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Lost phone

First published in The Guardian, 23 July, 2014.

 

I bet you didn’t realise that Salvador Dali’s Lobster Telephone is a sexually charged object. The crustacean’s tail, where its sexual parts are located, is placed directly over the mouthpiece. Ooooo. Lobsters held erotic overtones for Dali. This seems very weird, but it is not as uncommon as you might think. Most people like lobster. However a recent Royal Commission into Fine Dining revealed that several unscrupulous Michelin starred chefs were secretly adding small quantities of eroticism to their lobster dishes. This moral decay at the heart of the food industry has leaked out even into home cooking. An unaired episode of the Great British Bake Off showed an ambitious contestant adding a full dollop of eroticism to his lobster soufflé. At the judges’ tasting Mary Berry refused to release the spoon from her mouth. Immediately sensing danger, the quick-thinking Paul Hollywood gallantly punched her in the face, locked her in a full Nelson and hung on as she descended into full-blown lasciviousness, frantically clawing at his trousers.

 

After the judges deliberations, and despite Paul Hollywood’s protestations, the contestant was put through to the next round.

 

I have no idea why Dali decided to make a telephone out of a lobster though. It’s such a crazy idea. 

That Dali. Such a surrealist. Such a luddite.

 

 

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Vanity of vanities! An exercise in banality.

First published in The Guardian, 9 July, 2014

 

It ends a bit gruesomely this one. Severed heads and limbs were just some of the studies Gericault painted in preparation for his masterpiece “The Raft of Medusa”. Andy Warhol made pictures of soup cans which also shocked people. I’m not squeamish though. I once opened a can of Campbell’s soup without gagging. You’re either born with the warrior spirit or you’re not. An attentive sub-editor asked me if the name Jenkins referred to a real artist. No. I was just after a common, unflamboyant surname. If I’d said Van Jenkins you could be sure you could be sure there’d be a poncey artist on the end of it.

 

I’m a little annoyed at myself with this one. I often like a few ideas in my cartoons, and am quite partial to a bit of a narrative, but with this one I changed my mind about some things at the last minute and made it wordier – a cardinal sin. I was so annoyed with myself that for the next couple of months I only drew single or double panel cartoons, which is probably a good thing. Or is it? if you have a strong opinion on the matter I’d love to hear it (and perhaps act on it). Is it an immediate turn-off to see a multi-panelled cartoon? Do you enjoy going a bit more in-depth with an idea or prefer a quick hit? Or do you enjoy leaving me hanging, my hand hovering in the air for a high five as you walk away, sniggering at the publicly embarrassing position you have left me in?

 

 

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Alain again – de Botton 2

First published in The Guardian, 25 June 2014.

 

I know, I know – fart jokes are an incredibly subtle form of humour and this one will have wafted over the heads of less perceptive readers. I have learnt my lesson and will dumb it down in future. I don’t want to spend my life alone in an ivory tower of uber-sophisticated humour. But don’t get me wrong – I love my tower. No matter how high property prices go I refuse to sell. It’s my dream home and to even consider selling it would be a slap in the faces of those 7,463 selfless elephants who gave their trunks. It would get a really good price though – it’s the only ivory tower in the street and I know for a fact that everyone around here is jealous. To give just one example, the postman Mr Wang breaks off a bit every time he delivers the post. I once caught him in the act; he was stuffing my doorknob into his mailbag. When I berated him for his jealousy he wailed that he was not jealous, just sterile. WTF? Maybe I should move – so many nutters around here.

 

In their book “Art as Therapy”, Alain De Botton and the philosopher John Armstrong ask the question “what is art for?” They suggest that art is a therapeutic medium that can help us with our psychological frailties. I’ve got a couple of those which would inevitably draw jail-time were they discovered but luckily I have had a good hard look at a Corot and am now a functioning member of society. I jest of course. The Corot didn’t work. It is an interesting book and it certainly promotes closer looking at various artworks from unlikely angles which is a great thing, but my hackles are automatically raised by any New Age-y guff. But hey, I’m not everyone and for some people that works. Whether some art can be therapeutic or not is completely beside the point of why I love certain artworks. I certainly never think “how can this help me lead a better life?” when I look at a painting. Actually, it is probably a question of mental habits. I suspect that whatever De Botton looks at, not just art but anything, he is thinking about it in terms of how it could be reframed as a therapeutic tool. I just don’t think like that. When I look at something the questions and observations I make are completely different (potentially jailable). In fact, he either misses or intentionally ignores the central point of why art is sometimes overwhelmingly great – that visual music, with resonances and references tying together in beautiful and unexpected ways. As worthy as de Botton’s way of thinking may be, and he certainly thinks it is THE most worthy way (hence his confidence in wading into so many different areas, e.g. literature, philosophy, class, media, art, etc), I certainly don’t believe it is a more rewarding way of viewing art than my own, which has been the source of great pleasure. I welcome and enjoy his take on things but I suspect it is his belief that this is the best way, the proper way, of thinking about art that grates with some people – especially, it seems, with artists and critics, i.e. those who take profound pleasure in art but with completely different mental processes.

 

All part of life’s rich blanket I guess.