AFTER ARTISTIC RESEARCH
What follows the establishment and the realization of the establishment of the phenomenon
Ana Catarina Moreira Pinto da Fonseca Almeida
TESE DE DOUTORAMENTO EM EDUCAÇÃO ARTÍSTICA
DOCTORAL THESIS IN ARTS EDUCATION
Tese orientada por: Thesis supervised by:
Professora Doutora Catarina Silva Martins Universidade do Porto, Portugal
2015
Acknowledgements
The long process of thinking and of elaboration of this thesis has experimented several different phases, in what concerns its rhythm of construction and my moods and motivation. Different people were important to keep me on track, each contributing in their own different way. A few were my emotional backbone and fundamental for me to balance the contrasting feelings and conflicting thoughts crossing my overwrought mind. Others were my intellectual challengers, to whom I owe the most productive moments of writing. Others probably are unaware of how important they were in the right moments for just not giving a damn about artistic research. I am grateful to all of them.
I would like to thank my family, in the first place, especially my mum and dad, who have helped and still help me out in everything I need. I have to thank you for being always there for me and tirelessly concerned with my concerns. Also I feel very blessed for being among my beloved grandparents for whom my affection goes far beyond words.
I thank my supervisor, Professor Catarina Martins, for challenging me every now and then, and for inciting me, for enlightening me, and for clearing my confused mind in important moments of my investigation.
My recognition goes also to the group of colleagues, friends and teachers in the Faculty of Fine Arts of University of Porto and the Institute of Research in Art, Design and Society, together with whom I have shared ideas and grew up a lot, and who are responsible for my belief that there is a way out through research. In between coffees and lunch, we daily push each other further in frequent discussions and commentary. Thank you everyone, especially Catarina Martins, José Paiva, Sofia Reis, Tiago Assis, André Alves and Paulo Mesquita.
To my best friends forever, thank you for being always so supportive, for making me laugh and for taking care of me when needed. Thank you ‘crochet das 5’.
I am also very grateful to the people I have met in Helsinki, from the TAhTO group, from the Finnish Academy of Fine Arts, and from the Theatre Academy, and whose work I follow with admiration. My thanks go especially to the person of Anita Seppä for officially receiving me, and also to Simo Kellokumpu, Saara Hannula, Leena Rouhiainen, and the generality of the TAhTO students and board members.
Similarly my gratitude is also directed to the people I have met in The Hague and Leiden, in the PhDArts doctoral programme, who were always incredibly nice, available, and interesting all the way. I am thankful to Janneke Wesseling and Frans de Ruiter, who have officially accepted me there, and I extend my gratitude to Judith Westerveld, Brigitte Kovacs, Ato Malinda, Yota
Ioannidou and the rest of the students of PhDArts whose discussions have been quite insightful and influential on me.
A special acknowledgement goes to every and each of my interviewees, who generously contributed with their ideas, their time and availability to hear and answer my research concerns (thank you Simo Kellokumpu, Leena Rouhiainen, Saara Hannula, Ato Malinda, Yota Ioannidou, Judith Westerveld, Erik Viskil and Janneke Wesseling).
I would like to thank the team with whom I have organized the international seminar
Conversations on Artistic Research, which took place in November 2014 at the Faculty of Fine
Arts of University of Porto. It constituted a fundamental moment in the direction of my doctoral research. They are André Alves, Roberto Correia, Sofia Reis, Joana Vale, Catarina Martins and José Paiva. A special appreciation goes to the invited speakers and moderators of the seminar: Anita Seppä, Annette Arlander, António Olaio, Fernando Rosa Dias, Gabriela V. Pinheiro, Janneke Wesseling, Jeremy Diggle and José Quaresma.
I am also grateful to Miguel Esteves, for his work on the interview transcriptions, and to Sofia Reis, for proofreading the thesis.
A final thanks goes to FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, for the doctoral grant I was assigned with for a part of my studies, and through which I was able to further develop my ideas by actively involving myself with the doctoral activities both in Helsinki and in The Hague.
