Attendant
I've just been commissioned to make a sound piece for the toilets of South Square gallery, just outside Bradford. I'm going to work with toilet attendants to tell a story about space and ownership, economics and piss.
I want to speak to toilet attendants about their experiences, record interviews with them, and then use their words along with sound recordings of the toilets in which they work to make the piece. I'm interested in the precarious nature of their jobs, and I also want to ask them about their occupation of transient space. Toilet attendants work in places not designed to accommodate them - both economically and physically.
The gallery is in a rural setting, and I want the urban-ness of toilet attendants to be at the forefront of the work. The idea of a toilet attendant is only possible in places like clubs and bars - places where a job (if not a living wage...) can be sustained simply by the volume of people passing through.
I'm just starting to research toilet attendant culture, and one thing that comes up is the jokes and rhymes that are used by the attendants. Toilet attendants seem to often take on the role or persona of a 'smiley', humorous and friendly man.
Here is a list of rhymes used by toilet attendants to persuade people to try the aftershave that they proffer in exchange for tips. All based on the popular perception of sex as the consequence of grooming, and an affirmation and definition of stereotypical male/hetro space.
No splash, no gash.
No spray, no lay.
No Armani, no punani.
No Armani Code ya don't shoot the load.
No tissue, no issue.
No CK no BJ.
No Davidoff no suck you off.
Wash you fingers for the mingers.
No Gucci, no coochie.
No Kalvin Clein, no vagine.
I want to speak to toilet attendants about their experiences, record interviews with them, and then use their words along with sound recordings of the toilets in which they work to make the piece. I'm interested in the precarious nature of their jobs, and I also want to ask them about their occupation of transient space. Toilet attendants work in places not designed to accommodate them - both economically and physically.
The gallery is in a rural setting, and I want the urban-ness of toilet attendants to be at the forefront of the work. The idea of a toilet attendant is only possible in places like clubs and bars - places where a job (if not a living wage...) can be sustained simply by the volume of people passing through.
I'm just starting to research toilet attendant culture, and one thing that comes up is the jokes and rhymes that are used by the attendants. Toilet attendants seem to often take on the role or persona of a 'smiley', humorous and friendly man.
Here is a list of rhymes used by toilet attendants to persuade people to try the aftershave that they proffer in exchange for tips. All based on the popular perception of sex as the consequence of grooming, and an affirmation and definition of stereotypical male/hetro space.
No splash, no gash.
No spray, no lay.
No Armani, no punani.
No Armani Code ya don't shoot the load.
No tissue, no issue.
No CK no BJ.
No Davidoff no suck you off.
Wash you fingers for the mingers.
No Gucci, no coochie.
No Kalvin Clein, no vagine.
Chairs
I'm trying to write for a lecture at The Royal Standard in June. I've been browsing through some old photos, seeing if I can reinvigorate any discarded ideas.
I found a folder called 'Chairs'. And it was full of photos of chairs. I remember taking the photos and collecting them together - it must have been around 2005-2006, but I have no recollection of what I was going to do with them.
I found a folder called 'Chairs'. And it was full of photos of chairs. I remember taking the photos and collecting them together - it must have been around 2005-2006, but I have no recollection of what I was going to do with them.
Heygate: NO PARKING
I went down to the Heygate Estate with Elephant and Castle-phile Emma Cummins (Citybound Collective).
I can't believe I've never been inside before. A housing estate built for more than 3000 people which now has three or four occupied flats.
It was the quietest place I have been in London, you could hear the trees in the wind and the birds, but no cars, no people.
Activists and remaining residents have turned some of the communal spaces into allotments, and used hundreds of the abandoned recycling bins for planting food.
The weird thing was that although there was the occasional dumping ground, like these old tires and sofas piled up, there was no rubbish. No empty cans, no drifting plastic bags or crisp packets carried on the wind. The place was sterile.
We walked along the garages and I became fascinated by the hand painted NO PARKING signs that were on many of the doors. They seemed so pointless now, with no use for the garages - empty threats.
But then I started wondering why no one was parking down there, why not? You aren't going to get towed. And why was no one dumping down here? No tires, no sofas, no burned out cars. What was wrong?
In a way, the NO PARKING signs were finally having the desired effect. Only, with the additional consequence of displacing all the residents and eventually destroying the buildings.
