Code Trawling in my Dreams

A very strange dream occurred to me last night, causing me to wake up and think "I will not be that person".
Whether it was the whiskey, the painkillers I am taking for my shoulder, or the serious misgivings I have about going to my MA course on a Tuesday, I dont know, but it gave me cause to ponder.
In my dream, there was a very scary bint of a woman, long straight flint grey hair, spectacles on a chain, giving a lecture to a room of terrified and bemused students. She was talking about "code-trawling" and how that applied to an extended family from some remote part of the US and how they developed their own language and syntax or some other way of communicating with each other. I cant remember the exact details but this woman had clearly done a shitload of research and travelling and lived in a very unique world of her own, a world that others felt pretty much excluded from and a world that no-one else cared about nor really wanted to step foot in. This woman was really dogmatic and obsessed, and that came over as a terrifying dominance - almost aggressive - and that is what made me think "I dont want to be this person". I'd rather be a nice sweet little old lady painting landscapes in a cottage in the country than this scary bint of a woman.

Smile and the world smiles with you, frown and you're on your own...

I read an interesting article in the London Paper today - written by a man - that substantiates my arguements on how unfair life is on women. He was explaining how a smile on a man is not considered as sexy as a frown, and how a man who looks serious is considered to have a serious life, and thats why he looks all deep and conflicted. They have to beat women off with sticks, and the more distant and withdrawn they are the more desirable they are, as famously mentioned by Rasputin. But the reverse is true with women. We have to have an open and generous smile the whole time otherwise men will think less of us. At best they'll think we're hormonal, at worst a man-hating neurotic witch. Why is a frown sexy on a bloke but makes a woman a miserable bitch?

I have plenty to make me a bit insecure and pensive at the moment and quite frankly smiling is hard work and either I cant be bothered to make the effort or the tears come first, yes I am whinging but I am at least sincere and honest, and besides if you cant gripe behind an electronic alias where can you? I found a quiet moment in a corner of the uni library (when I finally found it, 50 yards down the road in the drizzle) when I just wanted to well up, I just cant decide whether I still belong in this MA or not. I took part in the seminar today, played the game, even scored a few points, but its a hollow victory in a game that takes too much energy (not to mention time and money). There's no soul in those interactions and I reckon that's why art is so soulless these days. Express a personal point of view and you lose. Its worse than a game, its more like an ecosystem, in a certain environment you either thrive or perish, or just about survive against all competition and predators. Show a weak spot or slow down and you die.

Why should I be pink and fluffy? The real world aint!

Well I got chided when I submitted an h2g2 entry by my so-called "peers". I should've known. They all said "oh, I'm at art school, its not like that". Well why should I be surprised. Most of the respondents are probably undergrads in the throes of Freshers Week. When the alcohol and party fever has worn off and they have to sit through lectures and seminars, they'll wake up!

The Prof has tried to reassure me yesterday but I'm still not convinced. I'd do something else if I had the ability and/or the cash.

It seems that if I don't unquestionably board the current arty bandwagon I will be disregarded and treated as an outlaw or stupid.

Do I sound embittered? Or realistic?

It was all looking ok yesterday (Tues - 1^st day) at Brighton, the other students were just as nervous and unsure of their abilities, and it looked like the course was going to be manageable, and I thought I’d like to study Aesthetics as I thought (stupidly) it meant something visual I could actually apply to painting, and since the other choice was Mentoring – having someone always looking over your shoulder – I thought this was the better option. How wrong I was. As soon as they put up the book list I knew this was just the same generic prescriptive BS as in the main book list. I did have a few drinks last night as I was so confused and just so unsure I’m doing the right thing. After all, who cares? Its not like being a cardiovascular surgeon and saving peoples lives or anything (not that that would impress my family anyway).