Abstract
Although not incisively approached in the text, the places of departure of this research are the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Porto and my involvement in the Research Institute in Art, Design and Society. Serving as my background for some years now, their contexts and the activities developed in both institutions were highly influential and motivational for the take-‐ off of the present work. In the late months of 2014 I organized Conversations on Artistic
Research in the Faculty of Fine Arts in Porto, an international yet focused event for the
discussion of several topics concerning artistic research. For Conversations was invited an ensemble of speakers whose inputs hugely contributed to the ensuing definition and re-‐ definition of my interests, concerns, and the direction of my research. The strengthening of individual relationships and the affinity found bridging my own research interests and those of some of these guest speakers were decisive in the further phase of my studies. This last year was the time when conditions were created for me to temporarily leave the grounds of the Faculty of Fine Arts of University of Porto and investigate in-‐loco two of the most important European academies where artistic research currently actually happens – and whose pioneering spirit is worth to mention as well.
In the first semester of 2015 I was a visiting researcher in the Finnish Academy of Fine Arts of University of the Arts, Helsinki, and, afterwards, at the Royal Academy of Arts, The Hague, part of Leiden University. The two institutions are well renowned in the international scene of artistic research expertise, and their staff members perform influential roles at different levels in the field. With this in mind I thus planned my move to become acquainted with the
organization, discursivity, and practices of research in arts higher education in the specificity of such cutting-‐edge environments. My stimulus was based on the conviction that if I wanted to know more about artistic research, I had to reach the places where artistic research
supposedly happens and to contact with the people that presumably work on it; I had to be directly in touch with artistic research that is happening right now in order to more
significantly investigate my object of study without depending exclusively on third parties and mediated discourses. Therefore the personal impression on artistic research that I construct and converse through this thesis is not limited to the interpretation of the overflow of literature that theoreticians produce since some years to the present day, but it is, more accurately, based on what these artists, students, teachers and researchers do and speak about in the legitimated contexts of artistic research – especially those two that I visited abroad, and the one where I grew up as a researcher.
affairs in artistic research. Perceived as a grey area, artistic research has been nonetheless considered in the published literature a disciplinary field, since its establishment in academic contexts is thoroughgoing and its recognition as a specific stance in the art world field has also been consummated – even if in a perhaps unorthodox way, as intends to show part of this doctoral text. In the present day, artistic research entails teaching positions and departments, official reports, funding programmes, political decisions, research, essayistic literature and exhibitions, all in the name of an idea of ‘artistic research’ that is anything but consensual. The growing body of materials that has been giving shape to artistic research is not rarely
conflicting and supported in tensional relations, dividing academics, artists and policy makers in different degrees of enthusiasm and skepticism. It was, in part, the contradictory positions felt within the academic environment that has constituted the impetus that triggered and fueled this research, and the reason for my preference for the term ‘phenomenon’ when referring to the reality of artistic research.
Through this text I have argued that the tensions that largely characterize the identity and activities in the field of artistic research do not necessarily preclude neither limit it, but rather contribute to the fundamental dynamics of a productive field (in a resisting and disrupting perspective), instead of a productivitist field (as soon as crystallization takes place, the field shifts from productive to productivitist). In addition to the tension between productivism and
productivitism, others are explored while chapters unfold – iconoclasm and iconolatry, writing
as artistic medium, benefits and harms of institutionalization, among others -‐, with special emphasis in the conflict between dematerialization and new materialism, a relation sketched as a possible digest of the current fragile yet potential situation of artistic research. Again, and besides the fact that the suggestion of a new materialism rises from critique, it is not meant to dictate an early end to artistic research. On the contrary, the title AFTER ARTISTIC RESEARCH suggests a fresh page turn: in the aftermath of the recognition that the phenomenon is established as a disciplinary field, it is time to step further the preparatory, technical and bureaucratic conversation, and to finally shift from the talk about doing artistic research to actually do artistic research. This small yet fundamental difference in the positioning towards artistic research is what possibly divides the heritage of inconclusive literature that has
seriously embargoed the field from its eventual realization in a joint venture. The effectiveness of artistic research is to become real in the making of art practice and research in the academic context, in a permanent dialogue (instead of either denial or submission) with the constraints that simultaneously inhabit the art world and the academic structures.
However, this effectiveness is something slowly becoming and happening since only less than a decade. For what is yet to come in what concerns this realization of potential, ultimately the practice of artistic research, this thesis argues that it should be regarded with self-‐restraint, considering that what is at stake is simply the affirmation of a territory of activity, in its proper idiosyncrasies, and by no means a land of salvation (from a view in overexcitement) nor a sterile ground condemned from the outset (from a view in skepticism).
Keywords:
Artistic research; phenomenon; tension; productivitism; dematerialization; new materialism; academy; artistic practice; Porto; Helsinki; The Hague.
