Grotty Little Island

My view in the face of the recent media tomfoolery which resulted in the death of an innocent human being is sad horror at the loss of a human life. But my second reaction was 'aaaaaaaaaaaargh'. In a country where morals and morale are holding either end of an ever-sinking limbo pole, an isle described in a glorious diatribe by Andy Salzman of the Bugle as "perpetrating a social culture... of institutionalised police cover-ups, mass corporate tax-evasion funded in essence by cuts to disability benefits a) because they can and b) because it was actively encouraged, political expenses scams rife through parliament, swathes of media not merely plumbing the depths but installing in those depths a fully-fitted moral bathroom... all suggesting that Britain has not only been taking a volcanic mud-bath with itself in a swamp of skewed morality but also turning an institutional blind eye to anyone trying to get away with anything in the field they're trying to get away with it", a country where journalism and politics are both so confusingly, unhappily tethered and yet so gut-wrenchingly unable to agree on anything, one condition is sacred: stay away from our Royal Family, you.
Like comments made in seriousness about your own mother, the playground tactics of the British press still somehow involve the rule 'leave the Windsors out of it.' Even the globally distributed images of Harry in the nip were dished out in England with a kind of gentle chastisement more than anything else. And with the appearance of Golden Girl Kate on the scene, we've regressed into a state of dabbing our eyes with a Union Jack handkercheif. I dread the scene when the God-given, third-in-line, doomed-to-those-ears sproglet pops out.
So shouldn't we be bolstering ourselves in the meantime? This incident has shown that yes, our media are a group of terrorising, backstabbing, bribe-accepting testicle lumps. But there are more laughs to be had, and they're missing out on them. This country has more money than it knows what to do with and in all the wrong places, and we still can't protect our monarchs from being taken potshots at by the Aussies?
The message, I feel, is clear: we need to grow some giant clanging balls, and fast. We need to be that dude in the bar that everyone knows has the middle name Ermintrude, but that no one would remind of that fact, because you know what? Bruiser Ermintrude McKnuckleDestruction is proud of every single syllable of his name. You try and tell him to be otherwise, he'll not only destroy you, but do it with pride.
I have fallen into a hamfisted analogy. I am not nationalist or royalist, but it shocks me that, really, we just can't tell people off like we used to. The Queen used to technically OWN those questionable Australian journalists' ancestors. Now we are left with the sad, shocking mess of the world's most morally empty media, which the rest of the world's media is still out-doing in terms of mockery and envelope-pushing.

Why I still don't watch reality TV

I was talking to a person recently, as you do, and they were kind enough to say 'You should write this stuff down.' Basically, the more you think about the richness and variety of life, the more it becomes disturbingly apparent that not everyone goes through the things you or I personally go through. Here are some examples of things:

I went to a PR event for a French resort that my workplace is tentatively connected to, and was introduced fairly early in the evening to two young gentlemen called something like Sam and Steve. Neither of them had name badges as an aid memoire, so it was inevitable I immediately forgot their monikers, but I began a conversation with one of them by asking why they didn't have these plastic name tags, which all of the other guests were given on their way into the venue. He shrugged and said 'We know some people.' Not seeing any real problem with this answer, I gamely continued 'What do you do?' and he replied that he was something in sports publicity. Again, his answer was broad enough that my memory fails me (this happens a lot). I jumped for joy - I was struggling with putting together the calendar of a sporting venues supplement my workplace is aiming to publish. There are many things I wouldn't claim expertise on, and sports is right at the top of the list, but the task had fallen to me in a 'no other bugger will do it' kind of way.
'I need someone who knows sports!' I exclaimed, giving the young man a slightly more positive overview of my work on the sporting calendar, 'Let me give you my card.' He gave me none in return, but etiquette dictated that he must now send me a message over the following few days at least saying how pleasant it was to meet me.
Pleased at having secured this contact, I continued my evening. Little did I know, until roughly 20 minutes later when speaking to two fantastic girls who write for a travel website, that the two roguish young men were from Made in Chelsea, and had come to the evening apparently just because they could. I thought it was funny, then strange, then I baulked: I had just over-enthusiastically found what now seemed like a paper-thin excuse to thrust my card into one of their well-manicured hands.
I cringe at it even now, and pray desperately that I seemed so ill-bred that he doesn't even recall what, in retrospect, looks like a journalist making a desperate pass at someone purely because they were on Made in Chelsea.