Like an incantation or a mantra. A critical mass of language that finally breaks the natural order. Cause and effect reversed: the people had gone because the cars couldn't park there, the buildings have to come down because the garages had rebelled.
The only other garage graffiti was the occasional Eye of Providence (or all seeing eye - the thing off the American Dollar that gets linked with Illuminati bullshit conspiracies).
The garages are watching you.
--
I saw this anti-tory graffiti and nodded my approval. It is nice to feel united by anger.
And then around the corner saw this (HELP TO STOP CANADAS SEAL HUNT), written with the same pen. Surely the Heygate has more relevant problems?
Like the sentient garages...
I can't believe I've never been inside before. A housing estate built for more than 3000 people which now has three or four occupied flats.
It was the quietest place I have been in London, you could hear the trees in the wind and the birds, but no cars, no people.
Activists and remaining residents have turned some of the communal spaces into allotments, and used hundreds of the abandoned recycling bins for planting food.
The weird thing was that although there was the occasional dumping ground, like these old tires and sofas piled up, there was no rubbish. No empty cans, no drifting plastic bags or crisp packets carried on the wind. The place was sterile.
We walked along the garages and I became fascinated by the hand painted NO PARKING signs that were on many of the doors. They seemed so pointless now, with no use for the garages - empty threats.
But then I started wondering why no one was parking down there, why not? You aren't going to get towed. And why was no one dumping down here? No tires, no sofas, no burned out cars. What was wrong?
In a way, the NO PARKING signs were finally having the desired effect. Only, with the additional consequence of displacing all the residents and eventually destroying the buildings.
Like an incantation or a mantra. A critical mass of language that finally breaks the natural order. Cause and effect reversed: the people had gone because the cars couldn't park there, the buildings have to come down because the garages had rebelled.
The only other garage graffiti was the occasional Eye of Providence (or all seeing eye - the thing off the American Dollar that gets linked with Illuminati bullshit conspiracies).
The garages are watching you.
--
I saw this anti-tory graffiti and nodded my approval. It is nice to feel united by anger.
And then around the corner saw this (HELP TO STOP CANADAS SEAL HUNT), written with the same pen. Surely the Heygate has more relevant problems?
Like the sentient garages...
Today I Shall Write Without Inhibitions!
"Today I shall write without inhibitions! That is what I thought. So I took off all my clothes, and sat down at my desk.
"I would write with my whole being, without the obstruction of clothes. I would let the words flow from my body like water from a spring, like spunk from a wanked cock.
"But from the open window I heard jeering. And when I turned to face the outside world, I remembered the school that I can see from my window, and saw that the children were on their morning break.
"Some were laughing, pointing. Most had their mobile phones out, filming me, sending pictures of my prone body to Twitter and Facebook. Teachers had been alerted. The more vigilant of the staff were dispatching janitors and dinner ladies around the the front of my house to find out who this naked pervert might be.
"So I shrank back from the window, enclosing myself around my genitals, like a flower cuddling its stamen, protecting it from the wind.
"I could not approach the window to close the curtains, nor to pick up my clothes, strewn across the bed. I cursed my earlier optimism. They will never let you write, I thought.
"There I stayed, huddled in the corner of the room, raising my head occasionally to stare at the thinning crowd of laughing children.
"After what seemed like an eternity, the bell went for the pupils to return to their classrooms. They reluctantly abandoned their new game, left with only their memories, and several gigabytes of medium quality cameraphone footage.
"When I was certain that the playground was empty, I leapt across the room, closed the curtains and put my clothes back on.
"I sat down at my desk and began again, only this time with the certainty that if my words flowed like water from a spring I should wet myself, and if they flowed like spunk from a cock they would leave a nasty stain."
"I would write with my whole being, without the obstruction of clothes. I would let the words flow from my body like water from a spring, like spunk from a wanked cock.
"But from the open window I heard jeering. And when I turned to face the outside world, I remembered the school that I can see from my window, and saw that the children were on their morning break.
"Some were laughing, pointing. Most had their mobile phones out, filming me, sending pictures of my prone body to Twitter and Facebook. Teachers had been alerted. The more vigilant of the staff were dispatching janitors and dinner ladies around the the front of my house to find out who this naked pervert might be.
"So I shrank back from the window, enclosing myself around my genitals, like a flower cuddling its stamen, protecting it from the wind.