Resumo
Embora não sejam directamente abordados no texto, os pontos de partida desta investigação são a Faculdade de Belas Artes da Universidade do Porto e o meu envolvimento no Instituto de Investigação em Arte, Design e Sociedade. Servindo-‐me de pano de fundo há vários anos, os seus contextos e as actividades desenvolvidas em ambas as instituições influenciaram e motivaram o impulsionar do presente trabalho.
No final de 2014 organizei Conversations on Artistic Research na Faculdade de Belas Artes do Porto, um seminário internacional focado na discussão de temas de investigação em arte. Para
Conversations foram convidados oradores cujas apresentações e pontos de vista muito
contribuíram para a sequente definição e re-‐definição dos meus interesses e questões, e, portanto, da direção da minha pesquisa. O reforço das relações individuais e a afinidade encontrada entre os meus interesses de investigação e alguns entre os exibidos pelos oradores foram decisivos na fase mais adiantada deste estudo. No último ano criaram-‐se as condições para que pudesse, temporariamente, deixar a Faculdade de Belas Artes da Universidade do Porto e investigar in-‐loco duas das escolas europeias mais significativas no que à investigação em arte diz respeito. São locais onde investigação em arte é uma prática, e das quais o pioneirismo, especialmente no caso finlandês, merece ser mencionado.
No primeiro semestre de 2015 fui visiting researcher na Finnish Academy of Fine Arts da University of the Arts de Helsínquia, e, posteriormente, na Royal Academy of Arts, de Haia, que se associa à Universidade de Leiden para manter o programa PhDArts. As duas instituições são reconhecidas na cena internacional de investigação em arte, e os seus membros
desempenham papéis influentes na área. Tendo tudo isto em conta planeei a minha ida de modo a familiarizar-‐me com a organização, discursividade e práticas de investigação em artes no ensino superior na especificidade destes ambientes instauradores. O meu estímulo baseou-‐ se na convicção de que, se eu queria saber mais sobre investigação em arte, eu deveria, então, envolver-‐me nos locais onde supostamente acontece investigação em arte, e entrar em contacto com as pessoas que presumivelmente trabalham investigação em arte. Eu tinha que estar em contacto directo com a investigação em arte que está acontecer agora, a fim de investigar de forma mais significativa o meu objecto de estudo, sem depender exclusivamente de terceiros e de discursos mediados. Desta forma, a impressão pessoal sobre investigação em arte que eu construí e explanei nesta tese não se limita à interpretação do fluxo de literatura que teóricos vêm produzindo desde há vários anos até aos dias actuais, mas é formada, mais precisamente, com base no que esses artistas, estudantes, professores e investigadores fazem e dizem nos contextos legitimados de investigação em arte -‐ especialmente aqueles dois que
eu visitei fora de Portugal, e este onde tenho sido investigadora.
AFTER ARTISTIC RESEARCH (DEPOIS DA INVESTIGAÇÃO EM ARTE) é uma tese estimulada pela necessidade de clarificação do estado da arte na investigação em arte. Percebida como uma área cinzenta, a investigação em arte vem sendo, no entanto, considerada como um campo disciplinar na literatura publicada, dada a verificação da sua implementação em contextos académicos e dado como consumado também o seu reconhecimento como um
posicionamento específico no mundo da arte -‐ ainda que de forma talvez pouco ortodoxa, como pretende mostrar parte deste trabalho de doutoramento. Actualmente, a investigação em arte gera cargos de ensino e departamentos, relatórios oficiais, programas de
financiamento, decisões políticas, investigação, literatura ensaística e exposições, tudo em nome de uma ideia de ‘investigação em arte’ que é tudo menos consensual. O corpo crescente de materiais que tem dado forma à investigação em arte não raramente é conflitante e apoiada em relações de tensão, dividindo académicos, artistas e decisores políticos os quais se movem com diferentes graus de entusiasmo e cepticismo. Foram, em parte, as posições contraditórias sentidas em ambiente académico que constituíram o ímpeto e alimento desta pesquisa, tendo-‐se também tornado na razão para minha preferência pelo termo ‘fenómeno’ para referir a realidade da investigação artística.
