on Tracey Emin

i've never thought much of Tracey Emin. the work has always maintained a kind of forced rawness, leaving it a little vacuous and lacking in intent. the Young British Artists tag was good timing for her, and i can appreciate that she has forged a career making the art she does.


her 2011 appointment at the Royal Academy as Professor of Drawing - only the 2nd woman since the RA founded in 1768! - is a bit of a strange one - she can't draw. her drawings get raved about - the passion! stripped bare!.... but i don't buy it.























The images above and right are by Egon Schiele. he has influenced a number of contemporary artists, including Emin. But where Emin 'scribbles' sexuality, he draws it. but don't get wrong, i know the art barricades are down and anything goes....


i just don't see the substance in Emins work, she so desperately wants there to be meat that there ends up being very little, and that sort of search has its finality in self consciousness and an awkwardness for the sake of being awkward. She has said,"There are some days when i can draw and some days when i can't draw". The drawing of the Queen, bottom, was what sort of day?

on Lowbrow and Highbrow

the terms - 'Lowbrow', and 'Highbrow' - have quite strange beginnings. they come from the 19th Century science of Phrenology - how the shape of ones skull dictated levels of intelligence. it was cut and dry - a 'high' forehead meant you were smart, a 'low' forehead meant you were stupid.
it set up forms of cultural divide in all sorts of ways - and spawned pseudo-superiority complexes that at worst would manifest in acts of genocide throughout the 20th Century.

 In 'ART', the terms are more blurred now than they have been. but when 'Lowbrow Art' emerged in the 1960s, some of the art world reacted like it was the 1860s and metaphysically reached for their Phrenology texts.
Lowbrow took the influence of the street and emerged out of posters and comics, cartoons and the drug scene.
Victor Moscoso, Stanley Mouse, Gilbert Shelton and Robert Crumb are a few names who were there at the beginning of modern lowbrow. Peter Max got lucky when General Electric decided to use his stuff on clocks.
Lowbrow has come a long way since then. A lot of imagery fits into it, so much so that its hardly a term at all anymore. Its swallowed up via mass information and general acceptance.
It is mostly 'non-intellectual' in that it normally doesn't require too much chin stroking or wrinkled brow discourse. it is immediate and generally does not pretend to be otherwise. thats why i like it, its empty and fun.