The Joke That Is Art.
‘It’s hard these days, being an artist.
It’s even harder when you’re socially conscious.’
That’s something from a song by The Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy that I think is very true indeed.
The reality of today’s art scene is that anyone can be an ‘artist’. You do not need to be able to draw and even if you can, then the quality of your work is not important. You don’t believe me? Have a look in a London gallery.
I have been drawing since I was old enough to hold a pencil. My work is competent and realistic. I am certainly not the best artist in the world but I do know that my work is of an exhibition standard. Over the past few years I have sold a number of my pictures but I have never been able to break into the hallowed ‘big money’ arena. That is probably because my work is not fashionable at the moment. The world of art is very fickle and if you are not creating work that is directly in line with what is wanted right now then you can forget it.
If I sound a little bit bitter about that then you will have to forgive me. It’s just that when you have walked around London galleries and seen the kind of pretentious crap that people are buying it can be a bit frustrating. Art is the oldest con in the book. If you say that a mess on a canvass is a representation of something convincingly enough then it will sell. How do I know that? Because I have tried it out for myself.
After struggling to sell any work on eBay for weeks on end I decided to perform an experiment. I got a small canvas and painted it in precise, coloured stripes. The largest amount of work that I actually did for this ‘picture’ was its ridiculous description. By the time that I had put it up for sale it sounded like a piece of high-end intellectual abstract art. I even used a pseudonym and gave the ‘artist’ a name that was actually an anagram of the word pretension.
So, does this make me a charlatan just the same as those people that I am criticising? I don’t think so. Like I said, it was an experiment. I will never do it again and I could never allow myself to make a living by doing that. I could make an awful lot of money but my conscience would get in the way.
So just before I leave, I have something to admit. I love bill owen (sorry Joy). I was watching the dvd last night and am a little bit preoccupied.