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ltmurnauOoooh, everyone hates Istvan... at least everyone working at the the Ottawa Citizen (Daily Petfinder, as Frank magazine terms it) who can do joined-up writing:
Dangerous artistic ground
Paul Gessell
The Ottawa Citizen
Thursday, March 04, 2004
(Graphic: Toronto artist Istvan Kantor, one of this year's Governor General's visual arts award winners, shown during his 1999 protest against an art gallery in Halifax that refused to show his work. He spattered six vials of his own blood on the window of the gallery, then lit a plank and jumped onto it, shouting from a megaphone.
CREDIT: Eric Wynne, The Canadian Press)
The Governor General's arts awards have moved into daringly different territory this year, handing out prizes to some off-the-wall artists.
Surely, it was inevitable that some totally weird artist who dabbles in blood, bodily orifices and other unconventional media would eventually win the country's top art prize, the Governor General's Award for Visual and Media Arts.
And, thus, Toronto artist Istvan Kantor will pick up his $15,000 prize March 10 from Her Excellency at Rideau Hall.
There are six other winners, most of them artists who focus on ideas, manipulation of materials and unconventional media rather than on esthetics. You won't find Group of Seven-style landscape painters in this bunch. This is art rarely suitable for framing, some of it art just for the moment, art even too off-the-wall for some galleries and museums.
With its picks, this year's jury has moved into dangerous territory. The purpose of the awards is to create greater awareness of, not disgust towards, visual arts in Canada.
By putting Kantor on an already exceedingly audacious list, the jury may have severely eroded public support for these taxpayer-financed awards and for contemporary art in general. It's like awarding Osama bin Laden the Nobel Peace Prize.
The jury's political incorrectness stretches even farther: All seven recipients chosen by the jury are men and none is from Quebec. It is refreshing when regional, gender and ethnic politics do not come into play in these awards. But it is unheard of for a parcel of awards with the Rideau Hall seal of approval.
This year's jury, assembled by the Canada Council for the Arts, includes artists Micheline Beauchemin, Evergon, Edward Poitras, Tom Sherman and Takao Tanabe and arts consultant Ian Lumsden. They have not pushed boundaries -- they have eliminated them.
Since the awards began in 2000, the recipients have tended to be far more conventional artists. Last year's list was topped by painter Alex Colville. In other years, we have seen multi-disciplinary artists Michael Snow and John Scott, filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin and architect Douglas Cardinal. They are all edgy in their own way. But Kantor is way beyond the edges. He is right off the map with, among other guerrilla tactics, the use of his own blood to mark an "X" on the walls of the National Gallery and other top museums. Getting arrested is, to him, part of an art performance.
Other recipients this year include:
(snip)
Starting March 12, the public can view examples of works by these seven artists at the National Gallery.
© The Ottawa Citizen 2004
Another story by Paul Gessell, for the CanWest generic news-feed spigot:
Artist's blood-soaked portfolio nets Governor General's Award
Paul Gessell
CanWest News Service
Thursday, March 04, 2004
Istvan Kantor: 'Gifts' of blood
OTTAWA -- Toronto artist Istvan Kantor has been known to mark a large "X" on walls with his own blood. On other occasions, he inserts a vial of his blood into his anus, assumes an upside-down lotus position and lets the blood flow into his mouth. He has prepared and served food containing human blood.
So, needless to say, Rideau Hall and the National Gallery of Canada are nervous about Kantor's planned visit to Ottawa March 10 to pick up the country's top art prize for a quarter-century of producing some of the most shocking and demonic (some might say disgusting and repellent) art in the world.
The Hungarian-born Kantor is one of seven artists receiving this year's Governor General's Award in Visual and Media Arts; each will receive $15,000. Kantor is the only one of the seven who has been permanently banned from entering the National Gallery for decorating a wall there with one of his self-described X-shaped "gifts" of blood in 1991.
However, he has been given special dispensation to attend a group exhibition at the gallery, opening March 12, of works by him and the other award recipients. "They will let me in but I will be under the surveillance of two security guards," the artist said in a recent telephone interview.
The gallery confirmed the arrangements.
Kantor can expect similar treatment at Rideau Hall when Adrienne Clarkson hands him his cheque March 10, even though Kantor says he has no "special plans" to leave a bloody "X" or other "gift" at the Governor General's residence. Parliamentary security guards will no doubt also be on alert when Kantor and the other six recipients are presented to the House of Commons March 11.
