ART! - Everyone’s a Hero

First of all, I’m going to have to thank NPR for helping us out on our ART Friday grind this week.AA Also, to those of you who aren’t hip to what ART Friday is, we try to post some new artwork every week.AA ART Friday is not limited to the visual arts, although they do lend themselves nicely to blog posting.

Sometimes on Fridays you’ll get analysis (UM… in a limited sense).AA Other times we’ll just make fun of whatever it is we’re posting.AA Still, other times you might just see pictures and links.

Dolphin Hunting, Scott Richardson (contemporary.mnp)
Dolphin Hunting, Scott Richardson (mnp)

Krumbles and Ock, two of our resident bloggers, have been tag-teaming ART Fridays for quite a long time, but had recently fallen off, which accounts for the holes in the calendar.AA At the same time as Ock resurrected the idea, Krumbles jumped off the newest (and probably most interesting) part of the feature: A Dozen.AA In this feature, Krumbles interviews different artists (local and famous) and asks them about their specific media.

Keep an eye out for all that goodness and more in the coming weeks as we re-launch our Art Store and prepare for the new blogging season (yes we treat this ish like professionals - trading people to other blogs and whatnot).AA But anyway, on to this week’s spectacular…

So I was listening to/reading NPR when I found this little piece about an unused plinth in Trafalgar square which has now been converted into a public art project.AA I’ll let you read the article yourself:

All Things Considered, July 6, 2009 AA In the northwest corner of Trafalgar Square, in the heart of London, there is an empty base, or plinth, for a statue. Unlike the others there, the Fourth Plinth, as it is sometimes called, never had the bronze likeness of a British hero placed upon it.

Now the vacant plinth, built in 1841 for an equestrian statue that was never created, is being put to use for a new art project that began Monday. Officially called "One & Other," the project will involve 2,400 members of the general public a€" chosen randomly from 18,000 applicants a€" acting, singing, jumping, shouting or doing whatever they want upon the plinth for one hour each, around the clock for 100 days.

It’s being called the ultimate democratization of art a€" whereby Joe or Josephine Schmo gets to stand on a plinth in the heart of the nation’s capital for a whole hour under the gaze of Lord Horatio Nelson, the hero of Trafalgar, and other heroes of the Empire.

While I clearly wouldn’t use such terms as the "ultimate democratization of art" (art is pretty frickin’ democratic…) I will say that this is an awesome idea.AA I particularly like the non-clarity of the metaphorical implications of a rando becoming the central figure on an haphazardly unused 1847 dais.AA It’s doing something subtle, drawing the comparison between the regular person’s expression and the commissioned artist, drawing a clear link to the past -which art (and architecture) is constantly doing wordlessly while reminding us that the present is constantly becoming the past.AA There is little visual representational art that can even be claimed to have a quality of ‘existing outside of time’ - which is the genius of this project.

I also find it interesting that all of a sudden the "statue" is regarding the onlooker with real blinking eyes.AA I always imagine those old statues peering back at me, stuck in one position eternally.

:: [ Go Read the Rest at NPR ] ::

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Posted: July 17th, 2009
at 7:43am by Black Ock

Tagged with , , ,


Categories: art fridays

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