Why I am afraid of youth now

So it has come to this...
I am afraid of 'the youth'. Not in an 'oh they're all so undisciplined, how dare they slouch about the streets on their alcopops and their internets' kind of way. But in an 'oh god how did I get this much older than them without commanding any of their respect' kind of way?
I refer to a specific incident which made me fume at how helpless I felt when I was in no way disadvantaged. I was out with two friends in Greenwich, we were walking through a park. There was a group of maybe eight teens, perhaps seventeen years old. Not that many, and not too threatening looking. But I had seen them pulling branches down off the trees and tearing up their leaves, so I was a bit disapproving. Then as we continued to walk out of the park, a stone came skittering past our feet. I turned around and, seeing the bunch of teens still behind us, gave them a scowl for throwing stones, which I think we all agree is usually a bad idea. The scowl, it seems, did not go unnoticed, and the next thing I knew, a large seed pod had smacked me in the back of the head. I immediately spun round and said 'please don't do that, you twats.' Which may be one of the strangest and sadly, bravest things I have done (more recently, I jumped off of a waterfall.) At least they hadn't thrown a stone at me. Suffice to say, nothing bad actually happened, and thankfully, one of the friends I was with is a teacher, so was more than adapted to getting rid of little shits. I suppose the feeling that affected me most of all was 'why does this happen?'
Why are we never too old to feel threatened or bullied when in reality, I'm an adult. At the very least, I can call the police. Or perhaps their parents. But these young people thought that it was okay to throw something at my head. Profoundly disturbing.
Next week: why I am afraid of the elderly.

Insult to Injury

The other day I received this email:

"Dear Applicant,

I am glad to inform you that we have read your CV and that have made my shortlist. The next process now is to interveiw candidates which will take place in the next few weeks.

My name is Peter Cole and I am the HR Manager at SMG Recruitment.

I have attached the application form which can be found here APPLICATION FORM

Please unzip or extract the application form folder to be able to open it and fill out the application form and send it back to me.

The job we offer is a full time and part time positions with a flexible schedule. On average, the working hours will be 40hours (Monday to Friday).

If you are having problem with the link above, you can download the application form from the download link below

Download Link: https://www.box.com/s/880fb47e3e9f194cf6f0

Sincerely,

Peter Cole"

Upon inspection, there is no Peter Cole, and no SMG Recruiters/Recruitment. The attachment is a virus. (What helped was noticing the awful grammar and that interview is spelt wrong.)

Among the many replies I get rejecting my job applications, this was an especially cruel blow. When you're job hunting, half of the graft becomes automatic: replying to emails, searching for jobs, filling in forms. It's difficult to keep track of all the random automated emails flying back and forth telling you you have applied and have or haven't succeeded. If this reminds me anything, it's that there is no bottom rung for some people.

If you are job hunting, please be careful. Every person you hear from should have a presence on LinkedIn and full contact details on their company web page, at the least. Finally, best of luck.

