Dear Me, Scott King

»Dan’s ›Lego Ronald McDonald‹ crucifixion piece can go… there. Tim and Sarah’s ›BOMBS KILL‹ neon text piece should definitely go… here. Mathieu’s bronze ›Estate Girl with Pushchair‹ statue will look fantastic… by the door«.

Lol was whizzing around his gallery, pointing at various empty spaces, »Has the ›Estate Girl‹ piece arrived yet?«

»Yeah, well… no. But it’s coming this afternoon.«

»Excellent. Did he do it life-sized in the end?«

»No. He couldn’t afford to.«

»Oh shame… how high is it then?«

»Twelve inches.«

»Oh dear… does it work at that size?«

»Yeah, it looks err… amazing.«

»Brilliant! So, then… really… Annabel’s tampon wedding bouquet should go right here, on a plinth. A black plinth of course.«

»Yeah, that’ll look good.«

»Has she got a title for it yet?«

»Yeah, ›Lil-lets of the Valley‹«.

»Oh gorgeous. She’s so facking smart. That’s it then, finito! That’s everything, right?«

»Yeah, that’s it.«

Lol and Anthony paused for a moment and looked around the empty gallery. Each imagining what the new show would look like.

»Oh, fack!«, Lol slapped himself on the forehead, «I thought that was too easy… we’ve got to show that guy’s film piece.«

»What?«

»The film piece… that awful documentary thing about the minimum wage… or whatever it is.«

Anthony looked at Lol blankly.

»GOD, ANTHONY!… that facking bore-fest by that moron, James? Justin?«

»Erm… Julian. You mean Julian. Oh, shit… oh my God.«

»Don’t panic Anthony! We’ll squeeze it in… much as I’d like not to… It’s facking coma-inducing.«

»Oh, fuck. Lol, I…«

»Anthony… darling… calm down. We’ll put it in the bathroom if we have to. God, you are so melodramatic!«

»Lol. I’m sorry… I forgot all about him.«

»Yes, me too, but we’ll squeeze his bore-u-rama in somewhere. I told Amie to order the smallest monitor she could.« Lol giggled. »People will hardly notice it. It can go behind the bookcase or somewhere.«

»No, I mean. I forgot all about him.«

»What?«

»Lol, I completely forgot we were showing him. I haven’t put his name on the invitations, the press release, the website… anything.«

»Oh.«

»I’m sorry.«

»FACK!«

»I’m really sorry, Lol.«

»You know why we were showing him, don’t you?«, Lol could barely contain his fury. He gripped onto the back of an Eames Eiffel Tower chair and started to hyper-ventilate. »YOU FACKING IMBECILE, ANTHONY!«

»I’m sorry Lol. I know…«

»We were showing him because Max James recommended that we show him.  Which is as good as saying that we had to, IF we want to stay in his favour. HELLO! Max James. HELLO! – The most powerful curator in London – HELLO ANTHONY! ARE YOU IN THERE?«, Lol rapped his sweaty white knuckles hard on Anthony’s forehead.

»Lol, I’m…«

»… a facking useless POT ADDICT! Jesus Christ. Where are the invites? We’ll have to re-do them. Are they still at the printers?«

»No. They were sent out last week.«

»YOU CANT!« Lol laid down on the floor, closed his eyes and started doing the relaxation exercises that his therapist had taught him. Eventually he calmly replied: »Then, I have no choice. I simply can’t show him. Thanks very much, Anthony.«

»But, we can still show him… can’t we?«

»NO. I am not about to risk my reputation by sending out invites that are not absolutely representative of the show. It’s unprofessional. I’ll have to drop him. I HAVE dropped him.«

»Please… Lol… what about Max James?«

»FACK HIM, TOO!« Lol started to hyper-ventilate again.

»Lol. Please, you don’t want to upset Max.«

»OH FACK HIM! I’m sick of being told whom I should or shouldn’t show.«

»But… this is suicide.«

»FOR FACK’S SAKE! This is a show about political art. About fighting back.  About standing up to THE MAN. About standing up for what one believes in. If Max can’t see that, then… HE’S A FOOL!«

»Lol. I don’t think you should say things like that«.