"I could not approach the window to close the curtains, nor to pick up my clothes, strewn across the bed. I cursed my earlier optimism. They will never let you write, I thought.
"There I stayed, huddled in the corner of the room, raising my head occasionally to stare at the thinning crowd of laughing children.
"After what seemed like an eternity, the bell went for the pupils to return to their classrooms. They reluctantly abandoned their new game, left with only their memories, and several gigabytes of medium quality cameraphone footage.
"When I was certain that the playground was empty, I leapt across the room, closed the curtains and put my clothes back on.
"I sat down at my desk and began again, only this time with the certainty that if my words flowed like water from a spring I should wet myself, and if they flowed like spunk from a cock they would leave a nasty stain."
Evacuations
Further to my dreams of ear wax, I've come to realise that in a distant bodily fantasy, I yearn to be completely evacuated. As in, to transcend my body through some sort of emptying out of all my excretions. Shit, piss, snot, bile, wax. And that physical voiding would set my mind free on to levels of thought previously unimaginable.
Or perhaps I would just be very thirsty.
Or perhaps I would just be very thirsty.
Street Drinking
Street drinking is a form of anti-capitalism.
Capitalism is nihilistic, but its nihilism is self-serving. It ignores consequences (economic, ecological, social) but ultimately it serves those who wish to accumulate wealth.
Street drinking is nihilistic. But it is an inclusive form of nihilism, i.e. it includes the street drinker. It ignores consequences (economic, social, psychological, physical) for society as a whole, and for the individual who drinks.
It is anti-social and anti-individual.
--
The street drinker inhabits space that is supposedly public, and constantly proves - to themselves and to those who care to watch - that public space is not public, and that it is monitored and policed, and that a hierarchy is maintained.
Street drinking is a ritual, towards obliteration. For the non-religious in society based on capitalist values, nihilistic rituals are the only meaningful ceremonies left.
To repeat the ritual, day after day. To be moved on from the same places, day after day. To perform these rituals is to (knowingly or unknowingly) perform a ritual against the incursion of the private upon the public. A performance of the chaotic towards the ordered.
Street drinking is a reminder that beneath the veneer of choice lies a chaos of determinism.
Capitalism is nihilistic, but its nihilism is self-serving. It ignores consequences (economic, ecological, social) but ultimately it serves those who wish to accumulate wealth.
Street drinking is nihilistic. But it is an inclusive form of nihilism, i.e. it includes the street drinker. It ignores consequences (economic, social, psychological, physical) for society as a whole, and for the individual who drinks.
It is anti-social and anti-individual.
--
The street drinker inhabits space that is supposedly public, and constantly proves - to themselves and to those who care to watch - that public space is not public, and that it is monitored and policed, and that a hierarchy is maintained.
Street drinking is a ritual, towards obliteration. For the non-religious in society based on capitalist values, nihilistic rituals are the only meaningful ceremonies left.
To repeat the ritual, day after day. To be moved on from the same places, day after day. To perform these rituals is to (knowingly or unknowingly) perform a ritual against the incursion of the private upon the public. A performance of the chaotic towards the ordered.
Street drinking is a reminder that beneath the veneer of choice lies a chaos of determinism.
Acceptable Blockages
Acceptable Blockages, lecture with slideshow, (2011)
[Download here]
Acceptable Blockages is the name of a talk I gave at the Centre for Creative Collaboration last summer. I made a badly formatted PDF document of it and I just found it, so here it is.
My favourite bit is the comparison between different types of road cone.
Enjoy.
Raining Blood
I'd had a serious few days of panic attacks and deep dread. I felt shaky and absurdly worried but I'd been in the house for too long. I knew I had to get out and do something. See the sky.
I decided to go see Patrick Keiller's exhibition at the Tate Britain. One of the few artists who makes the idea of a 'British' Tate less ridiculous by working with the connections between English landscape and politics. The presence of the Robinson character - a permanent outsider who is, at the same time, quintessentially English (Keiller writes about 'Robinson' being the sort of name someone would appropriate in an attempt to blend in) - is a framing device that allows Keiller to be both indulgent and wry in the way he addresses the political implications of the work. The show allows access to the art historical and literary references that Keiller alludes to in the films, which touch on so many things it can be hard to keep up.
One of my favourite images was this painting by James Ward called The Moment.
