In some quarters of the contemporary art market, a ‘genre’ has emerged. Steeped in esoterism, this art is a blend of New Age spirituality, pastel colours, neon, and Frankie magazine aesthetics. It is de-skilled, anti-disciplinary, wonky, cute-yet-nefarious, mischievous and somewhat eerie. It evokes feelings of unease — it would be mistaken to refer to this work as uncanny, but it is certainly unnerving at times — not because of any true or rattling subversion, perversion or transgression, but the contrary. This type of art is presented with the ethical and entrepreneurial ethos commonly held by the contemporary arts worker. The iconography of the historically-transgressive is utilised to yield a kind of ‘subversion of norms’ without the risk of fallout. Subversion on stable grounds. The work I am describing broadly is the kind sanctioned by scholarship and approved by discourse. Its merits for subversion come pre-packaged and ready for consumption via gallery didactics. These merits are often affirmative ones that establish the art is actually calling upon you, the viewer, to take some form of action (which is usually inaction, just looking, experiencing and, if lucky, thinking a little differently — all as a ‘political’ act). The subversion does not leave you scrambled. Instead, it alerts you to a cause.
Since around the 1980s, funding systems have favoured art seen to have greater social impact and audience ‘engagement’ — not only skewing what is funded but, more importantly, what is valued. Now, a valuable art school graduate is a ‘job ready’ one. No need for the study of art history; the key is to be well equipped for work within the hyper-corporatised ‘cultural industries’ in which the artist is assigned the status of small business. The artist is now a project manager, risk-assessor, accountant, planner, marketing manager, copywriter and, perhaps, somewhere hidden in the mix, a person who had an idea to make a thing. Under these conditions, how could a timeless or new art develop? Ironically, a young radical artist might turn to the art market to be liberated from grant funding subservience. And why not? The commercial art market might appear as an alternative lifestyle; a return to a former bohemianism. Within this scenario, the contemporary artist (or ‘celebrity small business’) must cultivate a brand. Among the available options, the enduring appeal of ‘newness’ often prevails: the urge to be groundbreaking, fashion-forward, cutting-edge.
Today, the contemporary subject — a badaud — does not crave the ‘shock of the new’ but rather a weak tremor that riffs off the historic controversies of art. This type of art is often accompanied by a qualifier, rationalising its awkwardness by attributing a ‘meaning’ or concept. It is quirky art that attempts to fulfil the various demands of its diffuse audience. The accompanying wall label describes that the work ‘poses questions’ or ‘subverts norms’. If effective, the jaw of the badaud drops, puzzled by the object, and they are then granted the satisfaction of an a-ha moment via the didactic label.
It is vague of me to describe an idea rather than an art object — an anally retentive activity to be sure — but hopefully this is beginning to sound familiar, to remind you of something you have seen before. A cursory glance at the stalls of last year’s Sydney Contemporary suggests that there is a public with a penchant for work like this: that is, at once, socially engaged and teasingly provocative. It could be read as zany (à la Sianne Ngai): art that straddles the various needs of its broad audience to, at once, shock, affirm, puzzle, remind, convey virtues and be a desirable commodity. It is a lot to ask of an artwork!
Perhaps an example of work that orbits these ideas is the work of Jack Ball, represented by Perth/Boorloo gallery Sweet Pea. This is a prime example of how light sexual imagery — perhaps we can consider it ‘soft eroticism’ — is employed to create work that is not so much shocking but rather about empowerment. It is pleasing to the ideals of an ethically-minded art market: it is about sensuality, but it utilises the iconography of once ‘subversive’ images (hairy legs, close ups of soft body parts, and the patterns and textures of flesh, often with moisture or liquid playing a particularly potent part of the image). Very vanilla in the age of hardcore 4K pornography. Ball’s are not ‘elegant’ images, but they are certainly not pornographic. The icky aspects of intimacy are paired with hallucinogenic colours, implying a surreality, which pushes the subject away, making it otherworldly — cleansing of its dirty reality. Work by artists like Carla Adams, Lauren Dunn, Nick Modrzewski, Sam Jinks, Iain Dean and Ramesh Mario Nithiyendran also approach this category of faux subversion to varying degrees; pushing and pulling between their numerous zany qualities.
To bastardise Slavoj Žižek, this art appeals to a contemporary thirst for faux experience: for Coke No Sugar — enjoying the taste, but only an expertly engineered semblance of taste with no substance. Žižek puts it simply: today ‘transgressive excess loses its shock value and is fully integrated into the established artistic market.’1 When riding on the hamster wheel of contemporary art fairs, shock and subversion appear to truly come from outside rather than within the gawkers’ market.
[1] Slavoj Žižek, The Fragile Absolute: Or, Why Is the Christian Legacy Worth Fighting For?, Verso, London, 2000, p. 25.