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.