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imomusWell, now, see, here's a thing. A thing to be. A thing that's happened to me. I'm to be a curator. I'm to go to Japan. A curator's a man who chooses what goes in an exhibition. I'll go there and feast my eyes. And come back and evangelize. In England.
Here's how it all began. There was a man. His name was Nick. Nick Slater had me on his radar. He reads Click Opera (hello, Nick!). He also runs an art project in Loughborough called Radar. There you are.
Now Loughborough (not a lot of people know this) is Britain's biggest university campus. And, as it happens, the uni there is well-equipped with sports facilities. They're all over the place -- pretty damned impressive. That -- not the Toyota plant at Burnaston, though that's massive -- is why the Japanese team chose it as their base for training for the 2012 Olympics. So here's the plan; here's where the art fits. While they're there, the Japanese Olympic team, training in the rain, jogging in the cold, slogging for gold, we'll be training brains with cultural campaigns. We'll be pumping England's heart full of Japanese art.
It won't be art about sport. Don't make me snort, son! Don't be heretical! Culture's complementary, dialectical. Here's the title: AFTERGOLD. Every curator needs a concept, a catch-all, theme, meme, something to hold. That's mine: the AFTERGOLD. What's in a name? What book is dressed up in this gold lamé jacket? Let me explain. Let's unpack it.
Whatever you're after -- gold medals, gold coins -- there's going to be a time after, right? That's as clear as day follows night. When the competition's over, when you've won, your javelin didn't put out the sun, right? That's elementary. There'll be another day, a different you, another thing to do. That thing might be celebration, sure, or some new you consumed by a stranger, subtler lust than winning. It might be some new project, some new beginning. Do you see what I mean, mate? Where this is going, mate? It's about what happens after the win. Stick that in your pipe, mate, and curate it!
This is where we have to get historical. Pardon me while I wax metaphorical. Britain and Japan are both nations that have won at life. They made it, they scored the gold, they arrived. They're on the podium, by money, by GDP. They got there, but -- don't stop me, I'm just getting into my stride -- they didn't stop there. It can't be denied: something must come after gold. Not just the golden years depicted by Miwa Yanagi in "My Grandmothers", those chicks with silver hair. No, something else, some bigger fever must take hold. The time, the state of mind, they call "the AFTERGOLD".
Post-gold means post-bling. Post-materialist, by any other name. It's not that money doesn't mean a thing -- it does. It's that determining the things that matter after money matters is what culture's -- in all senses -- all about. It's then -- the big ambition and the big expenses set aside -- that all the interesting questions arrive. Who am I? What does all this signify? Who are we, the national tribe alongside whom I strive? What makes this life worth living, beyond the win we deem worth winning? And how do you close car doors?
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It's the big question for contemporary art: what are we, who are we, what now? Some "thing" just happened, see, and now the me I knew is no longer the same me anyhow. That "thing" may be success, or some catastrophic big financial crisis. It may just be the slow tick tock of history, whose hands traverse the track of a great atomic clock. Within the art world, think of Superflat. It blew up big, defined a certain sort of Japaneseness for a while. But what came after that? Where do we draw the line, to Micropop? Or the Kotatsu School? Or did art stop?
No, art can never stop. Contemporary Japanese art cannot wither, gather moss, grow old. I hope to show what happens next, and what matters most... in the AFTERGOLD.
Here's how it all began. There was a man. His name was Nick. Nick Slater had me on his radar. He reads Click Opera (hello, Nick!). He also runs an art project in Loughborough called Radar. There you are.Now Loughborough (not a lot of people know this) is Britain's biggest university campus. And, as it happens, the uni there is well-equipped with sports facilities. They're all over the place -- pretty damned impressive. That -- not the Toyota plant at Burnaston, though that's massive -- is why the Japanese team chose it as their base for training for the 2012 Olympics. So here's the plan; here's where the art fits. While they're there, the Japanese Olympic team, training in the rain, jogging in the cold, slogging for gold, we'll be training brains with cultural campaigns. We'll be pumping England's heart full of Japanese art.
It won't be art about sport. Don't make me snort, son! Don't be heretical! Culture's complementary, dialectical. Here's the title: AFTERGOLD. Every curator needs a concept, a catch-all, theme, meme, something to hold. That's mine: the AFTERGOLD. What's in a name? What book is dressed up in this gold lamé jacket? Let me explain. Let's unpack it.
Whatever you're after -- gold medals, gold coins -- there's going to be a time after, right? That's as clear as day follows night. When the competition's over, when you've won, your javelin didn't put out the sun, right? That's elementary. There'll be another day, a different you, another thing to do. That thing might be celebration, sure, or some new you consumed by a stranger, subtler lust than winning. It might be some new project, some new beginning. Do you see what I mean, mate? Where this is going, mate? It's about what happens after the win. Stick that in your pipe, mate, and curate it!
This is where we have to get historical. Pardon me while I wax metaphorical. Britain and Japan are both nations that have won at life. They made it, they scored the gold, they arrived. They're on the podium, by money, by GDP. They got there, but -- don't stop me, I'm just getting into my stride -- they didn't stop there. It can't be denied: something must come after gold. Not just the golden years depicted by Miwa Yanagi in "My Grandmothers", those chicks with silver hair. No, something else, some bigger fever must take hold. The time, the state of mind, they call "the AFTERGOLD". Post-gold means post-bling. Post-materialist, by any other name. It's not that money doesn't mean a thing -- it does. It's that determining the things that matter after money matters is what culture's -- in all senses -- all about. It's then -- the big ambition and the big expenses set aside -- that all the interesting questions arrive. Who am I? What does all this signify? Who are we, the national tribe alongside whom I strive? What makes this life worth living, beyond the win we deem worth winning? And how do you close car doors?
