The joy of chastening, charming

[imomus]

This is a podcast about a podcast, a voice on a voice, criticism about criticism. It's my response to Guardian art critic Adrian Searle's recent series of podcasts, my investigation into his investigations, my whisperings about his whisperings, and what it is about his voice that makes me want to link Searle to David Toop and a certain late, laidback television landscape painter.



The joy of podcasting (stereo mp3 file, 15.1MB, 16 mins 26 secs)

My little talk is a reflection on the grain of the voice, and what happens when people seduce and repel at the same time "as a sort of strategy". I'm rather fascinated by jobs which require you both to chasten and charm, and I'm intrigued when people who usually do one start doing the other.

Comments

[cap-scaleman.livejournal.com]

Pink eyepatch! You've flipped that avatar in Photoshop (or similar) haven't you?

[imomus.livejournal.com]

It's not so much that I've flipped it in Photoshop as that I haven't flipped it in Photoshop. It was taken with Photo Booth, which initially gives you a mirror image.

[cap-scaleman.livejournal.com]

Oh, yeah, that is right. You happen to have better and fresher technology than I have.

[rhodri.livejournal.com]

I've always been very attracted to softly spoken people, and I'm always appalled when I realise that I'm exactly the opposite.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Yes, I instantly trust something said or sung to me in a quiet voice, like this song by Tunng:

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But I trust it even more if (as here, where the song is sung from beyond the grave by a suicide) it becomes clear that I'm not supposed to trust it.

[god-jr.livejournal.com]

for a second i had reservations of having to listen to today's post. not sure why, perhaps i'm just that much of a creature of habit. anyway, i did listen and discovered with pleasure that i could leave the computer and actually work (draw) at the same time. i can't agree with the idea that whispering is charming. having listened now to three whisperers on your pod cast, the experience verged on creepy, especially as i had to work a couple of times to figure out who was whispering. i think throwing in a whisper now and then could have great effect, but if everything you say is in a whisper you could come off as sneaky/dishonest: the opposite of charming. the words themselves (your subjects) did interest me, since i've just been asked to start writing art reviews. i don't think i'll be working often enough to make enemies, but i suppose that is the occupational hazard.

R.E. Jenny

[thomascott.livejournal.com]

I like that; sweet, serene...and chilling.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Glad you could get some drawing done while listening!

I wasn't entirely saying that whispering is charming, rather that it both charms and chills, attracts and repels, lulls into trust and makes the whisperee vigilant.

I've actually found it extremely hard to get the staff in the art galleries hosting A Spoken Word Exhibition to whisper. It seems to be breaking some personal or professional code of conduct to get that intimate with a stranger, and the ambivalence of the gesture (its sexiness and intimacy) makes people who work in galleries very uncomfortable.

I exempt Prague from this, because I haven't yet sent any spies to the Prague gallery to see how they're doing it. But in London and New York the gallery staff just wouldn't do it. They spoke the phrases aloud, from a distance.

The more I learn that whispering in galleries is taboo and impossible, the more I want to do whispering in galleries. It "hasn't been done". Not properly.

[god-jr.livejournal.com]

then do go for it.
i agree. galleries should be challenged on all fronts!
right now i am attempting a new series of drawings which i set the rules as to HOW they are sold (the who and at what price). so far i'm gettin away with it, i suppose because it becomes "part of the work."

it would of course be more taboo to dictate how the gallery sells all the work by all the artists they represent. but my name doesn't wield that sort of power.

as you can imagine, having trouble getting people to simply whisper, the artist has little say what happens with work once it is in the white cube. a constant complaint i hear from video artists is that, after the opening, the sound is always turned to near silence. in other words: a whisper is enforced. ironic then that they can't be bothered to turn their own voices down.

and you're right to call me on my simple reading, um, i mean listening, to your pod cast. the down side was that i did not hear everything. when reading i can pause when i want to think over on what you've written. when you set the pace by talking, i'm less likely to get up and replay a bit that might have been said while i was thinking on something said before it.

[(Anonymous)]

In real life, I find everyone talks too much and too loud. But I don't mind it in songs. I like the idea of introversion liberated rather than perpetuated by creativity. Apparently Finns are quiet, and think nothing of sitting in a bar saying absolutely nothing, then going home. Bliss.

Moleskin

[(Anonymous)]

There's a row of Searles in Highgate cemetery. Practically an enclave of them. Perhaps because of this I always picture Adrian Searle living in an dilapidated ivy-covered house with a slightly dotty aunt.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Japanese are like that too. I mean, they can be the noisiest people on earth (Shibuya restaurants at the weekend!). But at home they can happily sit in silence, or fall asleep on the floor in the middle of a meal. Couples don't yammer and natter endlessly to each other -- there's no reproach for a half hour of silence. It's not a sign that something's wrong.

Re: Moleskin

[imomus.livejournal.com]

There's a semantic proximity, too, between this phrase "moleskin jazz" which Searle prompted in my head and Molesworth, the character drawn by Ronald Searle. No relation, presumably.