Ao longo deste texto vou argumentado que as tensões que caracterizam grande parte da identidade e actividades no domínio da investigação em arte não impedem nem limitam, necessariamente, mas antes contribuem para uma dinâmica que é fundamental à manutenção de um território produtivo (olhando numa perspectiva de resistência e ruptura), em vez de um campo produtivitista (productivitist) (assim que a cristalização ocorre, o campo produtivo passa a produtivitista). Além da tensão entre o produtivismo e produtivitismo, outras são exploradas no desdobrar dos capítulos -‐ iconoclastia e iconolatria, escrita como medium artístico, benefícios e malefícios de institucionalização, entre outros -‐, com especial ênfase no conflito entre a desmaterialização e novo materialismo, uma relação esboçada enquanto possível sumário da actual situação de fragilidade, porém imbuída de potencial, em que se encontra a investigação em arte. Mais uma vez, e além do facto de que a sugestão de um novo
materialismo advém de uma visão crítica, não é minha intenção ditar um fim precoce à
investigação em arte. Pelo contrário, o título AFTER ARTISTIC RESEARCH sugere uma viragem de página: na sequência do reconhecimento de que o fenómeno está já plenamente
estabelecido como um campo disciplinar, é altura de ultrapassar a conversa preparatória, técnica e burocrática e, finalmente, passar de falar sobre fazer investigação em arte para realmente fazer investigação em arte. Esta diferença aparentemente discreta é, todavia, fundamental no posicionamento em relação à investigação em arte, e é o que, possivelmente,
divide a herança de uma literatura em geral inconclusiva e embargadora, daquilo que é a realização por meio de uma joint venture. A efectivação da investigação em arte torna-‐se real na intersecção da prática artística e da investigação no contexto académico, em permanente diálogo (em vez de em meras negação ou submissão) com os constrangimentos que habitam simultaneamente o mundo da arte e as estruturas educativas.
No entanto, esta efectivação é algo que vem acontecendo apenas recentemente, há menos de uma década. Para o que ainda está para vir no que se refere a esta realização de potencial, ou seja, à prática de investigação em arte, esta tese argumenta que esse potencial deve ser considerado em moderação, atentando que o que está em questão é tão simplesmente a afirmação de um território de acção, em suas idiossincrasias próprias, e não a miragem de uma terra de salvação (a partir de uma visão apaixonada) nem de um terreno estéril condenado logo à partida (a partir de uma visão céptica).
Palavras-‐chave:
Investigação em arte; fenómeno; tensão; productivitism; desmaterialização; novo
materialismo; academia; prática artística; Porto; Helsínquia; Haia.
INDEX
:: zero :: PROLOGUE > p. 01
View of the sea of Scheveningen, 1882 or The great escape, 2002 > p. 01
1. INTRODUCTION > p.13
2. FRAMEWORK > p.35
Image-‐breaking and iconolatry. Iconoclast aestheticization > p. 35
From autonomy to new materialism or how we moved from experienciality to
experimentalism > p. 51
Stuck? In the mobility era? > p. 65 Fetish for collaboration > p. 68
Micro-‐politics in art as complex narratives > p. 76 Axioms and productivitism > p. 82
3. ESTABLISHING the phenomenon of artistic research as a field > p. 97
Research in higher arts education in Finland > p. 116
Doctoral outcomes. Overview of the Finnish retrieved examples > p. 117 Sibelius Academy of University of the Arts, Helsinki > p. 118
University of Lapland > p. 124
Aalto University School of Art and Design, Helsinki > p. 125
TeaK -‐ Theatre Academy of University of the Arts, Helsinki > p. 129
FAFA/KuvA -‐ Finnish Academy of Fine Arts of University of the Arts, Helsinki > p. 132
TAhTO -‐ Doctoral Programme in Artistic Research, Helsinki > p. 134 Other Finnish doctoral frameworks > p. 136
Research in higher arts education in the Netherlands/The Hague > p. 136 Commentary on the analysis (after Finnish and Dutch experiences) > p. 148
4. WRITING MEDIUM. Writing (and who is) the contemporary artist > p. 157
Small antechamber: university in the knowledge economy > p. 157 Writing as translation > p. 162
Writing as creating complex narratives > p. 176 Reflexive dimension and contemporary art > p. 180
5. THE IMPACT OF ARTISTIC RESEARCH IN CONTEMPORARY ART > p. 187
Knowledge in contemporary art > p. 196 Manifesta > p. 199
Manifesta 6: a fruitful cancellation. Anton Vidokle and unitednationsplaza, Nightschool and
The Building > p. 203
parenthesis: Institutionalization > p. 213
Back to the narrative of the fruitful cancellation and ready for the final notes: Anton Vidokle and the practice of artistic research > p. 224
parenthesis: Time > p. 234
The Research Pavilion at the 56th Venice Biennale – from 7th May to 28th June 2015 > p. 242
Commentary on the excursion of the impact: we’ve been excavating parallel programmes, but what about the main exhibitions? > p. 246
How research us being made present in the subjectivity of the artist > p. 254