»I’ll say what I bloody well like.« Lol wiped his dribbling nose with the back of his hand, »My decision is MADE. You’ve made it for me, ANTHONY! That’s the END of the matter. Now come on. Get to work. You’ve got a lot to do before the opening: which IS tomorrow night, in case you’d FACKING forgotten that as well.«

An Unfortunate Alignment (Version 1), 2009, courtesy Herald St, London (Photography: Neil Drabble)

MH: Why is Lenin wearing a Devo hat?

SK: Well, technically he’s not wearing a Devo hat – it’s a Devo hat (or ›Energy Dome‹, if you prefer) turned into a lampshade. Then, as you can see, the Lenin bust is placed below it… the height of the lampshade suggesting it is a hat… but it isn’t. It’s attached to a cable that has a light bulb on the end of it. So it definitely was a hat, and is definitely now a lampshade. I was originally going to call this »An Unfortunate Arrangement« or »An Unfortunate Alignment«… but it seems to have become called »Revo/Devo«. ›Revolution‹ and ›De-evolution‹: An immediate and dramatic change in power structure, and the (Devo) concept of the human race regressing, respectively.

So, in some ways the ›unfortunate alignment‹ is accurate: two seemingly contrasting acts or concepts almost coming together as a unified object: Lenin almost in a Devo hat… or Lenin under a Devo lampshade.

You know what? I’m going to call it »An Unfortunate Alignment«. I prefer that title, I’m sure people can work the ›Revolution/De-evolution‹ part out for themselves.

MH: Where did get the Lenin bust from?

SK: It’s one of many that litter my house… I’ve stopped doing the ›re-branded‹ Lenin and Marx busts.

MH: How did you make the Devo hat?

SK: Well, the hat/›Power Dome‹ is a piece of flimsy junk that I bought on eBay from LA… It cost about £40 including postage and it’s the most badly made shitty thing you can imagine. It was made in China. I waited in London for a replica »Devo Power Dome« that was made in China to arrive from LA so I could turn it into a lampshade and place it above a once meaningful plaster bust that I also bought on eBay from the Ukraine. Is there a term for this yet? It’s a modern type of ›junk art‹, isn’t it? Unlike Robert Rauschenberg heroically searching the streets of Manhattan for stuffed goats in the 1950s: I sit here on eBay ordering utterly worthless shite from all over the world, paying for it on PayPal and collecting it from the postman at my front door.

Scott King, Airmyn, nr Goole, East Yorkshire, August 1986

Scott King’s school report, February 1987

There have been times, when I’m doing quite well, that I look at this school report and laugh. I think: »Mr Thornton, you fucking tit… How wrong you were«. Then there are other times, like now, when I’ve just had a show cancelled and it seems I couldn’t even give my work away, that I think: »Mr Thornton, I’m sorry. I should have listened to you when I was seventeen«.

All in all, however you see it, Mr Thornton’s words were horribly prophetic.

The ginger twat.

Outsider Heroes, 2009

I am looking for collaborators to work on a project. The project is going to be a series of proposals that are intended to improve Great Britain. 

I particularly need the help of anyone who:

- can draw (in the very traditional sense)

- can paint (in the very traditional sense)

- are fashion illustrators/designers

- uses CAD to make architectural drawings or similar

- uses or has access to a ›helmet / action camera‹ and has the facilities to edit (London only)

There will be no payment but all work will be co-credited.

If you are interested please email me at info@scottking.co.uk.

»Untitled«, 2009

Click image to enlarge

In early 2006 I made a series of posters called »Stalky«, the posters were what you might call ›method design‹. When I was growing up there was this punk lad (Storky), he was a few years older than me and he was always in bands. He was a funny character, first of all he was still a punk in 1983/4/5/6 (and he probably still is). Secondly, I’m not sure if he wasn’t a bit backwards, either that or he was just very addled by booze and drugs. He was an unfortunate character in many ways, but also quite heroic. I started thinking about him and I realised that I admired him – I admired him for at least TRYING to do something, for trying to be different, for trying to say something.

