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GUTRUMBLE IN FULL COLOUR
GUTRUMBLE IN FULL COLOUR
It is a great shame that I am lowering myself to even bother to write for this rag. Creature begged and sensing that there was a need for someone capable of lifting the standards from the turgid prose that I had the misfortune to have read aloud for me recently, I agreed. I do not own a computer. I occasionally browse through a random selection of websites in order to keep up to speed with the base obsessions of modern life. I use the laptop of an infrequent acquaintance, a very casual arrangement the details of which must remain undisclosed…
This minion will be the person responsible for taking my hand written text and typing it for general consumption by the eager visitors to this website. I have to trust that all goes well in translation; that my vision shall remain intact. I do worry. My subtle nuances and forthright views may be misinterpreted by the feeble minded and those of a troubled disposition. I may be hoist by my own petard.
It is my goal to enlighten the filthy masses and point the finger at those who dare to sully the glorious arts with their navel gazing. You may feel the need to respond and I shall encourage this, absolutely; fond as I am of vigorous intercourse, especially with strangers which in my case means most of the population. Sadly, for the most part, you fail to inspire me. I loathe all of you in equal measure. Every single one of you is a disappointment.
I don’t feel the need to show you credentials or prove to you that I have been involved in this project and that gallery and I know this person and that. I despise networking. Art whores debasing themselves for what? A ‘contact’. This vague notion that 3,602 virtual friends on some insidious social website and a scribbled drunken note from a letch at a private view constitute some kind of career is nonsensical. If I want to speak to my acquaintances I do not need the help of an internet service and if I am not in the habit of contacting them by post or some other vulgar means it is most likely because I despise them anyway. People do not lose touch accidentally; they mean to avoid the cretins that they had to endure when studying. ‘Keep in touch’ is a sure sign of future indifference.
The whole idea of a career in art is complete folly. Art, true art-not the artifice paraded as real by the pseudo-intelligentsia and cliterati of LDN-is from the soul and arrives and exists as a response to living, not a proposal required for a gallery or to tick the boxes on a module obsessed degree course. You work because you have to; art is a calling. Perhaps I should at this point define ‘art’. I don’t mean in some pretentious way. When I talk about ‘art’ I refer to any creative act. I am a painter and a writer. My version of ‘art’ does not preclude anything; acting, dancing, music and whatever else I have omitted. Creativity is the point. You do it because you love it. Talent is nothing without enthusiasm.
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O Mr Gutrumble! All that o so serious theorising you’ve been doing must be putting you in a bad mood! ‘This minion will be the person responsible for taking my hand written text and typing it for general consumption by the eager visitors to this website’ Not only do you sound like you’re from the middle ages, do you really believe bringing new writing to a wider audience is so bad? I would say it’s intellectual elitism, but you’re hardly an intellectual…
‘It is my goal to enlighten the filthy masses and point the finger at those who dare to sully the glorious arts with their navel gazing.’
And how do you do that exactly? By coming down hard on well intentioned, well equiped and dynamic websites that seek to bring great art to a wider audience? You’re going to enlighten people by writing poorly written rants? Have you heard of the clear English campaign? The war against cliche?
It’s great to see people using initiative, coming together and sharing new and innovative work in new and innovative ways.
‘I despise networking. Art whores debasing themselves for what?’
I’ll tell you for what, for the strenghtening of artistic communities and the widening of their appeal. For the sustainable growth and development of exciting new work. Because we don’t want to live and work in isolation, not when we can share, develop and extend new possibilities and enjoy well deserved opportunity.
My mood is less than ecstatic because of people like you, Mr. Brown. I do not understand the difficulty you seem to have with one person theorising, or thinking, even if the result does not fit your cosy world view. If I believed that bringing ‘new writing’ to a wider audience was such a bad thing, would I have bothered to commit pen to paper in the first place? Clearly you simply do not like my approach. It might clash with your dogmatic obsession with minority writers from the last century. I notice that you do not cite Rosamunde Pilcher as an influence. Shame.
An intellectual is a thinker. Nothing more, nothing less. I am prepared to listen to anyone, even when I believe they are sadly misguided. Having an ability to reason and to try to understand the world is more the stuff of intellectual substance than merely borrowing concepts from others and dropping the occasional ‘big word’ into prose.
The clearly written and correctly spellt campaign has a place but as a writer I would have thought you would be the first to appreciate that words are a thing of beauty, of the sublime; you really should not criticise any use of them, even if you feel it to be archaic. I cannot excuse my use; we all have our own understanding.
‘The War Against Cliché’ is an excellent collection from Mr. Amis. I suggest that you allow people to examine the breadth of your own imagination by making a regular contribution to this wonderful realm; help to strengthen this artistic community. Prove that you are not an opportunistic parasite; come and share, develop and extend the new possibilities that opening your work up to direct criticism can bring.