Cracked veneers

So, the website Cracked, which if you aren't familiar, is a purveyor of most things hilarious in a vague list-format. And there are funny pictures and such.
They recently posted that they are looking for writers. Having the posting opened on 26th June, and the page has had nearly 600 pages of responses and counting. The aim of the game, from a Cracked perspective, is probably not really to get new writers. It's about a little thing called footfall.
Now, I would love to write for Cracked. If you get published, the pay is good. I don't even consider myself funny, but I'd be willing to give it a try and will probably sign up today to find out what happens. However, what worries me is the sheer scale of people who are also replying. This is an internet-wide demographic, and writers will do anything for money, because generally they don't have any (and we need our booze). There were, in amongst the throngs of people saying how keen they were to write for Cracked, people saying they had never received the golden confirmation that they could try to actually write something for Cracked.
Mainly, I assume, because a few people cannot keep up with the admin of registering the influx of thousands of emails. But, I wonder. This is all websites want. Your blood. Well, okay, your email. But it means they snag you in a more meaningful way than if you just read their stuff. They own part of your ass then. And this campaign, however true it is, appears to have snagged them approaching a million casual visitors to commit in digi-pen-and-ink.
Well played, Cracked.

Shar'd disappointment

Maybe using a Shakespearean truncation as a pun doesn't quite work, but the Independent already used 'Shard done by', so what am I to do?
Well, I admit, I really like the Shard. I think it's beautiful. Alright, so it's a monument to phallocentricism in architecture, and how skyscrapers are erections spunking humankinds' dominance over the fragile skyline. I also dislike how there is one, just one, apartment at the top worth £50 million. Housing being the over-priced quagmire that it is anyway, this is hardly a venue borne out of need. But I think it's an achievement in architecture, and potentially a valuable source of revenue for local window-cleaners.
So why the laser show? I've seen better lighting at a Foo Fighters' concert, and there was music to listen to then as well. At what point in London's glorious weather conditions would a high-rise laser show have been expected to look spectacular anyway? Londoners were told to look for this:

This, however, in a HDR photo, which only camera technology can produce. Residents on the lookout described nothing more than some twinkly lights.
I'm very worried about the Olympic opening ceremony, let's put it that way.

Higgs 'like a Boss'-on NOW WITH VIDEO

The Higgs Boson, or a particle demonstrating almost exactly what they were looking for when it was theorised, has been found. It's like some kind of fairytale dream. The particle that gives mass to all other particles is actually real.



The Higgs Boson Explained from PHD Comics on Vimeo.

Massive, massive congratulations to Higgs. It's a new age, where wars, and trials, and now science colloquiums, can be broadcast live, revealing the true amount of effort and emotion that this undertaking involved.
And I apologise for use of the slogan 'God particle'. I say slogan because it's a really, really silly way to try and understand the particle. Partly because, y'know, those overly enthused by the existence of God probably don't feel that we needed to find it in the first place. I'm being mean, of course, but 'God particle' is just a name, like the word 'God' itself. Except that this is real and here and 99.9999% proven to be one of the reasons why the universe works the way it does! Yeah!

Next: supersymmetry. Something I myself can barely spell.

Goodnight Sweet Troll

Ongoing argument with boyf:

Me - Trolling is bad and pointless.
Him - Trolling is supposed to be like that.

He is a tad more eloquent than that. But, honestly, the media has discovered the word trolls and, like everything else spawned on the slightly more shadowy corners of the internet, has failed to 'get it'.
There is a difference between trolling and out-and-out abuse. Trolling may sink exceptionally low every so often, but it is there for a reason - to provoke someone. This may be, for example, the use of the word 'faggot' to disrupt a heated and earnest online debate. It may be far more directed and personal-seeming, but it usually revolves around one thing: derail your opponent.
It can be between friends or it can be in the glorious Anon-ymity of a forum, but with trolling, all you hope is that someone, somewhere, will rise to the bait and instead of getting even, will get mad. The precept is, no one has superiority. At some point or another, a mindless or abusive statement will tip anyone over the edge from reasoned, sensible human being to maddened idiot who will only undo themselves more in attempting a reply. And oh, that's exactly what they want.
Stealing someone's identity to defame them is defamation. Abusing someone or spreading malicious rumours and comments is bullying or libel. And misuse of the word trolling makes me want to literally huff off under a bridge and grind small children's bones to make my bread. Just, just... oh. They've totally trolled me.