I really do have great reservations about the establishment of education every time I see a book list. I hope that if I stick with this course and choose the Mentoring option they don’t just guide me down the path they decide from the off that is right, not that I want the path of least resistance either, but I would at least like to be able to read the kinds of books that I am interested in and will further my own ideas: call me narcisstic or a coward if you like, but I’d like to think I have something else to offer the art world. When I got the first lot of correspondence (ahead of the letter with the offer of a place) I wrote this:

I may well consider turning my place on an MA course down on the basis that their book-list looks like it hasn’t changed for the last 10 (or 40!) years. Freud? Freud was a nazi to all intents and purposes. He’s currently being used to justify reparative therapy: ie “curing” gays. When he was around people still lived under thatched roofs with outside privies and going to work on horseback. The world’s moved on since then. There are whole new discoveries in neuroscience, and far from wanting to cure people the general mood amongst psychiatrists that is emerging is one that recognizes the chaos and fragility of the human brain and celebrates that diversity. And talking of diversity, the definition of “multi-culturalism” is narrow and misguided as well, concentrating as it does on black and asian people, basically RACE. What about those who experience the world differently because of the difference in how their bodies interact with the world. Does a deaf-blind child have their own culture? Does anyone care?

On the train on the way home yesterday I was pretty sure these ideas will be lost on art academics, as this is a way of thinking that is alien to them, they have been indoctrinated with certain ideas and beliefs and wont budge, and will shoot me down on every turn without even thinking there might be ideas outside their scope in the worlds of science and philosophy that may bisect the world of art and dare I say it CREATIVITY.

In the Moment and trying to get out again...

I just heard a great quote from the late Tony Wilson describing Joy Division in their first show:
"They didn't want to be on stage, it was just that that had this thing inside them and it needed to get out..."
Perfectly describing how I feel about my MA.
I don't think anyone understands my ambivalence about my "performance". How I'm driven. How this stuff means I cant just fuck off and crawl under a rock.

I start Brighton tomorrow. Heaven help me.




(also the Unknown Pleasures album cover "set it apart from business, like it didn't care if you bought it or not.."
"Factory never "released" records, they let them escape.")

The Rise and Fall?

Come September, and I knew that somehow I would have sorted out something to do, whether academia or not. I couldn’t have stood much more of summer. I applied for loads of jobs, MA and Postgrad courses. Something had to work out. And it did. I’d rather have done a full-time MA Printmaking at Camberwell and no job, spending my time making things and getting messy in me jeans and t-shirt, but I’m working in a staff canteen getting messy in my black uniform, and starting a part-time PgDip in Fine Art. So I’ll be like Hong Kong Phooey.. by day, a mild mannered dinner lady..
But I’m glad. Being a normal person in a humble job will be a nice variation from being a pretentious arty intellectual. I’ll need that because the course looks like being highly conceptual. When I had my interview I thought there was no chance of getting in because I like actual painting. I groaned inwardly when he listed the tutors on the course.. “and there’s so-and-so, and he’s a theorist; and whatsisname, and he’s a theorist; and wassername, and she’s also a theorist”… do they actually make work or will they be another Martyn? I reckon people who talk about art without making any are like those people who talk about sex but aren’t getting any – hopelessly dull.

The Shaman's Hour

I would say the darkest hour is not just the one before the dawn, its the dawn itself. What other time is there when one is completely alone and in silence, the mind in reverie, quiet yet excited, than at 2am to 4am? Its almost like the rest of the world has shrunk away into an entirely different universe, or that your body and soul has been shifted to a new one. In this semi-concious state there is a new and different conciousness, one that needs no invitation and no chemical intervention to bring it through the door of being. There is only a slight awareness of proper social attitudes, but the inventive imagination is more or less free to take on whatever ideas occur to it and give them the worth they deserve without interference from outside forces.
So next time you cant sleep, value that time; if you get any ideas, write them down. If they look silly in the cold light of day, when the rest of the world has woken up and is bearing down on you, just quietly put them away somewhere until the next night...

An attentive mind? ADHD on Jeremy Vine

Just had the briefest of brief spells on Jeremy Vine discussing ADHD.
I e-mailed the show last week when they announced they were doing a programme about this because the story I was going to do on BBC News 24 got shelved and I thought it was important to tell people the disorder isn't just about kids but can have long-term and wide-ranging effects. Luckily they phoned me back and invited me on, so all last night and this morning I was trying to work out what I'd say. Typically, I needn't have bothered with all that internal rehearsing, as the programme makers and presenters have their own agenda, and in fact the time ran out before I could say what I consider to be the most important bits! Click on the above link and select the programme of Tuesday 28th August, which should be available on Wednesday 29th. I'm on about 1 hour 5 minutes into the show - in the 1 o'clock slot after the mum talking about her ADHD child. Let me know what you think - I'd love to do some more public speaking about this subject and give some exposure and support for people with this condition.
Its easy to dismiss these "disorders" but believe me I went through a lot of soul-searching before I went to be tested and I'm sure I'm not alone in that...

