CONVERSATION WITH AN ARTIST

Following the excellent Twenty Twelve on BBC4 last night, which has caused a small amount of introspection among colleagues, I have been reminded of an occasion that has been repeated many times over in my career. In particular the misconceived clock and conversations surrounding its creation and eventual display.

I am not represented by any of these fine actors

The Context.

In my daily life I have to, occasionally, take an artist’s vision, words or imagery and convert it into some copy that the rest of us can understand or show some relevance to the festival or performance that it forms part of.

I then have to go and sell it to the world's media and mostly first time audiences, people who would usually be scared off by all the bullshit that is so frequently wrapped around art so that the art elite can sit in judgement of everyone who 'doesn't get it'. This is my professional and personal crusade, to strip away bullshit and make sure people are comfortable with attending whatever they want and not be bullied into any specific reactions or false notions of art in the broadest sense. All art can be engaged with on any level.

The conversation.

Many many years ago I had, how shall I put it, a curious conversation with an artist that was representing a collective who had created a site-specific piece intended for ‘families to explore the nature of fairy tales through interaction and immersive theatrical experience’ – or as I would call it, something you walk through while actors make you unbelievably uncomfortable and scare your children. Any apparent misogyny on my part is not intentional, this is purely relating to the art and not the the social context. Here was the conversation:

Me: Hello, you must be Jane (name obviously not the real one), I am Simon. Can we talk about your piece so that I can put some copy together for PR and marketing?
Jane: Yes, I am. You realise that I don’t usually talk to men? (cold face, not actually looking at me)
Me: (nervous laugh) Oh really, you must be missing about 50% of the best conversations (idiot).
Jane: (silence)
Me: So tell me about your work.
Jane: It is not something that words can describe, it is something that needs to be experienced.
Me: OK, but in order to get people to experience it, it would be great to be able to sum it up in some way, tease the audience with what they might be seeing (stupidly over enthusiastic and nice).
Jane: But I don’t want it represented in a way that doesn’t represent it. (cold face, still not actually looking at me)
Me: Umm… yes, this is why we are talking about it now.
Jane: How do I know you understand what we are trying to do, you are a man?
Me: Well, I think the first step is to tell me what you are trying to do. (remarkably upbeat, considering)
Jane: (silence)
Me: So?
Jane: (launches into a rapid fire ACE application style description of what they plan) We see the role of women in European fairy tales damaged by the historical patriarchal dominance in authorship and publishing (so far so good). We aim to redress the balance through a series of female signifiers so that the theatrical semiotics are once again under the ownership of the correct gender, the gender that created the stories to provide a direct guardianship of grandmother, mother and daughter (again, I understand – am now thinking how do I convert this into copy to attract families).
Me: What kind of signifiers will you be using, are we looking at Red Riding Hood, with emphasis on the [folk] traditions, uses colour, moon, the kind of flora that suggests different aspects of femininity (I am bluffing a little here but I think I have pulled it off).
Jane: No.
Me: Oh.
Jane: Well that is a bit obvious isn’t it?
Me: Oh OK, but you said it was for families (said nicely trying to hint that highbrow is fine but different entry levels for different audiences is always helpful).
Jane: I have some images that may help explain it (she still hasn’t actually looked at me)
Me: Great! (could have shown these at the beginning of the conversation)


At this point three images were placed in front of me.


One labelled, The Gateway.
This consisted of two men (yeah I know, irony is a funny thing) basically dressed as the two halves of a vagina, making the shape of said body part for people to step through.

This is North Carolina - it rhymes with vagina

Two labelled, The Journey.
This was a series of artist impressions of, again, vaginas, only this time as trees, for the audience to wander through.

A forest - all you have to do is image these trees as vaginas. I can't un-imagine this now.

Three labelled, The Characters.
A hairy naked man with a large phallus, and a hairy naked woman.

This is hair. Imagine this all over a naked man and a naked woman. Or don't. I wouldn't.

Three things stick in my mind, Families, ‘Well that is a bit obvious isn’t it?’, Relief.

The work never saw the light of day.