It's all about the money

Post Modernism at the V&A

The highlight (for me) of the exhibition was the photography hall, it displayed a relatively few, but widely varied images from the period 1970 to 1990. The introduction mentioned three categories of parody/appropriation; Nature and artifice and lastly Tableau (though it was described differently – I hope I haven’t misinterpreted).

Haywain by Peter Kennard.

A depiction the Haywain by Constable with a cruise missile launch system transplanted onto the Haywain itself. The background image is a copy-print and has a monochrome/black and white delivery (there is a colour version). The image itself  i.e. without the interjection of the cruise missile – which was as much about the MoD’s beautification of the missile – could have played a Po-Mo part inasmuch as it is a clear devaluation of the original, cloned for the popular consumption in a consumer age. Constable for the people, re-packaged for a monotonic bijoux dining room?? The addition of the cruise missile added a dark humour and a political sub-text missing in most other pieces on show, both in the photographic hall and the main exhibition hall.

Carrots by Shrigley

A strategically placed carrot seed packet, clearly set at the end of a drill in and amongst some cacti in an otherwise arid desert or plain. These root vegetables need water, cacti don’t, the sun was burning down, the carrots won’t survive – the art is therefore ephemeral; a disposable item in this new consumer age. See later.

Canned Sunset by Keith Arnatt. Ostensibly the author takes discarded items from waste tips and rubbish and finds beauty in the abstracted artifice. This picture was a discarded tin can, lit and placed in what appears to be water, but could just as easily be effluent. There was another large print of waste in water that I didn’t take note of that used highly saturated colours to almost romanticise the discard of our lives.

Sarah Jones – The dining room

This picture I thought was meant to be funny, wry, ironic and worked at those levels for me. Three young females – mid to late teens – situated in a very formal, dining room. The formality of the décor, proportioned prints on the wall, a mantelpiece decorated with the trophies of staid middle class life. The dining table highly polished and pictured centrally on the table and lit quite brightly was a willow pattern china tureen that seemed to occupy the focus of their collective emotion. Two of the girls looking at it, with what could be described as disdain, whilst the third girl has her head on the table face – down, in a pose of exasperation. This was a carefully staged production. These three girls effectively saying this paraphinalia has nothing to do with me/us. Why are we here? "Beam me up". And yet this solidity of surrounding held them there. This “old – world” with different values, different histories had no relevance to the world this new generation were a part of – their clothes were of a different generation, colourful - not Post-Modernist, they hadn’t interjected any irony into their view of life and how they present themselves – they just wanted out, back to their future - were they, in fact, being "protected" from what they wanted? The image comes from a series of similar scenes using the same girls, but in different positions.

Jeff Wall’s “outburst” tableau – not on the surface a very worthy piece – need to consider further

Claire Stoppard – Scene’s of a struggle.

Like so many visits to exhibitions I started it the wrong end, not on purpose, it’s just where I seem to find myself, like a habit, and again I found after I had viewed the series I turned up at the start to then read the introduction. A dozen or so images that were carefully printed to look like working documents, not pieces of art (at least not treasured art), where placed in a line along three sides of the hall (at one end of the short hall). These black and white images where clearly meant to depict scenes of a crime - whether it was the same crime we didn't know, that was for the viewer to determine. I understand, but have never seen any to comment with any authority, that there are a lot of “forensic police” serialisations on television - CSI -  and these shots may have been influenced by them. Dispassionate shots of high contrast “scenes” with circles and arrows (reminds me of Alice’s Restaurant by Arlo Guthrie) depicting evidential data for us, the viewer to consume. And I think this was the point. We were participating in one of the by-products of this new consumer age. Here were items specified, depicted, highlighted for our attention, itself an ever decreasing commodity these days, so that we didn’t have to dwell on the image too long, we, the viewer, were presented with arrows directing us to the solution. Like a modern day police saga where the science convicts the criminal with just a few particles of evidence. The viewer is served up with the incriminating evidence and can move on to consume something else, maybe with a bit more juice next time? This then wasn't irony, not humour, this was an indictment on society and a relevant one, possibly more relevant that anything in the main exhibition.

Cindy Sherman – transformation

I was glad to have seen a couple of Sherman’s pieces - this one is in the main exhibition, but there has been so much discussed and written about her work that I found very little to add. About transformation, about the shallowness of image within culture today and most certainly Post Modernist with wit and an extremely accomplished delivery.

Karen Knorr’s “work of art” – constructed as a piece of classical/proper art. The image on the left is a hair grip and the left is a pair of tweezers.

