dotinthesky | The Artistic Butt that just Won't Quit

Ilya and Emilia Kabakov: The House of Dreams

I left work early yesterday to meet Kevin outside the Serpentine Gallery, in Hyde Park. One of Kevin's favourite artists, Ilya Kabakov, together with his wife, have a show there at the moment (visit the link above for more info.)

We grabbed a free glass of wine, covered our shoes with white hair-nets and entered the space. The gallery had been converted into a kind of hospital, with white curtains everywhere, white beds, and a circular room in its centre that, as one of the people chairing last nights Sweatshop correctly described, resembled a scene from 2001: Space Odyssey (though it made me think more of Superman's birthplanet):

The Sweatshop was supposed to be about "The uses of fiction... ideas of myth and fiction in relation to contemporary culture" but the speakers often veered towards discussions on art works we didn't know, art grants and all those other topics that are only relevant to struggling artists.

I don't go often to these types of events so I struggle to keep myself focused on what's being said. More often than not, I'm off with the fairies, imagining what kind of lives these people lead, why is my back hurting so much, am I really getting a butt cramp, why is one of the speakers now reading an excerpt from The Brothers Karamazov, who is gay and who just looks gay, etc.

Kevin scribbled fervently in his notebook while the speakers talked about "approaching the art work in the third person", "the lack of narrative", "the problematics of self-mythology", and so forth. Perhaps I should have taken down some notes too. One of the speakers, Shezad Dawood, a distinct looking asian man with a very persuasive and pleasant voice, spoke of the walk from Waterloo station to the National Theatre, the river Thames beside the building, and how all of these elements feed into the fiction we create when we go see a play there. I wanted afterwards to say that I work in the National Theatre, that I see behind the scenes as the "dream machine" gets set in motion, that I feel sometimes as if I'm working inside an ant hill geared towards the Arts, but the chance never arose (or maybe I chickened-flu out.)

While walking home, Kevin and I had a nice discussion on whether an art work can exist without its creator, whether the "author is dead" (our conclusion was that he/she is not.) I should try to read Foucalt again, to refresh my memory on why exactly he thought the author was dead. Perhaps Foucalt only meant horror authors?

***

I'm seeing Maximo Park, Kaiser Chiefs and The Cribs tonight at the Brixton Academy. Am half-tempted to sell my ticket and go home. It's nearly four o'clock and I've done very little at work. I'm reading Helen Dunmore's Your Blue-Eyed Boy and I do not like it. No, no, I do not like it at all, at all, at all...

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There is nothing more disappointing that starting a book only to find you don't like it. I always get a feeling of being somewhat cheated.

I have a tradition where before every major voyage I take, I buy a book at random, selecting it quickly, the first book that jumps to me from the shelves.

In doing this - I have found three of my all time favorite novels.

But when I traveled to France this year, I brought a book and it was terrible. Again that feeling of being cheated. (6 weeks later I tried again on a brief trip to England and was thankfully redeemed).

I like buying books in airports too. Usually, I go for something trashy so I can get easily sucked in, then quickly dispose of it when the flight is done. But this book I'm reading right now is well written and all that... yet it's quite cold and hard, not very easy to get into.

What is it that you're reading?

Helen Dunmore's Your Blue-Eyed Boy. I thought it was going to be about blackmail, but it's turned into something else... it's very meditative, and slightly depressing.

just want to say "hello!"
my friend sent me your link, i love your writng.
i think there is a "secret" club of people who only read "trashy" books on air flights, i know i do!

hello there. Do you have a livejournal?

Hello again!
I don't have a livejournal,,, yet.
I am the "David" that is in San Francisco that Doug Pexa (pexa-kuntsenaar/livejournal) writes about on occasion. we work forth and back with Dougs art/painting/photos and my writing. Doug is adamant about me starting my own livejournal,,, so soon i will have one. i'll let you know when.

Peace, -David
therapeofnarcissus@yahoo.com

Cool! Add me when you get your Livejournal. I'd be interested to learn more about your collaborative work with Doug, as well as what you are up to yourself.

Take care.

That sounds like a fantastic exhibit.

I didn't get a chance to properly see it yet because we only went to the Sweatshop. But I think we'll return this weekend and have a proper look around.

Sepaking of Helen Dunmore, I finished the little book you sent me, like a week ago. The first three stories were quite good, the last extremely strange. Did you read it before you sent it to me? And what a lovely inscription, thank you!

I didn't read it! I wish I had, so we could talk about it.

oh no! get a copy of it!

I feel your pain. I'm reading "The Rotter's Club" by Jonathan Coe at the moment which whilst perhaps not a BAD book, just isn't really my cup of tea. I always feel guilty stopping midway through a book but I'm finding this a chore and I have loads of other stuff I really WANT to read... but someone lent it to me and assured me I'd like it so I kinda feel obliged to keep plowing through it.

As I say, it's not terrible but I really just can't get into it. It's very twee and idealised and smug and nostalgic and whimsical and all those other things that I'm not usually fond of in novels...

Don't read it. There are way too many good books to read and our time on this planet is short... but I'm, erm, going to finish Dunmore's book cause I'm almost at the end, and all that. :D

"Most books are like cable TV with fewer ads."

Who are you quoting there? :D

I'm (mis)quoting The Official Slacker Handbook (1994).

The Artistic Butt that just Won't Quit

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don't be lonely

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hey buttertoes...

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