6. PAIN FOCI > p. 263
Plurality! Plural identity means plurality of outcomes, plurality of approaches in public presentations and plurality of appreciations > p. 265
The absence of a community of artist researchers > p. 273 Uniqueness and art world affinity > p. 283
Define a structure and undermine the discipline > p. 284 Create a problem and then offer a solution > p. 287
Lively publishing culture about not making clear what artistic research is > p. 289
7. FINAL REMARKS. “AFTER ARTISTIC RESEARCH” > p. 291
8. BIBLIOGRAPHY > p. 301
:: zero ::
PRØLØGUE ~
VIEW OF THE SEA OF SCHEVENINGEN, 1882 OR
THE GREAT ESCAPE, 2002
In these vibrant times we live in, information through different media outlets is almost too readily available to the point of sensationalism and inundation. The ubiquity of reality T.V is one such example. Reality T.V blurs the lines between reality and fiction and becomes performative. I am interested in these
performances. – Ato Malinda research synopsis at PhDArts 20151
While at The Hague I went often to Scheveningen, a coast area of the city with a very extensive seaboard. Touristic postcards witness a crammed beach with bodies and bodies exposed to the yearly scarce sunrays of Dutch summer, highly contrasting with the greyish scenarios I found in most of my rides to the coast. The pale light generated what looked like a green ground in the photos I took. The sunlight landscape fixed in postcards was something I could not see myself during my stay, but only perceive it in its absence. I had the frame in front of my eyes, and the picture was in my head.
As I cycled in the sidewalk and captured the beach resort commerce style of summer businesses, from heated restaurants and bars, to kiosks and clothes stores, I very much recalled the late nineties Algarve. I then pictured Algarve in Scheveningen, through the signs left in for the colder days: stores closed, ice cream announcements but no one selling them, deserted beach, waving hairs pushed by wind blows, limited areas for upcoming esplanades, people bundled up, nostalgia.
In my digression, I sighted the strange creature that is the Pier. Simultaneously a figure of the past and a symbol of the future, in the Pier converge the void of an abandoned architectural structure and the sci-‐fi fantasies of the passer-‐by. It is sort of a hole in time, or a time lapse, where chronology blurs.
From the Pier you can have a view from the sea at Scheveningen.
From the coastline you have a view of the sea at Scheveningen. And since 1959 also a view of the Pier -‐ actually of the second edition of the Pier, since the original, built in 1901, was destroyed in the Second World War.
Figs. 1 and 2. The Pier, 2015. Used with permission.
Having died in 1890, van Gogh did not have a chance to see the Pier, otherwise one can only wonder what variations his early paintings could have gone through. In any case, by 1901 he was not living in The Hague anymore. As a young man, Vincent lived near Scheveningen only by the years 1982 and 1983. He went to this location after having worked in his brother’s art agency.
Vincent didn’t come to witness the sci-‐fi structure of the Pier, neither the touristic landscape that today surrounds the city’s ex-‐libris Kurhaus Hotel, another attraction being spotted in the sunny Scheveningen postcards. Built in between 1884 and 1885, it was a period whereupon van Gogh was no longer in The Hague, but installed in Nuenen, right before leaving to Belgium and Paris. That’s perhaps a reason for Kurhaus not being drawn in any of his works from around that time. Only a couple of years before the construction of Kurhaus, van Gogh portrayed Scheveningen landscape quite frequently. It was 1882 and he depicted a stormy scene to which he called “View of the Sea at Scheveningen”, where he is not envisaging the land, but turned his eyes to the gloomy seascape seen from that part of The Hague. In contrast to sunny Scheveningen postcards, van Gogh found at the sea a hazy atmosphere which he depicted with green shades in the sand and sea. Experts say the painting was executed at the spot, in the easel painting open air tradition largely pushed forth by the Dutch artist, with energizing brushstrokes, as prove the sand grains mixed in the surface of the oil layers. These were the early days of Vincent van Gogh as a painter. In 1882 he was living shortly in The Hague and has painted and drawn several pictures of the shoreline, alternating between sea captures and human everyday activities ashore. Even so being an early career oil, “View of
the Sea at Scheveningen” became a very famous work. In 2002 it was valued in US$3 million, yet an event at the end of the year has boosted its value three times the former price. It thus became famous and high priced. On the early hours of the 7th of December of 2002, the van
Gogh Museum in Amsterdam has awakened with a decreased estate. It was Saturday and two hours prior to the opening of the museum.
