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The passing of Cyril Barrett / recirca.com
listings / Dalí deadlock / killing for art (January 14,
2004)
Cyril Barrett
We regret to inform those who do not already
know of the passing of Cyril Barrett, S.J., a pivotal figure in
Irish art and criticism. He died over Christmas.
For more, please click here.
Check out our listings!
CIRCA is pleased to announce the launch of
a new section of our website. We will now be including listings
of art events and exhibitions in Ireland and also information
on artists from Ireland who are exhibiting internationally. It
will be updated daily, with both the openings of the day and the
week included on the home page of recirca.com.
If you have a gallery or are an artist and
would like any exhibitions or events to be included in our listings,
please email liz@recirca.com
with your details.
3D: Dalí, dollars, Descharnes
compiled
by Rossella Regina
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Dali, The Apotheosis of the Dollar,
1965, Oil on canvas, 300 x 400 cm. Image held here |
Did you know that this year is the centenary
of Salvador Dalí's birth? (And would you believe he lived
until 1989?) Any worldwide celebration is threatened, however,
by a row about the commercial rights to Dalí's works. Robert
Descharnes, author of a biography and some other books on Dalí,
is claiming that the Gala-Salvador
Dalí Foundation has prevented him receiving the rights
Dalí gave him.
This business casts a shadow over
the centenary . An honourable liquidation of the matter would,
quite obviously, not ruin the other side.
Thus poor Descharnes to the newspaper El
País. Yes, 'poor', because it seems he got himself
completely ruined as the result of a legal appeal last year. The
court ordered him to pay costs. Joan Manuel Sevillano, the Foundation's
manager, told El País that most of the income it receives
from the commercial rights has been spent fighting Descharnes
in court and in a global war against the many forgeries of Dalí's
works. But Descharnes doesn't despair and this year is trying
again to appeal against that court ruling!
Dalí would probably not have been shocked
by this story, an anagram of whose nickname Avida Dollars (Avid
for Dollars), bestowed on him by André Breton. One of his
most famous phrases he pronounced while signing copies of his
masterpieces at the breakfast table:
Each morning after breakfast I like
to start the day by earning $20,000.
Maybe it's unfair to say so, but perhaps Descharnes
got inspiration from the artist's biography he wrote?
Inhuman(e) art?
compiled by Eimear McKeith
An exhibition of decapitated and dismembered
cats, rats, mice and rabbits by Ukraine-born artist Nathalia Edenmont,
on show at the Wetterling
Gallery in Stockholm, has been causing a furore among animal-lovers.
People for Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA)
in Britain has launched a campaign against the gallery in an effort
to prevent Edenmont from continuing her destructive artistic practices
and to discourage the gallery from promoting the artist's work.
PETA are arguing that the gallery is exploiting
both the animals and the artist herself, who has been traumatised
by her difficult past and uses her experience of this as a motivation
for her art. They believe the Wetterling Gallery to be acting
irresponsibly and they see Edenmont's work as "a desperate
cry for help, disguised as 'art'."
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Nathalia Edenmont, Star, 2002.
Image held here
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In a press release, PETA stated that they are
protesting
not only for the animals,
but also for Ms Edenmont, who they believe may be killing animals
and grotesquely displaying their heads and torsos as a way to
send out a cry for help. ...it is possible that the trauma Edenmont
suffered in her childhood, including the loss of her mother
and her oppression in the former Soviet Union, causes her to
want to mutilate and kill animals in order to demonstrate her
own ability to exercise the ultimate power over others who are
weaker than herself.
In a statement, the Wetterling Gallery explained
their reasoning behind displaying the distasteful images:
Most people who see Nathalia's pictures for the
first time are impressed by how beautiful they are....Slowly
you realise that the animal is dead, that the animal has died
for the sake of the picture...Nathalia's pictures...are so beautiful
- and the insight into the reality behind them gives rise to
thoughts of people's shallowness and double standards. Many
of us eat meat, wear leather or use make-up that has been tested
on animals, without arousing especially strong reactions. But
when a picture shows a dead rabbit, all hell breaks loose...There
is nothing illegal in Nathalia's art. She has killed the animals
in as humane a way as possible. Has she been guilty of a moral
crime? We do not think so.
Edenmont's art consists of a series of stills
in which the heads and limbs of various dead animals are used
in compositions that incorporate the body parts with vases, pedastals
and ornaments, manipulating them to create surreal visual images.
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Nathalia Edenmont, Bride (Red), 2003,
image held here
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PETA urges that Edenmont cease killing animals
and instead "seek counselling from mental health professionals",
stating that "it is long established that those who kill
animals for pleasure, excitement...or to make a point...are likely
to go on to harm or take the life of a human being...While we
do not imply that Ms Edenmont will go on to harm or take the lives
of human beings, her conduct is of great concern."
(Somewhat in the same vein, have a look at the
review of Dead Bodies, the show at the Centre Culturel
Irlandais in Paris which included beautifully arranged photos
of road kills, by Veronica Nicholson. The review is in the current
issue of CIRCA.)
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