Yes I finally have a solo publication as a poet. Not bad after 25 years of writing.

It is due to be released on 27th September according to Amazon and you can pre-order from there and Asda (links below).

My thanks to Chris Hamilton Emery and Salt for picking up on the poems. I am really chuffed that I am on Salt as it has a vast array of top writers on its catalogue (check it out on link below and purchase some – every little helps).

As for the title well you will have to wait until publication to find out who the Last Farmer really is..

Until then I offering a copy of the book to first person to correctly guess the following…

Which writer is buried three graves down from my grandmother?

Pre-order now at

AMAZON

ASDA

Visit the SALT PUBLISHING website

Two new additions to the drifting village now on Poetry part of my website at

http://www.shaunbelcher.com/writing/

The Shipstone Star and Landlocked

Myspace have finally taken note and upped their game so now the complete Suit of Nettles disc from Lincoln Collection show 2008 available to listen to there. This replaces the NING players which have been ended by the new pricing policy.

go to

http://www.myspace.com/trailerstarorchestra

A touring exhibition which started in Norwich and currently at Millenium Galleries Sheffield this Tate Gallery touring show comes with a specific tagline i.e. ‘Part of the Great British Arts Debate’.

Now, if you are not aware this Great British Art Debate commenced during the first wave of Arts Council ‘restructuring’ about two years ago. This seems to be a spin off from that ‘debate’. At the time that debate really amounted to no more than carefully chosen individuals talking in a ‘closed shop’ about how best to redeploy funding in face of cuts by the then New Labour Government.

Any attempt to genuinely ‘widen’ debate and participation is to be welcomed. That the Tate should choose to wrap a watercolour exhibition in such terms says more about current arts politics than any real ‘debate’ out in the Shires. This exhibition highlights the deep uncertainty and failure of contemporary art to address notions of both identity and place and technique properly. It raises more questions than answers but not in the way intended.

The exhibition contains a great deal of stunning work and no-one can complain about seeing (even if in very low light to preserve the fragile colours) a collection that shows Turner, Blake, Sutherland, Burra and Offili in the same space. The Millenium Galleries, to their credit, are showing both local war artists and local ‘amateur/professional’ painters work alongside the ‘masters’. However all of this is constantly being drawn into the shaping argument that a leaflet posits thus:

“Watercolour paintings have become shorthand for a comforting, conservative world view, rooted in the English countryside and largely rejected by the contemporary art scene. It wasn’t always so”

This statement has no author. It is presented as essentially true when it is, of course, contestable. It is illustrated by Burra’s ‘Soldiers at Rye’ which is in the exhibition (see illustration above). Again our anonymous author cannot help but shackle a political point to it -

“”..is no portrayal of a pastoral idyll”

before drawing a comparison to oil painting which is just plain silly.

The comments also include a statement that this exhibition illustrates a ‘remarkable diversity’ and also asks ‘where next’.

This is, I presume, continued in the exhibition catalogue which I did not buy for the simple reason that the interesting local artists and the work illustrated did not reflect what shown in Sheffield. It appears that if one wants to see the David Jones and John Piper work shown in the Tate publication one has to travel to Tate Britain next year.

The exhibition addresses two fundamentals of the watercolour tradition ’sense of place’ and ‘technique’ and tries to map them to a contemporary notion of ‘diversity’.

Watercolour paintings have become shorthand for a comforting, conservative world view, rooted in the English countryside

‘Shorthand’ is an unsatisfactory term based on a shallow perception of the tradition. ‘Shorthand’ suggests watercolour painting is somehow inferior to the ‘easel painting’ tradition and involves an almost throwaway sense of gesture usually ‘en plain air’. Anyone with a slight knowledge of the painstaking care that went into a Cotman or Turner can already see there a problem of some mis-aligned value systems here.

Instead of starting with the ‘tradition’ the commentator is explaining the tradition backwards with a rather ’secondhand’ shorthand of their own. The suggestion they make is that watercolour is merely an amateur’s playground and the contemporary refuge of the conservative artist only. This smacks of the contemporary arts graduate view of art history and technique based on little real comprehension of its true history or creation.

i.e. in short – Watercolour + Landscape = a moribund ‘white male’ tradition.

This notion is so embedded that the whole last part of the exhibition is set up as a failed retort to this assumption which instead of making one applaud the ‘beyond’ as ‘groundbreaking’ simply reinforces that there has been a break in both technique and value system which leaves no ‘beyond’ – simply a sense of closure of that particular tradition.

