Misfit (goat/fawn)Thomas Grünfeld, , 2001
Courtesy Hidde van Seggelen
Gallery, London  © DACS/London 2013

The beast has an immovable place in the history in Western culture. In the religious sphere, the Book of Revelations warns of the two beasts symbolising in turn the Antichrist and the False Prophet; the first rises up from the sea “having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy.” The second emerges from the earth to promote the authority of the first beast. One of the most enduring identifiers of the beast in popular culture also comes from Revelations 13:18 when John concludes his vision of the first beast with the riddle “Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is six hundred threescore and six.”

In the realms of philosophy, Aristotle alluded to the nature of beasts in his Politics stating “Man is by nature a social animal” before continuing that “an individual who is unsocial naturally and not accidentally is either beneath our notice or more than human. Society is something that precedes the individual. Anyone who either cannot lead the common life or is so self-sufficient as not to need to, and therefore does not partake of society, is either a beast or a god.”

The metaphor of the jungle is often used to encapsulate the political world with its internecine struggles for power and survival with the corollary that politicians who dominate the landscape in their era are classified as “big beasts”. George Orwell in Animal Farm, his allegorical tale of socialism subverted, deploys the term more literally in “Beasts of England” derived from the famous socialist anthem The Internationale when the porcine Old Major, representing Lenin, explains his dream of an animal-controlled society three nights before his death with the opening verse:

Beasts of England, Beasts of Ireland,
Beasts of every land and clime,
Hearken to my joyful tidings
Of the Golden future time.

As the animals in the tale soon discover, there is to be no golden future, something the individuals living under the Soviet Communist yoke learned to their cost during the course of the twentieth century. Whilst less of an anthem by their standards, Messrs Richards and Jagger nevertheless proudly proclaimed in their 1978 single that they would not be “a beast of burden” whilst at the same time questioning if they were hard, rough or rich enough for the object of their desire.

This is an admittedly cursory traversal of religion, philosophy and politics but it provide an amuse-bouche of the ways beasts have been used to represent concepts and ideas throughout the centuries. Curator Laura Culpan evidently shares such a historical perspective noting that “from Bosch to Dürer to Dali, the beast has been an undeniable part of art history”.

Culpan and Dea Vanagan from the London-based curatorial collective Artwise are the curators of Beastly Hall an exhibition currently showing at Hall Place, a Grade I listed Tudor country house in Kent with a 17th century courtyard, set in award-winning formal gardens.

The Hall, built by Sir John Champneys, Lord Mayor of the City of London, in 1540 using recycled stone from a disbanded monastery can lay claim to a unique bestial pedigree with the only topiary versions of the Queen’s Beasts, ten real and mythical creatures originally carved in stone to mark the Queen’s Coronation in 1953: the lion of England, the griffin of Edward III, the falcon of the Plantagenets, the black bull of Clarence, the yale of Beaufort, the white lion of Mortimer, the White Greyhound of Richmond, the red dragon of Wales, the unicorn of Scotland, and the white horse of Hanover.

Sixty years after the Coronation, Beastly Hall delves into the mind of 26 contemporary artists to explore the subversive, contemplative and sometimes humorous idea of ‘beasts’. The range of works on display are a testament to the diversity of the subject including paintings, sculptures, taxidermy, ceramics, sound, bone and bronze and specially created site-specific installations.

Fox with issues by Nina Saunders 2012 image ©
The Artist

The list of artists is equally impressive with works by Francis Alys, Damien Hirst, Polly Morgan and Matt Collishaw alongside Danish artist Nina Saunders and Korean artist Hyungkoo Lee who are both displaying new pieces of work for the first time in the UK.

The exhibition is as visually striking as one would expect from artists of this calibre; however what is even more impressive is how an exhibition which is ostensibly about beasts represented in art is able to bring in and explore the themes of beasts in a wider cultural sense. For example, as one marvels at the delicate intricacies of Tessa Farmer’s “A Wounded Herring Gull”, following her well-known theme of a larger taxidermy animal being attacked by a swarm of miniature menacing skeletal fairies, it is hard not to picture the Lilliputians pinning down Gulliver in Jonathan Swift’s satire or the macabre tales of the Brothers Grimm.

The literary theme is also apparent in one of the highlights of the exhibition, a full-room installation by Claire Morgan titled “Heart of Darkness”, referencing Joseph Conrad’s novel, in which a mass of flies are suspended in mid-air in perfect geometric form. This most chaotic of insects of the order of Diptera are brought to order and yet, by shifting one’s gaze slightly, they appear to return to a state of chaos before returning back into order as the laws of geometry exert their immutable force.

