Work 24. Tree At The Carbiele.

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Thank you for comments but forgive me if I cannot pin the thing down any more at this stage.1 Where is one to find the quiet of mind that might allow for a logical step by step unfolding of that which is the job of work?

The time will come when all can be layed out in order and in a manner befitting your requirements but that time is not now and I must warn you in advance that it may only be after some time has passed, beyond our six month arrangement, that the head and tail of it emerges. This is doubly so since my trip to Carbiele yesterday to paint their enormous ash ended in what can only be described as a humiliating reverse at the hands of a drunken mob on the source for passing out day.2 It is only now having slept on it that I'm beginning to work out what happened and its implications. Let me recount briefly the events.

I dropped my daughter off at HMS Raleigh as usual and it was abundantly clear that something was in the air as the machine gun armed security guard outside the nursery was wearing a kilt and seemed in radiant mood as he performed the daily ritual of diligently studying my pass.3 He sent us off with his best salute. On the way back I saw more signs of revelry in the making and lots of bunting; a sure sign that something is afoot. You know that Torpoint holds the world record for bunting.4 I’m not sure of the details or how it is measured but bunting has become a source of pride in the town and there it was all over the military wives quarters.5 What I could not know at that time is that yours truly would be providing the entertainment for the post ceremony party.

I got started early on and was feeling my way into the painting which was progressing well. The drinkers began to show themselves at about one, the first contact occurring soon after. It was the usual verbal fare to which I have grown accustomed when out painting, plus a few poses held with the intention that I might sketch them in. This carried on but as more of the freshly certified navy recruits arrived and gathered outside in the garden things took a turn and the standard comments took on a more sinister tone and I soon became the focus. It seemed at first that the spectacle I provided was acting as a kind of social lubricant to the group who were standing just out of frame on the left side of the painting. They could focus on me while getting through the pleasantries common when meeting new people, it reminded me of the reception of a wedding party in point of fact. But the odd harmless shout from one of the recruits parents was interspersed with far coarser offerings from the younger recruits themselves who emerged now and again from the pub to smoke before returning to the source. Time went by, drinks went down, the sun came out and more of the recruits gathered with family members outside. This is when the first chant was offered: "Painter man give us a wave painterman painterman give us a wave."6 Look here its all good and well ignoring the odd comment but a chant of this nature cannot be ignored lest you receive a sustained chorus of boos that reach a raucous crescendo of cheering when one inevitably raises a hand. A pattern was emerging. A chant then a few minutes of quiet before the comments begin again building up to another chant set in motion by some wag in the bunch. For what it is worth the painting was now in full swing, with my usual laying in faze cut short by the doggerel I was now wet on wet and steaming ahead. I was determined not to be sent packing but was in a hurry to get back to the yard all the same and of course I had collect my daughter later that afternoon.

The chants continued: "Who are ya? Who are ya?"7 This one I did ignore. Then appropriately, considering our humble project and rationale of breakage, there was this: "Are you Van Gogh in disguise? Are you Van Gogh are you Van Gogh are you Van Gogh in disguise?"8 Not malicious in itself but it was delivered with considerable spite. Then this: "There's only one Claude Monet, one Claude Monet walking along singing a song walking in a Monet wonderland".9 This I had heard before from my days in Newcastle when I encountered a crowd of furious association football supporters gathered outside Shearers Pot House singing "there's only one Kevin Keegan..." and this followed by a terrifying chorus of "lets go fucking mental". 10 Mercifully I was spared that coda at the Carbielle but the chants went on and what disturbed me most and continues to do so today was the way the whole crowd now participated in this mockery. It was a diverse bunch, upper class 'admiral types' working class recruits, women and men, from varied ethnic backgrounds, children, pensioners, and casual observers . In short all comers were now turned to me and laughing and look here I was no more than thirty yards away, I could see the glee. Towards the end I was squarely the focus and there was no restbite, following a chant the group remained fixed upon me glass in hand sneer on face as if posing for a diabolical wedding reproduction. And the laughter was out of control, from the gut, the sort of high pitched revelry that one can hear at prime ministers questions from the toffs in particular, a sure sign that the group was united and really having a memorable ball of a time.

Doggedly I painted on, bringing it all to as swifter conclusion as I could muster but as you may be able to tell from the reproduction, the handling has a desperation to it and the composition cobbled. I was keen to escape back to the sanctuary of the boatyard and so started packing away my easel with great haste and as I did so a chorus of pantomime disappointment which erupted from the gang. The old woman who had been as watching from her position on the car park wall caught my attention.  I suppose I have been so accustomed to people watching that I had not properly registered her continued presence but I think I saw her sitting there as I set up. "Don't listen to them son" she said as I watched her slide down from her perch and dust herself off. "Rather difficult to ignore I'm afraid, look how they sneer" and I gestured to the group with one of the extended legs from my easel, receiving an inevitable 'wayhey', "even still they stare and laugh".  She looked towards the group and dismissed them with one wave of her mitten. "Some folk are only happy when they got someone to look down on, helps them feel together if you follow." She said this by way of explanation but I was neither cheered or convinced. "These people have been openly mocking me for the last two hours, as you have seen" I said. "Oh yes I was watching you daubing away" (she actually said 'daubing') "but I was waiting to see my  grandson, he's passing out today." "Congratulations" I said and the woman began hobbling off towards the Carbeille.  After a couple of delicate steps she turned and said "you just keep doing what you're doing, you don't need that lot anymore. Don't give'em time of day son." These last words delivered with the kind of penetrating seriousness possessed only by the older generation and drunkards but what she meant by my 'not needing them' I do not know, I wish I had pressed her."Thank you, I'll do my best" I replied and continued to deconstruct my easel.

