Black Ink Unreliable Information Since 1972

Museum Copyright

I was reading an article by BoingBoing pundit, SF author and copywonk Cory Doctorow in Make magazine the other day (I’m afraid that there’s only tiny snippet of the article available for free on-line.)

He’d visited the Greenwich Maritime Museum, full of hundred-year-old sextants, and even older devices that people used to find their way around the world before we all had satnav on our dashboards, and was struck by the “no photography” signs everywhere. Surely, he thought, most of these things cannot possibly be in copyright? Surely the museum cannot prevent others reproducing them if they so desire?

So he asked about it. No, they weren’t in copyright. No, there was nothing there likely to be damaged by a camera’s flash. The musuem just wanted to safeguard it’s postcard sales, and prevent people from taking any mementos home that they did not have to pay for.

Doctorow makes the passionate, strident, and quite correct argument that this is a complete betrayal of everything a good museum should stand for.

Copyright (ostensibly) exists to ensure that a creator is fairly recompensed in their lifetime. It exists to ensure that there is an incentive for people to produce the artifacts and technologies that shape our culture. But it runs out for a reason - because these things are too valuable to be allowed to remain in the possession of any one person or institution.

Which is of course, also the reason we have museums and art galleries. They provide places that the public can see, interact with, and be inspired by these things. They are the custodians of our culture. Doctorow’s argument is that by preventing photography, especially just because they want the money, the museums are betraying that trust in a massive and disgusting manner.

The argument, is of course, not that simple. Museums are expensive things to run - the cost of curating, preserving, and securing these objects is enormous, and most of them (in the UK, anyway) don’t charge, or don’t charge much for access. Surely there’s a reasonable argument to be made that their attempts to force cash out of people are quite justified?

Well, only up to a point, in my view. I firmly believe that you can accurate judge a culture’s level of civilization by how it treats its libraries and museums. If the museums are expensive to run, that’s not an reason to allow them to attempt to crowbar more money out of the public, that’s a reason to give them more public money.

But even aside from that argument, there is of course the possibility that the museum is simply not allowed to permit photography on certain works - that they remain in copyright, and that the museum has no choice but to disallow photography, under the terms that the owner or creator has allowed them to be exhibited under.

But on the other hand, surely it’s mostly Modern Art that this would apply to? And surely Modern Art has the least leg to stand on? Even aside from the fact that most of these works have been photographed over and over again, turning up in all sorts of media-related discussions, there’s a sizeable body of modern art that is derived from reproducing (or even simply appropriating and re-presenting) other people’s work - from Warhol’s Brillo Boxes to Duchamp’s Fountain. Surely it’s the height of hypocrisy for the owners of this body of art to attempt to prevent it’s reproduction and remixing into new forms?

Wall And Piece

So. Banksy.

For them what have been living under a rock for the last while, Bansky is a graffiti artist who produces stencil works like these.

Is he big or clever?

Well, as my old mate Paul points out, his work is hardly a sophisticated multilevel examination of complex ideas. But on the other hand while he’s currently being feted by art establishment, and generally selling works for stupid prices, that fact remains that he’s essentially a sloganeer. One doesn’t do that sort of thing to deal with terribly complex issues - a good slogan is simply a good way of encapsulating common feeling of your times and/or peer group. Complaining that what he does isn’t terribly highbrow seems rather like criticizing a badger for not being an eagle.

If Banksy, as a sloganeer is suddenly popular, it is presumably because he’s saying something that resonates with people. And if the what he’s doing is a criminal, and yet still popular, it follows that what he’s saying is probably worth listening to, since it would seem to show the establishment as being out of step with its constituents.

And for myself, well, I like a lot of his themes. Yeah they’re a bit teenage boy, a bit “Fight the Power”, but it seems to me that our freedom to express ourselves is increasingly in danger, and our public spaces are increasingly controlled by authorities who take more and more powers to themselves without stopping to ask if we actually want them to have those powers. I think that Banksy and his colleagues have a useful part to play in our modern cultural conversation.

Fletcher Retrospective

I’ll try and find a bit more time to write about this in full on another occasion, but for now, I feel I should note that if you live in London, then you really ought to try and make it to The Design Museum’s retrospective on Alan Fletcher.

For those that don’t know, Fletcher is one of the most important graphic designers of the last half-century - I guarantee that you’ve seen his work, even if you haven’t been aware of it. He’s one of the founders of Pentagram (if you have any interest in design, then you’ve heard of them, right?), and when he passed away last year, there were tributes all over the place.  The retrospective is excellent, and if nothing else it will make you aware of just how prolific and influential he was.

Obsession

Reading an article this morning, The Design Disease, reminded me of something I’ve long held to be true - that while you or I might create Art now and again, it’s not the same thing as the urge to be an Artist. (Or in this case Designer.)

Everyone I know who has become a successful (by which I mean: makes their living doing it, and receives at least modest acclaim from their peers in the field) creative type has one thing in common - brain damage. They’re obsessed with their field. I swear to god, I could go round my friends with creative aspirations, and point fingers saying “will make it”, “Will do a few bits and bobs, might make a modest living”, “no chance”, purely on the basis of the level of their obsession. I’d be right about 95% of the time.