Wounded herring gull by Tessa Farmer © Bexley
Heritage Trust /A.Purkiss

Breaking free from any equivalent shackles is the fox in “The Nightwatch” by Francis Alys, a piece commissioned by Artangel in 2004 in which a fox was released into the National Portrait Gallery overnight with its meanderings recorded for posterity on the gallery’s CCTV -  shades of Orwell again and the nature of modern day surveillance in Britain where an estimated 2 million cameras ensure the beady eye of Big Brother rarely leaves us unobserved as we go about our daily lives.

The preservation of beasts has been one of the defining traits of Damien Hirst’s work and his subsequent notoriety; one of the works on show here, “Sacred Heart (with Hope)” plays on the religious theme with a dagger plunged into a bulls heart which is sprouting angelic wings.

Caroline Worthington, Chief Executive of Bexley Heritage Trust, the charity which runs Hall Place said “we know that it will certainly appeal to the curious, the art lovers – and anyone with a sense of adventure.” From the humorous interpretation of psychiatry displayed in Nina Saunder’s “Fox with Issues” to Thomas Grunfeld’s manipulation of the laws of genetics to create new ‘species’ in his “misfits” series, Beastly Hall is an imaginative, thought-provoking and stimulating journey through the land of beasts and which encourages us to reconsider our preconceptions and prejudices of what constitutes a beast.

Heart of Darkness by Claire Morgan / © Bexley
Heritage Trust

Beastly Hall runs until July 2013

Hall Place & Gardens, Bourne Road, Bexley, Kent, DA5 1PQ

http://www.bexleyheritagetrust.org.uk/hallplace

You can be quite sure the Parliamentary Whips Office will be working overtime this weekend trying to ensure they have the necessary votes in place before the Commons showdown on press regulation scheduled for Monday. David Cameron abruptly withdrew from the all-party talks on Thursday and threw down the gauntlet by calling for his non-statutory proposals to be put to the House surprising not only Ed Miliband and the Labour Party, but more importantly his coalition partner, the Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg.

The issue has been dragging on for what seems an inordinately long time with the prospect of other parliamentary legislation being hijacked with amendments to give effect to Lord Leveson’s recommendations. David Cameron is proposing a Royal Charter which would seek to regulate the press but without enshrining it in statute. Ed Miliband and Nick Clegg are of the opinion that the body that regulates the press needs to be free from press interference and, crucially, that the Royal Charter should have a statutory underpinning.

If all the Conservatives vote together, they will have 303 votes whereas if all the Labour and Liberal Democrats vote together, they will have 313 votes, leaving the various nationalist parties holding the balance. This is where the Whips, with responsibility for party discipline, will come into their own: persuading, cajoling, threatening, flattering and generally doing whatever it takes to ensure they have the requisite votes to win the motion.

The Whips Office and its activities, usually tucked away in the dark recesses and secluded corners where nobody can hear a recalcitrant MP scream, have tended to have had the spotlight shone firmly in their direction and not always for the right reasons. Plebgate, which led to the resignation (rightly or wrongly) of the Government Chief Whip, Andrew Mitchell, brought the office onto the front pages of all the newspapers and dragged the long-serving and honourably decent Deputy Chief Whip, John Randall into the scandal after one of his constituents claimed to have witnessed the altercation outside the gates of Downing Street. We have seen Kevin Spacey reprise the role of the scheming and conniving Chief Whip Francis Urquhart, so memorably portrayed by the late Sir Ian Richardson (although in crossing the Atlantic he has become Francis Underwood). Those with longer memories will remember Gyles Brandreth’s diaries of his time as an MP during John Major’s Government; the title Breaking the Code alluded to what many considered his treachery in laying bare the day-to-day activities of his role in the Whips Office during that tumultuous Parliament.

Phil Daniels and Vincent Franklin. Photo by Johan Persson

However, whilst the whips may lament their plight over the next few days, they can reflect that the current Parliament has been mercifully free from such close-run votes. For their counterparts nearly forty years ago, it was a very different story and one that is told with great aplomb in James Graham’s play This House, currently playing at the National Theatre. The story revolves around the 1974-79 hung Parliament when Harold Wilson returned to Downing Street as Prime Minister at the helm of a Government in October, with a slender majority of three. In essence, every time the Labour Government wanted to steer a piece of legislation through the House of Commons, it wasn’t necessarily enough to rely on their own MPs supporting it (never a given), especially when one considers how many of them were aged and infirm; they needed to secure the support of the Liberal MPs, Scottish Nationalists, Welsh Nationalists, Irish MPs and Independents. Of course, these so-called “odds and sods” had no altruistic inclination to prop up a minority Government and so, with the Tories waiting with bated breath for a suitable opportunity to defeat the Government and call a Vote of No Confidence, the Labour whips had to constantly calculate and recalculate whether they had the necessary votes to continue to govern Britain. The point is aptly made by the Conservative Opposition Deputy Chief Whip when he warns his opposite number “A minority government? No one with any sense or gumption gives you more than a matter of weeks.  You’re gonna fall, and fast, and hard. So start finding things to land on. Now.”

