On the 8th November, we spent a lunch hour investigating the above exhibition in the Arts Centre gallery (and then took another hour off to actually eat). Having warmed up our aesthetic appreciation by admiring the beautiful people strolling around outside, we felt ready to indulge our artistic souls in an orgy of profound iconoclasm and other -isms. Unfortunately, we became unwitting victims of a display of cretinism.
"Container One" - An eight foot long yellow dildo in an attractive wooden packing case, perfect for the ambitious fetishist with a large KY Jelly budget. A new Rag challenge, perhaps?
"Woman 2" - Shame that the artist never got round to finishing it before it got broken in transit. Disheartened by the progress of the work, the artist had given up and drawn the outline of a woman on in biro instead.
"New Stones, Newton's Tones" - A cuttingly-named floor display of scattered plastic fragments, including a politically incorrect Nestles top. Choice of material obviously dicatated by the artist not being allowed sharp objects.
"Toy" - A sardine tin (empty!) in a tin bath tub. Very profound, unlike the following comment - crap. This, however, is a better expression of truth and beauty.
"Five Heads" - Five household objects in a column with eyeholes cut in them. Looks like your kitchen after your housemates have come home drunk and had a "good idea" that ruins your best coffee pot.
"Fleeting Moment" - A pile of small Big Bens cast in lead. The soft metal allows this sculpture to be easily crushed into another exhibit called "Scrap".
"The Eye Has It" - Rob: A profound piece involving a sperm, made from metal and trouser legs (perhaps a witty remark on trouser snakes?) and an open object resembling a vulva. Deeply moving and very amusing. Ade: Crap, didn't turn me on.
"Houses and Occupants" - A badly focussed photograph encased in a thick piece of glass which regrettably wasn't smoked.
"Crow & Carrion" - Nice plinth, shame about the two broken brollies dumped on top of it. Some people don't appreciate great art.
"Coal Stove" - Model of a stove, carved from coal. Oops, my sides have split from laughter.
"Mont Saint Victoire" - Described as constructed from "corrugated metal, paint and a branch". No shit. Bears an incredible resemblance to some painted metal and a branch.
"Bearing" - Recovered from the BBC special effects department after Dr Who was taken off the air. Unused first design for Davros.
"Ferment" - Looks like a large steel flute in a case, with the added appeal that it can't be played and would break the back of anyone who tried.
"An early start" - Happily, unfinished. Show what happens when you attempt to assemble MFI coffee tables without using the instructions.
"Kiln" - Bizarrely, this looked like a kiln. Adequately large enough to roast the artist in it.
"Green Beak" - A beak of slate that is, well, green. The reader may wish to pause and gasp in astonishment at the unholy truths thus revealed.
"Untitled (vertical cardstack)" - A stack of corrugated card bricks, "purchased 1992" but actually "nicked 1992 from the rear of Kwik Save".
"Untitled (zinc)" - the titles of these last two pieces should indicate the incredible creative energies expended by the artists. This one was possibly someone's fire guard. The artist will be sorry when their old Mum burns to death this winter.
"Five Fishes" - Five welded metal objects that - get this - are vaguely fish shaped. Possibly intended to provide stretching exercises for "Container One".
"No Smoking Sign" - Modern, iconic and immensely communicative; a message for us all [Ed - errr, I don't think that's an exhibit...]
It isn't very clever, and certainly not polite, to mock in such a superficial and unappreciative tone but sadly that is all this limp display deserved. For an exhibition supposedly about communication, it succeeded in communicating very little, beyond the fact that care in the community isn't working for some individuals. Art like this is apparently designed to provoke, to shock and to confuse, yet its immature posing and utter lack of concept or direction fails to arouse much strong emotion. It was hard work even taking the piss, but what alternative did we have? Enough talent had already been wasted without adding mine and Rob's meagre stock of literary ability [speak for yourself - Rob]. On the other hand, the fact that BT is blowing our phone bills on this impotent rubbish arouses very strong emotions indeed, coupled with fantasies involving mass executions of marketing departments.
The best that can be said was that this exhibition was a prime stereotype of all that is pointless in modern art. It does not reach out and communicate with the viewer; it rots and waits to be burnt on a bonfire of the artists' vain pretensions and empty "insights". I hope someone can be bothered to fetch the matches.
Rob Webb and Ade Rixon