BEER DIARY

It's like 'Dear Diary', except we're brewing a beer, gettit? Our illustrious East London alehouse adventures begin. Look on, gentle blogobserver, and learn well.

The beginnings of a good day.... To find out why Vaseline is in this picture, continue reading...

The bucket is sterilised then rinsed.

We add the delicious ready-made beer goo to warm water - I think this just makes it stir in easily. It's like molasses but with a ready prepared golden Pilsner flavour to it (I neglected to look at the ingredients and understand how this is achieved. More learnings to be done!)

Goo goes in bucket.

Then more sugar, dissolved in hot water. Then a large amount of cold water (amounts vary based on your brew, so I won't go into it.)

The mixture must then cool back down to 20'C, while we wake up the yeast in just-over-room-temp water for ten minutes. Braumeister Heath considers the options carefully.

Mmmmmmm, super-sugary water.

Cooling down proved impossible as London was at an unprecedented 26'C, so the bucket was carefully placed in the cellar.

Finally cooled, we add the yeast and seal the lid with the airlock (this is why you need Vaseline, if you were wondering.)

The beer in its resting place, will brew in the initial stage for ten days before being transferred to our keg. Hopefully after a further week we will have something drinkable. Stay tuned!

still getting used to this new uploading format

It's crazy, I was thinking about making a world map of feminism, after England ranked twelfth or something ridiculous in the places it would be good to be a woman in the world (wild claim based on half-remembered article somewhere). I just want to chart what's going on, I suppose. We definitely could be doing far worse.
And now I suddenly find out about Paula Scher's amazing maps. I don't know if she did a feminist-oriented one though. I'll let you know how my research goes.

A Brick and A Hard Place

Just read the Samantha Brick article, as I should have done when it first emerged, and am pleased that it engendered such a response, because it is a pile of claptrap. But I’m confused by the reactions. Why does this woman reduce everything to her good looks? It’s an awful piece of journalism, and the way in which she feels that her beauty is the entire reason for the attentions she receives makes me incredibly sad.

She speaks about how women constantly socially reject and professionally block her because of their insecurity and jealousy over her looks. The things I find myself becoming jealous about, when it comes to my boyfriend, are that other women may be more suitable for him personality-wise. I would also get jealous if someone younger than me was getting a promotion ahead of me (although I know how unrealistic that is, especially in present circumstances). These do of course all speak of huge insecurity issues. But Brick does not allow herself to indulge in any alternatives to the idea that her beauty is the threat to other women.

I don’t know about the constant attention from men she talks about. It strikes me that that is not a ‘beauty’ thing, or not as directly as it seems: it is that she is confident, wears bright colours, wears well-fitting clothes, and is generally well-turned out. If I had to live in heels and make-up to get free bottles of champagne, well, look at me not bothering. I like dressing like a lumberjack half the time because I know I'm a beautiful woman and I don't need any external parties pointing it out to me.

It’s simple to get people’s attention in this way, and just as easy to defer it. Brick has made a career of it and it is her ‘On’ setting. That’s perfectly fair for a journalist and media personality. The only reason people should have for hating her, I would suggest, is that she is too dense to see past her own exterior.

Keep trying, feminism, but I think Brick would count herself out of the movement for fear other women wouldn’t want her in it.

Support Freedom of the Press!

Write What You Feel

Re-reading Rushdie

After Salman Rushdie's withdrawing from a Jaipur literary festival due to Muslim protests, I thought I'd re-examine the man. He was reported as saying that assassins may have been on the way to Jaipur to kill him.

In protest of this, four authors read passages from Rushdie's banned novel, The Satanic Verses. Hari Kunzru, Amitava Kumar, Jeet Thayil and Ruchir Joshi have now too been asked to leave the festival so as not to endanger themselves or present a risk to other festival goers.

