Tomch

Tom Croft

Cosas:

E alcun nota per a un essayo(?):

Brit Art Lite

Errata: For cure read curate. Para. 5: for mongrel read mogul

Hello. We all know that anyone who's everyone knows that in the late 1980s Goldsmith Craig-Martin, the magic man, invented Brit-Art and the 1990s. But what does that actually mean? How does it affect the day-to-day lives of the current artistic generation? What, in essence, is Cool Britannia? Let's answer some of the questions that no-one ever asked.

In 1973, Goldsmith Craig-Martin could be found in a corner of the local boozer. A once famous, some would say clever, modern minimalist, he was now reduced to declaring that his drink is a tree. But this was soon to change. With little more than a collection of boxes (albeit lids reversed) and 16 objects, ready or not, he founded an art school named Sensation.

The first students came in 1988. They were: Daemion Hirst, Sarah Lucas, Michael Landish, Enya Gallaccio, Gary Hume et al. Together they were called the yMca---the Young Gifted Black Artists. After only two years, they (excluding Enya, whose work had unfortunately dissolved) put on an exposition entitled Freeze by Daemion Hirst, who cured it.

Freeze was the first example of exhibitionism in a warehouse. Daemion himself acted as the centre piece, frozen in a block of ice for the duration of the exhibition (Freeze, 1989). Shockingly, the artists pretended to be well-established instead of just dirty students. They bought nice wine and produced a colourful catalogue.

One of the visitors of the exhibition was advertising mongrel Charles Saaatchi, who, with his brother Jean-Paul Saatchi, was responsible for advertising, Brit-art, Thatcher, the second marriage of Nutella Lawson etc. Charles Saaatchi rather astutely patronised the works, which upset the artists, although he was rich, so it was OK.

1990

1991 Turner Price: ANISH KAPOOR, Fiona Rae, Rachel Whiteread Hirst: The Metaphysical Impossibility of Death in the Physical Mind of

      Someone Living Everywhere, with Everyone, Always, Forever, Now.
      (Tiger Shark suspended without food in a glass case over the river Thames)

1992 Turner Price: NUL, Daemion Hirst Rose on Green - Enya: 10,000 roses Hirst: Pharmacy (room of shelves with pills on) Dick and Tracy Chapman get together after discovering close family link.

1993 Turner Price: RACHEL WHITEREAD, Sean Scully K Foundation Art Award: RACHEL WHITEREAD Enya: Stroke (Smearing chocolate around) Daemion: Mother and Child Reunion (cows) Rachel W: House

1994 Turner Price: ANTONY GORMLEY Tower Hamlets (iconoclasm-as-art collective): Moving House

 (destruction of Rachel W work)

1995 Turner Price: DAEMION HIRST, Mark Wallinger

1996 Turner Price: NUL, Gary Hume Intensities and Superficies - Enya: Ice sculpture made with salt.

1997 Turner Price: GILLIAN WEARY, Angel Bollock Sensational! Rachel W & Bruce Nauman Gabo (or Chomsky?):

  One Hundred Spaces (resin casts of underchairs)

1998 Turner Price: CHRIS OFILI, Cafe de Monchaux

1999 Turner Price: STEVE MCQUEEN, Tracy Emin (My Bed)

2000 Enya: Nothing Has Changed (an apple tree) Rachel: Nameless Bibliothec (holocaust monument)

2001 Rachel W: Plinth: Third sculpture on empty fourth plinth is plinth itself, in resin

2002

2003 Turner Price: Enya Gallaccio, Dick and Tracy Chapman Jun: Beagle 2 probe lanuched with Hirst work onboard Sep: Hirst's Pharmacy closed by health officials

Now Hirst: Wants a Pharmacy called "The Seafood Restaurant".