"Although I did an 'X' recently at the Power Plant (a Toronto gallery), I don't do it as often as I used to."
The Governor General has no voice in deciding who will win the visual arts awards, which honour a body of work or a lifetime of work rather than individual works. The recipients are picked by a jury of artists and art experts selected each year by the Canada Council for the Arts. This year's jury included artists Micheline Beauchemin, Evergon, Edward Poitras, Tom Sherman and Takao Tanabe and arts consultant Ian Lumsden.
Kantor could be described as an art anarchist, or perhaps a guerrilla artist. He is the first to admit that receiving the ultimate establishment art award is "contradictory" for someone who has made a career of protesting against the establishment, especially the art establishment, with his bloody "X"s on the walls of prominent galleries in North America and Europe. "It's pretty contradictory, I guess, but it gives me a good occasion to talk about my work, so that is very good," Kantor said.
Kantor is a multi-disciplinary artist. His performance pieces are the most notorious. But his award, he says, is most likely for his work in video, robotics and new media.
Kantor estimates he has been arrested at least a dozen times. He is usually charged with public mischief. He says he has been branded a "subversive" by the U.S. government, has several convictions there and, especially since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, has had problems entering that country.
The Museum of Modern Art in New York was particularly distressed in 1988 when Kantor splashed some of his blood on a Picasso painting. He claims he was just trying to do one of his "X"s. He was initially charged with causing $10 million in damage. But, after two years of court battles, Kantor was merely fined $1,000.
So, what is Kantor's art really all about?
"My philosophy is based on the equation that life equals art equals life. It's not really a scientific equation but it's useful. Everything is art; everybody is an artist. The greatest art is the people in the streets, the beggars, the prostitutes, the people in the offices, executives and secretaries." That's a far more detailed explanation than Kantor normally offers when asked to define the art "movement" he created called "neoism."
In announcing the visual arts recipients this year, the Canada Council distributed essays written on each of the winners. The essay on Kantor was prepared by Daniel Baird, art editor of the New York magazine The Brooklyn Rail.
"The intent of Kantor's work has always been to disrupt closed systems of power, political and aesthetic, to lay bare the ways in which technology transforms human bodies and minds into elements of a vast robotic machine and to confront today's deadening systems of technological control," Baird wrote.
Images of Kantor on the Internet and in publications show him, at times, wearing a conservative business suit and, at times, with nothing but a robotic sex device attached to his privates.
So, what will he wear to Rideau Hall? The Governor General's people, he said, suggested he wear a tuxedo.
***
But it was an unsigned editorial in the Daily Petfinder that really brayed it from the rooftops:
Save awards for real artists
Visit any university art class and you'll likely find at least one painting or sculpture that is pronographic or religiously offensive. Happily, this is often just a phase that an artist passes through before settling down to serious work.
Besides, the crucifix-in-urine is so yesterday.
Which is to say that the proper response to shock art is not outrage but a great big yawn. For Toronto artist Istvan Kantor, however, we'll make an exception.
It's not that we're really and truly shocked by his faux anarchism - his masturbation performances and penchant for inserting opbjects into his rectum come to mind - but what upsets us is that he has been awarded a $15,000 Governor General's award in Visual and Media Arts.
Kantor has the right to debase himself, but he shouldn't be publicly funded to do it.
Nor does he have the right to practise certain varieties of his "art." One of his schticks is to walk into an art gallery and, without permission, smear blood on the walls.
In 1988, he splashed blood on a Picasso painting hanging in New York's Museum of Modern Art, and he has been permanently banned from the National Gallery.
To give Kantor a Governor General's prize makes a joke of the award. It also shows contempt for the many gifted Canadian artists who have made a mark on the art world without resorting to cheap and easy shock tactics.
***
In other news, I want to say that I really like zucchini. It is my favourite member of the squash family. I have a good simple recipe for curried zucchini I will post up here some day.
Also, I neglected to mention that two weeks ago the coffee tree in my office had three blossoms on it! They are small, delicate, white and very difficult to see - they also wither quickly. I tried to cross-pollinate them with a swatch of gauze but I don't know if it will work. It could do - three years ago I did get one bean to grow! Enough for a hemi-demi-semi-tasse, I suppose.
