy the artworld and start afresh. This will… er… make it all better and fix everything. An ingenious and feasible plan.
Linda Stupart says there is a new generation making art which is able to address the gut-wrenching politics of Africa while at the same time being consumable and glam.
Andrew Lamprecht says there are notable similarities between artists from here and China, which has taken over our previous position as flavour of the month. Only, huge financial influence being what it is, China might last longer than a month.
Kathryn Smith says the Sydney Biennale was good, and people from there are shocked at how fast South African art is going to the dogs because of its commercialization.
Malcolm Payne had a nice haircut and left us with a thought: Have you ever seen a work of art that has changed your life?
Stuart Bird summed up by asking why there are more questions than answers.
It was a good seminar, well worth attending, although it made me simultaneously envious and appalled that people get paid to think about this crap all day.
However, seeing as the world is going to end soon and there is not an awful lot we can do about it, art is a very good way of spending your last days. A bit of an expensive habit, but it keeps one entertained, and if you are a little dim it could even leave with you with a satisfying sense of selfless righteousness. Like they say, nice work if you can get it.
posted by Vince Condesini at 5:30 PM
16 Comments:
this is the dumbest thing i have read in a long time
Anonymous: Why? Back yourself up or shut the fuck up, I reckon. Cos at the moment your comment of 6:00 PM is definitely the most boring thing I've read in a long time. In fact, the whole comments section of this blog is a bit of a yawn-fest. C'mon, people. Let's all stay awake, at least.
this blog will change your life...
Malcolm poses a pertinent question as always (perhaps because he has had the luxury of thinking about this 'crap' all day long) The truth is seldom has a single work changed my life, but there are a few that were very moving, The sistine chapel roof (they should have got him to paint a second one), San paintings in the Drakensberg, the mona lisa (just because you want to rescue her from the bullet proof glass and tourists) Wilson's sump oil installation at the old Saatchi (and the new one), The Lydenburg heads, Courbet's The Artist Studio at d'Orsay, Van Gogh's self portrait here as well.Police's Synchronisity, Tracy Emin's bed at the new Saatchi, Tony Ourslers early works...
But the truth is that a single work perhaps lacks the power to change your life (in totality). But fine art, as a whole has indelibly changed my life and all of yours that are reading this blog. Fuck otherwise you would be merchant bankers and have lots of tom...
"I can laugh, Felice, don't doubt that. I'm even known for my propensity to laugh."
Franz Kafka in a letter to a girl friend
you
as a bug
with a cracked carapace
Enjoy
Do you art exhibitions often leave you feeling bored? You come to them because you hope that art is going to give you something to be inspired by, or maybe some insights that could make life more interesting, or maybe something beautiful that makes life seem more worth while. But instead all you get is something that has turned its back on you. It is a closed book and you are outside it. There may be an artist's statement or titles, but they don't offer enough to help you understand, so instead you just feel jerked around, and wish you hadn't wasted your time schlepping all the way to a gallery when you could have stayed at home and watched a movie that actually gave you something to think about.
It's not just you. Huge international shows like the Kassel Documenta are completely obscure to people without an art education, despite the fact that these shows earnestly believe themselves to be communicating with the public. This is the strangest thing about it. The artists are actually trying to communicate with you, and earnestly believe that they are. This art which turns its back on you and remains obstinately obscure to anyone without an art education (even to people who are in other ways vastly more knowledgeable than any artist) is actually trying to communicate. There is a whole set of assumptions that goes on among artists about how this communication is taking place, and to tell them that it just isn't working is so heinous as to be taboo. If you point out that the communication isn't working, you are seen as the one who is NOT GETTING IT, because they have completely convinced themselves that what they do makes perfects sense. They need to believe it to justify their existence. So there is this closed system in which one is not allowed to point out that the emperor has no clothes.
'We can forgive man for making a useful thing so long as he does not admire it. The only excuse for making a useless thing is that one admires it intensely.'Oscar Wilde
this is the dumbest thing i have read in a long time
Never mind, some things are bound to go over your head.
( 0 Y 0 ) <-------Boobs.
or, type in 58008 on a calculator and turn it upside down. For those who haven't watched extras.
Thembinkosi Goniwe is so last season
( 0 Y 0 ) <-------Thembi Goniwe
Those boobs are lovely
(oYo)
there are boobs and then there are boobs
( o Y o )
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