[Error: unknown template video]
It's the big question for contemporary art: what are we, who are we, what now? Some "thing" just happened, see, and now the me I knew is no longer the same me anyhow. That "thing" may be success, or some catastrophic big financial crisis. It may just be the slow tick tock of history, whose hands traverse the track of a great atomic clock. Within the art world, think of Superflat. It blew up big, defined a certain sort of Japaneseness for a while. But what came after that? Where do we draw the line, to Micropop? Or the Kotatsu School? Or did art stop?
No, art can never stop. Contemporary Japanese art cannot wither, gather moss, grow old. I hope to show what happens next, and what matters most... in the AFTERGOLD.
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(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 12:21 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 01:07 am (UTC)Tell me. Who are you? And how did you manage to get so completely inside my head?
(Of course, I apologize if we've had this conversation before. I have the memory of a goldfish.) Where has click opera been all my life? xoxo 'Elle
(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 01:12 am (UTC)"The storm had now definitely abated, and what thunder there was now grumbled over more distant hills, like a man saying "And another thing…" twenty minutes after admitting he's lost the argument."
(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 02:09 am (UTC)The whole thing sounds ridiculously exciting and fun (not that it won't be hard work).
Look, Momus!
Date: 2009-08-05 03:35 am (UTC)http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bslnvltIALI&feature=PlayList&p=FEC454E538F8CE64&index=16
I imagine, however, that you gravely disapprove of the documentarian.
radar
Date: 2009-08-05 08:08 am (UTC),,ant
Re: Look, Momus!
Date: 2009-08-05 08:21 am (UTC)Re: radar
Date: 2009-08-05 08:22 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 08:23 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 08:26 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 08:30 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 08:59 am (UTC)[Error: unknown template video]
(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 04:07 pm (UTC)When you do mention sport, you often refer to it as all about winning. I might be overstating the case but it seems you frequently draw parallels between sport and the system of capital. It seems clear that aren't much interested in it yourself, which is fine, but does sport really seem to you to be an enemy?
(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 05:00 pm (UTC)Sports media often equate sports with physical exercise. Then they start to preach the virtues of sports, as if there was no other way of getting the benefits of exercise. But sports are only a *kind* of exercise. IMNSHO there are much more interesting alternatives for those of us with a naturally non-competitive temperament — dancing, yoga, parkour, traditional martial arts, hiking, backpacking, bicycle travels, urban exploring &c.
Btw, congrats to momus — it sounds like the perfect job for him.
Non Aftergold: Madonna
Date: 2009-08-05 05:01 pm (UTC)The young and ambitious must ask - if that is success, why bother?
Re: Look, Momus!
Date: 2009-08-05 05:03 pm (UTC)Anyway, The Ascent of Money (which I don't think was a BBC thing) is by the infamous Niall Ferguson:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Niall_Ferguson
(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 06:46 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 07:14 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 07:22 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 07:41 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 08:36 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 08:39 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 08:48 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 09:18 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 09:19 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 10:03 pm (UTC)I ended up going to Derby for some reason. Derby.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 10:05 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 10:09 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 10:12 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 10:27 pm (UTC)I should say, though, that this is only half my song. The entire instrumental backing is by Ken Morioka, this guy:
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Ken used to be in a band called Soft Ballet, and asked me to be a guest vocalist / composer on one track of his first solo album, Questions. It was produced by Dominic Brethes (http://www.netkonect.co.uk/w/wolfen/DominiqueBrethes.html), who used to be in a band called Schleimer K, who I'd heard on Peel and rather liked (they were somewhere between The Passage and Bauhaus):
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I recorded the vocals in a studio in Paris, where Ken was working on his album, in about 1993. Then I heard the finished version at Dominic's house in Brixton. Dominic was one of the first people I knew who had a Japanese girlfriend. Well, apart from myself, of course! I must've had the mono no aware concept described to me by my friend (not girlfriend) Chiharu Watabe, who guests on Summer Holiday 1999.
oh those hidden gems!
Date: 2009-08-05 10:32 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 10:37 pm (UTC)digiki
(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 11:03 pm (UTC)Re: oh those hidden gems!
Date: 2009-08-05 11:18 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-05 11:21 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-06 12:20 am (UTC)Well, as the Lord said to Moses, don't hide your light under a bushel! Give us a link to your work!
(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-06 01:56 am (UTC)You have to prove your worthy first, so far... not so good. One day my son one day.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-06 02:09 am (UTC)I've always been disappointed that I've been closed off to these sort of art worlds. It all feels very familiar.
perfect
Date: 2009-08-06 02:48 am (UTC)why do you hide?
because your grant ideals, still await you,
in a future perfect sort of way, in a possible world
that might never cum into existence.
(dont fret, just keep working, and remember
99% perspiration 1% inspiration)
hmmm?
Date: 2009-08-06 03:03 am (UTC)It both has honestly attempted to mimic ( copy, or steal, which ever word you feel is the best, and I do mean it in a positive sense) western 'Art' and to communicate and creat 'art' on their own terms.
In this light, I think Japanese artists use of "trad" arts can be more complex then whats on the immediate surface. I find japanese crafts (you cover this stuff on the regular on this LJ) a wonderful mix of objects that are art yet common.
And in general a lot of interesting art is focused specificly on crafts these days. anyways...
but yeah its not really 'trad' arts (....I know...)
How about Japanese artists living abroad? huh?
How about non-japanese artsits that live in japan
(Trevor Brown)... ; ) huh?
dude... you are going to put on a super cool show... I just know it.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-06 03:55 am (UTC)(Cue your "it's more legitimate because less people recognize it" routine.)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-08-06 11:58 am (UTC)