This House opened in the Cottesloe Theatre last year to ecstatic reviews and has now migrated to the Olivier Theatre, making the transition skilfully thanks to Rae Smith’s design with some audience members taking their seats on-stage on the famous green benches and with the clock face of Big Ben looming over the proceedings. The action largely alternates between the Labour and Conservative Whip’s Offices where we see politics stripped bare with intrigue, ambition, cunning and compromise interspersed with glimpses of empathy, decency and nobility on both sides.

The direction and acting is first-rate from a cast that includes Eric Daniels as Labour Chief Whip Bob Mellish. One of the reasons the play works so well and is such an enjoyable theatrical experience is the crisp dialogue and badinage both inter and intra-party with the central axis interplayed between opposing Deputy Chief Whips: Charles Edwards as the smooth suave and impeccably attired James Weatherill and Reece Dinsdale as the bluff, plain-speaking Yorkshireman Walter Harrison with a talent for knowing about developments before anyone else –including the Chief Whip. It is their friendship, mutual respect and professional rivalry that gives us the best insight into the compromise and compassion necessary in politics, whichever the era, and gives the play many of its funniest lines.

When politicians refer to the ethereal ‘good old days’, they probably won’t be thinking back to the Parliament that ushered in the advent of Margaret Thatcher; however, it does make for a good old night out at the theatre.

Who is the rudest man in Britain? David Starkey was famously given this sobriquet by the Daily Mail for his acerbic performances on Radio 4’s The Moral Maze in the early Nineties. A more modern candidate to take his mantle might be the Scottish comedian Frankie Boyle – a man with a special talent for defecating out of the wrong orifice in the name of humour (toilet or otherwise). However, if the public were given the opportunity to ponder the question, I can be certain that before long Jeremy Paxman’s name would crop up and so, inevitably, would John Humphrys.

The stalwart presenter of BBC Radio 4’s flagship Today Programme has a tendency to irritate his audience. Humphrys is routinely criticised for interrupting, hectoring and shouting down guests who have had the misfortune to commit some transgression and then have to explain themselves or their policy before the Lord High Inquisitor of BBC Radio. With the advent of Twitter, one can see real-time commentary on the #r4today along the lines of “Why don’t you let him finish…”, “Rude and bullying John Humphrys this morning, no respect for…” and similar sentiments from outraged listeners. The famous “John Humphrys” interviewing style has become part of cultural folklore for decades, a convenient byword for hostile and aggressive questioning with a superior, holier-than-thou tone.

Except it is largely untrue. Granted, he has a forthright interviewing technique but to listen to some commentators discussing his style, you would imagine that he comes into the studio at 6am and begins a grandiloquent soliloquy which doesn’t end until the pips chime at 9am. I will gladly admit that I somewhat biased. I am to John Humphrys what the Cumberbitches are to Benedict Cumberbatch. For the past 15 years, I have routinely woken up to Today and when Humphrys is presenting, my day immediately gets off to a good start. I know I’m not alone in this. For all those roll their unopened eyes at the sound of his voice and grind their teeth, there will be many, many more silently punching the air. Three hours of thoughtful and intelligent debate before the rigours of the working day. If Humphrys was as constantly rude and abrasive as popular myth would have us believe, the audience would quickly find it tiresome and banal. In fact, to my mind the opposite is the case. The vast majority of his interviews are conducted with the courtesy, professionalism and good humour that comes from a long and distinguished career in broadcast journalism for the BBC. He has been one of the presenters of the Today Programme since 1987 – a remarkable feat in modern broadcasting history.

Humphrys was today honoured with the Harvey Lee award for outstanding contribution to broadcasting at the Broadcasting Press Guild Event with praise for his ‘tenacious and fearless’ interviewing style. One man who knows the consequences of a poor performance in the hot seat is the former Director-General of the BBC, George Entwistle, who gave such a hopeless performance in a live interview over his handling of the fall-out from the Jimmy Savile abuse scandal that everyone, including himself, knew he was a dead man walking. Twelve hours later, he had resigned.

Far too often, people in public life, most notably politicians, are not adequately held to account. Humphrys performs that role on behalf of us and has developed a reputation for it. The only people who are made to look foolish and incompetent are those who are, unsurprisingly, foolish and incompetent, especially when they try to bluff and bluster their way through it. Humphrys doesn’t let them get away it and this award is a testament to his achievements.

When Humphrys finally stops presenting the Today programme it will mark the end of an era and mornings for so many of his devoted listeners will never be quite the same again. However, until that day, we will remain under the covers at 6am poised to silently punch the air when we hear his voice.

‘Gayle’ by Robin Lee

At his trial Socrates is reported to have said that ‘the unexamined life is not worth living’; it might be equally true to say that the unexamined face is not worth seeing. A face is the antithesis of the inanimate objects that surround us. The slightest change in one’s features can communicate an emotion or a changing mood. Whilst a smile can be an expression of genuine joy it can just as easily be seen as a malicious smirk or a sarcastic grin.