After smashing the glass with a covered elbow, two men entered the Rietveld designed building through a window on an upper level and quickly left carrying two artworks authored by van Gogh. A 4,5 meters high ladder was needed for the climbing and left at the crime scene. The escape was accomplished by sliding a rope, also abandoned for the policemen to retrieve. The robbers’ procedures sound quite simple, ironically almost admirable. Apart from the not enough fast reaction of police officers, nothing can be seen as having failed in security plans. The director of van Gogh Museum, John Leighton, recognized that every museum is exposed to similar situations and, seemingly, they could not prevent it in any way. The idea is that in the future it seems plausible to carry out a similar plan with high probability of success. The works taken were “View of the Sea at Scheveningen” (painted Aug. 1882) and “Congregation Leaving the Reformed Church at Nuenen” (painted Feb. 1884).
Figs. 3, 4 and 5. Van Gogh Museum, 2015. Used with permission.
The episode relates to the idea of lost artworks and the presence through absence. This is a presence which is ironically owing to its simultaneous absence. Art robbery, in this sense, can be approached in the context of an image-‐breaking or iconoclast attitude. Robbery, as well as the image-‐breaking are most often due to motives completely detached from the theme depicted in the artworks. Aesthetic accession is inexistent, and thus the quality and the content of the image are totally neglected. Market value is the guiding force, along with other pragmatic conditions such as size and weight. “View of the Sea at Scheveningen” is not big sized. Its dimensions are only 34.5 cm x 51.0 cm. The portability of the two paintings might have been decisive for their abductors, much more than the scenes portrayed or any biographical remark of the objects. But this is my mere speculation.
During the 2000s in The Netherlands a rumor was spread about the activity of an organized gang stealing art. The modus operandi of the heist of these two van Gogh’s in 2002 followed the same procedures of other robberies sweeping the country in the same year: all the three cases registered (Haarlem, The Hague and Amsterdam) used the smash and grab technique, deluding security systems and escaping from the crime scene before police’s arrival. Add to this the previous years’ occurrences (2001, Amsterdam, 1999, Bilthoven and Bussum), and the public sphere soon was inquiring whether there was a common motivation supporting such dark period for Dutch art estate. Nevertheless, most of the robbery art cases end with the successful recovery of the objects in a safe condition and the arrest of criminals, but to this day are still missing both “View of the Sea at Scheveningen” and “Congregation Leaving the
Reformed Church at Nuenen”.
There is something worth a note about Dutch law that might have an influence in these art heists. There is something deeply ironic that insufflates with more infatuation the performance carried out by the two men that invaded van Gogh Museum on that 2002 morning. Apparently in The Netherlands art stealers can lay claim to legal ownership of a work of art they have stolen and kept for 20 to 30 years (the first for private art, the latter for public art). This unforeseen law turns The Netherlands into art thieves’ paradise. However, beware it is not all roses. In order to reap the rewards, a criminal has to be able to prove the authorship of the robbery.
Security cameras were turned on at the van Gogh Museum on the 7th of December of 2002.
They have captured two male individuals forcing entry into the building and taking state property with them. The fake mustaches they wore were not enough to mask their real identities. A year later, Henk Bieslijn was caught in Amsterdam and convicted 4 years. Octave Durham – known as The Monkey by authorities for previous involvement in art crimes – got 4 years and a half and was arrested in Puerto Banús, a luxury suburb of Marbella, on an
international warrant. Puerto Banús is a marina built in the 70s that backgrounds wealthy tastes and is popular among international celebrities. Rolls Royce, Ferrari, Lamborghini and other supercars, as well as impressive yachts are common in the neighborhood and brought to the sight of possible buyers by dealerships. Five million people visit the place annually, coming from northern Europe and the middle–East countries such as Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.
