The awkward question about art
By Hamish Coney,
Art isn’t easily measured, but it can pack a mighty wallop
[Art]
I was blindsided by a straightforward question recently. I’d been flushed out of my art cave and into the open plains of a business function. There, cornered by a well-lubricated business type, I was asked a seemingly innocuous question—something along the lines of “What does art actually do?” or “How do you measure the success of art?”
As they say in the art world, context is everything, which is my only defence for a shambling and pretty hopeless answer. The function was one of these celebratory shindigs where goal-setters celebrate being goal-getters. In this context, my blathering about intangibles and cultural dividends sounded like a load of old toss and my corporate interrogator’s eyes glazed over as his worst suspicions about the freeloading, impossible-to-measure arts sector were confirmed. (He was at least half right as I had no idea why I was at the function other than a mate had asked me, dangling free grog as failsafe bait.)
The least I could have done in return for a few gratis glasses of pinot was to engage tomorrow’s titan in something resembling intelligent conversation for a while. Alas, I failed. As is the case with these sorts of social meltdowns I came up with a brilliant response about two days later. So here it is.
The good readers of Idealog are used to measuring creative success on a regular basis. Ads that flog product, win awards and generate a bit of industry buzz are winners without question. A filmmaker’s measure is bums on seats and so it goes. The makers will argue that all sorts of other stuff is in play, but they know if their creative product doesn’t register on the dollar meter they may not get another chance.
Peter Madden, Installation detail: Escape From Orchid City. Courtesy the artist and Michael Lett, Auckland
Like any good presentation I’m going to use a visual aid, in this case Peter Madden’s dazzling recent show at the City Gallery in Wellington, Escape from Orchid City. This superb exhibition will assist me in making the case for art.
Imagine a dimly-lit room about the size of a school classroom, walls painted black, filled with a variety of museum-type cabinets and lower tables. As your eyes become accustomed to the gloom you peer around and begin to see Madden’s delicate collages and sculptures in the cabinets or sprouting like fungus from cracks in walls.
These cabinets contain Madden’s middens. His assemblages are a riot of colour as all the component parts are cut from a bewildering variety of magazine sources: old National Geographic magazines, gardening mags and some of the tasty bits from Vogue go into the blender and out pop moving meditations on mortality, species diversity and the sheer phantasmagorical nature of life on planet Earth.
Mixed in with the artworks is a large selection of stuffed huia, some posed grimly and permanently dead, others carefully arranged to look like a snapshot in a forest glen before Mr Buller and his mates hunted them to extinction.
It’s a show that packs a mighty wallop. The audacity of the inclusion of the prized but sadly departed huia is a mournful counterpoint to Madden’s delicate visual poetry. Just imagine how wonderful it would be to see a huia in the wild; how sad that we cannot. Madden’s artful argument for the protection of Mother Earth does just what art is meant to do. It works on the heart and the head. Long after a great business has sold its last product, a great artwork is telling you something you need to know.
That’s what the best art does. It works hard forever. Just ask the ticket collector at the Sistine Chapel.
Comments
Jason Kemp
This might also be a line to remember "When I make art, I think about its ability to connect with others, to bring them into the process." Jim Hodges.
I'm not sure art needs apologists. If some people don't "get it" then they need to ask themselves how they got that way. Art is part of creativity.
That show you mentioned wouldn't reasonate with everyone - meaning and context is important.
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