In news just across our desks Arts Hub has heard that controversial English performance artist Mark McGowan is going to eat a Corgi. Live. On Radio. Next week. We felt very ill at the thought, but had to call him.
The first question we asked Mark was, are you for real? “Yes,” he said. So you’re going to eat a dog? “Yes, well, we’ve been waiting for some time to get hold of one. We’ve been waiting since January”. Silence. This was not the answer we had expected.
Have you ever eaten a dog before? “No.”
“I know it’s really bad eating a dog, but my friend, he knows of a dog market in China. They eat dogs in other countries. I’m vegetarian, but I’m going to do it, I’m going to suffer for my cause.” He’s a vegetarian? As in no meat, no fish, no eating animals, right? “That’s right.”
This is truly suffering. But why?
“I know some people will find this offensive and tasteless but I am doing this to raise awareness about the RSPCA’s inability to prosecute Prince Phillip and his friends for shooting a fox earlier this year, letting it struggle for life for 5 minutes and then beating it to death with a stick.”
Mark McGowan continues, “I’ve been planning it with two animal rights activists from Gloucestershire. I did a piece earlier in the year, trying to raise awareness of the Royals’ treatment of animals. I’m trying to send a message to the Royals, do you know what I mean?”
Well, kind of.
Mark is a graduate of Camberwell College of Arts and Goldsmiths College in London. He has previously described himself as the British alternative to David Blaine. In other forms of artistic protest he has nailed his feet to a gallery, and once attracted vast media attention by pushing a monkey nut with his nose for seven miles to 10 Downing Street.
Mark ate a swan earlier this year outside the Guy Hilton Gallery in East London, in a protest against the monarchy, the rich and the upper classes. His website also shows him crawling on his hands and knees through the streets of New York with a George Bush mask on and a sign on his bottom saying “KICK MY ASS”. He’s also eaten a fox to protest for awareness of crackheads. Performance art, with a hint of comedy – and it’s not always what it seems. In April 2005 the BBC reported that his much publicised vandalism of fifty cars with a key as “art” was actually a staged hoax. “at least I’ve shown people do care about car crime”, the artist said after claiming he’d received death threats.
Beyond the shock tactics, he has a sense of humour. In a recent interview he said “the thing I like the most is the performance aspect… Within the art world they definitely think I’m an idiot.”
But back to the dog. The dog in question died on a Corgi breeding farm in Southern England and is allegedly to be prepared and cooked for McGowan’s consumption by the two Gloucestershire ladies. When Mark asked the RSPCA for a statement about the Royal’s treatment of animals they would not answer, but Mark says they told him that they had to be careful because the royals are their patrons. Does the RSPCA condone his performance? “No. But we contacted them, it was not illegal.”
How do you classify this as live art? we asked. “I’m not sure whether it’s live art. But it is art. The whole thing is art: the event, the news coverage, as a whole it’s an arts piece. You could even say that the narrative exists as a strong art piece in itself, before, during and after the performance.”
But why radio, with such a striking and stirring event wouldn’t TV or internet broadcast be more suitable and impactful? “Well, it’s going to be on the Bob and Roberta Smith radio programme on 104.4 Resonance FM. Bob asked me to come on the radio show ages ago, Yoko Ono is going to be on at the same time. There’s some poetry being read, animal rights, animals in general.” He drifts. Is Yoko Ono going to eat the dog too, we ask? “You’d have to ask Bob and Roberta, I don’t know,” says Mark.
Arts Hub asked a spokesperson at Resonance FM, who said “I read Mark McGowan’s press releases with the same incredulity and slight impatience as most people do. We trust Bob and Roberta to put on a good radio show. The station has a ‘no animals in the studio’ rule, so he’ll have to kill it first, or maybe eat it outside. It’s a provocation – he ate a swan before didn’t he? You’d have to see it in context. It’s symptomatic of the times, just as one might expect young men to stab each other in a country that takes itself to war.”
Resonance FM have previously hosted other sensational radio events, like a Japanese woman conducting a “silent reading” for a 30 minutes, but the spokesperson thought that for maximum impact on radio Mark might need to make some extra sound effects with celery or crisps. In fact, the spokesperson at Resonance seemed doubtful that the event was actually going to take place, and didn’t know if Yoko was going to be there, or take part.
Yoko or no Yoko, Mark seemed to have his heart set on eating the Corgi when Arts Hub questioned him. The consumption of a Corgi is obviously somewhat symbolic, being the Royal breed of choice. Royalty seems to be a persistent theme in Mark’s work. His DVD entitled The Re-Enactment of the Conception of Prince William 2007 went on sale through the ICA yesterday. It’s definitely not art for the fainthearted and is described by the ICA as a “controversial performance consisting of two artists wearing cardboard boxes with pictures of Prince Charles and Lady Diana having anal sex”. It could fall into many categories but they are selling it as art, and it was “performed” at The Brick Lane Gallery, East London, in April 2007. Since we’re on the phone, we ask Mark what it’s about.
“The participants are a guy called Bacon Boy and a guy called Paolo who is covered in tattoos. I gave them the two cardboard boxes. We had a set painted. The place was packed, it was 5pm in the afternoon. We had 20 people audition to be in it. It went on for an hour and a half. There were people shopping in Brick Lane outside, looking in as they came past, it was too much for me, I was dipping in and out.” But, we say, forgetting his evocative choice of language for a moment, you organised the event – how could it be too much for you? “You cannot pre-empt an event” Mark says. “The people we were auditioning – we were not really sure what they were going to do. Anyway, the DVD is out, actually it’s a double DVD and on one DVD there’s stuff about me on Richard and Judy’s TV show. Maybe we’ll make lots of money”.
Well, it does cost £50, that’s quite steep, we say, you’ve got a good chance.
But, again, back to the dog eating. Has Mark received any Arts Council funding? “No – not for this one.” He says. So how did the dog die – illness, old age? Mark doesn’t know. Isn’t he worried about eating a dog that has died of unknown causes? “I trust these two ladies”, he says.
The one remaining, unasked and unanswered question about this performance is: can he still call himself a vegetarian? The narrative of art continues…
Mark McGowan’s event is to take place on the Bob and Roberta Smith radio programme on 104.4 Resonance FM at 8pm on 29 May 2007. You can listen live online
