Rhinocrisy

Eric Muller had a link to this BBC World Service piece about the Turner Prize, an art prize recently awarded to Simon Starling for his performance/piece “shedboatshed”, where he took a shed, turned it into a boat, paddled it down the river to Basel, and turned it back into a shed. The BBC commentator Mark Whitaker interviews two art-world airheads about this bizarre business (starts at around 6:25 in above link). He’s quite funny and seems to be peeved for the same reasons I am (I’ll explain later). Here’s a bit of a transcript, though you really should listen to the whole thing:

MARK: Eric Troncy at, uh, museum in Dijon - is it art? a shed?
ERIC: Why not?
MARK: Is the French view of sheds the same as the British art establishment?
ERIC: Well you know, I think the question is not about, it’s not about ‘I could do it’, it’s, it’s, because in fact you did not… do it, and this guy did, and it’s the difference between you and him.
MARK: Well, the difference is that he’s got the gall to do it, then.
ERIC: Well, he decided to do so, and you did not decide to do so, uh, to try to make things, uh, simple.
MARK: (almost laughing) Because I don’t think it’s art! I mean, if I was to bring my underpants in next year, and submit them for the Turner Prize, would I have a chance of winning?
ERIC: Why not? But I am sure you will not do that, and that’s the difference between you and an artist.

This has been one of my buttons for many years; I’ve often lamented the slow decay of the word ‘art’. And I think this exchange captures it perfectly. If, indeed, the art world wishes to espouse the philosophy that anything can be art, or that, in the extreme, everything that human beings do, anywhere, any time, is art, then they should immolate themselves. They should give up the idea of an ‘artist’, wreck their museums, and distribute the Turner Prize equally amongst all people, from the housewife cooking deviled eggs to the homeless man sleeping in his own filth. The whole point of Duchamp painting a moustache on the Mona Lisa was to mock the idea of art as something special and figurative, to be brazen and tear down boundaries between art and the rest of life. It’s foolish in the extreme for M. Troncy, above, not to recognize the hypocrisy of insisting that what Starling does is art, while Mr. Whitaker is not an artist, merely because he lacks the pretension to declare himself one.

This bleg post is a non sequitur. It comprises two utterly unrelated snippets of information. The attempt to draw a connection between them is a futile journey. Save yourself the trouble. Have another beer.

Rumsfeld’s growing stake in Tamiflu

Defense Secretary, ex-chairman of flu treatment rights holder, sees portfolio value growing.
October 31, 2005: 10:55 AM EST
By Nelson D. Schwartz, Fortune senior writer

NEW YORK (Fortune) - The prospect of a bird flu outbreak may be panicking people around the globe, but it’s proving to be very good news for Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other politically connected investors in Gilead Sciences, the California biotech company that owns the rights to Tamiflu, the influenza remedy that’s now the most-sought after drug in the world.

Rumsfeld served as Gilead (Research)’s chairman from 1997 until he joined the Bush administration in 2001, and he still holds a Gilead stake valued at between $5 million and $25 million, according to federal financial disclosures filed by Rumsfeld.

That has nothing to do with this.

Report: Tamiflu is ‘useless’ for avian flu

LONDON, Dec. 3 (UPI) — A Vietnamese doctor with experience in treating avian flu says Tamiflu, the drug being stockpiled for treatment of avian flue is useless against the virus.

Dr. Nguyen Tuong Van of the Centre for Tropical Diseases in Hanoi has treated 41 victims of H5N1, following World Health Organization guidelines and administering Tamiflu to her patients. She told the Sunday Times of London the medicine had no effect.

“We place no importance on using this drug on our patients,” she said. “Tamiflu is really only meant for treating ordinary type A flu. It was not designed to combat H5N1.”