Salvador Dali’s 3,6 tons “Rhinoceros dressed in lace" adds the convenient artistic scent. Puerto Banús is what looks like an interesting place to sell art to private collectors. Even if stolen art is the case. What Octave Durham was doing in Puerto Banús is beyond public knowledge. One can only guess: was he enjoying a small fortune earned at the costs of van Gogh’s paintings? Was he trying to sell them yet? Was he just hiding the police and passing time among rich
people?
The crime scene in Amsterdam was left full of evidence. Incriminatory remarks were so numerous that it is not out of the question that these thieves actually wanted to be identified. The paraphernalia included the rope, the cloths used to involve their arms in the glass
breaking, the hats they wore that kept many hairs, the surveillance images. Even though the two men always denied, to this day, any involvement in the robbery, both were charged and condemned. However, in face of so obvious evidence the fanciful press proposed a script suggesting they actually intended to be charged. According to the gap in the Dutch law, this was the necessary detail worth assurance in advance for them to prove, in the coming year 2032, the legal ownership of the two van Gogh’s paintings. A few millions of American dollars in exchange of 4 and 4 and half years in prison do not sound too absurd but ironically a good business.
For the effect, it was likely they were staging a deskilling mise en scène. This is, all in all, still an open question. It could be the case that “The Monkey” and his accomplice were performing amateurism, in such a convincing way that we would no longer believe what our eyes see but only trust what our analytical and rational competence tells us to. The final image is
incomplete. The image is broken. The paintings are gone but what is left speaks aloud. Nevertheless, deskilling strategies in the art world have this double ironic effect which are findable in a more general level in most aspects of the conflict of art meeting academy as research (or, in other words, of artistic research): what at first sight sounds like a critical review of the status quo, risks to become a reinforcing act. In a critical reaction to the current
economy of knowledge, the art world has recently been conducting several events dedicated to the exploration of the idea of deskilling (Claire Bishop2), but a critique of this criticism is also
needed since the ideas behind deskilling seem biased from the beginning, since deskilling is only possible after the learning of a skill. At first sight this sounds a contradiction as a strategy to counteract the economy of knowledge, even with the risk of becoming a nourishing gesture. In a metaphorical way and caricature mode, Durham and Bieslijn proved to be professional amateurs, which they needed to be in order to break the system(s) – both of security and law. Luxury art, yachts, and businessmen are known to be a profitable triangle. In 2010, Roman Abramovich acquired his third private yacht and gave it the name Eclipse. It is a 170 meters giant worth US$420 million. Protected against missiles and paparazzi, two of the most disquieting threats in high seas and in marinas (such as Puerto Banús?), Abramovich still had
2 The conference took place in Amsterdam, at the Rietveld Academy, curated by Claire Bishop and the theme was deskilling and its
new aesthetic possibilities. More info: http://clairebishopresearch.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/are-‐you-‐still-‐alive-‐rietveld-‐ academie.html. Last access on: 30.06.2015.
one problem left awaiting resolution: the interior decoration of the yacht. A Bloomberg article (Reyburn, 2010)3 accounts for the issue and launches a range of names of artists, art dealers,
and collectors as possibly having decision over the contemporary art purchases of Abramovich – remember he was the recent buyer for both Francis Bacon and Lucien Freud works, and a tycoon of this caliber entering the art market is always good news for the business. For the present purpose, the gossip names on charge of decorating Abramovich’s new acquisition are not important. The highlight here is that there is a super-‐protected yacht, money and a taste for purchasing art.
Following these events, Water McBeer Gallery and Andrew McClintock state to have curated an exhibition hosted in Roman Abramovich’s yacht Eclipse, in 2013. A very particular one astonishingly announced as “a very exclusive 48 hour viewing of Vincent van Gogh's ‘View of the Sea at Scheveningen’ 1882” (McClintock, 2013)4. The singular exhibition was not only an opportunity to see the painting but also to purchase it, knowing in advance that “fifty percent of the proceeds will be donated to the Iranian Ministry of Defense and Armed Forces Logistics (MODAFL) at the request of the owner”. According to the gallery public statement, the event resulted from a delicate and generous negotiation that actively involved the philanthropist Sheikh Khalifa, President of the United Arab Emirates and emir of Abu Dhabi, and the anonymous owner of van Gogh’s artwork. The unforeseen fabulous exhibition is reported to have happened in May and to have taken place in faraway international waters in the proximity of Dubai. Andrew McClintock and the Water McBeer gallery are programming a series of “black market” auctions in the likes of this. So why didn’t Octave Durham and Henk Bieslijn keep the paintings? Wasn’t the apparatus left on the museum on purpose? Didn’t they want to be found? Weren’t they deskilled thieves, or are they really just sloppy amateur thieves?