Every time we glance in a mirror we see ourselves through our own unique prism, seeing only those features which we choose to see. Are those dark circles under the eyes getting worse? Do I look haggard? Is the detox making my skin look better or worse? Our perceptions can change within seconds based on a new, previously unseen flaw or the change of mood expressed through our features. An alternative channel to reflect upon ourselves and, crucially, to see how we are viewed by others is through the time-honoured medium of the portrait. Whereas a standard mirror presents you exactly as you are, a portrait will contain as much of the artist’s personality and style as the subjects.

Some sitters will drop a subtle (or even a not too subtle hint) that they expect a gratifying portrayal of themselves. Often the painter, in the hope of flattering his patron and with an eye on future commissions, will use his skills and expertise to present the most pleasing and attractive representation.

‘Andy’ by Robin Lee

A rarer breed is the subject who wishes to be represented as true to life. The most notable example being Oliver Cromwell, Leader of the Parliamentary Army during the English Civil War and subsequently Lord Protector of the Commonwealth who, according to a contemporary account noted by Horace Walpole, gave his painter, Sir Peter Lely the following instructions:

 “…I desire you would use all your skill to paint my picture truly like me, and not flatter me at all; but remark all these roughnesses, pimples, warts and everything as you see me, otherwise I will never pay a farthing for it.”

This has become known to posterity in the phrase ‘warts and all’, used in a sense wider than just painting, to mean the inclusion of all faults or other unpleasant facts.

In a similar vein (warts aside), the contemporary portrait of the high priestess of feminism, Germaine Greer, by Paula Rego, which hangs in the National Portrait Gallery appealed to Greer precisely because of its honesty. She said “A portrait that is kind is condescending. The last thing I would want is for Paula to condescend to me, and it’s the last thing she would think of doing.”

‘Peter’ by Robin Lee

Cromwell’s sentiment is very much evident, from the painter’s perspective, in a new exhibition of paintings titled ‘Clocks’ by Robin Lee currently showing at the Tapestry Gallery in London. Lee’s focus is in capturing an honest representation of his subjects. His intention is not to flatter his sitters but rather to bring out their quirks and character through his style of painting. One can appreciate that it might be difficult to find sitters prepared to be subjected to such scrutiny and many of works on show are of Lee’s trusted friends who were willing to be cast on canvas.

He admits they “were rarely flattered by the results but loved them all the same”. Looking around the exhibition, one can see why the subjects loved them. There is an honesty and integrity which shines through the large canvasses combined with a sense of exuberance through the judicious use of pinks and blues alongside the flesh tones.

Lee has also painted people with disfigurements and who are less often captured in portraits such as Raj, who Lee met in Varanasi in India, and who was born with a cleft palette, a hair lip that had never been treated and the attendant crooked teeth. One of the most arresting works is a representation of Howard, a baker in Leeds who, one morning after a night shift, had his nose bitten off by a dog while walking home across a park. The painting is actually a self-portrait of Lee amended to take account of the injuries suffered by Howard.

‘Raj’ by Robin Lee

‘Howard’ by Robin Lee

All the paintings in the show were completed during October 2012 and none took more than two hours to complete; the immediacy cutting through all extraneous factors and concentrating on communicating the essence of the sitter. Lee has made a time-lapse video demonstrating how he works (see below).

The exhibition runs until the Thursday 14 March 2013 and there are plans for pop-up shows in locations around London.

‘Clocks’ by Robin Lee, Tapestry Gallery, 51-52 Frith Street, Soho, London, W1D 4SH

Come a bit closer. That’s right. I don’t want to shout. Now, let me tell you about a unique play that will be performed this evening. It will feature some of the most accomplished actors anywhere the world including one who critics and cultural commentators regard as one of the two finest actors of his generation. “Well”, I hear the cynics mutter, “there is nothing unique in very good actors coming together for a special one-off theatrical performance. Such stunts have become all but obligatory these days”. The pessimists have already switched off; not through lack of interest in the performance which has piqued their curiosity, but whose instincts tell them they could not afford tickets for such gala performances and even if they could, they wouldn’t be able to get hold of one because they will have been pre-allocated to “corporate hospitality” and smartly turned out couples who were given a subtle nod from a friend of a friend to have the date etched into their Smythson diary.

The prophets of gloom continue that the only ticket they could afford would be wedged in behind a pillar craning their neck to see any of the stage. Rest assured, sceptics, you are not to be excluded.

But before I deal with such administrative trivialities, let me whet your appetite with a little about the performance and what will make it so special. I have already touched on the quality of the acting talent, but this is pointless unless one has a worthy director to get the most out of them. As a one-off event, it would be too risky to stake everything on one director and so two of the finest directors have been appointed and to ensure the maximum output of creativity and vision, each will direct half the assembled cast. In any other production, this might appear odd and even  counterproductive but here it only adds to the tension and suspense.