Rushdie's writing career began in advertising, and his first work, Grimus, went largely ignored by the literary world. This is no surprise to me: it's a strange, dark novel centred on magic realism. Other than knowing that I've read it, I can't really remember any specific details about it, except that there were some enchantments going on, and a mountain (maybe not even a big one). As you can tell from the title, which is the protagonist's name, it was not really geared to connect immediately with an Indian or Western audience. Not a very memorable work.

His next was the absolute breakthrough. Midnight's Children saluted the complexities of Indian political history, the histronics of family, the endearing qualities of a range of young characters with fascinating 'mutant' powers, and the glory of chutney. There was only a tiny wee peek of misogyny.

He then wrote Shame, a study of political turmoil in Pakistan, which followed the similar themes of postcolonialism and immigrant perspectives in Midnight's Children. Then there was the non-fiction The Jaguar Smile, based on his first-hand experiences in Nicaragua at the scene of Sandinista political experiments.

He has written many novels in the intervening years, but it was the next which would change his life. The Satanic Verses, published in 1988, was well-received in the UK, but immediately after its publication, the novel was banned in India because of it's perceived insults to the Muslim faith. Within the story, which involves two expatriates living in England, is a re-narration of Mohammed's life, which is seen as the section most potentially insulting to Muslims. As with all Rushdie, it is dense, referential, and constantly set in the soupy lyricism of magic realism. The passages which refer indirectly to Mohammed (as Mahmud or The Messenger) are literal dream sequences. The book's publication led to a fatwa, asking for Rushdie's death, from the Iranian leader, Ayatollah Ruohollah Khomeini, and Rushdie subsequently went into hiding in England to avoid assassination.

The title The Satanic Verses refers to the Qur'anic verses which supposedly allowed prayers to be made to three Pagan Meccan goddesses: Allat, Uzzah, and Manat. The verses were apparently included in the Qur'an by Mohammed, who was tricked into referring to the three goddesses, thus deferring from his monotheism, by Satan. Mohammed was said to take back the words, and the reference was eventually removed from the Qur'an. Scholarly views and reactions as to whether the verses actually existed or are truly damaging to the Muslim faith vary.

The novel may never have acheived such notoreity had it not touched upon these issues, which were previously merely the centre of religious debate. Khomeini claimed that the book blasphemed against Mohammed and his wives, although Rushdie himself stated that the book was about "migration, metomorphosis, divided selves, love, death, London and Bombay."

Personally I feel that most of Rushdie's works are a mixture of reflection and love letter to his origins and current expatriate status. It is rare that an author integrates religion, history and politics so successfully into what are usually highly personal and intimate narratives. This is a true expression of Rushdie's fascination with the rich past of his country, and his interest in the place of romantic mysticism in the modern world. His intellect creates the dislocated veil through which he views and engineers all of these happenings into his own dialectic, and his success lies in this ability to add a brutally comic edge to it all.

As Khomeini has since died, the fatwa can never be rescinded. Life imitates art, I suppose.

Classic Horror Campaign again

I have also had another review published on the wonderful Classic Horror Campaign website.

Incidentally, did you know that the word 'campaign' is drawn from the French for countryside, campagne, which is taken from the Latin for field, campus. The best soldiers in the field were campiones, from which we get 'champions'. From there you also get 'camp' in both senses: first the army who pitched their tents, and then the women of ill-repute who were camp followers, plying certain wares. After a while, to be wearing too much make-up and having illicit sexual encounters was referred to as camp as well. Very Brighton.

Internship!

I am writing things for The South African. It is quite fun.

What Is the Problem Here?

