SHE'S UP TO SOMETHING

Yesterday I went up to see some stuff by Jake and Dinos Chapman at the White Cube Gallery. Titled 'If Hitler Had Been a Hippy How Happy Would He Be', there were defaced paintings, 'vandalized' paintings by Hitler (like the one above) and a recreation of their previous work 'Hell' -which had burnt down in a basement fire - now named 'Fucking Hell'. Lovely. 'Fucking Hell' comprised of nine cases filled with miniature scenes and figures of war and destruction types of things. Lots of heads on poles, nazis and random limbs everywhere. It was the kind of piece that photos don't really do justice to and it was great to walk around each one and look up close at the amount of detail - the expressions on each little face especially.

The White Cube seems to never have any words to go along with the works they show so you end up trying to interpret it for yourself rather than relying on the gallery's description. However, I had no bloody idea about the Hitler pictures, which are apparently concerned with the insight you may be able to get from an artist's work, and how little you could have gotten from Hitler's really crap landscapes.

I also went to see the BP Portrait Award at the National Gallery, which as usual was full of hyper-real photographic style portraits. It makes you think what the point is really, when they could have just taken a photograph and gotten the exact same result. A lot of it seems just to exist to show off technical skill. Maybe I am just jealous that I can't paint like that.

^Boots No. 7 (2), by Harriet White.

Anyway, here is a song. I especially like when the phone rings and someone goes 'Hello?'
Out Hud - It's For You