The play centres around two grand armies who after a preliminary skirmish are resolved to engage in one final battle to decide who takes the spoils. Each army has a rich and prestigious history with medals to mark their successful campaigns. They have also amassed considerable wealth. However, on this day, they are fighting for more than money. Each general has his reputation at stake.

If this wasn’t a dramatic enough, the play is also a homecoming. The prized warrior who felt he wasn’t given the quite the recognition his skill and prowess deserved and defected to a rival Continental army.

His former commander remained true to his belief that no individual was more important than the army; a philosophy that had been vindicated on numerous occasions. However, the departed warrior went on to establish himself in his place in the pantheon of legends.

This is the story of his return to the battleground that nurtured him and to commence battle with those he once stood alongside as brother-in-arms.

For those trying to identify the playwright, I would counsel against such a fruitless exercise. Even those well acquainted with ancient and contemporary literature would be flummoxed. The play is unscripted. There are two acts separated by an interval but apart from that nod to convention, it is left completely to the actors, directors and a stage conductor ensuring adherence to certain codes of conduct.

“Yes, that all sounds most intriguing and quite a spectacle”, you implore, “but how can I get hold of a ticket?”

Ah, well the production has in fact sold out. Wait, I have not been leading you down the theatrical garden path. Just because you can’t get a ticket, it doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy the production on television. Whilst everything I have said above it true, this is not a play in the conventional sense. It is a football match.

Had I revealed in the opening paragraph that I was referring to the second-leg encounter between Manchester United and Real Madrid in the Champion’s League taking place this evening, you might have rolled your eyes and dismissed it as just another football match. Yet, it is much more than that. The strategic of battle of wits between Sir Alex Ferguson and Jose Mourinho, the return of Cristiano Ronaldo and the small matter of Ryan Giggs celebrating his 1,000^th appearance for the club are just some of the highlights along with the unpredictable nature of the beautiful game itself.

How appropriate that it will be played at what is known as the Theatre of Dreams.

When I wrote in my previous post about the increasing lack of cultural knowledge and awareness, in all its forms, I wasn’t expecting to see a glaring example of it quite so soon. Perhaps because I’m not the type of cultural pedant that actively seeks out transgressions like the guerrilla grammarians that creep around provincial town centres painting the correct apostrophe onto a grocer’s shop sign.

However, as I was coming out of Tottenham Court Road underground station, a new free magazine was handed to me. Drafted Magazine joins the ranks of other free publications in London including most notably (and profitably) the Evening Standard, City AM, Shortlist, Stylist and Time Out. It’s a publication that “aims to brighten up your journey to work on the first Monday of every month” with a mixture of fashion and popular culture aimed at both men and women.

Fair enough, a once-a-month magazine with features such as “Meet the Cast of new E4 Show ‘Youngers’” isn’t competing for the same audience as the Times Literary Supplement or Apollo. However, there was something that rankled on the very first page. The debut issue is themed “A Brave New World” which “explores our evolving universe from our obsession with fame, to new technology and whether finding love online is really the twenty-first century way to go”. Half the introductory page is taken up with the phrase in a huge font and the accompanying text contains the following paragraphs:

“Although we often think of drastic change in terms of invention and innovation, even basic language has transformed massively over the last decade. Now peppered with abbreviation and slang and an overwhelming need to get something ‘trending on twitter, I sometimes wonder if Shakespeare is turning so much in his grave, that he’s practically a wind turbine.

If the destruction of language was not enough to make Shakespeare weep he can rest assured that while the mighty e-reader is ensuring that novels are still in existence, reality television continues to grow strong, as more and more of us are after our 15 minutes of fame and flashbulbs”

Whilst I can’t speak for Shakespeare, I can say that what made me weep is that the writer throughout the piece is using a phrase coined by Shakespeare! ‘Brave New World’ is taken from Miranda’s speech in The Tempest when she exclaims:

O wonder!
How many goodly creatures are there here!
How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world,
That has such people in’t.

Admittedly, it is one of the few phrases to have been made more famous by the author Aldous Huxley in his novel of the same title imagining a dystopian future set in London in the year 2540.

Whilst I don’t expect every cultural reference to be footnoted, if you are going to invoke Shakespeare in a discussion of our latter-day “destruction of language”, at least note that you are deploying one of his phrases as the theme for your entire article and magazine (hint, it’s in massive typeface above your words). To be fair to Drafted, there is an amusing article in the magazine that discusses our changing language and txt tlk so I’m not seeking to portray it as simply light entertainment fluff and fashion.