If the instructional videos and cases of ‘this is how you do it’ sketches and paintings littered around the show inspire one person to try the technique that is fine. However the examples used were illustrative in the manner of the conservative tradition the exhibition is supposedly challenging. Instead of inspiring true engagement it suggests an administrative dumbing down, reflected again in the noble but ill advised attempt to show and sell local work at the exhibitions end. It would have been far better to have a decent contemporary artist showing the technique ‘live’ and ’signpost’ people to good watercolour artists in the community or have their work for sale in the ubiquitous ’shop’ than hang a frankly weak bunch of works next to William Blake which is doing neither party much good in comparison.

Because the Millenium contains an excellent Ruskin museum (all be it small) there were a couple of Ruskins and a large scale although slightly mad Burne Jones (a similar problem to most of the Burras being evident where scale and surreal subject matter outweigh a lumpiness and lack of touch in the works). Watercolour is a light and spontaneous medium which gets bogged down into sticky gouache when over-worked. Having said that a single ‘constructed’ Burra landscape retained that effervescance.

The exhibition makes a very good fist of showing (albeit in a fragmented manner – i.e. Offili then Burra then Turner then Ruskin then Blake) some classic work in the medium. Nobody could walk away from the Cotman and not feel that they have seen an illustration of the very finest technique. It is almost as if one is in a hall of greats onto which a slightly amateur exhibition has encroached.

Now before the ‘post-modernists’ cry foul and contest any suggestion of a “hall of greats” or “artistic canon” let me be clear. I do not buy into the notion that certain works of greatness can be explained away by socio-marxist reductionisim or are part of a white male tradition that needs ‘re-examining’. The reason the predominant works in the exhibition are from white males is simple. Historically, the only people able to safely travel the countryside and have the independent means to do so thus creating the topographical tradition, were men and white men of independent means at that. There were as few farm labourer watercolourists (male or female) as there were poets because of a harsh bondage to land. Arguments about impediments to joining ‘tradition’ whilst valid do not change the available corpus of work we are left to examine.

So if one removes the ‘diversity’ framework and examines the work one finds a fairly consistent and challenging set of works created by white males over a two hundred year period. The historical ‘romanticisation’ of the ‘wilderness’ occurred in this time frame. When the anonymous PR person spouts about a ‘conservative’ tradition it is one built on socio-economic changes and predominantly male for a reason. Far more interesting would have been a ‘debate’ centred on notions of ’sense of place’ not ‘diversity’ as both are loaded terms.

The ‘contemporary’ works undermine that tradition by both their subject matter and their technique, or lack thereof, and in my opinion this should have been divided into two shows maybe run concurrently.

Nowhere in the contemporary works do we see a similar level of technique displayed except maybe in the Blackadder (an illustrative painter whose work influenced a swathe of eighties illustrators). Other contemporary artists range from the slightly cack-handed (Offili) to the downright awful..Kapoor and Paolozzi or Houshiary. Indeed worst of all was a very contemporary bunch of splodges on paper by a ‘conceptual’ artist I didn’t even bother looking at. All used watercolour in varying ways, none successful, and none with an understanding of the technique itself. Rather we were in the post-modern’s favourite place i.e. “Irony Island”.

Were these works selected simply for their possible ‘diversity’ tick-boxing? Paolozzi not Peter Blake, Kapoor (not noted as a painter per se?) instead of Michael Andrews? The whole show fell between two stools in trying to concoct a ‘diverse’ and ‘contemporary’ ‘beyond’ that didn’t exist and in so doing it competely ignored a far deeper and questioning use of the ‘watercolour tradition’ that could have included Conrad Atkinson amongst others. That would have been a real debate. Instead we are left holding the bath whilst baby and bath-water both lost and the bath increasingly leaky as a container for ideas……

To that degree ‘Tradition and Beyond’ did reflect the current lack of confidence at the heart of arts organisations trying to hit targets in all areas..footfall, diversity, engagement and failing to concentrate on the matter at hand…..a word no longer politically acceptable above all others.

QUALITY.

Quality is now so disparaged amongst academics and administrators that one is admonished for just mentioning the word. However all artists can be judged by that criteria if all could agree on a suitably diverse criteria to encompass works.

At present there is no such consensus and until there is we continue to drift through shows like this……like Turner strapped to the mast in a storm the water blurring our sense of vision….

Reply to Mark Ravenhill piece on Guardian forum here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/jul/25/arts-funding-cuts-theatre-galleries

As someone with good and bad experience of work-shopping and the community arts ’sector’ the point Rozainaziara makes i.e.

