contemporary monkey

Xu Zhen is at least one part of MadeIn. Or not.

Can you ever really know someone, a country, or a culture? Armed with the worldwide inter-webby thing, a plane ticket to just about anywhere, and a credit card that purchases just about anything on the planet, you’d think our capacity to be global pals of the highest order is a cinch. What is it we don’t know? Want to meet people from all over the world, but don’t have the wherewithal? Line up a four week holiday to South Africa in June and the world comes to you. Constantly wondering what all the hub-bub is about of, say, the politics in Georgia, shifting borders in Armenia, or football teams of Togo? An iPhone in your pocket is all you need to pull down as much data as your battery allows. But honest data doesn’t make it easy to grasp the details.

This month at Birmingham’s Ikon Gallery is a show from a Chinese art collective called MadeIn. There is a large amount of work in the gallery, so the term “collective” could mean a small Chinese village of 200,000. And this is exactly the point MadeIn are making in their show called, “Seeing One’s Own Eyes”, how much of the world is understood through cliche. MadeIn’s work enables the platitudes of the Middle East, including the sympathies of the region’s locals, with the caricatures of the “tourists” (that would be us westerners with our ample supply of guns and ammo).

In one section, enclosing about 8-10 mixed media works, each about 8 feet by 15 feet wide, reflect someone’s interpretation, or subjective opinion, of the current realm of the Middle East. American’s like me will see this as one more smirk at our country’s muscularity, bullying, short-sightedness; just more censure that the world piles onto every American, as if we’re all standing shoulder to shoulder against the world. And while the trite remarks might be somewhat warranted, it’s becoming an increasingly old story. I was mostly annoyed.

anti-American? or anti-indolent?

However, while the work uses mixed media, the images are painted cartoon-like, suggesting less than earnest comments. The images reflect what someone in Shanghai might perceive the Middle East to be from thousands of miles away, viewed through a skewed lens of the Chinese media, knowing it’s probably not completely true. The proposition is one that hints toward our inclination to shape subjective, even lazy, views into absolute fact.

I can’t leave without commenting on the over-zealous copy from the exhibition guide suggesting that MadeIn is a Chinese collective, that pretends it’s a Middle Eastern collective. Ikon Gallery state that Xu Zhen, a single man, is indeed MadeIn, which in itself pretends to be a Middle Eastern Art Collective. That’s more than a bit optimistic, as firstly, I don’t think one has to go that far to make the point about cliche which they were successful in constructing. Secondly, no visitor is going to think that, so why even make it up? It’s not like MadeIn needs to be more than once removed to prove their point. In fact, if you’re going to the trouble of inventing another layer, why not keep inventing layer; why stop at two? Why not suggest the Chinese artist Xu Zhen is pretending to be a Chinese artist collective, which is pretending to be a Middle Eastern Collective, which in itself is pretending to be an American collective, which might really be a British collective, pretending to be Chinese. Isn’t it all so circular and mind-bending, and self-reflective and black-hole-like? Who’s got drugs?

Staffordshire Gold Hoard of Plenty

The City of Birmingham is going through a collective treasure hunt for money at the moment, to acquire, or keep, recently found artifacts in the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery.  On a Staffordshire farmer’s land, a seventh century, Anglo-Saxon gold hoard was found via the usual suspect: anorak wanderer armed with metal detector: a minimalist Indiana Jones.  The “gold hoard” is a collection of 1500 gold and silver pieces, and was originally displayed at the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery in 2009.  The hoard is now in the hands of those greedy treasure robbers, The British Museum, and the West Midlands is angling to get it back.

Popular British TV personality David Starkey has stoked the fire by throwing his celebrity-ness behind appeals for public and private money.  Starkey was quoted in the Birmingham Post web site saying, “…break it up or move it and its meaning is lost”.  This is the same argument that the Greeks use to retrieve the Elgin Marbles from those greedy bastards, The British Museum, to no affect.  Maybe the Greeks would like to contribute in spite.