It’s a long documented thing, the thin line between Artist’s gift and madness. But the thing I find most interesting is the idea that it can be taught. You can make yourself an obsessive, with a brain that is optimised to do certain things, and you will do better than your contemporaries. All you need to do is be willing to sacrifice a bit of your normal human function in exchange. For some people, this is no contest at all. Others, they hold a bit of themselves back, in fear.

Flat-Pack Art

The Tate Modern has one of my favourite pieces of Art on display, Marcel DuChamp’s Fountain, which is an ordinary urinal, that Duchamp then turned 90 degrees from it’s natural position and signed it “R. Mutt 1917″. It was part of his series of “readymades” ordinary, everyday objects that had at most, been slightly altered by the artist. He himself defined a readymade as “an ordinary object elevated to the dignity of a work of art by the mere choice of an artist.”, although he also said “The curious thing about the readymade is that I’ve never been able to arrive at a definition or explanation that fully satisfies me.”

The Fountain isn’t the first readymade, but it’s probably the most famous - he submitted it anonymously to the Society of Independent Artists 1917 exhibition, where they claimed would exhibit any and all work submitted, only to have it rejected. He then submitted it a another gallery, not anonymously this time, and had it accepted.

Duchamp was, at the time, trying to get away from what he described as “retinal art”, reaching for something a little more conceptual in nature. The readymades themselves were selected on the basis of visually indifferent, presumably so as not to draw attention from the ideas and concepts he was trying to put forth. He was rejecting the notion that Art could be rigidly defined, or at the very least, trying to get the viewer to ask questions of themselves about what they thought Art was, and as you’ve probably guessed, if you’ve been following my definition of Art, I of course, see no problem with saying that this sort of thing is Art.

There is a danger, though, in allowing this sort of thing to be called Art, and that’s that other Artist will start producing similar things, and suddenly the Art world is full of Artists talking about what Art is, and wrenching their arms with all the patting themselves on the back, and saying very little that’s of any worth to a wider society. Don’t get me wrong: I like Duchamp’s work. I’m glad he made The Fountain. It has certainly done a lot to shape my thinking about Art. But I do think that we only need a few works like it in any given generation, and it certainly feels like we get a few more than that, these days.

A Moment Of Design

So having explained what I think Art is I also want to talk a little about design.

Design is very obviously allied to Art - they’re often mentioned in the same breath as a subject of study, and that’s not really terribly surprising - it’s more or less the same range of techniques and materials that they draw on. There is no discipline in one that does not have a corresponding on in the other. If we proceed from my definition of Art as at attempt on the part of the creator to communicate something inside them, then it follows that a reasonable definition of Design is an attempt to communicate something that is not inside the creator. (I nearly used the word “extrinsic” there, and then I thought of an old Fry and Laurie sketch, and backed away at speed.)

Design, more than Art these days, is the language of our culture. It’s where people are actually paid money to work out how to get ideas across, to push values and yeah, products. Art is generally looked on as the “purer” of the two, (theoretically) unsoiled as it is by filthy lucre, but one might also argue that it’s in design that we find most innovation these days, as people and brands compete to be heard over the increasing noise. (There’s obviously the counter-argument to be made about corporate conservatism and people sticking with an idea that works, but one only has to look at any sort of design retrospective to see that things do change.)

It occurs to me though, is that for all the designers I’ve met who have made Art in their spare time, I’ve met the same number of designers who don’t really seem to have any urge to create for themselves outside of work. They enjoy the science of communicating, but they don’t seem to have anything to say themselves. I personally don’t understand this - I’m hugely interested in design because I think it’ll make me a better artist (in so far as I make any claims to be one). I could come up with half a dozen reasons why this should be so - lack of confidence in their own ideas and opinions, simply being left creatively tired by work, unwillingness to do for free what they can earn money doing, all sorts of things. It doesn’t really matter why it should be. And I’m not yet too terribly disheartened by it. I think it illustrates that the fundamental human urge is to commnuicate, even if oen has nothing to say.

Which explains small talk, I guess.

On a related note: I am heartened to see the D&AD are now offering an option for people who aren’t professional designers to join up, and it’s something I intend to do later in the year.

Practicality

I’d like to take a moment to talk about the practical applications of Art, just to establish that Art is relevant to everyone, and not some load of effete rubbish for an intellectual few.

Architecture isn’t something that immediately springs to mind when someone says “Art”, yet it’s probably the form or art that most of us have most daily interaction with, since it’s the art form that creates the spaces we live in.

But on the other hand, it’s also the one to which it is hardest to apply the working definition I opted for in my last entry – that Art requires that the creator be expressing a thought they have had about the world. It’s not impossible. Jump Studios for example, created a fascinating space for the new Red Bull office in London this year. I’m not sure how it would feel to work there, done out as it is in heavy blues and stark whites, but it’s certainly interesting. It’s other major unusual feature is that the building incorporates slides as a way of moving between floors in the office.