I've written about the genre of 'Animal Terror' before, and this is a particularly fine example. There is something magical about the almost Byzantine 'incorrectness' of the bodies of the animals. The coiled, bouncy serpent and the swan-like neck of the horse. The unreal, uncanny nature of the animals was once their symbolic power (which is lost on a contemporary audience - something about the power of the monarchy being challenged by the state). But it was also their downfall in the history of art. Muybridge's photos eventually swept away this illustrative style of the representation of animals, just like the Renaissance did for Mediaeval representation of humans.
I walked back from Pimlico, along Millbank, past Conservative HQ, where student rioters had danced in broken glass. It seemed like a silly place for a riot, blank and characterless. The Conservative party is a non-politics, a void swirling with capital where values should be. The surrounding area is severely lacking in amenities, unless you count Pizza Express. It is a depressing part of the river, you are followed by the gaze of the MI5 building on the other side of the river, watching as you walk.
The riots have been erased from the landscape here, though the outrageous convictions continue for the August riots (despite or, obviously, because of the widespread racism of the police and the strange officially manufactured 'moral outrage' that guides the judiciary).
But you find moments, gaps in the façade.
Or in this case, written on the façade.
--
Once I got past Westminster (again, it is the lack of politics that is striking here - security personnel, tourists and TV crews, but the MPs are on their Easter Holidays, so the cameras are pointing at nothing, getting cut aways and establishing shots for other things, another time. There was an in-between, airport feeling about the place.) I was on steadier ground, but a ground that was golden with bird shit.
It is not yellow, or golden-ish - it is metallic and shiny and actually golden. What are they eating here in Westminster? Which tree produces these golden berries? I am tempted to paint with it, or just to collect it, and smear the walls with it. It must fetch some sort of price. Or have some shamanistic value. Can we use it?
All day I'd been seeing Barclays/Boris Bikes - subsidised travel for city workers, pootling along taking calls on Bluetooth headsets. The slow bouncy hulks of the Big Society. Only someone as fat as Boris Johnson could see these as an adequate way of moving around the city.
And then, this.
Golden shit, rendering the Boris bikes impotent. Had it knocked the saddle round? The sheer weight of fecal matter raining down from the trees.
[Idea for exhibition: Boris bikes, smeared with golden birdshit. Kept in a gallery space and rented out for free. Idea for long term intervention: plant the golden berried trees in cracks in the pavement near Boris Bike settlements. Then wait 40 years for the birds to do their job.]
I went on, into the City proper.
Keiller's exhibition had been describing the Enclosure Acts, and resistance to them. But the City has been enclosed for much longer. The boundaries of the City were formed by a quirk of history, William the Conqueror granting it an independent status, its freedom from state control pre-dating the Enclosure Acts and the early stirrings of capitalism. Ironically, this prepared it for its contemporary role as an uncontrollable market vortex, unmoored from the ropes of reason or realism.
I was skirting the edge, keeping out of the way. I stuck to Upper and Lower Thames St, where the architecture is brutal -flyovers and concrete.
I found these fenced off trees.
Half planted, then blocked off with official street furniture. Barriers to entry. Protecting you from nature until its power can be fully controlled.
Earlier I had seen this 'No Pedestrian' sign by the side of the road.
The white paint had flaked off, and the walking man was surrounded by red. The crimson clouds closing in. A much more extreme warning than the original sign could ever suggest, implying that if you cross onto that upon which pedestrians must not tread, the sky will swell and it will rain blood.
I got to the Tower of London and skulked around the closed ticket offices and Traditional Fish and Chip Shoppes, accidentally photo-bombing dozens of tourists before getting the tube home.
--
Later on I went to the pub and saw this excellent example of Slayer graffiti. I've been documenting Slayer graffiti for a while. They are one of the few metal bands that have retained their iconographic power. Even I can draw the Slayer logo, and obviously, so could the person who did this.
Slayer wrote a rather excellent song called Raining Blood. Inspired by the sign maybe. This could be a new genre: Hazard Sign Metal.
I decided to go see Patrick Keiller's exhibition at the Tate Britain. One of the few artists who makes the idea of a 'British' Tate less ridiculous by working with the connections between English landscape and politics. The presence of the Robinson character - a permanent outsider who is, at the same time, quintessentially English (Keiller writes about 'Robinson' being the sort of name someone would appropriate in an attempt to blend in) - is a framing device that allows Keiller to be both indulgent and wry in the way he addresses the political implications of the work. The show allows access to the art historical and literary references that Keiller alludes to in the films, which touch on so many things it can be hard to keep up.