If this could be simplified, if instead of chasing workshops on the one hand and commissions or project funding on the other they could be salaried to teach these workshops in exchange for some time and space to do their own work, then a great deal of time and money could be saved without a loss of quality.

Is about the most positive note I read here….the rest seems to fall into the trap of ‘quality’ assessment of, lets face it, a hugely variable sector. Because art is funded has never mean it good or bad simply that is exists. If cuts sever the funding arteries the arts will bleed to death slowly in those areas which state-funded. This is happening now because the ‘boy who cried wolf’ arts organisations never thought the wolf would actually call.

Most arts projects do not in themselves create worthwhile art because they are not intended to. They create opportunities for people who would otherwise not get them to have therapy, fun and maybe enlightenment. This work has for too long been a unregulated, snout-in-trough mess where predominantly well meaning white middle-class do-gooders have poured millions down the drain through sheer un-professionalism and lack of regulation. A fair proportion of it went to ‘artistic’ friends who short of cash too whatever their ability which lead the previous government to start pulling hard on the reins and changes to start happening at ACE.

An objective audit of the area with final outcomes assessed truly not the fabricated results ACE play with..(I know having watched the targets be falsified personally by desperate organisations) would show where we have been and then where we might possibly know where we are going.

We regulate schools, FE and HE to a high degree. Community Arts should be regulated too and then employed artists, values, performance and outputs would rise hopefully to match the best work and not reflect lowest common denominator.

If that meant training artists properly to deliver so be it. Attempts in this direction have been lacklustre and warped by social output targeting meaning that substantial grants always went to those individual artists higher up the target organisation’s ‘hit list’ not on their innate ability to deliver professional outcomes.

So yes to professionalizing the area but it has to be a level playing field as in colleges and schools. Then reward the best and weed out the weak. In a sector nose-diving into non-existence this is the only way to save it in my opinion.

The Titanic of Ace is sinking and the most able will build themselves lifeboats of whatever works private/public sponsored etc….
The cuckoos in the nest i.e. opera and ballet will continue to be funded as ‘State’ necessities and will push even more fledglings out of the nest. The outlook is not good.

skloas just sent you a message on Vimeo:

“hey shaun,

the little spot I used your video for is finally finished. I uploaded it already on vimeo and youtube. because it was urgent. I hope you don’t mind. I mentioned your name in the final credits. it doesn’t last very long, but it’s there. I hope that’s ok for you. if you want to I can also tag it with your name.
the video is in german, so I better clarify what it’s all about.
there is an event in berlin called MUSIKCAMP 2.0. It’s a workshop series for young musicians. It lasts one week and gives the attendees the chance to do their own musical experiments with the help of some prominent musicians. professional musicians.
the event is non profitable, there is just a little contribution the attendees need to make, but it’s just to cover the cost of the event. so we get nothing out of it. but for that kind of project it’s very nessecary to do a lot of PR, otherwise it’s very hard to get noticed. so that video is one part of a very small internet and print campaign.
we hope it get’s the right attention and becomes viral, because right now it’s still hard for us to get people enthusiastic about it. and that’s a shame because it’s such a good project and a great chance for musicians or people who want to make music for almost no cost.

well, to cut a long story short,
here you go:

so that’s it for now,
again, thank you very much for providing your video! it was just perfect for the subject. I hope I treated it right and you are fine with it

nevertheless if there are any complaints please feel free to contact me

with best regards,
sascha”

skloas’s profile on Vimeo:

http://vimeo.com/user3228202

I seem to have come to a crossroads. I have dallied with ‘fine art’ as it presently defined for over three years now and still feel ill at ease with it. Today I received the latest ‘Art Licks’ newsletter about latest projects in London and that like the Critical Network missives which does similar job for rest of country (guess which livelier and more active..yes London) yet still it feels like ‘foreign ‘terrain’.

What struck me about the London links was firstly the sheer number and ‘conceptual’ bias of most of the work..yes there were exceptions but what on offer was to me ‘lazy art’…spurious affectations by a ‘Eurocentric’ elite playing at being artists in the ‘Hip’ capital and supported in their suspension of disbelief by a value system built in threadbare M.A. systems across the Capital and further afield. Nobody wants to point out the Emperors of the ‘New’ are naked as they are paying a lot of lecturer’s mortgages. Rather than cut off income streams keep pandering to the infantile and the mock outrageous….I wil not quote any particular ‘intervention’ or ‘affectation’ it all looked uniformly bad..as in fast art or SHART..shallow unfunded nonsense.

