Nothing is too squalid for Brand Tate, argues Laura Gascoigne. ‘Change the name and not the letter, change for the worse and not the better,’ ran the old wives’ saw on choosing a husband. Nowadays, in the wider world of consumer choice, a change of name is almost always a change for the worse. Whenever… Continue reading Building brands, ruining reputations – Laura Gascoigne on the Tate
Category: Comment
Mind the funding gap – Laura Gascoigne on NEDs and philanthropy
It may have been the heat, but in the lead-up to the summer recess accusations of conflict of interest were flying around Whitehall like frisbees. First the PM’s Aussie electioneer Lynton Crosby was outed as a lobbyist for Big Tobacco just as the government announced its decision that plain cigarette packaging represented a danger to… Continue reading Mind the funding gap – Laura Gascoigne on NEDs and philanthropy
The spin of art
Michael Daley describes how the main players in State Art have taken spin to a new level. Many people remain in awe at the legendary manipulative means by which the political spinmaster, Alastair Campbell, delivered to successive New Labour governments the media coverage they craved. What is not sufficiently appreciated is that compared with art… Continue reading The spin of art
Grayson Perry’s 2014 Reith Lectures – a missed opportunity
Patrick Cullen explains why Grayson Perry missed an opportunity by avoiding the important issues he claimed to be addressing. Grayson Perry was a surprising choice to deliver the Reith Lectures given the list of senior academics, elder statesmen and those at the top of their profession preceding him in the job. One wondered why, when… Continue reading Grayson Perry’s 2014 Reith Lectures – a missed opportunity
Charity vaunteth not itself … except sometimes
Friend of the Royal Academy, James Birkin, believes the RA is neither open nor giving enough considering its charitable status; and overly concerned with business. It is said that a true friend will speak truth unto power. How sad then that the Friends of the Royal Academy are denied the chance to do just… Continue reading Charity vaunteth not itself … except sometimes
Performance before content – Eric Coombes is disappointed…
…by the frivolity and lack of ambition and academic rigour in the 2014 Reith Lectures. Immediately after his predictably rapturous greeting at the first performance, Grayson Perry raised the question of why he was asked to give this year’s Reith Lectures. Well, for the first time in their sixty-six years, they were to be given… Continue reading Performance before content – Eric Coombes is disappointed…
Why shit can never be art – painter Patrick Cullen contests the commonly held view that a relic of an idea is a work of art
If any Jackdaw readers were still in doubt about just how rigged the contemporary art market is after numerous articles on the subject, many from the editor, then Phil Redman’s piece “The Crap Art Market” (The Jackdaw, no 108) should have put the matter beyond doubt. So I take all that as read. Less obvious… Continue reading Why shit can never be art – painter Patrick Cullen contests the commonly held view that a relic of an idea is a work of art
The importance of being Erno – Eric Coombes questions the reputation of a Brutalist architect
Sometimes material appears in a “serious” newspaper which—even in our current cultural condition—is at an astonishingly low intellectual level to come from the prominent “authority” who wrote it. Disagreeable though it is, perhaps one should occasionally draw attention to such material, and subject it to closer inspection. Those who can bear to do so, should… Continue reading The importance of being Erno – Eric Coombes questions the reputation of a Brutalist architect
Frieze – state art’s closed shop: artist John Keane exposes a cabal
In 1986 I did a large painting which I called The Emperor’s New Pose and was subtitled The Importance of Being Important. It poked fun at art market darlings of the time, such as Julian Schnabel and Georg Baselitz, and included felt that I had stolen from a Joseph Beuys installation at the Anthony d’Offay… Continue reading Frieze – state art’s closed shop: artist John Keane exposes a cabal
Disobedient Objects – Edward Lucie-Smith at the Victoria and Albert Museum
It is understandable that, in current circumstances, major arts institutions should try to ally themselves with the more anarchic, contrarian elements in contemporary culture. Perhaps this is especially true of those dealing with the contemporary visual arts, committed as these still are to the myth of ‘avant-gardism’. One problem that immediately presents itself, of course,… Continue reading Disobedient Objects – Edward Lucie-Smith at the Victoria and Albert Museum