Perhaps a Christmas party is not the best context in which to appreciate art; wine had been imbibed, vision was slightly blurred, and yet I feel that my state of semi-inebriation made this year’s Turner Prize exhibition bearable. As I stumbled round the gallery, I was bored and completely unmoved by what was on display. Everything seemed to exist as an empty signifier; all was meaningless and depended entirely on the accompanying blurb to locate a reason for its existence. The forms and shapes were neither new nor inspiring. Lucy Skaer has recast an old work of Brancusi’s but this isn’t daring and neither is the naked bottom depicted on one of Enrico David’s papier-mâché figures.
The works aren’t attention-grabbing or outré, of which I will concede there has been enough of in recent years, and yet they don’t offer anything exciting or stimulating. Roger Hiorn’s efforts looked like the inside of a vacuum cleaner – hardly accomplished. But it was the winner which was the biggest disappointment. Every onlooker admired the fact that Richard Wright would not be able to sell this work, it would be painted over, it was beautiful, how pretty. Yes, it looked fine as a recreation of a baroque fresco and its detail was minute, but I can’t recommend this work on the basis of it having taken quite a while and a bit of effort to produce. Has no one heard of the Sistine chapel? The problem is nobody had a problem with it and that, for me, just goes to show that it has nothing going for it.
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