Mobile Money

Maybe I’m getting more right-wing as I get older, but I really feel strongly about taxation all of a sudden. I’ve realized that the way people support each other and rise up economically depends entirely on the rich being able to hold onto their money and spend it as they wish. If the Government taxes the rich this is what happens:
The Rich tighten their belts and don’t splash out on luxury things like art.
Artists cant start or maintain a career.
Canvas makers and paint makers struggle. Art shops go out of business.
People who run the art shops or were previously employed in art industries are made unemployed. They have less money to spend on things like coffees.
Coffee bars profits run low. Low wage workers in coffee bars are made unemployed.
In effect, it’s the rich KEEPING and SPENDING their money that keeps the economy going and helps the poor. Taxing them just halts social mobility, and everything stagnates.
Maybe I should move to Jersey…?

The Queen of Anhedonia and the King of Qualia

Title for a book of poems I want to publish, apparently its getting easier to do that now, there's places where you can just send the text and graphics and they print and bind it for you..

Writers should be read, but neither seen nor heard.
- Daphne du Maurier

Performing For Fun (and Profit?)

Just listened to an interview with Siouxsie on the radio. She's a very insightful and bright person. She talked about admiring Bowie for being non-stereotypical, and how she dresses up and does the whole make-up and character thing for no other reason than its fun. How refreshing! And her new material is pretty good and non-compromising - probably wont get that much airplay but good luck to her, I wouldn't mind going to see her live (hopefully not at a festival, don't like them much). I think she'd still be an amazing performer. But what I admired most is her saying "don't believe ANYTHING anyone writes about you, good OR bad!". In that vein, I'm glad I've left my BA behind - you have to so be on top of everything that's written about your work then. I don't know how artists/performers can carry on having fun with what they create when it becomes their livelihood. It must take tremendous strength. I'm having trouble maintaining the enjoyment and I'm not even famous. I don't know whether being recognised and even a bit famous would make it any easier to hold my head up, maybe she does it by hanging around with like-minded people. That's hard to do when people are younger or geographically far away or are in a different trend or fragment - as time goes on there seem to be more and more fragmentation in any field of the arts - and age pretty much pre-determines cliques, especially in the young (which I find sad for myself and for them, so much waste of opportunity to cross-fertilise and just support each other). I try not to let age be an issue, even when I reccy venues with an OAP who is prone to some trying behaviour and Senior Moments (my god yesterday was tiring.. one end of London to the other.. sweating on the tube and walking around lost.. I ache and I have blisters!).
I can only hope to attract more peers and soulmates by having shows so that they can see and feel the work for itself, have a good experience, and maybe purchase something to keep my domestic woes at bay.. if only I'd started earlier when I had less responsibility.
Watch this space for news of upcoming shows. I don't want to say more until the venues are finalised, but so far it looks like 2 in London and 1 in Chicago. Fingers crossed!

Just because I wear a Union Flag badge on my lapel, does not make me a racist!

I really enjoyed myself at the Buzzcocks gig in Bromley the other night but was rather saddened at some peoples attitudes towards the black security staff. He was the only black guy in a group of poor sods working hard to stop us trashing the barriers, and he got singled out for an insult by a guy standing next to me who assumed I would find that funny or cool.
Its a shame that some people have to equate punk and British music with race hate. There was a lot of it about in the 70's and 80's when punk started but the world has moved on since then. I just shook my head and said "There's no need for that.."

We Could Be Heroes - Just For One Day

Well I wasn't that excited about my graduation ceremony yesterday, but then I got into the car and Heroes was playing on the radio and it just kinda made me excited. Even tho standing around in magenta-trimmed robes doesn't exactly make us heroic, the rousing speeches and the loud cheering certainly added to the feeling. I lead a boisterous round of applause when John Bird (alumni and founder of the Big Issue and colourful character!) announced in no uncertain terms that the world needed more artists (and not just ones that make tents!). Yep. It was memorable.