Should libraries be run by volunteers? Who would these volunteers be? When I hear that someone on full-time JSA has been forced to work in a Poundsaver rather than continue to volunteer in a museum, I can’t help but think everyone is missing a trick. Libraries would teach customer skills, for people from all walks of life. Libraries are one of the only places you are guaranteed to encounter young graduates, foreign students, the elderly, parents and their children. There is a space for everyone. Libraries mean regular access to computers, furthering rudimentary computing skills and having a chance to search for jobs in the meantime. Libraries mean social interaction and the possibility of meeting someone who could help you towards your ideal job. A librarian is helping run a business, maintain a workspace, upkeep a database, and look after extensive physical records. It is a full gamut of social and practical tasks that any jobseeker would benefit from.

The debate continues to rage over the future of libraries. Are people really harbouring that much disinterest? When I was at school, generally it was accepted that children don’t like reading, and England was forever doomed to be a race of illiterates. I had few friends, because I preferred books, and I still love books, dearly.

Within the publishing world, people have been slow to respond to e-readers. The main issue is the dramatic drop in price which the reader implies for a publication, and the fact that people are very good at getting hold of these things for free. But I don’t see how e-readers can possibly threaten books in the long run. Not everything is available on e-reader, certainly not the obscure things I occasionally decide I want. I will always relish strolling aisles and simply looking, trying to find something I haven’t seen before, or something I had forgotten I had wanted. I also love graphic novels, and an e-reader has a long way to go before it can hope to capture the brilliance of a fully-inked double-page spread by Alan Moore or Garth Ennis.

I also feel that within Universities, e-readers could be embraced as a way to cut students’ costs, by making more of the syllabus directly available on a reader. The Uni loans you the reader and so doesn’t risk its own textbooks, and you have no excuse for not owning (or doing) the reading. This is a basic idea and I have no real knowledge of whether it could be successfully implemented, but for a science student the idea could save them hundreds of pounds in textbooks they may never use again, and mean that the most recent edition was readily available.

I hear you cry, what about physical books? What about libraries as actual spaces of reverence for knowledge? What about musty old bookshops and charity shops full of books that were trendy a month ago? I still use all of those. A library is far from just a place for books, and this is what most people are really fighting against. It is a social centre, somewhere to take your children: many have coffee shops now as well as study areas, they rent DVDs and music, you can check newspaper archives, or gain access to a computer.

In people’s fear of abandoning physical books they seem to forget that the community already reading out there will never stop. I never leave my e-reader behind, but I mainly use it as a Dictionary and a study aid. I read the news on my phone. When I want to relax, I pick up a book. E-readers, like mp3 players, may be heading towards prevalence, but I don’t know many people who have one yet. At present, unless you are able to hack yours into some kind off catch-all uber-reader, they are the equivalent of a calculator for an accountant: if you really feel you need it, it’s there, but there are plenty of other options for the less fanatical.

People thought the mp3, and the piracy thereof, was going to kill music. But everyone I know owns coveted collections of tapes, CDs, or vinyl. And still buys them. And as far as I’m aware, the music industry is still doing okay. In fact last year saw the advent of such a saturation of music festivals in the UK that there weren’t enough fans to go around. Culture fluctuates with the times, but those that support it stand firm in their bewilderment at the mass-panic of the ‘death of …’. Project Gutenberg is an example of people embracing e-readers. They work to digitise books on which the copyright has run out: previously published items that may never be re-printed. Items that you might have never had a chance to see. Cruising Project Gutenberg is almost like walking through a huge antique bookshop, and the thrill of the hunt remains. As with many websites, they rely on donation from their users: this has never proved a problem.

The only way may be to embrace it. Industrialisation is inevitable, but access to literature is vital.

Knitty Gritty

People keep asking me for help with their knitting, although I am a gross amateur myself. As I probably won't get all of you in the same room for some time, I recommend YouTube for a dearth of knitting instruction videos. To start you off, here's how to Cast On:



And how to carry on in Stocking Stitch:



Sorry for bad sound on the second one but I thought it was a particularly informative video. Also I have a huge stock of needles so if anyone does want to practise in person, give me a DM. Happy Knitting!

This is Brilliant!!!!!

