It was inevitable that at some point in my capacity as A. N. Other Football Blogger I would be drawn into attempting to, in some way, address from my own point of view, an aspect of football’s relationship, or lack there of, with ‘art’. In my civvies away from this site, in what would be considered by some in direct contrast, I own and run a community arts space, and am a sometime practising artist. What we’re practising for is not entirely clear, surely it would be more productive to actually just get on with the doing. Artists hey?!
Where were you when we were sh…sitting there.
This past week me and David, the other half of Bifurcated, had a day out at the Arnolfini arts centre in Bristol to watch a footy double-bill of the Zidane film and the documentary The Referees. We were speculating in the cafe beforehand, upon noticing our tickets were No.15 and No.16 respectively, if the allotted numbers might represent the potential audience in attendance. When we finally entered the auditorium we discovered we had been a long way off … there were two people sat separately and a young father with his two sons. By the mid-point of the first film there was just us left. Curator of the event, and deliverer of a wonderfully articulate opening introduction, Dr Mike O’Mahony, from the University of Bristol, turned to see who was left, and then to us, and uttered, “Just the die-hards left then?!”
The Arnolfini in Bristol does have a reputation for being a bit ‘stuffy’ (other people’s words, not mine). Without being archaic it certainly has an ‘old-fashioned’, almost obsolete, vision of contemporary art at times, stuck in a cliche almost. However, this still for me felt like contemporary art inviting football in to its home just for the opportunity to humiliate it. “But we’re full of examples of artistry” says Football. Art just replies by searching its pockets. “I’ve got something for you”, Art says, before unfolding its hand to reveal a one finger salute, which it shoves in Football’s face, while blowing a raspberry. “Jog on” says Art, “and don’t darken my door again”.
Terry is forever having his portrait done…
A.C Grayling believes that “‘Art might by our language’s most controversially difficult word to define” and I’d agree: it’s subjective. We don’t live in times where writers, the likes of Clement Greenburg, tell us what to like, we do our thinking for ourselves, for the most part. Although we are inevitably influenced by our interior and exterior history and by the ‘market society’ we find ourselves in, what we think of as art may, in a lot of cases, be relatively ambiguous, but it is very personal to us.
Within football I can clearly see the creativity and artistry apparent in almost every game Stoke don’t play and I’m also moved by it, but I don’t see it as ‘art’. As football has, as we all know, become commodified, its true, pure, artistic expression, artistic endeavour, has been all but swallowed up by the rapacious nature of the monster it now exists as. The same perhaps can be said of much of mainstream art. Art created primarily for material gain, for me is not art. That’s not to say I think this is the fault of art or the artist. As Lewis Hyde observes in his book ‘The Gift’, “[…] the exploitation of the arts which we find in the twentieth century is without precedent”. I’m a purist in many ways although of course art and indeed football challenges my preconceptions all the time. And that’s the way I like it.
Jody Craddock an artist on and off the field.
Not long into my art degree a tutor told me that I would soon realise that there weren’t actually that many ideas in art, which at the time felt uncomfortably pretentious. The further I progressed/regressed I came to realise he’d exaggerated wildly and that in fact there was only one idea in art; identity. The more time I spend on the planet, the more I’ve come to realise that in fact I was guilty of embellishment too. It wasn’t just the only idea in art, identity was the only idea in everything ever.
This is a little plug for my friend Matt from University (Click on the picture for more)
People have an in built propensity to fight for the ownership of a given subject or interest and they keep it so tightly clasped to their chest that no one else can share it with them, apart from the select few they believe to be of kindred spirit who reinforce their own persuasions. This is certainly true in my own experience within the spheres of football; and without question art. It’s no surprise that this happens with our personal interests because we all need an identity. When intellectualising football, art, whatever, by giving it its own special language, its own code, we define it, we give it its meaning which gives us our meaning and defines us. Our identities (our lives) are defined by the meaning we try and give to them. It’s a shame that we find that in some cases the most effective way of protecting our identity is in the form of thinly veiled bullying through snobbery, inverse or straight forward, or more commonly through a form of passive aggression.
Perversely, sharing, engaging with and discussing our interests with someone not of our ilk (perceived equal intellectual level, social strata, postcode etc), whose views appear in direct opposition to our own individual sensibilities on the subject would ultimately provide a much more enriching experience for everyone involved.
If you can work out how to do that successfully then please let me know.
Martin Creed has a personal message for United fans
p.s. Below is an example for me of when art is good…
An Oak Tree by Michael Craig-Martin in simple physical terms is a glass of water on a shelf with an accompanying text (an intrinsic part of the piece) explaining what the artist has achieved.
Here’s an edited version, highlighting the main points, I got off of Wikipedia (where else)…
“[…]I have changed the physical substance of the glass of water into that of an oak tree. I didn’t change its appearance. The actual oak tree is physically present, but in the form of a glass of water.It would no longer be accurate to call it a glass of water. One could call it anything one wished but that would not alter the fact that it is an oak tree”
The artist and spectator have to both invest belief equally in it for it to be successful and in that respect the message is universal, transcending the boundaries of the art institution, speaking to us all.
Another way of looking at it, if you’re not a fan of conceptual art, is with absolute disdain. You decide.
