Another week of sun and Moogee may start dog-bathing again. Meanwhile the shower of marvellous art continues to drench us with facts and figures. Mr Hirst (Moogee’s favourite artist) has seen fit to make some headlines (with a little help from his overactive PR dept) by releasing a diamond-encrusted bonce. Said Pearly Bling has made many column inches and left people in no doubt that we witnessing the greatest living artist since…oh Rolf Harris I’d guess. That the bonce is tarted up with a batch of sparklers of indeterminate lineage (pace Clive James in BBC article) we are left to wonder at the beauty of the artifact. A noble addition to the fake skulls that the Incas knocked out circa 1952 this latest ‘zeitgeist trembler’ is as good as anything the Hirst as ever done. As if by a miracle (or tie-in) David Beckham dyed his bonce in homage. Moogee waits with trembling paws for the Becks and Posh his and hers diamond skulls to be released soon.
Apologies for older dogs who may think artworks are ‘shown’ or only emerge fully formed from artist’s studios. Nowadays artists ‘release’ works in the same way as the latest fashion line hits Top Shop (Kate Moss or Frida Khalo?). Some of this may stand test of time but as that smart old dog ‘Ozzer’ Wilde said ‘Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months.’
So it good to know that Hirsty has already knocked out a second Fish in a tank to keep the market bouyant. Expect a Top-Shop Emin Tent soon with back page adverts in Sunday Times and how long before individual Mark Quinn blood heads will be sold as Blood bags for hospitals as part of yet another PFI initiative to ensure that dying pensioners see great art as they waste away in corridors. Yes life is consumption these days and a big Woofy yes to the show and tell generation.
Thank god the art world has cleansed itself of those dour old duffers with their paint smeared hands and anti-social graces. A skull is worth a hundred Howard Hodgkins or Francis Bacons because all that depth and intensity and craft just got in the way of a good headline. You cannot expect your average Oxbridge hack to delve deeply into the artist’s psyche as they wolf their dinner down in Groucho’s can you?
Thankfully Warhol and his comedy offspring Gilbert and Sullivan (sic) were here to save the artworld from meaning. Better a hundred photo rehashes by some tired old pearly kings desperate to be asked on to the set of Eastenders than real painting.
Yes the world is a better place and our lovely students of the arts have heeded their words and are busily creating artificial nonsensical installations and photo essays with flags and turds in as we speak. Hip hooray barks Moogee we love the new millenium artworld and all who sail in her…..
Pip pip …snarl…