So, in 2006, I imagined I was Storky (renamed Stalky), I tried to put myself in his place. I imagined that Stalky was still living by his punk ideals and was about forty years old. I imagined he was still trying to get and keep a band together. I designed a poster to promote ›my‹ gig at a pub in Goole – the first gig for many years by »Stalky & The Reprobates«. So, Stalky had got his old band back together – but the band were obviously a bit reluctant, they all had cars, mortgages, kids and jobs. Nevertheless, in my model, the gig happened ­– and of course it was a total failure. Undeterred, Stalky booked the band to play at the same pub a month later. The rest of the band became unwilling, not turning up to rehearsals, challenging Stalky’s authority and refusing to wear the clothes Stalky thought to be ›punk‹. As Stalky, I designed twelve posters all for the same venue, all taking place month after month thus taking up a whole year. As leader of the band and speed fuelled, drunk and increasingly furious designer of the posters, Stalky decided to change the name of the band each month, every month/poster illustrating his increasing dissatisfaction with his band mates as well as his own spiraling paranoia and isolation. By the end, in December, his band have left him and Stalky is forced to play a solo acoustic set of old punk standards.

That, in brief, is the story of the Stalky posters. They’re intended to work as an illustration of the final death throes of The Punk Dream for a middle aged man in a small town.

»Stalky«, 2006, courtesy Galleria Sonia Rosso, Turin

»Stalky’s Revenge« is the second part of the work. In this series, using the same ›method design‹, I imagined being the members of the band that had deserted Stalky. I imagined being the blokes who no longer believed in punk, who wanted something completely different… and who desperately wanted to get away from the paraniod, megalomaniac Stalky. So, Steve Worswick and Daz Tether, formerly of The Reprobates, relaunch themselves as DJ Cosmic Tentacle and DJ Astral D, respectively. Cosmic and Astral start a trance night called Flowtation, it’s run from the back room of The Steam Packet pub (where Stalky and endlessly renamed Reprobates had played their year long residency). Goole is the last place you’d imagine a trance night; being as far away from Goa as it is possible to imagine. Nevertheless, the night was a big success and it looked like Cosmic and Astral had created something positive. However, they made one fatal mistake. If you look at the poster for the second Flowtation night, you’ll see that there was a short solo set by Stalky. Cosmic and Astral allowed this only out of guilt and pity, they thought it could do no harm. Unfortunately for them, Stalky believed his short set to be the best thing about the whole enterprise and used it to muslce his way into the next Flowtation night. Then, disaster begins to unfold… over five posters you can see that Stalky regains his power over Cosmic and Astral. Eventually, Stalky takes over both the design of the Flowtation posters and the night itself. Finally, he forces Cosmic and Astral to rejoin his band and revert to their real names, Steve and Daz… so everything is back where it started. Nothing has changed. Stalky has won, but his victory is a crushing defeat for all concerned.

Stalky, as I said above is based on a real person called Storky, someone told me that he now lives in a hostel in Hull, but I can’t verify this. Daz Tether and Steve Worswick are also real people. I was at school with Steve Worswick, he was a very nice lad who was the classic old- fashioned ›university type‹, someone who might have gone to study accountancy or perhaps engineering – but he never did, he stayed in Goole and became a local trance DJ/remixer. Steve Worswick works under the name Square Bear… he has a website if anyone wants to look him up: www.square-bear.co.uk/

»The Flowtation Story: Stalky’s Revenge«, 2006, courtesy Herald St, London.

In 2005 I started writing a long story, in my dreams it would have become a novel. One of the chapters was set in The Steam Packet pub, and I described some of the posters on the pub wall – all for local, long forgotten bands. I got quite excited about the idea of bands and characters that I remembered and wondered if I could actually design these posters – the idea being to use the posters to tell a story: the ›rise‹ and fall of the band. I wondered if I could convey the positivity and excitement of a new band and track that band through a series of posters until they imploded or drifted apart. So, I suppose, I stopped writing the story and started designing it. Trying to tell a story with this limited vocabulary was very enjoyable, I mean there aren’t a lot of elements to work with: the name of band, the nature of the image, price of admission, number of support acts – that’s kind of it. With »The Flowtation Story: Stalky’s Revenge« I devised the story around the clash of two contrasting sentiments and graphic styles, I wondered if I could convey the whole sorry episode using only the promotional posters. If you like, it was an attempt to combine graphic design and pop cultural cliches in order to create fiction.

MH: Would agree with me when I say that Goa Trance is the worst genre of all music genres?

SK: Yes.

MH: What’s wrong with the Goa Trance people’s taste for design?

SK: They’re all on drugs.

The (real) Reprobates rehearsing in Goole circa 1983. Storky: vocals, Zander Burton: lead guitar, Bones Hutton: drums, Sneady Snead: bass.