The author concludes by saying “A Brave New World is more about recognising spirit and diving into the unknown, celebrating the fact that while we’re here this is the once chance we have to make our mark”. Yes, one should seize the moment and take the opportunities that arise but that is no reason to discard centuries of historical, artistic and cultural baggage and henceforth live merely from hand to mouth.*

* That sentiment is not mine, but has been lifted from Goethe.

Roy Lichtenstein,‘Femme d’Alger’, 1963

Tate Modern will have been overflowing this weekend with visitors queuing up to see its blockbuster Roy Lichtenstein retrospective. Whilst much of the attention would have been focused on iconic works such as Whaam!, bought in 1966 by the Tate for £4,665 (an acquisition which split public opinion and the Board of Trustees) and the other trademark comic-book pictures, many visitors will have been pleasantly surprised to see that Lichtenstein looked much wider for an application of his new found style.

The thick black lines, bold primary colours and the benday dots that make him so recognisable were used to create works inspired by other artists such as Femme d’Alger 1963, a reworking of  Picasso’s Woman of Algiers. Many have a deeply held belief that Lichtenstein was little more than a plagiarist, a parasite taking works by other comic artists and, in essence, passing them off through his artistic prism.

Yet Lichtenstein once said that “the things I have apparently parodied I actually admire”. Is this channelling imitation as the sincerest form of flattery? Is parody a benign and largely benevolent practice or is there something more sinister behind it? F.R. Leavis thought parody demeaned the writer being parodied. Far from being a form of flattery, should it be rightly regarded as a tool more suited to character assassination?

These were just some of the points raised and debated at one of the events at the London School of Economics Literary Festival 2013 titled aptly “The Art of Parodies” chaired by Michael Caines, Editor at the Times Literary Supplement and with a panel comprising novelist, biographer, literary critic and parodist DJ Taylor; multi award-winning Guardian cartoonist and author of graphic novels Martin Rowson and author and cultural commentator Ewan Morrison.

Taylor, who has published a collection of his parodies that he wrote for Private Eye (What You Didn’t Miss Part 94), read a painfully funny parody he wrote when A.S. Byatt published The Children’s Book, noting that, as a purveyor of the art, he saw it as a form of authentication and said that the genre could be regarded as a form of literary criticism. After all, one has to be deemed worthy of being parodied for the amusement of a wider audience. Yet part of the problem we have at present is that it is often difficult to tell fact from parody. This is partly because politicians, celebrities and other public figures seem intent on parodying themselves to extremes. This is less of a concern when it simply adds to the general gaiety of life. What is more concerning is when it is combined with the widespread lack of cultural awareness which leads to a failure to distinguish between what is and is not a parody. Most parodies in newspapers and magazines now contain the proviso “as told to…” to make it clear that this is a joke.

The unease over the occasionally blurred line between fact and parody is not a new phenomenon. The late Alan Clark, politician, diarist, philanderer and bon vivant sued the Evening Standard in 1998 over its spoof election diary when he was the candidate for the parliamentary seat of Kensington and Chelsea. Peter Bradshaw’s parody in the newspaper was so acute that his editor Max Hastings told Bradshaw to continue it even after Clark was duly elected as the MP. Ion Trewin’s Biography of Clark recalls the MP telephoning Bradshaw to say “Listen, you must stop this ridiculous column – effectively it’s a counterfeit”. Hastings told Bradshaw to continue and when the case came to Court, Mr Justice Lightman ruled in favour of Clark on the matter of ‘passing off’ and said that Clark’s reputation and goodwill were placed at risk. The Evening Standard considered appealing and then decided it would be wiser in the circumstances to pay the £200,000 in legal costs.

The media were up in arms and Andrew Marr, then editor of The Independent ran a leader which said “Laugh where we must. And we must at this judgment…which if it stands will damage the public life of this country…[and]…the public space within we conduct our collective and political life and [threaten] our capacity for honest self-government…[implying] newspaper readers cannot understand, let alone take a joke”.

The Evening Standard had the last laugh as Mr Justice Lightman allowed the parody to continue as “Not Alan Clark’s Diary’ which the paper proudly trumpeted on its front page.

However, on the whole, the Clark approach is very much in the minority. Martin Rowson confirmed that most politicians like to be parodied because it gives them publicity, recognition and a sense of approval. They are worthy of being parodied. Remember Michael Heseltine being determined to buy his Spitting Image puppet? Rowson recalled how the now disgraced Denis McShane seeing a cartoon lampooning him in The Guardian telephoned Rowson first thing in the morning requesting to buy the cartoon and demanding “You must put me in more cartoons”.

Rowson pointed out that parody for a cartoonist is a form of visual shorthand, a way of immediately and powerfully communicating an image which will remain in the public consciousness. However, this works best when the audience has the necessary cultural awareness and knowledge to understand the parody. If we are accustomed to seeing “as told to” at the bottom of a journalistic parody, it is even more common to see “apologies to” or “after” next to the signature of a cartoonist noting the attribution of the original artist or cartoonist. The famous “Rendezvous” by David Low in 1939 has been reworked on numerous occasions by Rowson to make a contemporary point. However, if a newspaper reader is unaware of the original Low, the reinterpretation thereby loses part of its power.

