Not the most stunningly original shot I’ve ever come up with, I admit, but I was passing the Eye the other week, and was struck by the idea of producing a companion piece to Pearly Gates (21st Century Edition). So here it is.
Samsara
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.
What I Did On My Holidays
Mostly, I took pictures of small children.
I recall seeing Grumpy Old Men do a christmas special a few years back (back before John Peel died, anyway) in which someone lamented the way that what you ask someone how their Christmas was, they always answer, at best, “alright”. Those that have had miserable chirstmases may be more downbeat still, but that, for such a hotly anticpated season, everyone always seems to have had a Christmas that fell slightly flat. Well, not me.
I had a bloody marvellous Christmas. I honestly don’t know when I’ve enjoyed one as much. No internet, no TV (although we did play on a Wii for a bit on Boxing Day evening), no eating till I burst or drinking myself into a stupor. Just a few days away with my family, the whole time spent enjoying each other’s company. All those cliches of what Christmas should be about: that’s exactly what we had. And it was fantastic.
My sympathies to those of you who have spent your christmas in the arena of the unwell, of which their seem to be rather a number of you.
And so to the next big thing: Lacking anything better to do, I’m going to Slimeshite for New Year. Am I likely to see anyone there?
And Done
You’ll have to forgive me – I’m drunk, so this is likely to be less than coherent. This is a texture piece – a shot that is, one one level, trying to capture both the mood of my Christmas, and on another, a technical experiment in capturing texture with a very narrow depth of field. I’d love to know how well you think it worked – what you can infer about my holiday from this shot alone…
And To All A Good Night
Future Worlds
One of the things I like about “Test Site” is the sense that it’s an attempt to try and figure out some alternative ways of doing things that we take for granted. That it’s an attempt to look ahead to at least one possible future. Any, of course, the whole thing has that cyberpunk feeling – all glass and polished metal. And so I went looking for a few sci-fi/cyberpunk type shots.
Protected: Inkstains
Liquid City
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?”.
A Dream Of Stairwells
A question for you this time. This is obviously (well, obviously if you’ve been or have heard about it), a photo of part of “Test Site”, Carsten Höller’s current exhibit at the Tate Modern (some more shots of that to follow.
But here’s my question: what is this photo about? (As is often the case, there’s a clue in the title.) What was going through my head when I took it, what ideas am I reaching for here?
It won’t exactly bother me if no-one gets it – while I’m generally trying to say something about the thoughts in my head when I take a photo, that’s mostly because I think I take better photos that way. But I would like to know what other people think about, or think I’m thinking about, when they look at my pictures.