Dangerous artistic ground
Paul Gessell
The Ottawa Citizen
Thursday, March 04, 2004
(Graphic: Toronto artist Istvan Kantor, one of this year's Governor General's visual arts award winners, shown during his 1999 protest against an art gallery in Halifax that refused to show his work. He spattered six vials of his own blood on the window of the gallery, then lit a plank and jumped onto it, shouting from a megaphone.
CREDIT: Eric Wynne, The Canadian Press)
The Governor General's arts awards have moved into daringly different territory this year, handing out prizes to some off-the-wall artists.
Surely, it was inevitable that some totally weird artist who dabbles in blood, bodily orifices and other unconventional media would eventually win the country's top art prize, the Governor General's Award for Visual and Media Arts.
And, thus, Toronto artist Istvan Kantor will pick up his $15,000 prize March 10 from Her Excellency at Rideau Hall.
There are six other winners, most of them artists who focus on ideas, manipulation of materials and unconventional media rather than on esthetics. You won't find Group of Seven-style landscape painters in this bunch. This is art rarely suitable for framing, some of it art just for the moment, art even too off-the-wall for some galleries and museums.
With its picks, this year's jury has moved into dangerous territory. The purpose of the awards is to create greater awareness of, not disgust towards, visual arts in Canada.
By putting Kantor on an already exceedingly audacious list, the jury may have severely eroded public support for these taxpayer-financed awards and for contemporary art in general. It's like awarding Osama bin Laden the Nobel Peace Prize.
The jury's political incorrectness stretches even farther: All seven recipients chosen by the jury are men and none is from Quebec. It is refreshing when regional, gender and ethnic politics do not come into play in these awards. But it is unheard of for a parcel of awards with the Rideau Hall seal of approval.
This year's jury, assembled by the Canada Council for the Arts, includes artists Micheline Beauchemin, Evergon, Edward Poitras, Tom Sherman and Takao Tanabe and arts consultant Ian Lumsden. They have not pushed boundaries -- they have eliminated them.
Since the awards began in 2000, the recipients have tended to be far more conventional artists. Last year's list was topped by painter Alex Colville. In other years, we have seen multi-disciplinary artists Michael Snow and John Scott, filmmaker Alanis Obomsawin and architect Douglas Cardinal. They are all edgy in their own way. But Kantor is way beyond the edges. He is right off the map with, among other guerrilla tactics, the use of his own blood to mark an "X" on the walls of the National Gallery and other top museums. Getting arrested is, to him, part of an art performance.
Other recipients this year include:
(snip)
Starting March 12, the public can view examples of works by these seven artists at the National Gallery.
© The Ottawa Citizen 2004
Another story by Paul Gessell, for the CanWest generic news-feed spigot:
Artist's blood-soaked portfolio nets Governor General's Award
Paul Gessell
CanWest News Service
Thursday, March 04, 2004
Istvan Kantor: 'Gifts' of blood
OTTAWA -- Toronto artist Istvan Kantor has been known to mark a large "X" on walls with his own blood. On other occasions, he inserts a vial of his blood into his anus, assumes an upside-down lotus position and lets the blood flow into his mouth. He has prepared and served food containing human blood.
So, needless to say, Rideau Hall and the National Gallery of Canada are nervous about Kantor's planned visit to Ottawa March 10 to pick up the country's top art prize for a quarter-century of producing some of the most shocking and demonic (some might say disgusting and repellent) art in the world.
The Hungarian-born Kantor is one of seven artists receiving this year's Governor General's Award in Visual and Media Arts; each will receive $15,000. Kantor is the only one of the seven who has been permanently banned from entering the National Gallery for decorating a wall there with one of his self-described X-shaped "gifts" of blood in 1991.
However, he has been given special dispensation to attend a group exhibition at the gallery, opening March 12, of works by him and the other award recipients. "They will let me in but I will be under the surveillance of two security guards," the artist said in a recent telephone interview.
The gallery confirmed the arrangements.
Kantor can expect similar treatment at Rideau Hall when Adrienne Clarkson hands him his cheque March 10, even though Kantor says he has no "special plans" to leave a bloody "X" or other "gift" at the Governor General's residence. Parliamentary security guards will no doubt also be on alert when Kantor and the other six recipients are presented to the House of Commons March 11.
"Although I did an 'X' recently at the Power Plant (a Toronto gallery), I don't do it as often as I used to."
The Governor General has no voice in deciding who will win the visual arts awards, which honour a body of work or a lifetime of work rather than individual works. The recipients are picked by a jury of artists and art experts selected each year by the Canada Council for the Arts. This year's jury included artists Micheline Beauchemin, Evergon, Edward Poitras, Tom Sherman and Takao Tanabe and arts consultant Ian Lumsden.
