Arty explanations

I've always been fascinated by those explanatory panels beside artworks in galleries. When I was younger I liked landscapes.  I liked pictures of mountains, lakes, rivers, villages, and cottage gardens. I was keen on animals too - even fields of cows held my interest - but people bored me. I used to avoid the halls of stuffy portraits of primped up posers in dark suits and darker oils, or (less frequently) women in layers of frills and nonsense, always with sour expressions and sallow complexions.

But at least I knew what they were. The abstract art confused me. People didn't have multiple noses and dozens of eyes; they weren't made out of cubes. I was completely impervious to wibbly blue lines on yellow backgrounds, or random dots and geometric shapes. Surely, if you had to describe and explain it; it wasn't art.

And then I began to understand how words can narrate more intimate pictures than paint or pencil, and I began to appreciate the fine art of criticism. Analogies are drawn and connections made. I don't believe a picture is worth a thousand words - I feel that words and pictures can exist harmoniously, each adding value to the other. Incidentally, the BBC TV programme Words and Pictures began the year I was born, was a feature of my childhood education, and my introduction to the magnificent (Sir) Tony Robinson - long before he was Baldrick. 

At one point I wanted to be a curator. I wanted to be the person who put exhibitions together and wrote the blurb that went with them. What a wonderful creative outlet, I thought. I later discovered that the job was far more orientated towards filling in forms, applying for grants and fundraising, than being creative with writing and interpretation, so I gave up on that idea. I do, however, retain the greatest respect for those who provide the words for those little white cards, which in turn provide the insight into a piece of otherwise indecipherable art.

For example, this piece of art is made from a wood table, chewing gum and resin cast. It is an oval mosaic of a bearded bloke, with a slightly unusual back board. It is called Egghead and it is by Sean Healey. It is okay, but I wasn't particularly drawn to it. 

Egghead by Sean Healey

And then I read the reasoning, which explains that the cameo is a portrait of Melville Dewey, inventor of the Dewey decimal system used to classify books and other publications. It is constructed from over fifty pieces of chewing gum, chewed by Healey and his son and coated in resin. These fragments of the whole are then placed on the bottom of a repurposed school library table. The curator elucidates that the artwork "explores the rationales of social power structures. Healey's process-orientated installation work is infused by pop culture and the urban environment." He or she adds that the materials used and the placement thereof is "a nod to youthful defiance yet ironically requires much strategy and intelligence".

Suddenly I like the piece more, and have a greater appreciation for its subversive message and its ironic intent. Without these words, I would not have recognised the full implications of the work. So, do we need these statements to justify the art? Or is it mere pretension and aggrandisment? What do you think?

Detail of Egghead by Sean Healy

Friday Five: Things Found in Books

Because of a (self-imposed and not very strictly enforced) ban on buying any more books until we have decided that we are never moving again and I haven't got to cart boxes of them around the world, I have been borrowing a lot of books from the local library.

I love libraries. I love the thought of sharing literature and information and the wonderful joy of reading. You can get so much from a book. You can learn about new worlds and introduce yourself to new ideas, or you can escape into comfortable and familiar narratives or even just look at the pictures as you turn the pages.

Yes, indeed, libraries are a wonderful invention and have been going strong for almost 5,000 years. That's pretty impressive.

However, on a more prosaic level, there are some things I have found in these borrowed books that have not entirely thrilled me. Although finding someone else's shopping list or scribbled notes to self doesn't bother me at all (and, in fact, can be quite interesting), I would just like to put out a plea here for people to return books in the state in which they would like to find them, or at the very least, try to make sure they don't contain any of the following:

5 Things Found in Library Books:

1. Sand - we all know that the stuff gets everywhere, and you can accept that when you've had a nice holiday by the beach. But when you haven't, and you still end up with gritty little particles all over the sheets, it can be annoying.
2. Dead insects - probably preferrable to live insects, but still... I suspect one recent volume I borrowed (The Timeless Land by Eleanor Dark, since you ask) was deliberately used to squish mosquitoes.
3. Food - particularly tomato pips for some reason, and unidentifiable sauces - at least I like to think they're sauces, otherwise I would recoil in horror.
4. Lists of today's checked-out items - they contain your name, membership number and other personal details. I'm not interested in stealing your identity, but others may not be quite so scrupulous.
5. Hair - mainly (but by no means exclusively) from the head.

Quiet Zones

I am sitting in the library trying to work. Until our internet connection is established at home, this is the only place I can do so. And yet I am struggling, because of the deafening screams of children. Yes, that’s right, in the library.

There is a glass rectangle marked ‘quiet zone’. It looks like some sort of modern art installation or version of a torture chamber where prisoners are contained in the see-through cage with the sun beating down. It is opposite the ‘play area’ and it is not sound-proofed. It is deafening, and my idea of hell.

Inevitably questions arise: Why is there a ‘play area’ in a library? I understand the need to introduce children to the wonderful world of reading and even for the horror that is story-time, but why isn’t this separate, maybe in a windowless basement? Shouldn’t these children (and their parents) also be taught the need to respect others; for their privacy and their desire for silence? To read or study (and this library is next-door to a large college) in peace?

It’s no secret that two of my favourite things in life are books and beer/ wine. It follows, therefore, that two of my favourite activities are reading and drinking, and by logical consequence that two of my favourite locations should be libraries and pubs. Until recently, this was indeed so. Now they are all but ruined by children.

