Tate Modern, London, 11th October 2011-11th March 2012
Congratulations, you’ve made a screensaver twenty meters high. Even I find it impossible to be annoyed by something so incredibly banal and devoid of either artistic merit or any meaningful entry points for intelligent discussion. It would be like reviewing the blobs in a lava lamp. I’ll restrict myself to being annoyed by the massive screed that Dean has unloaded, in which she self-righteously informs us of how long and how hard she has slaved for us at the coalface of Proper Film Making:
“I cut my films on a Steenbeck cutting table. I always work alone. I physically splice the print and stick it together with tape… film is my working material and I need the stuff of film like a painter needs the stuff of paint. So I chose to make an experimental 35mm film inside the camera, and so revive spontaneity and risk. I wanted to show film as film can be, and use no post-production other than my normal editing process and the grading that happens in the lab.”
[Tacita Dean, text accompanying 'Film', also available as a leaflet]
Let’s try reversing this statement: “I paint my paintings on a canvas. I paint all my paintings myself. I physically brush on the paint and allow it to dry. Paint is my working material and I need the stuff of paint like Tacita Dean needs to congratulate herself. So I chose to make an experimental painting on the canvas, and so revive spontaneity and risk. I wanted to show painting as painting can be, and use no post-production other than my normal varnishing process.”
Yes, this sounds pompous, redundant and stupid. You could substitute almost any medium other than film and it would sound stupid. It’s a bit like listening to a postman tell you in detail how all your letters got sorted yesterday before he’ll agree to hand them over. It’s not a relevant or helpful form of information or dialogue with you. You’d just think: OK… what do you want from me, a medal?
Use whatever medium you like, but just get on with it. Don’t smug us to death because you’ve chosen to work with something difficult and virtually obsolete, as if that makes it (or you) inherently interesting or valuable. Doing this is a weird application of the Puritan work ethic to the making of art, as if personal or artistic merit is automatically earned through the (in this case self-imposed) hardship of making it. Obviously it’s a serious blow if you’ve been relying on a medium or a product for your work and it goes away, as Dean’s beloved film is doing, but to me that just reinforces the lesson that an artist’s work should be about the ideas, the quality and the content and not just about the side effects or physical limitations of your medium. If the reason for your work and your ability to make your work entirely goes away when the medium does, or if you fear that it might, then to me that doesn’t speak very well of your integrity or creativity as an artist.
By the way, I placed every pixel of this post individually by writing a unique computer program in pure binary code stored on a specially commissioned solid state silicon wafer. The completed blog was then transmitted via my own private, local offshoot of the internet that I built myself out of copper wire and lolly sticks. I have personally inspected every photon that is entering your eye, why doesn’t anybody else do that these days? I didn’t mine and refine the copper ore myself, though, or make it into wire. Sorry about that.
PS: I have a hilarious anecdote based on generally unknown information about Tacita Dean which is too bad even for this site, mainly because it also involves other people who don’t deserve to be publicly drawn into it. If you ever meet me, ask me about it…
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Tags: art speak, artbollocks, artist statements, baffling, DISAPPROVED, doing it wrong, GTFO, lazy, London, nonsense, status anxiety, Tate, video installation
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