»Halt! Im Namen der Liebe«, 2008, courtesy of Herald St, London

Below are two examples of things I’m trying to do lots of: »Infractions« (see my previous postings). I’m not sure if they are going to become new work – they might just be the research for something else. I don’t know yet.

»Kicked to Death« was first and is a survey / map of people who were kicked to death by drunken youths – it’s colour coded by year.

»Kicked to Death« (working title), 2010

»Takeaway Tragedies« came out of »Kicked to Death« when I noticed how many people were killed outside takeaway restaurants… It’s colour-coded by the nature of the restaurant: Indian, Chinese, pizza etc.

»Takeaway Tragedies« (working title), 2010

SK: Also attached is a rough of something I’m going to try – which is putting images and more detailed words on to the work… I’m trying to do stuff ›by hand‹ in a DIY kind of way – printing the dots with stencils and handwriting the texts.

MH: Why are you now planning to do this? I always thought the ›normal‹ infractions were so strong because they didn’t have any images or words that went with them…

SK: Mmm. That’s a good point – maybe it’s wrong of me to include images and additional words – as you say, the original point of these kind of works is that they’re deeply impersonal and matter-of-fact… while dealing with events that are sad and horrific, events that have effected people in the most brutal kind of way.

»Rough (Mock-up for revised »Kicked to Death«)«, 2010

MH: Is there a reason for you now ›painting‹ the dots ›by hand‹? We’ve discussed this before: You’re not really a painter… What do you like about DIY? Do you want your these new infractions to appear more natural or personal?

SK: I’m not a painter by any stretch of the imagination! What I’m trying to figure out is the balance of several issues.

I wanted these works (»Infractions«) to be a composite of information design and ›pure‹ abstraction… but at the moment they’re still very much ›design‹ – in that, they’re largely generated using the tools, premise and logic of information design.

It’s important to me to try and find a way of generating, in its entirety, work that comes out of THIS ROOM… the room that I sit in all day. This could be a mistake. It’s perhaps ›truer‹ to the idea, the basic tools that I’m surrounded by and to the 21ST. CENTURY that I simply research this information, design it and then email it to the digital printers (or even better: email it to you to put on this blog… then the blog becomes the gallery… and then perhaps I’m having a mini one-man-show from this afternoon until next Monday on this blog). A part of me feels that this is correct – that this is conceptually absolutely the right thing to do. However – another part of me is deeply frustrated and, dare I say, alienated by this process. This whole process, this conundrum, has been bothering me for years! I use methods that I feel to be conceptually correct – I work on the premise of reduction (of how much I can strip an idea down to only its necessary content), I make it, then I declare it finished. The main problem is – I get no enjoyment at all out of it.

The greatest – i.e  worst ever example of this – was when I did »Art Statements« at Art Basel in 2005. I totally fucked that show up by reducing every idea and thought to a black line on white paper … not only that, some of the paper was wrinkled. It was a disaster.

SO… Although I’m no painter, and although I’ve lost confidence in doing things ›by hand‹ – I’m forcing myself to try and do things this way. It might not work, but I have to try – the primary reasons being – I want to make work that is totally DIY and I want to enjoy doing it*. Years ago, I always made very rough work – all photocopies and rolled on ink, that was at college, before I went to i-D. I started doing diagrammatic and reductive work because it seemed like The Truth… it seemed true to my situation, but I’m kind of sick of it. I want to make work that’s more immediate… ›visceral‹ is the term, I believe.

I don’t fucking know, Martin – I’ve got all sorts of things on the go – this is just one of them… I’ve got a bit hung up on ›The New DIY‹ so I might do something else this week. Tess keeps trying to make me paint our living room… so maybe I’ll have to do some real DIY… that’ll give me something to cry about.

* I am aware of the hideous irony that I’m complaining about my lack of Worker Satisfaction while researching incidents where people have been kicked to death / committed suicide / blown up in Afghanistan.

SOME LIGHTER NOTES:

The Greatest Record Ever Made:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=epYwOfM3oMA

The Greatest Band That Ever Existed:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7YA-frg2tw

BY THE WAY:

Below you’ll find a photograph of a Mondrian-style umbrella – does anyone know where I can buy one – or can anyone sell me one? If so, please email me on: info@scottking.co.uk.

Man and Desk, 2010

The Table and Chair at Which I Will Write the First Year 10 Manifesto, 2010, ph. Mark Walker

MH: What do you like about manifestos?