Some photos of the exhibition are to be found in the Water McBeer gallery’s webpage.
3 Retrieved from: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=adeWnMSygj00. Last access on 30.06.2015. 4 Retrieved from: http://watermcbeer.org/andrewmcclintockvangoghveiwoftheseaatScheveningen.html. Last access on
Figs. 6 to 11. View at the Sea of Scheveningen, 2015. Used with permission. Images of Water McBeer and Andrew McClintock
exhibition hold in international waters. Their website5 shows images of the opening, depicting, among others, Damien Hirst, Koons
family, the recently deceased Chris Burden and USA President Barack Obama.
A different report spots “View of the sea at Scheveningen” at a different location. Previously to Water McBeer’s exhibition, the painting is said to be seen in Monaco. More precisely, it was reported aboard a yacht in the marina of Monte Carlo. These are the words of James Twining narrating Tom’s occasional sighting of the artwork:
Up close, the yacht was even larger than it had appeared from the shore – perhaps 400 feet long, with sheer white sides that rose above him like an ice shelf… Tom counted five decks in all… Treading stealthily, Tom made his way up a succession of steep teak-‐lined staircases to the main deck… The second open doorway revealed the main sitting room. Hanging over the mantelpiece was a painting that Tom recognised as the View of the Sea at Scheveningen, stolen from the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam. This room, too, had been set up, although in readiness for what looked like cocktails rather than
breakfast: champagne cooling in an ice bucket, an empty bottle of ‘78 Chûteau Margaux standing next to a full decanter, glasses laid out on a crisp linen cloth (Twining, n.d.)6.
Tom is Tom Kirk, a retired art thief, appointed to help FBI in the investigation of a Caravaggio painting stolen 40 years before. What he couldn’t know is that he was about to find van Gogh’s painting while investigating in favor of Caravaggio. James Twining is reporting a much bigger conspiracy case involving grave robbing, antiquities smuggling, secret warehouses and famous museums. The case eventually received the name “The Geneva Deception” and is published by HarperCollins Editors. Twining’s website shows a photo of the luxurious yacht moored in the harbor at Monte Carlo:
5 Retrieved from: http://watermcbeer.org/andrewmcclintockvangoghveiwoftheseaatScheveningen.html. Last access on
30.06.2015.
Fig. 12. Perolus, 2010.
After looking at dozens of pictures of luxurious yachts made available by the extensive catalogue of Google, the identity of the mysterious vehicle was finally revealed in my investigation. Its similarities led me to Perolus. Perolus is part of the fleet of Roman Abramovich. For two times the stolen painting of Vincent van Gogh is to be found in Abramovich’s facilities. Maybe it is just a coincidence.
This is how the story ends. Open-‐ended.
While 2032 doesn’t get to December, we can only guess about what took Octave Durham and Henk Bieslijn to enter the Rietveld designed building of van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam and remove two art pieces from the main exhibition hall. They might be 43 years-‐old now, as both aged 31 at their arrest. Thirteen years have passed by and although the sentence is served they still claim innocence. To my knowledge Roman Abramovich was never interrogated by the police neither the FBI. His name was never related to our anti-‐heroes story except in this narrative.
There is no concrete evidence of van Gogh’s “View of the Sea at Scheveningen” to be in the possession of Abramovich. Some images of Water McBeer’s exhibition suggest that the painting and its damaged frame – as it already was back in the time when it was purchased by the father of the lady who afterwards bequested it to Dutch state – have been, at least temporarily, on his properties. However and in the first place, it does not imply him directly, and secondly, these images are broken and incomplete because while they’ve created
information on the one hand, they lack information on the other. They are here the reification of the productivity of iconoclasm: something is born out of absence.
I put the ‘anti-‐heroes’ epithet to Durham and Beislijn in regards of the appreciation of the art world. Like any anti-‐hero, they would be said to be the good and the bad, loved by some and hated by others in the art world. The two are regarded simultaneously as being iconoclast and the iconolater. For the former they have made the images disappear. But an artistic point of view would regard them as iconolater heroes: after all they risked themselves to remove artworks from the deadly museum. Wherever these works are today, they are safe from