Cap, Gown, Dirty Hands

I'm proud I get my hands dirty. Not like some artists who dump stuff and call it art and then get 2 grand for it (no names, no pack drill). I make stuff. Hard graft! Yeah I only got a Desmond and I have an overdraft and debts and a HUGE guilt complex (semi-detached, suburban Mrs Jones I aint but am stuck in it), the house is full of crap I like but cant get rid of - not even on eBay - thats my work we're talking about there! - hubby says he's proud I haven't sold out but I said "Haven't sold - PERIOD! Drop the "out"!" which made him laugh but in a kind of shrug and aint the world shit way.
I've been taking advantage of the good weather at last to get my hands even dirtier: rubbing down bits of rusty stuff till all gleaming and then coating it in anti rust paint. That paint is horrible. It doesn't come off your skin until your skin cells fall off, so there I'll be tomorrow shaking hands with the great and the good with black fingers LOL. I dont care. I dont even want to be there. Whats to celebrate FFS? 4 years and a sum total of nothing has happened as a result. Just come-up-next-tuesdays taking you for a ride.
Been reading Hooky from New Orders blog. That man should write a book. Seriously. William Burroughs of the 80's (and beyond). Bit like Trainspotting to read, have to get in the mind of a Manc (icky) but its rivetting. From what I garner he's DJing or something? Will have to look out.
Dont you love that photo? He looks lovely and grizzled, but with an evil twinkle, just like a legend should!

Allelopathic Artists

Oftentimes relationships between artists or creative people is described as either competitive or symbiotic.
I argue that the relatively new term "allelopathy" is a more accurate description of this relationship. Having been at art school and in curated shows I can honestly claim I have experienced this kind of phenomenon both first hand and as an observer.
Allelopathy is either described as a type of, or opposite of, symbiosis. It is categorised by the nature of both parties contribition to the relationship, that is it falls into the rough bracket of Amensalism, in which the association is disadvantageous to one member while the other is not affected. (−party harmed vs 0party neutral) Allelopathy can fall into this category.
The reason I equate the artists with plant life (not meaning to offend!) is that in the cases stated on Wikipedia one organism poisons the others domain to the extent that it has an advantage and therefore can become the dominant type in an environment that would otherwise not specifically be favourable to one type or another. The output of certain artists can take over the domain in such a way: for example, conceptual artists in the latter part of the 20th Century, YBA's. They aren't in direct competition with other artists, they just smother them! Compare the works of Damien Hurst in the art world to the leaf litter of Casuarina equisetifolia that completely suppresses germination of understory plants despite the relative openess of the canopy and ample rainfall*: beneficial factors that may encourage growth of the new emerging artists as well as maintain established ones are like the sun and the rain in the world of nature, and direct parallels can be drawn between the unconscious and the conscious organisms.
I have been in shows where we have an equal or fair share of space in the gallery, and been in group crits where everyone is on equal ground, and yet one artists presence seems to predominate and send the others into shade or infertile ground.


*although not widely acknowledged, Rhododendrons are a plant that is allelopathic - "rhodie-bashing" is a well-known activity for nature conservationists, cutting back the bushes to prevent the soil become sterilised by the dense shade, fallen leaves and the toxic roots. Victorians planted them as beautiful ornamental bushes, little knowing the affect they had. Curators and Buyers of Fine Art take note - todays attractive investment can be tomorrows pest!

The Power Of Colour

Anyone who thinks just coloured paint isn't worthwhile (look at the amount of actual paintings in colour at my degree show.. count them on the fingers of an amputee!) needs to have a look at the Sony Bravia ad on TV. Awesome! I wish I had a tower block to paint, but will have to settle for smaller scale. But there's no reason small scale use of colour cant have an impact. I'm working on it!

Another box of blank canvases arrived today but the couriers really bashed them around. Big puncture holes in the cardboard and the plastic sleeves were all split. However, the person packing the canvases into the box took a bit more care. They obviously know these things are going to be slung about by people who dont give a damn and placed them in the box backwards so that the stretchers were on the outer edge. Otherwise the surfaces would be totalled. The courier guy was a teeny bit concerned when I pointed the bloody great holes out to him, said it had only fallen on a box of dog biscuits, but opened the box to check. I am nice to service people but I swear if they were damaged the company would have paid and I'd've moaned!