It was this aspect that was so aptly covered by Ewan Morrison arguing that the opportunities offered by the internet and YouTube threaten to rob parody of its influence. Parody is more than plain comedy. The problem is that we now have hundreds of thousands of people making mediocre parodies of anything and everything and millions of people worldwide watching them in an unthinking, unquestioning, passes-the-time-when-I’m-bored-at-work manner. The present generation is already experiencing a phenomenon whereby parodies can go through two or three generations in a very short space of time, so that we have a parody of a parody itself parodied. The danger is that people lose sight of the original person, action or event being parodied and are left with a pale, albeit slightly amusing, version of it.

Amongst the raucous laughter echoing around the Wolfson Theatre at the LSE, this was the slightly gloomy undercurrent. Parody works best if the reader understands the cultural reference. Collectively, the nation’s arts/cultural knowledge is being steadily eroded by the onslaught of cheap cookery bake-off shows and crass Essex/Chelsea/Geordie/New Jersey reality lifestyle programmes. We are gorging on fast-food entertainment that is in varying degrees banal, saccharine and plain idiotic. Parody can play an important part in our national life but it requires a bit of effort from its audience rather than just dementedly wolfing down the cultural equivalent of a Big Mac (occasionally known by its full title of Michael McIntyre).

Chiharu Shiota (Japan) Zustand des Seins (Fotoapparat) / State of Being (Camera), 2012; Metal, yarn, camera 30 x 30 x 30 cm; Alexander Ochs Galerie, Berlin

When I spent some time living in the British Virgin Islands, there were many things I didn’t miss about London. Driving along empty roads surrounded by lush green scenery, I didn’t miss being scrunched up in a Tube carriage whilst some irritable person on the platform shouted “Can you move down a bit please?” The ‘please’ part of that sentence being anything but polite or courteous even though to accede to her demand would have meant surgically removing at least three limbs. I also didn’t much miss being on the precipice of pneumonia for the half of the year.

What I did come to miss and appreciate was the abundance of art in London – and notably publicly accessible art. Londoners may tut and huff when they see a couple in fluorescent jackets, rucksacks on backs, engrossed in a map standing in the middle of the pavement completely oblivious to all around them. Yet one of the reasons London attracts so many tourists is the number of art galleries within the capital, many within walking distance of each other: The Courtauld Gallery, The National Gallery, The National Portrait Gallery, The Royal Academy and The Wallace Collection are all within a brisk(ish) stroll of one another.

London is also blessed by the number of different art fairs that take place throughout the year giving people the chance to see and buy works of art that are distinctly different from the works in museums and public galleries – complementary, but different. Some may argue that with such a crowded calendar of art events already in place, and I need hardly run off a list, do we need yet another art fair in London?

The answer is a resounding yes. Art13 London makes its debut at the beginning of March launched by Tim Etchells and Sandy Angus, the founders of ART HK, Asia’s premier art event with Stephanie Dieckvoss as the Fair’s Director. Why do we need one?

Lee Seahyun (Korea) Between Red 162, 2012 Oil on linen 200x300cm; Hackogoe , Seoul

According to Dieckvoss the fair will be “a new global art fair for Europe’s global city. Our aim is to translate a unique vision into a great experience for collectors and the general public alike”.

The claim to bring a global fair to the city is more than just rhetoric; Art13 London will have 29 territories represented in total across the fair, 50% of the work presented will be by non-Western artists and 70% of the galleries will be participating at a fair in London for the first time.

In addition to territorial diversity, the fair will cover the full spectrum of art including paintings, etchings, prints and photography.

Nobuyoshi Araki (Japan) Kaori, 2004 Michael Hoppen Gallery, London, United Kingdom

Galleries presenting photography at the Fair will include 2902 Gallery, Singapore, Jack Bell, London, Brancolini Grimaldi, London, Kleinschmidt Fine Photographs, Wiesbaden, Michael Hoppen Gallery, London and Galerie Paris-Beijing, Paris and Beijing. 2902 Gallery specialises in exhibiting photography from both established and emerging artists from Southeast Asia.

The Paragon Press, London will be launching a new series of prints by Anish Kapoor as well as bringing large-scale linocuts by Gary Hume together with Richard Deacon’s new series of etchings and Ged Quinn’s work ‘Utopia Dystopia.

Whereas when one is abroad, one misses the art at home, Art13 London will give people the chance to see a range of art which they would usually need to travel to the country of origin to see and purchase. As Dieckvoss says “bringing together exhibitors from all corners of the world, we offer visitors an unparalleled opportunity to see the extraordinary quality and variety of art produced across the globe.”.

