The art of not being an Artist.

Art; The expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture , producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional  power:

When people call me an artist I feel wrong. To me what I do isn’t art. I’m not a painter or illustrator which is what, in my head, constitutes as art. Whilst this argument is more complex than I originally thought I still cannot shake the feeling of unease when someone calls me an artist.

To me art is a rather pretentious hobby that middle class people force their children to view because they feel the need to live a cultured life. Not a kid making Youtube videos in their bedroom to distract themselves from doing homework or studying. It may have been the way I was brought up, it may have been something that I’ve picked up myself but there is still some uncertainty I have with being under the same name as Picasso. (Bit of an exaggeration but you get the idea?)

I believe that whilst ‘art’ has seemingly similar intentions lugging everything from film to theatre to paintings somehow demean them. I personally get more satisfaction being called a filmmaker than I do being called an artist. ‘Artist’ being used as such a broad term, to me, looses its uniqueness - ironic for a sector that is built on unique interpretation.  I understand that society has a need to categorise everything and that ‘Art’ is simply a large container filled with many other smaller ones but art is supposed to be a very personal thing, why we don’t treat it’s name as such bothers me.

 

This entire thing entered my head because I got assigned my photo for Image Factory and it’s of a sculpture called ‘House’ by Rachel Whiteread – I know nothing about sculptures or how to interpret them.

I learnt a long time ago that some sculptures have meaning and other don’t, or they do but they may as well not. (A bit harsh I know, but it’s the truth)

A few years ago in Middlesbrough the council unveiled a new sculpture near the riverside and Transporter Bridge that locals assumed was there to promote the towns past. However when Temenos (Anish Kapoor) was unveiled I can safely say it wasn’t what people were expecting, even 5 years later as locals we are still unsure as to how and why the sculpture was built. It says a lot that in the suggestion box at the bottom of The Guardian’s article about Temenos there is a link to another article titled ‘Anish Kapoors Temenos sculpture shows how uncool Britain is’.

Temenos is described as a butterfly net, brilliant! What has it got to do with Middlesbrough? Middlesbrough has and always will be an industrial town, most people who live in the area work as engineers or somewhere in that line of work and it’s been that way for over 100 years. The area is even known for being the home of the first public railway – so why on earth do we have a sculpture of a butterfly net? What’s even better is the project cost £2.7 million to make, yet to my understanding none of the steel came from Middlesbrough’s steel works, it was all shipped in.

The point of that story is I am very much aware that an artist can have good intentions, just not for the community they are exhibiting in. Whilst what I have read about ‘House’ makes it seem that all intentions were pure I can’t help but think there is more to this story than meets the eye.

Therefore I have some books, some websites and an open mind.

I hope Whiteread is worth it.