SK: I like the the bravery of them. I love the idea that an individual or group can attempt to instigate a series of rules or outline a set of behavioural codes – then try and adhere to them. Most manifestos seem to end in abject failure, don’t they? I like that, I like the idea of idealism – and the seemingly inevitable failure of that idealism when it’s put into practice. Almost all the great 20th century art movements were built on manifestos – or manifestos were very quickly written in order to define them.

Historically the French avant-garde have created the best manifestos – I suppose they have the unashamed seriousness that a great manifesto requires:

A) Excerpts from the Lettriste Manifesto

http://www.thing.net/~grist/l&d/lettrist/isou-m.htm

B) The Situationist Manifesto

http://www.infopool.org.uk/6003.html

C) Yves Klein – The Chelsea Hotel Manifesto

http://www.yvesklein.de/manifesto.html

MH: What will your manifesto be about? Do you really think you’ll be the first artist writing a »Year 10 Manifesto«? I bet a lot of artists are sitting at their desks RIGHT NOW!

SK: I’m not going to write »The First Year 10 Manifesto« – I was going to write it this afternoon. Unfortunately I expelled myself from ›The Year 10 Group‹ earlier this morning. This is very common – not self-expulsion perhaps, but unexpected and unwarranted expulsion was commonplace in many of the 20th Century avant-garde movements (the Situationist Internationale particularly).

MH: Tell me about that Nabokov documentary you saw on TV recently. And what are your thoughts when you look at all those powerful men at their powerful desks (see above)?

SK: Well it was just a documentary on BBC4… a kind of populist arts TV channel in the UK. The documentary was called »How do you solve a problem like Lolita?« and, from what I could gather, was essentially about the paedophilic nature of »Lolita« – and more importantly – did »Lolita« suggest that the author had paedophillic tendencies? Anyway – the presenter of the documentary was a journalist called Stephen Smith; he went to the Montreux Palace Hotel where Nabokov lived in his later years. Smith went into Nabokov’s room and sat at his writing desk. Smith’s excitement was palpable as he caressed Nabokov’s desk while speaking to the camera… as I remember he was wondering if the desk had somehow been imbued with Nabokov’s literary talent. He seemed to think that if he sat there long enough, maybe The Great Author’s talent would somehow rub off on himself.

SO – this got me thinking – not new thoughts – it kind of reminded me of old thoughts. It reminded me of my own most precious possession.

I’ve hardly ever told anyone this, but I own a shelf from Martin Kippenberger’s studio. Years ago an old friend of mind visited Kippenberger in Cologne. Kippenberger was very welcoming and told him he could take anything he wanted from the studio – his exact words were: »Take anything from here that you consider to be great art… except the great art«. So my friend, probably showing off, pointed at the wall and said: »I’ll take that shelf, it’s the most beautiful thing in here«. About five years ago my friend was completely broke, so I bought the shelf from him. I never use it, of course, I keep it stored safely away in bubble wrap.

Here it is:

Martin Kippenberger’s Shelf, taken from Kippenberger’s studio in March 1984

So, in short, I’m very interested in seemingly inane and inanimate objects that may or may not have some kind of mystical power.

The greatest example of this I’ve ever seen is currently being safeguarded by another friend of mine. John Marchant, of Isis Gallery, has the original newspaper clipping of HRH Elizabeth II that Jamie Reid used for the »God Save The Queen« single sleeve. I’ve actually held it, it’s an amazing thing – as John said: »It’s perhaps the most simultaneously valuable and worthless artefact in late 20th century popular culture«.

I just got John to send me a picture of it, here it is:

MH: Did you paint the table and chair white? You used the word ›cleansing‹ when we spoke on the phone earlier on but you weren’t sure if it was the right word. Is maybe ›neutralising‹ more fitting?

SK: Yes, ›neutralising‹ is better – ›cleansing‹ has different connotations. I painted the chair and table white. I found them discarded near a skip in my street. They were tatty and filthy – deeply ›un-mythical‹ objects – so I took them home and repainted them white – if you like, I ›neutralised‹ them, I saved them – I wanted them to start again. I had every intention of not only neutralising them, but elevating them to semi-mythical status – if I’d have been allowed to write »The First Year 10 Manifesto« while sitting at them – they WOULD have attained semi-mythical status. But that was yesterday, and today I was expelled from ›The Year 10 Group‹.