[butterflyrobert.livejournal.com]

"Silence is golden"

[kaipfeiffer.livejournal.com]

or maybe the problem is that you force gallery staff to endorse your art by participating in it, instead of just doing their job, and maybe they try to maintain a minimum of distance to your piece of art by not getting to invested in executing the performance they are made to deliver?

The quietude of quiet

[thomascott.livejournal.com]

I can relate to that, whilst I'm certainly forthcoming with my opinions and ideas, with my closest friends and my partner Ruth I don't feel the need for space-filling small-talk.
I'm always been a little puzzled by people who fear silence and must, must have small-talk/gossip/radio-noise to fill that void.

[kaipfeiffer.livejournal.com]

meaning: maybe you need whisperers to do the whispering, instead of staff members, who also don't paint the paintings they prevent you from touching.

[imomus.livejournal.com]

Oh, yes, if you want something done well, do it yourself.

I have to do a tour of the South Bank in June, transforming London into Tokyo. Maybe I'll do it whispering.

(PS: Have you seen the Biennial yet, Kai?)

[idletigers.wordpress.com (from livejournal.com)]

I wondered what you might think of David Toop. There's a similar thing to what you're describing going on in his more recent book Haunted Weather -- the writing is more or less atmospheric, in the very real sense. But then the musics that he's discussing there more specifically exemplify the split between voice and body that you gesture towards.

Ross

[kaipfeiffer.livejournal.com]

i can imagine you being a great whisperer; can't leave that to the stage hands!

no, haven't been to the biennale yet, but i will definitely go see it (also, we will be teaching a workshop here with art students from vienna beginning of may, a nice opportunity for a second look together with the youngsters. since we will teach drawing as reportage, maybe we have them report from the biennale. or, have them find a parallel, readymade/imagined biennale on the berlin streets, since their professor teaches "art in public spaces".)

[kaipfeiffer.livejournal.com]

any thoughts of yours already on the biennale?

[fishwithissues.livejournal.com]

have you heard whisper rap?

[fishwithissues.livejournal.com]

although i don't get the impression the ying yang twins were at all nervous about people hearing them in the other room as they recorded, which is probably related to the appeal you're talking about.

mezmeric

[count-vronsky.livejournal.com]

A) I could and will listen to this and the Alice clip from yesterday always. *chrisostomomus

B) Your BMW C1 ad from yesterday is a simple pastiche, a mash-up of an old Buster Keaton gag where he runs into the middle of the road, in front of the oncoming headlights, in a fit of suicidal despair and is passed on either side by motorcycles. And Jenny Holzer truisms. I'm all for cross-culti pollination, but a tip of the hat to the yanks is due I think.

First monocle then moleskine? Are you trying to sell us something?

whisper


then shout

[imomus.livejournal.com]

The Skulpturenpark is a waste of time (especially in the rain) -- the art there is holes, trees, a tent, a snacks van, a little circle of junk and a couple of signs, as far as I could see.

The KW show is like a good KW show -- I liked Sung Hwan Kim's video best. The atrium is paved with bitumen, which makes a nice tarry smell. The loft installation by Tris Vonna-Michell (a project on Detroit) is atmospheric, with old slide projectors and audio installations. Kohei Yoshiyuki's "sex in the park" candid camera stuff is interesting, but I'd just seen it all in a book at ProQM an hour before. Overall, the KW show is quiet and oblique, but in a good way, a rather Documenta-ish way, I thought.

I still have to see the Neue Nationalgalerie part, including a sculptural installation by my friend Thea Djordjadze (seen here (http://www.studiovoltaire.org/images/andreas-thea-stage.jpg1.jpg) in concert with her husband, Andreas from Kreidler).

Mitte's really buzzy just now. I've seen Nick Serota twice!

[kaipfeiffer.livejournal.com]

ok, that reads like i can see the skulpturenpark anywhere, but i'll check the rest.
thanks for the survey!
while right now i'm sitting at home writing/scribbling, missing all the glamour:
dude, i'm, like, so not where it's happening?!

appart from the subject

[(Anonymous)]

this is yuly from madrid, i wrote you once. this time is to sent you a link which posted about japanese architecture. i thought you might find it interesting http://www.spoon-tamago.com/ thank you and best regards to hisae as well. i found her great

softspoken

[pay-option07.livejournal.com]

Your bang on with intimacy, trust, and sofspeak. About all those beige palettes of Brit social landscapes bubbling up in thought and intonations is all a pleasant mystery to me as is eastern thought. You have got your hands/head full on this one.

[microworlds.livejournal.com]

You know, being a relatively quiet person in real life, I hate when I'm with a group of people and they condescendingly ask "why don't you talk?" Like that's going to get me to speak up! I only speak up when I feel like it, sometimes I just feel like conversations about drinking and getting high aren't intellectually stimulating and so I tune out into my own little world of happiness and excitement. So while they're talking about partying, I'm thinking of Howard Devoto!

But of course, the things I find exciting may be terribly boring to other people, and vice versa. Now, if only I could find people irl who have HEARD of Howard Devoto, I most likely would die of excitement.

[microworlds.livejournal.com]

what happens when people seduce and repel at the same time

Which is what attracts me to this blog every day. :(