mark
wallinger at whitechapel
From "Threshold
to the Kingdom."
Like
all the late 80's/early 90's generation of British artists, Mark Wallinger always
denied and decried the dreaded YBA pigeon-hole that was flung in abandon at any
artist who got his or her face splashed about the fashion jazz mags. But in Wallinger's
case, the denials never felt exasperated, but more amused, safe in the knowledge
that journos need the pigeons[1]. Wallinger blends pathos, politics, theory, intelligence,
poetry, theology, technique, wit + humour, plus the all important pun with ease
and grace. A skilful practitioner examining the connections and similarities between
our (British) in-built scaffolding of pomp, ceremony, class religion and ritual.
The stuff that binds and divides us all together.
At
last years Venice Biennale, Wallinger annoyingly blew everyone out of the canals.
I walked around desperately trying to find a pavilion that offered more, concerned
that maybe my reaction was due to the fact that I'm English/Irish myself, and
had had that affinity thing going on. But no. Nothing. I hobbled away, depressed
that there was not much to write home about. Even so, there was a sense of too
much at Wallinger's pavilion. Just a little. A kind of retrospective but in too
tiny a place. Take each piece individually however, and you get a lot.
The
Union Jack hanging high on top of a flagpole but in the colours of the tricolour
is a little gem. Antagonistic and peaceful in equal measure, plus the question
of what symbolises more? Shapes or Colours? [2] A high level political statement,
mixing easily with Hofmann, Itten and Handcock. This wasn't at Whitechapel, and
nor was angel, his video piece shot on the bottom of the central escalator
at Angel tube he made a few years back. 'In the beginning was the word, and the
word was whferhyreher.'
But
what was repeated was the magisterial video, threshold to the kingdom.
It's odd for digital to obtain emotional depth, but it's here. You know that the
music is going to carry you off [3], whatever was on screen, you can hear it when
you're in another room, but Wallinger fully, and successfully, pulls off a marriage
to image. As poignant and as funny as a work of art can be. Godard remakes Heaven
Can Wait with a Pete an' Dud conclusion. Replayed in slow-mo, small groups of
businessmen and women, weary travellers and pensioners pass through the portal
to the airport passenger lounge, and its pace allows the viewer to construct a
wondrous narrative.
From "Threshold
to the Kingdom."
The
ending is perfect. An Asian man, mid 30's, on his own, wheeling a trolley in front
of him, map in hand unsure of where to go, left or right, right or left, up there
or back from where I came? Fade. I was moved in Venice, but on seeing it in London
only a couple of months or so after the attacks on America, a new dimension is
found. But not, surprisingly, an emotional one. It didn't give the piece more
import, just changed it a little, added a new narrative angle.
'The
fragility of life is aaalllll ab'art Dud'. Down the evolutionary ladder a little,
but facing similar complex metaphysical questions are 3 houseflies; one lying
dead in the middle of the screen while two others mill about, in Wallinger's video
piece, fly (2000). All three are stuck in between the double glazing of
a window looking out onto grey grey skies, one is already dead, the other two
will surely follow. Flies possess this genius quality in finding their way into
seemingly impossible places, but there are flaws to such inquisitive resourcefulness.
They can't find the exit door. I was only going to give the video a short look,
but Wallinger's wit 'pulled me back in'. And sure enough, I was transfixed.
As
a Boeing flew past in the distance, a fly enters from stage right to investigate
the dead one. My father?, my daughter?, my lover?, that sod from the other side
of town? It wanders away either through sheer grief or nonchalence. Then returns...
I've never done it with a dead fly... but a big brute appears from the bottom
of the screen and approaches the scene with stealth. Is it a policefly? Is this
the fly having the affair with my wife? Or his murderous cohort? There's tension
as Brutus approaches... but he passes on up the window.
Wallinger
can juggle and find a way to ask the big questions on life through banality as
well as the big stage, where more concentrated study is required, such as his
statue of Christ parked outside the National Gallery on Trafalgar Square, ecce
homo. It created some fuss, but in general was well recieved. A modern, clean
shaven Christ, the young son of Man, standing on a plinth 100ft below Admiral
Nelson.
'When Railway Lines Meet At
Infinity'
I left
the video when railway lines meet at infinity (1998) alone to the three
others watching it to go back to where I started, the main installation, prometheus.
The large front room at the Whitechapel housed another room in the middle. Running
round the outside, four video monitors placed on high in each corner, each replaying
Wallinger sat in an electric chair monotonously reciting Ariel's song in Shakespeare's
'Tempest.' Inside the internal room, an electric chair, bolted to the middle of
the end wall and flipped 180º, lies waiting. Infront of this, a metal circle about
9 foot in diameter buzzes noisily away. The infuriating sound only stopped by
pulling another smaller ring attatched to a handle away from it [4].
Wish
I was chewing some gum at the time, as there was no way of turning it off. I went
to the reading room, and read about a fact previously unknown to me [5], that
gave prometheus some coherence, or rather a level of meaning I needed.
Indeed, it gave me much to think about on my way back home; 'Later on in the 19th
Century, Westinghouse and Edison were in competition to electrify the United States.
One was a proponent of AC and the other DC. The way they were to measure the success
of one or the other, to see who would win the contract, was in the most successful
dispatch of the human.' [6]
[1]
Which pisses us all off.
[2] That and the fact that done the other way round,
it would look French or something.
[3] Allegri's 'Miserere'.
[4] Similar
to those contraptions you find at fair grounds, just can't remember for the life
of me what they're called.
[5] Though it did ring a bell.
[6] Mark Wallinger
in coversation with Anthony Spira (attending notes to 'No Man's Land' 2002). [Editor's
note] A dog was put to death as a demonstration of the dangers of DC.
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