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Artbollocks with Anony Blue-rinsed Buddhist twerp, Gormless, has reached the point of seeking 2,400 fellow publicity seekers to stand on the fourth plinth for an hour each for a hundred days until October 10th. Subjects, it is reported, will be randomly selected. This is a lie, just like the ‘randomly selected’ vox pops you get on the BBC, which somehow always manage to locate the only Zulu in Southport. We suspect that Gormless’s latest stunt will launch a thousand pages of bollocks over the next few months, so, herewith, is the first of many to come. ìIt’s an artwork, there’s no question about it.î (We beg to differ on that point Mr Gormless, but do proceed.) ìBut the central question, in replacing bronze and stone with flesh, is what happens when life occupies the space of art? I have had an idea and asked the rest of the world to help me realise it. At that point I have to treat myself in the same manner as everyone else.î Meanwhile Boris Johnson, who spoke with fingers and toes crossed, explained: ìIt’s going to be a brilliant case of people coming to art and art coming to the people as people become the art.î And do you know what, you couldn’t see his anus even twitch when he said it. Gormless bounced back: ìThere will be those self-selecting exhibitionists that have been burning to communicate their acts or words but there will be others who are just representing themselves or their communities. There will be those people who hold dearly prejudicial views but these voices will be qualified by other acts and voices. The idea is to immortalise the debates of our time.î ìThis is, in a way, a process of democratisation, where people are not being judged. It is very, very important that they are not judged on what they might do, how they might perform, or their ethnicity. The only criterion is that we want it to be a portrait of Britain now, and want people from all over Britain to participate.î ìThe safety net is obviously important as a safety device, but it’s also important in terms of talking about the vulnerability and exposure of the person at the top – this idea that you are alone in a very public place, really exposed and, therefore, in danger, not simply from the fact that you are eight metres above the ground, but also, perhaps, from what others might do to you. It feels like a basketball net or a trampoline, but it’s also a fence. ìIt’s the making of a piece of sculpture in time. It’s asking fairly fundamental questions about who can make art and how it can be made, who can participate in it, and important questions about representation. What I’m hoping is that this will tell us something we don’t already know about what people think and feel about being alive now.î ìI think the issue of incarnation, of embodiment, is the fundamental conundrum. We are minds embedded in bodies, or we are bodies that have become reflective, and who we are and what we are remains a huge question – an exciting question. What I offer is simply a trace of where a body once was. It’s not an interpretation, it’s an index... Buddhism is really practical, very practical. It helps. It’s about facing the fact of being, in a very direct way, and I think it’s an alternative form of knowledge that is not about the ingestion of facts and theories.î ìThe square has its history as a place of national identity. My project is about trying to democratise this space of privilege, idealisation and control. This is about putting one of us in the place of a political or military hero. It’s an opportunity to use this old instrument of hierarchical reinforcement for something a little bit more ... fun. I’m not trying to entertain people for the sake of getting their attention. There’s an element in which climbing on to public monuments is a stupid thing to do. But this is a simple and stupid idea that I want to use for something very serious. The work has wider implications than simply having a laugh on the plinth. There is a danger in which this thing is seen as a spectacle in the manner of a stunt by American magician David Blaine, or I’m a celebrity get me out of here!, or Big Brother. I think it uses all those idioms, but to a very different purpose. I’m interested in how people’s view of the work changes by being that exposed in such a public place. This is also me testing myself, calling into question everything that I’ve done. Is this sculpture, or isn’t it? Can you use real life as a subject?î | ||||
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