I'm looking for a "proper" job, back in the TV industry. Better the devil you know. And since no-one reads this blog, buys my art for more than a few quid and gives me nothing but pitying condescending looks when I try to talk about my work or art in general, I figure I'm the wrong person in the wrong place at the wrong time. Maybe if I was 21, single, living in Brick Lane and with an unlimited supply of confidence enhancing cocaine I might stand a chance..

Healers Hurt

Gonna do a bit of politics I'm afraid. But its more a reflection of Human Nature when given Responsibility.
Should anyone be surprised that the latest terrorist bombers are Doctors? Have you been to a Doctor recently? Haven't they been rather cold and stand-offish? I think when you give a person the power over life or death, there is a great temptation to use that power to rise over fellow human and choose to administer death.
Healers have a polarised view of the world in my opinion. Psychotherapists are a very good example of this, and counsellors, and other academic practitioners. They acquire some sort of authority and then believe they have some sort of right to use this to justify just about every decision and thought they have. The rest of us are just their patients, the serfs to the masters, the lower animals in the family. They have an insight into mortality that can elevate them consciously over the rest of the living race. Whatever beliefs they have must be right as they are more educated and informed than the rest of us. That is what makes these elite potentially very dangerous.

I'm an artist. I admit I know nothing. I quite like it that way!

Implacable, Embraceable You!

On the subject of an audience.
I hate when I get false hope, I hate silence. I especially hate the silence that is the harsh echo of the sound of praise.
The gallery owner has not got back in touch. You have to wonder where you went wrong in this instance, and there have been A LOT of such instances.
If creative people aren't BORN mad, then this surely MAKES them so!
The number of images and types and styles of images I have released to people is getting quite staggering now. I'm all in favour of being accessible but you have to wonder, in this age of cheap and easy reproduction, whether the "fan" is just a third party exploiting YOU as cheap labour? What happens to the photography you put on websites, for example? I dont want to have to copywright stamp everything, it just doesn't look nice, and I want genuine fans to enjoy the images.
I also want to be told WHY people decide they dont like what I do!

A Painters Life is Not a Happy One?

Clives James says: "There are lots of reasons to be cheerful about the world, many the result of human creativity - the difficulty is remembering not to be miserable.

Jeffrey Smart is one of several great living Australian painters who have continued the success of their now-deceased role models in carrying our unusually productive little nation's name into the international world of art. Among the illustrious dead are such names as Sidney Nolan, Russell Drysdale and Arthur Boyd. Among the resplendent living are Margaret Olley, John Olsen, and Jeffrey Smart. They are all getting on in years but they have that unquenchable sprightliness that painters so often seem to have, possibly because they lead more enjoyable lives than writers.

This last opinion of mine might have something to do with my own temperament. My feeling that I would have been a happier man if I had been a painter and indeed a happier man if I had been a gravedigger - a very useful occupation, in my view, as it was in the view of the gravedigger who met Hamlet, himself a gloomy fellow - that feeling might have something to do with a disposition towards melancholy. From the inside I don't actually feel like a wet weekend. But apparently I strike other people that way."

Painters HAPPY??

Now come on...

MAYBE if you had someone to pay your mortgage. MAYBE if you were single and could do what you want in the hours you wanted (or needed) to do them in. MAYBE if you know for sure you are doing the right thing and have a happy client base that agrees with you. MAYBE if you haven't got a car in the drive, a cat that needs watching, a husband that needs feeding and a house that needs cleaning. Or a loan that needs paying, come to that (student loan system is biased towards graduates who join management training schemes such as advertised on Hobsons, Hobsons being a very apt name, its that kind of employment or nothing - but who wants an artist working in a bank or come to that what kind of artist COULD work in a bank??).

Notice only ONE of those names is female. She must be single! Or be blessed with a laid back bohemian partner, more than likely she is a lesbian. I'll have to look it up. If she is married, its probably to a fellow creative. Otherwise where is the permission (explicit or implicit) to embrace freedom? And ignore the washing, the dust and little bits of creeping flab?

Camberwell Degree Show