As I over 50 and can reasonably hope for maybe 20 more years of moaning on this planet I better direct my attention to things of some gravity rather than this kind of moronic sideshow (I have enough opportunities locally to watch rabbits reciting shakespeare thanks to not need a trip to London to wince).

So analysing the current scene is something I simply cannot be bothered to do any more…Moogee was proof that a well aimed barbed comment, scrawl will always gain attention. The whole three years has been one extended howl at the absurdity of much contemporary posturing exemplified in all its obscene irrelevance by our local Ars Factoria de Idiocy Nottingham Contemporary who believe it or not are as I type gaining PR for some albino frogs ..yes frogs…birrrup birrup….

So what is a ‘roaming’ artist to do if the fine art scene has run itself into the ground? It curious but the contemporary plethora of modestly talented artists all vying for attention reminds me of post-punk London where half the bands were crap and also of the ‘boom’ (it over pretty quickly if ever it really happened) in the early Nineties of poetry. Suddenly the British Isles was coming down with cutting edge poets and although not totally played out there has been something of a lull hence most of the same names appear on poetry scene now as then..Armitage, Shapcott and Uncle Bob Cobbing’s heirs and all….although Salt does seem to be redressing the imbalance.

Being totally honest with myself I see no chance, even if dedicated, of establishing myself for ‘real’ painting and then making any kind of living from it. The very best painters locally of my age …Mik Godley, Marek Tobolewski ( show at lakeside you should visit!)
http://www.lakesidearts.org.uk/Exhibitions/ViewEvent.html?e=1585&c=5&d=0 have been practicing artists for at least three times as long as me ( I stopped around 1993 and never really got back on the easel) and they struggle to make ends meet so what chance I. Even if I discovered my paintbrush and canvas tomorrow and was the new whatever I still would have too much ground to make up.

I seem to have been blessed with more talent than good for me or looking at it another way ‘artistic ADHD’….first painting then poetry then songwriting..and made a reasonable fist (sans voice) of all three. Now I find myself teaching ‘multimedia’ because I buggered about so much and strangely an expert in something nobody can actually define. One thing multimedia ain’t is albino frogs.

So where to now Silver? Hi ho and away into the sunset leaving a sheaf of scurrilous doggy poo and a host of invective? Sorry for the navel-gazing nature of this post but I really struggling to 1) define and 2) commence on a new direction..

Bit like the current state of the country..am I LIBLAB , CONLIB or FOWL?

I am not a willing convert to academia and frankly sometimes find myself screaming inwardly at some of its absurdities but it pays my bills. If I cannot open up some new territory away from the Leftist absolutes of the New Conformity..maybe via ‘New Aesthetics’ then I will probably drop it once and for all. I am interested in the social and philosophical elements of the art scene whilst not being impressed by much of its ‘production’ or lack of production and intellectual flimsiness.

I also may have finally found some outlet for my poetry..fingers crossed although after 25 years I half expect it to fall through as usual. If not then I may get a chance to push forward again in that area but like Hillary on Everest I do need the Sherpa of a publisher. Lets just say I may have made it as far as my first base camp:-)

If challenged I can always defend my writing. My poetry is as good as anybodies and I will stand on Bob Dylan’s coffee table and say that. My songwriting is as good as Clive James and my voice as good as Nick Cave with a hangover. So its the writing as in the title of this post that coming to the fore…maybe just poetry..maybe a mix of art theory/criticism and poetry..who knows.

For now the guitar will be a hobby and the paintbrush will be staying dry….probably forever…..

The writing box is a heirloom left to my father by my grandmother and now contains a selection of photographs related to both sides of my family. Some of this family history is dark and unknown some of it has come to light. The writing box has lain in my mind as an idea for over five years and finding an appropriate ‘form’ for its outlet is probably going to define my future ‘artistic’ activity. It is too important to me to rehash as yet another ‘digital’ exploration or conceptual fraud. This time it is a story that needs telling plainly with craft and that to me is what art really is.

http://redherring.posterous.com/

Join in the new arts debate by joining posterous and becoming a contributor

Posted via web from shaun belcher

via facebook.com

Invited to participate last night in Grizedale Arts project Ruskin ‘Re-Coefficient’s Dinner’. An enjoyable evening of strange music, politics and craft. For further details see http://www.grizedale.org/

Posted via web from shaun belcher

I was asked to pen some thoughts on this blog for the Pakspectator

Would you please tell us something about you and your site?