Okay, so I know that people think I don’t like children. This isn’t true. What I dislike intensely is rude and inconsiderate behaviour by people of any age. Children appear to display this more and more frequently with the tacit (and often open) approval of their parents. If you don’t believe me, just try complaining when a child shrieks in your ear as you try to type in the library or runs into you and spills your pint in the pub.

Certain areas should have designated behaviours. I wouldn’t go to a park and be annoyed by children squealing on the swings. Noisy participation is all to be encouraged at a Wiggles concert. Brightly-coloured plastic toys and high-pitched appreciation of rubber food are what I would expect at fast-food outlets. And as far as I’m concerned you can do pretty much whatever you want in your own home.

But please, just stay out of my space. And if we really have to interact in it, can we do so by the rules? Quietly? I’m not alone in this. The poor young woman opposite me, who has been trying to study, has given up and packed up her books to go somewhere more peaceful – the airport, perhaps. She sighed as she departed and wished me good luck, before suggesting I should invest in a pair of headphones if I wanted any silence in the library. Good advice, perhaps, but should I really have to?

Belated Birthday Wishes

I am snatching an hour in the local library to post on my blog. I couldn't become a member of the library until I had some bill or something addressed to me in ACT that I could use as proof of residence. I haven't got a landline or a mobile phone yet, nor are we connected to the internet at home, so I am unable to contact people in any way other than post. This feels quite isolated.

Anyway, I have now finally got a bank account and received mail from the bank, so am able to join the library and log on - for one hour per day. This is my first day and I have got so many things I need to look up (such as what day the rubbish collection is, and what are we allowed to put in our recycle bins, and where is there a laundrette in this town as we are running out of clean clothes!) but I thought I would just leap on here and post a message to all my lovely friends and family to let them know that we are well and everything is okay.

I also know that I have missed several birthdays in transit and want you all to know that I am thinking of you and will get round to sending the cards and birthday messages as soon as I get a little bit more sorted (all my stationery is packed in the container!). I shall leave you with this sage sentiment:

"Birthdays are good for you. Statistics show that people who have the most live the longest!" - Larry Lorenzoni

The tyranny of book lists

The Telegraph has released a list of 100 books that defined the noughties. It's interesting. It doesn't claim these are the best books written in the past decade; just the ones that have had the most impact on the book-reading (and even non-book-reading) populace.

Top of the list is J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - fair enough. The publishing world would certainly be a different place if it weren't for the boy wizard. As the author of the piece, Brian MacArthur notes, "If you don’t know what a Muggle is by now, you’re either Rip van Winkle or enormously stubborn."

He also points out the influence of the Richard and Judy book club (the 100 titles they selected sold 30 million copies), the politics of the Blair years, and the impact of the war on terrorism and the resulting conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. It was the decade of the rise of the non-celebrity (Jade Goody) and the runaway best-seller (Dan Brown).

Of course, there are the usual spurious splutters of indignation from the faux-literati; "Can't believe you've not included..."; "Don't make me laugh"; "I'm not being a snob, but..."; "Are these things written to reflect the vox populai?"; "A list to give any aspiring writer who still has a clean conscience a lifelong stomach ache. Filled with trivia, morbidity, and sheer horror."; "You missed..." These from people who clearly didn't get the point of the article.

And MacArthur writes well - how about this description of Speaking for Myself by Cherie Blair - "Prime Minister’s wife turns into Lady Macbeth. The rest of the country cringes." - this one of Eats, Shoots and Leaves by Lynne Truss - "Bossy, humorous punctuation primer that taught us to love the semicolon." - or this of The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold - "Grim, grim grim: teenage girl is raped and murdered, and watches her family from heaven. Everyone loved it."

Naturally, being a list-loving Libran, the first thing I did was see how many books on the list I have actually read (14), how many are on my bookshelves waiting to be read (14) and how many others I might actually read having seen this list (19).

I say I love lists, but actually they tyrannise me. When I see such a list, I feel compelled to somehow validate myself by measuring up to it. And I end up buying more books. Every time we move house, we cart boxes and boxes of my books from place to place and yet I still buy more and go regularly to the library. It's a serious addiction.

I realised recently that even if I never buy another book and live to an average life expectancy, I won't be able to read all the books I own. It was a sobering thought. And yet I still buy them. I blame the reviews and the lists which point out failings in my literary knowledge. I think perhaps I need help.

Susan Hill has the same problem as me, but she is famous, so she has written a book about it. In Howard's End is on the Landing she describes how she eschewed bookshops for a year and only read books from her own bookshelves. She came up with a list of 40 books that "I think I could manage with alone, for the rest of my life". I don't think I need to read this list as it would only put more pressure on me.

Also, despite assurances that the book is "charming", I'm really not sure that I could cope with the envy sure to ensue from reading descriptions of cosy farmhouse life snug around the aga in the sumptuous kitchen while her Shakespearean scholar husband (I didn't know she was married to Stanley Wells) potters about in the background. They're bound to have a big ginger cat too.

Anyway, I have my own system. It's not exactly fool-proof, but it sort of works, and I do work my way through several of my volumes. I'll tell you about it in another post. Meanwhile, I've got some books to return to the library...