London is a truly multicultural city and it will now have an art fair that reflects it. Only the most insular of minds could do anything but welcome that.

There will however be a distinct touch of Englishness as Art 13 London have partnered with Fortnum & Mason to create an exclusive bar and restaurant at the Fair giving visitors the chance to enjoy a glass of Champagne Louis Roederer, lunch or a spot of afternoon tea.

Art13 London sponsored by Citi Private Bank

1-3 March 2013 (VIP Preview: 28 February); Olympia Grand Hall

www.artfairslondon.com

Judit Reigl (Hungary) Outburst, 1957 Oil on canvas 91×115 cm; Kalman Maklary Fine Arts, Budapest

(All images courtesy of Art13 London)

 Kate O’Flynn (Racheal), Mike Noble (Billy). Photo by Kevin Cummins.

 On my recent visit to the National Theatre, I didn’t go to see “People” the play by Alan Bennett that manages to intertwine pornography and the National Trust into the same script. I didn’t even particularly go to see people generally. However, there is something more interesting about a theatre audience compared to the multitudes one might see at the local multiplex. It’s as though the National Theatre is one large, extended stage and the visitors playing their allotted part simply by crossing the threshold and being themselves.

Sitting in the cafe idly flicking through my newspaper, ahead of the play I had actually gone to see, Simon Stephen’s new production Port, I politely nodded to the geriatric couple that joined my table laden with tea and coffee, scones and pastries. If Mr Kipling were casting for a couple to symbolise sturdy, rural respectability, he couldn’t have gone far wrong with this husband and wife double-act. So it was something of a shock to overhear, in between his sips of Earl Grey, the husband say to his wife “…all that proves is that even a cripple in a wheelchair can get his rocks off if he’s President, the dirty bugger”. Luckily I wasn’t drinking a cup of tea at the time or I would have spluttered it all over the table. It transpired he was referring to Bill Murray’s portrayal of President Roosevelt in the new film Hyde Park on Hudson as opposed to the philandering President of the local golf club. Clearly warming to his theme, he continued with a careful dissection of the sexual peccadilloes and prurience of a number of US Presidents, all whilst his wife obediently nodded her assent. I was hooked. It was as if this little analytical discourse was, albeit indirectly, being carried out for my benefit.

When they left the table, I almost wanted to say “Come back, I want to hear your speculations on the prospective infidelities of the current incumbent of that soiled office of state”. But I didn’t. It would have been undignified.

Returning to silent people watching (I seem to have arrived absurdly early!) this time I fixed on a family in the audience. A perfectly pleasant husband and wife with their two young children. The son aged approximately eleven and looking distinctly uninterested in being at the theatre with his parents and the daughter approximately nine or ten and still wearing her school uniform. I add that detail specifically because reflecting that the play we were about to watch centred on the experiences of a brother and sister, not too dissimilar in age from these two children, it seemed somehow uplifting that some parents do try to introduce their children to the theatre from an early age.

How those parents must have shuddered as the first “f*ck” resounded around the theatre. Then the second. Then the third. And fourth. Whilst children are hardly shielded from expletives these days,  I could feel the mother squirming every time yet another “c*nt” or “w*nker” was delivered.

The incessant swearing might even have made Malcolm Tucker turn a shade of scarlet. Yet, it is not gratuitous. The play centres on a dysfunctional family. In the opening scene, we see two children and their mother sitting in a car because their drunk father has locked them out of the flat. It is midnight in Stockport in 1988. We know the mother is going to desert the children and Rachael aged 11, knows it too. Whilst her 6 year old brother sleeps on the back seat we see the precocious nature of this young girl badgering her mother with a Joycean stream of consciousness. Racheal is played by Kate O Flynn and is undoubtedly the star of this surprisingly amusing production which is cleverly interspersed with moments of pathos and despair.

It would be wrong to focus too much on the swearing but it captures the dilemma of this girl who has been forced to mature quickly and take responsibility for her younger brother but is still a child herself. Swearing is traditionally the preserve of adults her swearing demonstrates how she desperately seeks to attain that status along with having her own flat and ambitions to escape out of Stockport. It also serves a defence mechanism in a bleak world.

One of the most impressive aspects of Port, directed by Marianne Elliot, is that O Flynn never leaves the stage once the curtain rises. The entire set, in the slightly too large Lyttleton Theatre, and the play revolves around her and how her life develops, in significant chapters, between 1988 and the much anticipated millennium.  Port is described as a “celebration of the human spirit” but it is also a reminder that however hard you try, your surroundings shape you and, however, unconsciously, they will continue to exert that influence in the decisions you make throughout your life. We see Racheal, despite her best endeavours repeating the mistakes of her mother. The finale is somewhat saccharine but it should not detract from a vibrant production that reminds us that those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.

 

 

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