I am an artist and my blog is an art criticism blog with my own cartoons illustrating my criticism. It is basically about the English art scene but sometimes touches on International themes.

Do you feel that you continue to grow in your writing the longer you write? Why is that important to you?

In some ways but also as I do not have much time I do think my writing style sometimes suffers because of the speed of ‘blogging’. I need to think before I type more often!

I’m wondering what some of your memorable experiences are with blogging?

Well being contacted by the Pakspectator is pretty unusual. I mostly get visited by, and comments from, people interested in the art scene rather than politics although I do cross over when it comes to government funding of the arts which we lucky enough in this country to have received ..well until recently that is. When the economy does badly so do artists. People have other priorities and we lucky to have such a thing in first place compared to other countries. Art is not about just money though it about spirit too.

What do you do in order to keep up your communication with other bloggers?

I simply try and keep the blog updated as much as possible which not easy.

What do you think is the most exciting or most innovative use of technology in politics right now?

Probably the use of ‘interactive’ technology via the internet. We have a lot of U.K. politicians using youtube which is amusing…they try to look ‘up to date’ for the voters.

Do you think that these new technologies are effective in making people more responsive?

I do. I know a lot of English people are sceptical but I work with young people and they have long since abandoned their pens for the computer screen.

Politicians should speak in a language people understand even if on internet.

What do you think sets Your site apart from others?

My cartoons and my art dog character ‘Moogee’

If you could choose one characteristic you have that brought you success in life, what would it be?

Being inventive and seeking new solutions to problems.

What was the happiest and gloomiest moment of your life?

Meeting my partner and losing my father in the same year.

Do you think [the use of Twitter and other social networking tools by politicians] is bandwagon jumping or what?

As I said before politicians need to communicate in whatever way is suitable.

If you could pick a travel destination, anywhere in the world, with no worries about how it’s paid for – what would your top 3 choices be?

Iceland
Nashville U.S.A.
New Zealand

What is your favorite book and why?

Raymond Carver – Fires – short stories and poems
because it made me a poet.

What’s the first thing you notice about a person (whether you know them or not)?

Attitude.

Is there anyone from your past that once told you you couldn’t write?

A lot of arts adminstrators, politicians and lecturers are uncomfortable when one says the truth.

How bloggers can benefit from blogs financially?

I wish I knew..I do not..and never set out to make money from my blog..

Is it true that who has a successful blog has an awful lot of time on their hands?

They need to be sat down in front of a screen and type a lot that is for sure. They also need to avoid R.S.I. and related diseases from too much typing…

What are your thoughts on corporate blogs and what do you think the biggest advantages and disadvantages are?

I not that familiar with ‘bigger’ blogs although something like Huffington Post does seem to have changed the rules about how news is provided.
I think the world has changed and blogging is helping to change it even more…for the better.

What role can bloggers of the world play to make this world more friendlier and less hostile?

Just help with communication..we all need to communicate and avoid misunderstanding each other.

Who are your top five favourite bloggers?

I do not have a top five..I like the Guardian Newspaper Uk Bloggers – five of those do?

Is there one observation or column or post that has gotten the most powerful reaction from people?

Yes but not written by me ironically! A noted New York artist chose to comment on my blog and he gets lots of ‘hits’. He also going to write some ‘artist in New York’ travelogues for my blog so looking forward to those.

What is your perception about Pakistan and its people?

I have a very nice Pakistani family living next door who offered us some party food last weekend because welcoming someone from Pakistan.

So my impression was very good as was the food!

Have you ever become stunned by the uniqueness of any blogger?

My cartoon dog is pretty unique I haven’t seen another.

What is the most striking difference between a developed country and a developing country?

I have never visited Pakistan but I would guess people the same the world over and health and happiness not related to wealth at all. We are wealthy in some ways but poor in others.

What is the future of blogging?

I think it will become more like television because of technology but I hope there will still be a place for good writing.

You have also got a blogging life, how has it directly affected both your personal and professional life?

It has affected my profile as an artist. I believe more people may have heard of me because of the cartoons.

What are your future plans?

Keep blogging and asking questions even when I get no answers!

Any Message you want to give to the readers of The Pakistani Spectator?

Many thanks for spending some time reading my little thoughts from a damp and raining England. May you enjoy health and happiness and good weather!

regards,
Shaun Belcher

Artist and Poet and Songwriter

Nottingham, England

]]> http://www.shaunbelcher.com/blog/?feed=rss2&p=1259 0