Kantor could be described as an art anarchist, or perhaps a guerrilla artist. He is the first to admit that receiving the ultimate establishment art award is "contradictory" for someone who has made a career of protesting against the establishment, especially the art establishment, with his bloody "X"s on the walls of prominent galleries in North America and Europe. "It's pretty contradictory, I guess, but it gives me a good occasion to talk about my work, so that is very good," Kantor said.
Kantor is a multi-disciplinary artist. His performance pieces are the most notorious. But his award, he says, is most likely for his work in video, robotics and new media.
Kantor estimates he has been arrested at least a dozen times. He is usually charged with public mischief. He says he has been branded a "subversive" by the U.S. government, has several convictions there and, especially since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, has had problems entering that country.
The Museum of Modern Art in New York was particularly distressed in 1988 when Kantor splashed some of his blood on a Picasso painting. He claims he was just trying to do one of his "X"s. He was initially charged with causing $10 million in damage. But, after two years of court battles, Kantor was merely fined $1,000.
So, what is Kantor's art really all about?
"My philosophy is based on the equation that life equals art equals life. It's not really a scientific equation but it's useful. Everything is art; everybody is an artist. The greatest art is the people in the streets, the beggars, the prostitutes, the people in the offices, executives and secretaries." That's a far more detailed explanation than Kantor normally offers when asked to define the art "movement" he created called "neoism."
In announcing the visual arts recipients this year, the Canada Council distributed essays written on each of the winners. The essay on Kantor was prepared by Daniel Baird, art editor of the New York magazine The Brooklyn Rail.
"The intent of Kantor's work has always been to disrupt closed systems of power, political and aesthetic, to lay bare the ways in which technology transforms human bodies and minds into elements of a vast robotic machine and to confront today's deadening systems of technological control," Baird wrote.
Images of Kantor on the Internet and in publications show him, at times, wearing a conservative business suit and, at times, with nothing but a robotic sex device attached to his privates.
So, what will he wear to Rideau Hall? The Governor General's people, he said, suggested he wear a tuxedo.
***
But it was an unsigned editorial in the Daily Petfinder that really brayed it from the rooftops:
Save awards for real artists
Visit any university art class and you'll likely find at least one painting or sculpture that is pronographic or religiously offensive. Happily, this is often just a phase that an artist passes through before settling down to serious work.
Besides, the crucifix-in-urine is so yesterday.
Which is to say that the proper response to shock art is not outrage but a great big yawn. For Toronto artist Istvan Kantor, however, we'll make an exception.
It's not that we're really and truly shocked by his faux anarchism - his masturbation performances and penchant for inserting opbjects into his rectum come to mind - but what upsets us is that he has been awarded a $15,000 Governor General's award in Visual and Media Arts.
Kantor has the right to debase himself, but he shouldn't be publicly funded to do it.
Nor does he have the right to practise certain varieties of his "art." One of his schticks is to walk into an art gallery and, without permission, smear blood on the walls.
In 1988, he splashed blood on a Picasso painting hanging in New York's Museum of Modern Art, and he has been permanently banned from the National Gallery.
To give Kantor a Governor General's prize makes a joke of the award. It also shows contempt for the many gifted Canadian artists who have made a mark on the art world without resorting to cheap and easy shock tactics.
***
In other news, I want to say that I really like zucchini. It is my favourite member of the squash family. I have a good simple recipe for curried zucchini I will post up here some day.
Also, I neglected to mention that two weeks ago the coffee tree in my office had three blossoms on it! They are small, delicate, white and very difficult to see - they also wither quickly. I tried to cross-pollinate them with a swatch of gauze but I don't know if it will work. It could do - three years ago I did get one bean to grow! Enough for a hemi-demi-semi-tasse, I suppose.
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no subject
Date: 2004-03-06 01:08 am (UTC)next time I'll just attach a vial of rabbit blood with my application form.
no subject
Date: 2004-03-08 04:20 pm (UTC)And in the end $15,000 is not much to show for over twenty years of assorted work done in wilful obscurity. I won't pull the 'starving artist' argument with you, but I do know that he has spent most of his life doing low-paying jobs in order to have time to devote to his work - he has carried bedpans, been a caretaker in mental homes, and worked in morgues, crappy factories and construction.