Tuesday, July 07, 2009

Gormley's Atomised Culture

I sort of gave Antony Gormley the benefit of the doubt when I interviewed him about his scheme for the fourth plinth in Trafalgar Square. I usually do this when I interview people because I feel I should give subjects their say rather than just spraying attitude all over them. But, in this case, I can't help agreeing with Nige - this particular work of art is an invitation to the exhibitionist streak in the British public. What it cannot be is a picture of British society, as Gormley intended, since those who appear are, by definition, self-selected show-offs. It's also an example of the 'art is what I say it is' movement which began with Marcel Duchamp's strokes of genius and now ends with a dull freak show. Art cannot be what 'I' say it is because both art and 'I' are entities embedded products of a culture that is defined by millions, dead and alive, never by one. Duchamp worked because he drew attention to the heart of the modernist crisis which was, in essence, a fear that art had become impossible in the absence of any coherent culture. But the assumption now is that art can be what I say it is because the culture's coherence derives solely from a set of atomised individuals. A deeply pessimisic insight has been morphed into a shallowly optimistic one. The assumption that there could be such a culture is wildly irrational. But that, alas, is where we are.

13 comments:

  1. is it art (or not) yet? looks like a work in progress...

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  2. I totally don't get this plinth idea, not when Nige describes it, nor when you do. Is it supposed to be a way to relocate Speakers Corner from Hyde Park to Trafalgar Square?

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  3. For a self declared Buddhist the vanity inherent in Gormley's work is astounding.

    As for the self-certifying of art, the certifiers should be the last to give it such a title; only others can do that.

    I once at some interminably pretentious 'event' got talking to one of these artists who played up to all the caricatures of those with a staggering lack of self-awareness. Driven to despair I ventured to suggest that..."just because you call yourself an artist, it doesn't make you one".

    She threw her glass over me.

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  4. Cool!

    I've never had anyone throw a glass over me, but it looks like quite an experience.

    How does one react, Recusant?

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  5. Oh all right, Brit, I admit it: it was the contents of the glass, rather than the glass itself..

    My reaction wasn't that shocked as I sort of expected it - she was a Performance Artist after all. Still it always end up making one look a prat, having warm white wine dripping from your chin. I think she thought she had bravely stuck one to the 'system'.

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  6. Recusant: You're probably right in that she believed she was making some sort of statement of artistic intent by throwing wine over you.

    It would have been interesting to have called her bluff by throwing more and more glasses of wine back at her (and perhaps some more over you, for the sake of a balanced composition). If you were lucky she might have ended up demanding the police be called, thereby undermining all her claims and revealing you as the true artist.

    But this sort of rejoinder is always thought of when it's too late.

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  7. Ah yes, l’esprit de l’escalier.... if only I'd chucked a bottle over her head.

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  8. just because he calls himself a Buddhist doesn't make him one

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  9. Recusant, you should have just continued talking in the same tone of voice, wine dripping off your chin, then suddenly said - in the same tone: "One night I'm going to come to you, inside of your house, wherever you're sleeping, and I'm going to cut your throat", Daniel Plainview-style ('There Will Be Blood'). Then start licking the wine off your fingers like a beast, making grunting noises, then grab the glass from the bitch and lick it clean, then cast it aside and advance on her with a bellow: "More wine!"

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  10. Compliments on the telly appearance.

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  11. the fourth plinth

    I needed a title for my novel. Thanks, Bryan.

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  12. I think the simplest approach is to treat anything created or displayed for aesthetic effect as art, but to acknowledge that that doesn't necessarily make it either objectively skillful, or subjectively interesting.

    I think Duchamp's contribution was to break away from the literalism of the notion that art has to look like something (after all what does a rose look like, except itself? It can still be beautiful). The problem is the same message has been repeated ad nauseam, and seems to have become a cover for a certain laziness: you can't just churn out any old tat and expect respect.

    I agree about the narcissism of the plinth. Gormley can do much better. ( Hang on, I think Hermann Goering wants his revolver back. Some people never learn to share).

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  13. Frankly, the figure most representative of modern London is the fat American tourist in shorts, a t-shirt and with a camera around his neck. If we're being truly representative, we need a kid or two yanking at his shorts. Put that on a plinth and you'll truly have captured London.

    I could be persuaded to lend authenticity to the project by coming over and standing on your plinth for you. I'll provide my own shorts.

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