String Quartet Cover of the Pixies

Alright, so, brought to my attention by the Kinect advert currently doing the rounds. But it's the timing that does it for me above all in this song. The brief intake of 'breath' right after the first chorus (caesura), and the translation of Kim's faint vocals into a literal instrument only stress how the Pixies schooled the rest of us in songwriting from day one. The quiet-loud dynamic in its ultimate form.

New Year's Resolution - SEE MORE MUSIC!!!!

By Any Other Name

Sorry to start with an Uber-quote, ie a quotation so overly quoted that it has metastasised into its own product and spawned endless self-edifying titles and pops at the original. But that’s what I’m interested in talking about.

Hockney’s sly jab at Hirst seems to have come from nowhere. Not that I was aware of any history between them. Is there some growing factionalism between painters and conceptual sculptors? I feel I must stress that Hockney talks about painting and caftmanship. Hirst has exhibited some paintings, and was lauded for it. By comparison, those pieces which are exhibited worldwide, generally not created under his own hand, have provoked shock and, to use the hackneyed follow-up, awe. Aside from the other debate I would have about the cash value ascribed to these things (part of what makes art elitist is the monetary aspect), their capacity to inspire and generally freak out the public is an important one. An overblown gesture is never a harmful one, in any perceivable artistic movement: Hirst was the Lady Gaga of the 90s, not appearing to show others up, but entirely redefining how things were done. Who cares if her image is carefully built around her by a million designers, make-up artists and vocal engineers?

Hirst, likewise, employs the Warholian tactic of an absurdly ramped-up persona, image and entourage. And many will use this in his defence no doubt, as The Factory produced fantastic work, and again, altered how things were done. What about Matisse, whose old age required assistants to create his final, gloriously child-like cut-and-paste works? Or the Sistine Chapel, largely created by Michelangelo but finished in sections by several other painters?

Hockney is speaking about painting. To him, art is a creative process done by one person and one person alone. That is what is revolutionary about Hirst, and the reason that people sit up and pay attention. This is not an issue of who is the greater artist or even what you like: this is an ‘how is art made’ issue, another part of the overall ‘what is art debate’ that is perhaps more biased towards those who really want to stick their oar in as professionals of the trade. I haven’t seen comment from Hirst because I don’t think he feels the need to make any. The global impact of his work has now more than paralleled any made by Hockney in the 60s, and while Hirst continues to shock and dazzle, Hockney has taken the route of what he might deem “true artistry” and continued devotedly down his own creative path. Whether or not either of them is an artist is open to interpretation.

I recently came across a book called The Best Art You’ve Never Seen. It is art you’ve never seen because it is not internationally lauded, it does not go on tour, it may be inaccessible to the public, and generally there is a fairly substantial problem with getting to see it in the first place. Another bold statement made by the author is that art is only a sacrosanct item to our modern eyes, or rather, it has only gained the extra value placed on something deemed as ‘art’ by a Westernised culture. Hence, much of the art we have left, and many of the pieces remaining in the book, survived ultimately due to their obscurity, being hidden from the elements or any other potentially destructive factors, such as rival tribes or religious groups.

The pieces you get to see are breathtaking because of the history they reveal and the knowledge they bestow: that humanity has always created, to a level of skill and technicality that would surprise many, and with a passion devoid of alliance and motivation. One thing we often do not know about these pieces is, who the artists were. A lot of these great historical works are unrecognised because they were created by a name long lost to history, a person whose pieces do not sell for benchmark prices and who never owned their own nightclub (probably). They may have been created by groups of people and we my never be certain of the purpose of their creation. So maybe Hockney could take solace in the fact that his works will be recognisably bound together by their distinctive style, and by his signature in the corner. And Hirst can know that the weight of his fame is what has brought about a series of fantastical conceptual objects, objects which make people squirm. In several centuries’ time, they may both be well remembered. That is the signature of an artist.