The card on the left reads: Hair Clip. Used to secure hot curlers in the hair. Rollers were electrically heated the applied to the hair, which was scorched into temporary curls. British c. 1980's

The card on the right reads; Tweezers.  thought to have been used for the removal of hair ... (I didn't note any more down - but you get the gist). This might have started as an exercise in typography, it is certainly a deadpan delivery, maybe there are more in the series - I liked the prints, I'm not sure about the wry commentary.

James Welling Platinum/Palladium. I was probably always going to enjoy this. The classical processing of a installation designed to show off a piece of objet d'art, minus the piece of objet d'art! The work involved to create a Platinum Palladium print – especially if one considers that route the artist has to take to gain the skills to be able to create a print like this AND THEN not use it to present an object, but to exhibit its absence, it’s presentation mount of velvet, which interestingly is a perfect material to deliver the Platinum/Palladium’s graphic capability. Nice one Mr. Welling.

Richard Prince – Cowboys. Another iconic photograph of the genre – and already having an ocean or words recorded in its wake.

There are a lot more photographs in this hall and some more in the main exhibition.

The rest of the exhibition.

I found it absorbing on one level and disappointing on another level and finally revelatory I was disappointed in that whilst I found a few pieces that I thought beautiful, the sketches for the “Best” store, the 3D work in wood and some, but not all, of the Kitsch tableware I didn’t come away feeling inspired about anything. I did come away feeling that I “got-it”; but I’ll come to that later.

There were a significant number of references to classical art, columnades, scrolls found in two and three dimensional work. There were also a number of Art Nouveau references, especially around the furniture pieces and homeware; for example the chest by de Bruyne(?) – Art Nouveau meets neo-classicism?!?

Fill the space! I also thought that the artists were determined to give full value for their art commissions.  Gehry’s house for example left very little space, it was his own commission I believe. It appeared as if he felt the need to deliver no space, negative or otherwise – he used it all up, filling the voids with construction as if it were all an opportunity to demonstrate his ideas.

Ad-hoc assemblies. There are a  number of “ad-hoc” assemblies, for example a “sound system” with speakers, a record deck and I assume some kind of “deck” with a guitar built in. This was clearly an assemblage with no utilitarian value, it’s point was to reflect the consumer need against the jetsam of everyday life. Whereas the chairs/stool were “crafted”. They could be used as stools  - no-one was allowed to do a weight check, but they looked more than some insubstantial creation - one piece didn’t look very comfortable but nevertheless they appeared functional. The trembly table didn’t look scared!  But it did have shapely legs – see picture below. Note the use of ironic colour (I'm being ironic here).

The sketches for the “Best” outlet were beautifully crafted – needing to depict the “installation” correctly for their client, this despite their patron being a generous benefactor for the arts.

And as we near the end of the tour we get to “Money” – to Martin Amis’ quotation about money having no morals but before I move to that I wanted to mention Takamatsu – whose beautiful images of utilitarian “machine-like” buildings, seemed less about Post Modernism and more to do with architecture mirroring the society and civilisation it was to end up in – I am sure I am missing a very big and blunt point with his work, but for me there was no irony in the art, there may be fun with the ornamentation. I did however admire the draftsmanship and wonder whether they existed before "Blade Runner" or did it (the film) influence Takamatsu?

Then……..”protect me from what I want”. Whether this was the point the curator wanted to project I'm not sure, but my overall takeaway from the main exhibition was about consumerism, about the way in which these artists had either followed the money or had tried to lead the way towards it. I didn’t feel the quelling of the old order – sure there were a lot of “ironic” references to prior movements, but irony is a weak tool when used continually and I didn’t really see any other device in the main exhibition to warrant a strong PM theme. There was a strong use of colour throughout, quirky ideas not had little functional value, but I saw no “brave new trajectory” more an assimilation into a Thatcherite grab for cash. Follow the money. 

Wharhol

Post Modernism may have started in the 1950’s, it may have had a natural reaction to some of the societal utilitarian injusticies built in the name of “social solution” from Le Corbusier and others, and so it should have. But this collection of pieces had no political comment that I could discern, no fight against right or left, no search for a new way other than lucre.

Who was the spirit in the machine whining for protection against what they wanted? Or was that one last splash of irony tempered by the one piece of truth I found, Amis’s view that money has no sense of right or wrong, it doesn’t care what we call it, it doesn’t have any morals and I found few to see at the exhibition.