Here is the initial installation ready for inspection. I'm really pleased with how it looks, and have scripted my presentation to ensure I don't miss anything out. I have made temporary business cards as the printed ones aren't due until Tuesday. Here is what I have written...
"In 1994 following redundancy, I found myself in a situation where I had to claim benefits for two months.
In those days, benefits consisted of; the UB40 – unemployment benefit, housing benefit and council tax benefit. Each one required a separate set of paper work.
At that time, until all benefits had been processed, you weren’t entitled to any money.
After a three-week delay, I rang the benefits office and asked;
How am I supposed to buy shopping? I was told; Go to the food bank.
Horrified I saw this as an indignity and couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Fortunately I was back to work within a matter of weeks and managed to cope with the support of family.
Twenty four years later, Food banks are much more common. Things are much worse for people on the fringes of society. With the introduction of Universal Credit and delays of up to three months, families and individuals end up in far worse dire straights.
The inspiration for this piece came from a student I know.
She said; "I can’t buy materials, I have no money. Things are so bad I’ve had to use the food bank this week because they’ve stopped my benefits."
Clearly she expressed an indignity in having to accept charity.
In 1997, George Ritzer coined the term ‘Macdonaldization’ when referring to how society has evolved.
He identified; four key principles; Efficientcy, Calculbility, Predictibility and Control. This can be seen at play in our social welfare system today.
The film I Daniel Blake emphasizes this point.
A system controlled by the digital age where a face less person determines the fate of another through a list of criteria.
Technology replaces the human.
During my own experience, I was lucky enough to have a conversation with a person.
It could be said that Efficiency and Calculability however, prevent this today - the effects of which categorise people into a group. Groups which are easily sterotyped as incapable, lazy or even ignorant.
In the piece, the nameless, faceless objects represent the nameless and the faceless, both relating to burocracy in the system, and the individuals on the receiving end.
Importantly though, they represent those who give to the foodbanks, the nameless and the faceless that wander pass the bargin basket in the supermarket, and put a few extra items in their shopping to do their bit.
Casts in plaster represent the fragility of life and fortune, we’re all just three wage packets away from being homeless, or so they say –
On the face of it, this prestine white installation is something you might find in any art gallery, but on closer inspection, it reveals the knocks and bumps individuals experience through life in a bid to survive.
The indignity in having to accept charity – a threshold we might have to cross, if unfavoured by simple misfortune, such as lack of work and financial misfortune.
The sparse arrangement of objects, is inspired by Norman Bryson’s book about painting still life entitled; looking at the overlooked. Bryson examines the theory of Meglography and Rhopography;
Meglography, dealing with the exceptional act and the unique individual; and Rhopography dealing with the routines of daily living, the absence of personal uniqueness and distinction – also apt for the nameless and the faceless.
Humans are present but are unseen.
To conclude, in our modern age it seems there is still a huge gap between those that have and those that have not – one might draw similarities with the soup kitchens of the victorian era – this begs the question, have we really moved any farther forward?
Warhol’s Soup Cans in the 1960s were seen as a celebration of consumerism in which tinned goods were portrayed as benign objects. In stark contrast, my work brings to light the challenges and paradoxes of being a consumer in our current political climate, raising awareness of the challenges faced by people who may have the misfortune to have to ask for help, and find themselves through one reason or another, on the fringes of society and victim to a system void of empathy."
Comments