Maybe It’s The Lighting
We have, I fear, been neglecting the arts and their uplifting tendency. Let’s correct that immediately and thereby better ourselves:
“I wanted to make a work… about Britain for the British public.”
How kind.
I know. You’re positively trembling with aesthetic rapture.
According to the artist, and the Turner Prize judges, what we, the public, need, and indeed deserve, is a seemingly random arrangement of tape, net curtains, and metal crash barriers, thereby conveying “a familiar yet delirious world,” and an allegedly “hostile” immigration policy, while “invoking societal breakdown,” and “unsettling perceived notions of labour, class, Britishness and power.” It’s “bold” and “engaging,” you see. The Telegraph’s art critic, Alastair Sooke, preferred the term “sculpturally compelling.”
And clearly, the stuff of a good day out. Definitely worth the bus fare.
Sharp-eyed readers may notice another possible reason for the artist’s gushing reception among our betters. The artist’s identity, or pretend-identity, being so terribly in right now, and by default deserving.
Update, via the comments:
Regarding that allegedly “hostile” immigration policy, the number of net legal migrants for the past year has been the highest recorded, several times the level of three years ago, and is somewhere around 700,000. This figure is likely to be revised upwards, of course, as with previous years’ figures on immigration.
700,000 is equivalent to the entire population of Sheffield, by the way.
But hey, let’s ignore such minor details and defer instead to our artistic Brahmin, all busy telling us how it is.
We’re told by Katie Razzall, the BBC’s culture editor, that the prize-winning art, or pretend-art, “tackles nationhood and British identity,” and that the offering is “a cut above” the other entries. It is, says the BBC’s arts reporter Ian Youngs, “making a comment on modern British life.”
Well, it seems to me that if we are in “times of crisis” and civilisational decline – and civilisational dismay – then much of that may be a consequence of the politics and mentality of those who applaud piles of tat as the best that can be done, the peak of human creativity. And who expect the rest of us to pretend along with them.
And because I like to spoil you, here’s another colossal work by the same dysmorphic individual:
What’s wearying is that these things are so numerous and predictable, so uniform, as if the mentally interchangeable peddlers of such things were following the same ideologically acceptable template. The end result being dutifully banal and artless, devoid of any obvious aesthetic, or any discernible skill with tools and materials, and then justified with some equally hackneyed and preposterous political blather.
It is, as they say, all so tiresome.
Oh, it’s a “critique of consumerism,” before you ask.
She shouldn’t have.
Oh, yes, nice button. Eliminate the Israeli Jews. Of course. Of course.
Well, repulsive art does often reflect an evil heart.
To paraphrase our artistic establishment, “You’ll get what you’re given and like it, bitches.”
Ya know, there’s a (lonely) kernel of an idea in this installation’s humanoid artifacts. The idea of a crowd-control barrier, perhaps alarmed by something, growing legs and sprinting away…? Is at least a little amusing, altho Warner Bros got there 70 tears ago.
But yeah, that little moustache isn’t fooling anyone. Surprised Eliot (sigh) Page didn’t try it this wispy strategy. Not surprised that a lot of FTM strivers look more like adolescent males than grownup men – tho what they most look like is, uh, women.
All that in-group piety has to be signalled somehow.
Liar, liar, pants on fire.
Lately I’ve dabbling and messing with acrylic paints and such, and generally making a mess which I think is artistic.
Not sure they mean much.
Darling said he would spend his prize money on dentistry and rent.
How very British.
At the end of his speech, Darling pulled a Palestinian flag out of his coat pocket and waved it.
Of course he did. It is the current red ribbon of AIDS. Although it must be exhausting having to re-accessorize every few months as news cycles change.
I think I can confidently say that all good-hearted people visit their local art galleries in order to stare at unattractive piles of tat, while imagining that the tat in question evokes “societal breakdown” and an allegedly “hostile” immigration policy.
No, wait. Not good people. The other kind.
Twats.
‘Patrons’ will, no doubt, be prevailed upon to buy the pamphlet, which explains it all in detail, in case the deep and meaningful profundity escapes them.
Unfortunately, the janitorial staff, mistaking the work for garbage, threw it all in the trash bin.
Stunning and brave.
Regarding that allegedly “hostile” immigration policy, the number of net legal migrants for the past year has been the highest recorded, several times the level of three years ago, and is somewhere around 700,000. This figure is likely to be revised upwards, of course, as with previous years’ figures on immigration.
700,000 is equivalent to the entire population of Sheffield, by the way.
Loves it so much, lives in another country. Right-o.
Senses this from Berlin, I guess, but there is so much austerity they can throw away 25,000 Imperial Dollars on a room full of random trash. Times are certainly tough.
Willfully ignorant that they part of the cause by plumping this sort of garbage.
My surprise is overwhelming, a talent so titanic one would have though to have been a child prodigy..