I have a better idea, one that performs an educational role.  Let’s work with the facts: it’s a gold hoard.  That means long ago a greedy Anglo-Saxon chief (probably an ancestor to the greedy British Museum n’er do wells) stole, embezzled, or otherwise pilfered gold artifacts from another chief, or possibly his own tribe.  Let’s put the stealing in an environment that it deserves: jail.  The Maze Prison is in the process of being ripped down, but surely England must have their Alcatraz, or a version of Guantanamo Bay.  Why not convert part of an unused prison into a showroom for Britain’s found treasure hoards.  Children on school trips would get a two-for-one lesson: historical evidence of what is now their homeland, and a moral lesson for what happens to you when you steal.  Maybe add a chained-up, rotting old actor in one of the cells to add to the affect of misery.

What’s more, the security comes built-in.  Any art thief would be greatly intimidated to set foot anywhere near a jail.  For the optimistic crook who dares to make a dash for it, the one or two security agents stationed at the front door could easily bundle the burglars into a nearby cell.  Then call the nearest magistrate for a quick hearing, and game over.  Bandit caught, taxi fare saved, Bob’s your uncle.

Birmingham's IKON Gallery: our lifeline to contemporary visual culture

Birmingham: England’s second largest city.  It’s a colossal second to London in population, cultural energy, and decent pubs.  The distance between the largest and second-largest, in population, is the equivalent of New York City and Austin, Texas.  Birmingham, however, is ground zero for the industrial revolution, heavy metal music, and the Balti.  The intrepidness of its history in the muscular shadow of London speaks volumes about its local pride and pluck.  At least that’s what I told myself while walking to the Ikon Gallery for a small, but important, gathering of art folk.

Birmingham is England’s Pittsburgh in that pretense doesn’t reveal itself here.  So with a handful of optimism and some hopeful yearning, I attended a local meeting of art-minded people to discuss the topic of a new contemporary art building to be built in Birmingham.  “Imagining Museums” was held at what is Birmingham’s lifeline to current visual culture: the Ikon Gallery.  The Ikon isn’t the Tate Modern, but it does a remarkable job informing us locals with contemporary visual culture.  Without it, we could easily be stuck listening to Pink Floyd.

Unfortunately, this is still England, and to ask British professionals to devise an image of the future is like making the request to meet in Hells’ conference room of getting no-where fast.  On the precipice loomed a fiery fur ball of committee meetings waiting to be gathered, rolled and spat out.

the IKON gallery; small but concentrated

Initial panel discussions from other global museum directors provided an immediate spark, with vital prompts to go for a new type of museum “while you have the chance”.  Great, I thought, this is going to be a blistering exchange.  After the administrators had their say, however, the exchange was thrown over to (mostly) the locals.  That’s when things turned a bit hazy and grey.

Having only lived in Birmingham for a year, but in England for five, it’s clear to me that Birmingham has an advantage that most British cities don’t.  All sorts of immigration happened, and is happening, in Birmingham, and to ignore the obvious is like wondering if there are any gay men in my home city of San Francisco.  Pakistanis, Caribs, Africans together make up 27% of the population (according to Wikipedia), and that number doesn’t include mixed race.  Amassing contemporary art from these communities, mixed with the current Anglo Saxon offerings, yields an understanding amongst nations that other cities can’t, or won’t, provide.  A new museum that includes nations united could eliminate the need for a British National Party, or any other narrow-minded, political group.

There was a push amongst the group of 50-60 art professionals to canvass the community, to ask them directly what they wanted.  Some of the international administrators were broadly suspicious of that idea.  What you don’t want is entertainment, warned one.  Perhaps give them a wizened choice, recommended another.  This sort of holier-than-though thought process is what gets the art community into trouble.  They turn super-nanny on us.

I’m not sure where this is all going, but as pie-in-the-sky meetings go, a room bursting with animation to discover the new world this wasn’t.  Regardless, there is a palpable (albeit at the low hum end of the audio range) local push for contemporary art in Britain’s second largest city, and with any luck, we might just get something that reflects it.