One of my favourite images was this painting by James Ward called The Moment.
I've written about the genre of 'Animal Terror' before, and this is a particularly fine example. There is something magical about the almost Byzantine 'incorrectness' of the bodies of the animals. The coiled, bouncy serpent and the swan-like neck of the horse. The unreal, uncanny nature of the animals was once their symbolic power (which is lost on a contemporary audience - something about the power of the monarchy being challenged by the state). But it was also their downfall in the history of art. Muybridge's photos eventually swept away this illustrative style of the representation of animals, just like the Renaissance did for Mediaeval representation of humans.
I walked back from Pimlico, along Millbank, past Conservative HQ, where student rioters had danced in broken glass. It seemed like a silly place for a riot, blank and characterless. The Conservative party is a non-politics, a void swirling with capital where values should be. The surrounding area is severely lacking in amenities, unless you count Pizza Express. It is a depressing part of the river, you are followed by the gaze of the MI5 building on the other side of the river, watching as you walk.
The riots have been erased from the landscape here, though the outrageous convictions continue for the August riots (despite or, obviously, because of the widespread racism of the police and the strange officially manufactured 'moral outrage' that guides the judiciary).
But you find moments, gaps in the façade.
Or in this case, written on the façade.
--
Once I got past Westminster (again, it is the lack of politics that is striking here - security personnel, tourists and TV crews, but the MPs are on their Easter Holidays, so the cameras are pointing at nothing, getting cut aways and establishing shots for other things, another time. There was an in-between, airport feeling about the place.) I was on steadier ground, but a ground that was golden with bird shit.
It is not yellow, or golden-ish - it is metallic and shiny and actually golden. What are they eating here in Westminster? Which tree produces these golden berries? I am tempted to paint with it, or just to collect it, and smear the walls with it. It must fetch some sort of price. Or have some shamanistic value. Can we use it?
All day I'd been seeing Barclays/Boris Bikes - subsidised travel for city workers, pootling along taking calls on Bluetooth headsets. The slow bouncy hulks of the Big Society. Only someone as fat as Boris Johnson could see these as an adequate way of moving around the city.
And then, this.
Golden shit, rendering the Boris bikes impotent. Had it knocked the saddle round? The sheer weight of fecal matter raining down from the trees.
[Idea for exhibition: Boris bikes, smeared with golden birdshit. Kept in a gallery space and rented out for free. Idea for long term intervention: plant the golden berried trees in cracks in the pavement near Boris Bike settlements. Then wait 40 years for the birds to do their job.]
I went on, into the City proper.
Keiller's exhibition had been describing the Enclosure Acts, and resistance to them. But the City has been enclosed for much longer. The boundaries of the City were formed by a quirk of history, William the Conqueror granting it an independent status, its freedom from state control pre-dating the Enclosure Acts and the early stirrings of capitalism. Ironically, this prepared it for its contemporary role as an uncontrollable market vortex, unmoored from the ropes of reason or realism.
I was skirting the edge, keeping out of the way. I stuck to Upper and Lower Thames St, where the architecture is brutal -flyovers and concrete.
I found these fenced off trees.
Half planted, then blocked off with official street furniture. Barriers to entry. Protecting you from nature until its power can be fully controlled.
Earlier I had seen this 'No Pedestrian' sign by the side of the road.
The white paint had flaked off, and the walking man was surrounded by red. The crimson clouds closing in. A much more extreme warning than the original sign could ever suggest, implying that if you cross onto that upon which pedestrians must not tread, the sky will swell and it will rain blood.
I got to the Tower of London and skulked around the closed ticket offices and Traditional Fish and Chip Shoppes, accidentally photo-bombing dozens of tourists before getting the tube home.
--
Later on I went to the pub and saw this excellent example of Slayer graffiti. I've been documenting Slayer graffiti for a while. They are one of the few metal bands that have retained their iconographic power. Even I can draw the Slayer logo, and obviously, so could the person who did this.
Slayer wrote a rather excellent song called Raining Blood. Inspired by the sign maybe. This could be a new genre: Hazard Sign Metal.