Which leads me, of course, to “Test Site” Carsten Höller’s current exhibition at the Tate Modern. Holler’s body of work combines architecture, sculpture and other disciplines to ask questions about the way we interact with the space around us. It’s a notion that’s increasingly relevant today, as we start to move from an industrial economy to an information economy. Suddenly, we no longer need to have our use of space dictated by the practicalities of using machines. There are exceptions as, for example, major internet companies are forced to locate their server farms in places where they can obtain the bandwidth and electrical supply they need, but for the most part, we are increasingly free of the need to work in warehouses, or even dedicated office space.

And so it becomes increasingly relevant to ask how we can make use of space in such a manner as to enhance our daily lives, not just from a functional point of view, but also as a means to create moments of pleasure in our day to day life. This is the question currently facing artists and architects, and having been to experience “Test Site” myself, I have to say, Höller and Jump are probably on to something.

The Human Truth Of It

So if I intend to talk about Art (in all forms) here
I suppose I ought to set out my stall, first. Let’s start with a quote:

“Art, in the human truth of it, touches the universal. Seeing Art, we recognise a thought we had but could not utter, are made less alone.” — Alan Moore from “Snakes and Ladders”.

I use that quote a lot. But it’s one of the best working definitions of Art I’ve ever come across, or at the least, it’s one I find myself in strong agreement with. It provides a way of telling Art from non-Art – the acid test it points to it simple: was the creator of a given work trying to express a thought about the way they see the world, as opposed to “just” creating something pretty/entertaining?

This definition, or course is one that leads to things being Art simply because their creator says they are, but then, Art is not automatically good or worthy. There is no shame in simply creating something pretty or entertaining – I’d far rather look at a really pretty picture that was not Art than a really banal one that was expressing the really boring views of a very tedious man. I don’t wish to suggest that it’s in any way a lesser thing to create beauty rather than Art, simply a different thing. But if we must have a means to define Art, then that’s the one I choose to use.

I’d further suggest that in order for Art to be considered “good” it should also invite the person experiencing the work (I could just say “viewer” but I want to emphasise that I’m not just talking about the purely visual arts here) to think. It should pose questions, or make suggestions. It should be the artist engaging in a discourse, saying “Here’s what I think. Do you have any ideas on the subject?”.

New Maps Of People

I spent a few hours this afternoon at the “London: A Life In Maps” exhibition at the British Library. Fascinating stuff, and I thoroughly recommend it. It’s a brilliant way to look at the history of London.

It’s actually a slightly broader thing than it sounds, starting as it does with the earliest known depictions of London, on Roman coins, and starting with what you’d have to pretty charitable to call maps – river panoramas, the precursors of maps, generally the view looking North from Southwark, because 95% of the river is over there. It does rather put the London North/South divide into perspective to note that for about three quarters of it’s existence, South London ended at Borough High Street, this despite the fact that the area I grew up and, and now live, have been settled for most of that time.

But I digress. This and a few other things have got me thinking about digital maps. A way to chart one’s personal topography. While at the exhibition, I sms-ed a quote that made me laugh to my Twitter log. I take photos all over the place. I blog, or have blogged, from more than a few places. The photos are now stamped with a place, thanks to Flickr’s mapping service, although that’s really all I’ve got in the way of geo-located data.

But I got to thinking, have “twittered” (god, that’s an ugly term) from the middle of an exhibition, wouldn’t it be interesting to have a device that dumps your timestamped GPRS co-ordinates on-line every hours or so. Hell, give it a crappy phonecam like camera and clip, and in a lot of places it’d be perfectly possible to attach a picture as well. It’d dump it to a website automatically, and the website would filter the thing, so that instead of a load of photos of the same place, it just tracked new locations.

You could have a log of exactly where you’d been and what you’d done on a given day. (Yes, privacy concerns, big brother issues with tech like that are all quite real. I don’t know I’d want to do it all the time myself, and I’m in the guy who has a side project in basically logging his entire digital life…)

But where it gets interesting is that with a clever designer, you could get some really interestingly mapped data out of it – imagine a personal atlas, where places are spatially related by how long your spend in them. And then to relate your maps to those of other people. Suddenly it becomes possible to provide a digital topography of our planet that has nothing to do with its physical space, but at the same time is not simply an arbitrary construct.

Turner

So, the Turner prize this year goes to Tomma Abts. Personally, I preferred Mark Titchner’s work - his themes and his general approach are things I have a lot of personal sympathy with, but hers were a close second favourite. I thought Phil Collins (not that one) documentary was interesting, but I think I’d rather just have watched the documentary of telly, rather than get presented with it as “Art”. Rebecca Warren, well, think I see what she’s trying to do, but it’s a fairly old hat idea.

I do wonder if Abts won in part because her painting are closer to most people’s idea of conventional “Art”, and if the Turner Prize committee are trying to balance the scales a little, after least years Shedboatshed, and Jeremey Deller’s documentary the year before that.