As I watched her slow progress up the bank I felt rather heartened by the exchange. As she moved closer it was evident that the old woman was familiar with several of the gang to whom she gestured another mitten. The gaggle remained posed like a sports team as she cut a path through the middle with her stick and continued on towards the Rothko like entrance slot.11 The group automatically reformed the hole made by the old woman's path, like a Deleuzian sieve,12 and continued to stare. On the brink of the void the woman turned to me and waved, becoming part of the team for an instant, before disappearing into the black. At this point I too fled the scene to a hearty chorus of "cheerio cheerio cheerio" that was sustained for some time after I had started back down the hill. Can you send me some new wing nuts for the easel?

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I heard this morning from Roy the taxi driver who has a nice little rig on the west pontoon that passing out day is  a notorious time in the town for trouble and there was indeed a set-to in the Carbielle that night . The question I asked myself this morning was whether the events of yesterday were merely an unfortunate encounter with a group of drunks or something more? The latter I fear and as I said I am still coming to terms with the implications and you may think me previous but can we not see the whole business as metaphor for the shattering of the revolutionary dream in the public imagination?  Or perhaps more accurately, the shattering of the artists dream of a revolutionary public imagination. Now look here, every artist with the exception of the most commercial and macho types imagine an audience or a public whom receive the work and to which the work is in part designed. That's what one learns at the academies and we know that a good deal of booknotion has been produced about the nature of a 'public' and the possibility to create a 'public' with the work, 13 not to mention the ubiquitous artistic snares designed to trap the 'general public' in the name of participatory practice. And it is probable that many artists imagined, as I did,  an educated, intelligent, multi-class, curious, liberal minded, progressive set that in theory support the project of art, ideas, and emancipation. Well I say that the rabble that tortured me yesterday was a new public and one that has been forged in the chaos of the post-financial crisis austerity melting pot. An austerity public! Orcs!

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The imagined art public of yesteryear has been shattered and I for one now imagine a UKIP public. I imagine it but it also happened in real. Have we not experienced a shifting dynamic where anti capitalist revolutionary sentiment around the time of Occupy has given way to acceptance of austerity politics and the blaming of benefit cheats and immigrants for the country's financial woes? I remember that people generally supported occupy, there was a sense that every section of society concurred on some form of anticapitalist feeling after the criminality of the banking system had been revealed. I recall one meeting where I was struck by the class diversity of the people present, but it started slipping away. There were noticeably fewer honks of the horn14 by passing motorists, and eventually it seemed that people turned violently against the revolutionary dream having been swayed by the media promotion of the austerity narrative. Never before has he power of the media seemed so tangible to me. Of course you cannot be surprised at the conservatives, they were and continue to do just what they do; exploit, suppress, divide and rule...its away of life!  You can however blame the opposition party, Labour for providing no opposition! Presumably fearing for their careers their dithering soon solidified into actual support for austerity. Now I am no commentator on national politics but it is not hard to see that while all was confusion the influence of UKIP on moderate folk was growing and growing and these people would have historically voted Labour.

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Look here, how can a group of politicians with very right wing views convert so many people from a left wing party to vote for them? I don't know but UKIP wallows in the stench of racism and I don't want to believe that so many people think like that. But UKIP has supporters from many different races so I cant make it out. Post-post-politics is a meat grinder!15 What we can say with more certainty is that since the financial crisis 'the people' have been made to pay all over Europe through austerity and this has coincided with increased support for the far left and far right. In the UK however it would seem that the far left amounted to Occupy and countless other protest groups while the far right could capitalize in the traditional party politics fashion through the UKIP.

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This UKIP is a one! And you know that we have advertisements appearing for these blowhards in the town and on the roads outside towards Rame and Liskeard. Automobile stickers have been donned and one fine old gent in the yard is a UKIP activist! His sticker says "UKIP - If everyone who agreed with us voted, then we'd win". And Trago Mills, are you aware of it?16 A strange store set in the woods about thirty miles from here. Well it would seem to be a political shop! It, the "shop", has a political stance! I have never seen the like. Is it not a contradiction for a shop, that exists sell as much as possible, would then present a hardcore political stance which would presumably result in customers with differing political views to shop elsewhere? It is very strange to me. They always had anti European propaganda on prominent display but the last time I went it was layed out like a political rally for UKIP with dozens of large boards to greet the customers around the car park, people handing out leaflets at the door and most surreally of all, in the middle of the store and surrounded by plumbing equipment if memory serves, I found two UKIP activists at a desk recruiting new members! I shielded my children's eyes and moved through to find the hose clips needed but I couldn't shake the feeling that I was buying UKIP hose clips. In any event this UKIP are 'a new force in British politics', as some talking head on the television would perhaps say but I go further. For me they have managed to rupture the imaginary institution of British society17 and somehow, I do not know how exactly, but somehow that rabble I contended with yesterday are born out of this brave new imaginary.

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Now, to return to matters of a more material nature, I require two tubes of zinc white and a set of 12 round hog hair brushes, artists turpentine and those wing nuts. I shall stay in the yard to recover for a few days. Maybe some drawing.

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With a handshake,

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John

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