That, as they say.
Bit early for Spring cleaning.
Are you not awed by madam’s mighty works?
How very dare you.
So she’s pretending to be a man and pretending to be an artist?
Another colossal work by the same pretender.
What’s wearying is that these things are so predictable, so uniform, as if following the same ideologically acceptable template. The end result has to be banal and artless, devoid of any obvious aesthetic, or any discernible skill with tools and materials, and then justified with some equally hackneyed and preposterous political blather.
It is, as they say, all so tiresome.
Oh, it’s a “critique of consumerism,” before you ask.
I think the piece is a success. Artist set out to create something evoking modern society, and came up with “talentless” and “garbage.” Hard to argue.
[ Post updated. ]
Are you not awed by madam’s mighty works?
No, no I am not. All this desperate pretending is getting old fast.
I saw an “art” installation that had a point on the floor from which multiple strings extended up to the wall, at which point each was fastened to a small slip of paper with a trite/banal expression on it. That was it. In an art gallery.
The reason of course is that it is “unfair” for artists to need to produce art that is attractive, because that is a lot of work.
He/She seems to be going for a certain Laurie Anderson vibe, from the pics. The attire, hair, and the insouciant posture.
Anderson had talent, but that’s so 20th century, you dig?
Has the quality of drugs gone down so terribly?
Not ’til you borrow your mother’s frock & adopt a fashionable attitude.
When aspiring trans-Britons look at that pile of garbage, do they think “this fortress built by Nature for herself against the envy of less happier lands”?
Or do they think: nuisance red tape that can be stepped over or through, barriers that to all intents and purposes don’t function as barriers, and national pride so diluted and discredited that there’s little chance of the people effectively uniting against invaders.
I was worried that had fallen out of fashion, but we can all rest easy knowing this box was checked.
“So she’s pretending to be a man and pretending to be an artist?”
She identifies as an artist. Bigot.
It’s like they have a secret competition to see how crap and insulting the winning ‘art’ can be.
Again, like a civilisational shit test.
The insulting aspect being the bit that so many of our betters somehow manage to tip-toe around, despite it being, one would have thought, difficult to miss. And yet, for the artist and the judges, and for the applauding seals in the media, this was deemed good enough.
An unmade bed was exhibited at the Tate a quarter century ago. I dare say more effort was put into that, which itself wasn’t much, than anything here. Define ‘fast’.
Again, like a civilisational shit test.
Speaking of which another installation
by a third graderthe same “artist“.But wait, that’s not all…
Only a nekulturny boor would fail to be inspired, and enlightened by all this.
Rather a lot of portentous adjectives for a bit of roller-coaster track and tin-foil airplanes.
When I first saw the headline, I thought it said, “Maybe it’s the Lightning.” It immediately made me think of this post. One of my favourites!
For years now, I’ve enjoyed looking at the latest Turner prize winner. I know I’m going to see something that’s fun to mock. They never disappoint.
A big pile of ugly worthless junk, thrown together by a talentless loony with the artistic sensibilities of a V2 rocket and lauded by empty-headed pseuds and morons, is a fitting tribute to Great Britain 2023.
Doubters, you need to look at the whole thing, not just the ‘art’ but the media nonsense surrounding it. Colossal ponce and imbecile Waldemar Januszczak is as much a part of this piece as the scrap iron.
It is fitting that this debris labelled ‘art’ should be inspired by ‘austerity’ and ‘hostile’ immigration policy, at a time when public spending and immigration are at record levels.
[ Post updated again. ]
So they does portraiture as well. This one gives us a glimpse of where some of our more fetching Friday freaks will end up – on the scrap heap. Credit then to they as they has talent for passing perspicacity.
They are the decline.
They are the decline.
Not totally unrelated, the Flems and Walloons get it right.
“Darling said he would spend his prize money on dentistry and rent.”
I don’t know why I found that so funny, but I did.
Ignore the gondolier at your peril.
One wonders how much the Turner Prize judges were bribed to award it to him.
I mean, they certainly didn’t give it to him on merit.
A recurring favorite here informs us the “genocide” of people in Gaza can be ended with one Instagram post from (cleans glasses) Taylor Swift.
Perhaps these unhappy immigrants should return to their countries of origin.
On second thought, no “perhaps” about it.
It’s all just so tropey. It’s like we’re all stuck in some boring subgenre, forced to think about this one set of ideas, which is being shoved on our throat over and over and over and over again.
Great art is hard to do and rare. But even good art, even mediocre art can aspire to talking about universal values, about the interesting and the unique experiences of real human beings, rather than just political boilerplate that is exactly the same as everyone else’s political boilerplate. It’s also bone-achingly tedious
If I had a time machine, instead of bothering with that mustachioed fellow, I would murder Marcel Duchamp, in the toilet, with a toilet.