Posts Tagged World Cup
News Art – PAUL THE OCTOPUS GOT IT WRONG
Posted by Heidi in NewsART Highlights, Religion, Sport on July 11, 2010
This might surprise/upset some of you but I am not a psychic octopus. Hence I do not know who will win the World Cup and had to work around this as I began constructing my artworks BEFORE the final results…
News Art – PAUL EXPOSED AS FALSE PROPHET!
Paul the Octopus was wrong. Spain has lost. All talk of his psychic, almost god-like abilities has been proven meaningless.
But it is far worse than that, it has embarrassed a world who embraced the possibility that this Octopus had other worldly powers. It has shown how incredibly desperate we remain to have some kind of order to this chaos that is life. Despite all our advances in science and evolution and iPhone apps over the years, the moment we see some evidence of possible magical or religious powers we jump at it. And so we put our faith in a sea creature that was too stupid to not be charging huge amounts of cash for his ‘psychic’ predictions.
Is this the behaviour of rational adults? To worship these false idols?!
Victory for Netherlands in World Cup
To MOCK this behaviour I made this golden statue of a random animal. I then put it up on a street in London and asked people if they wanted to worship this elephant and trust its opinion on great sporting events. They all said no. Some even laughed.
However I then surprised them and challenged their perception of the world by asking how this elephant was in any way different to an octopus. I was told that instead of four legs octopuses have eight arms (or tentacles) and can swim very fast. This was most interesting! I researched more about octopuses and found out that they have no internal shell or bones and have a hard beak!?! I began devouring books on octopuses and found, to my surprise, that this is a very poor way to learn anything so I soon switched back to reading.
After several hours of this ‘reading’ I concluded that octopuses/octopussi are awesome, elephants are average and man is a foolish creature who will not only seek evidence of the divine at every opportunity merely to comfort him from his fear of death and the unknown, but also only has two arms and can’t even squirt black ink as a defence mechanism. LAME!
ARTWORK OPTION B- PAUL IS OUR NEW GOD!!!
Paul was right! Spain has won! All hail Paul!!
Victory for Spain in World Cup
I have made this sculpture of the child I would be willing to have with Paul to honour his extraordinary powers. It’s half human (me) half octopus (Paul). I apologise for the slight lack of focus, I was so excited at the prospect of becoming Paul’s first earthly concubine and giving birth to a demi-god with tentacle legs that my hands would not stop shaking. Wouldn’t be a problem with tentacles!!
News Art Prediction – ENGLAND’S CONTROVERSIAL WORLD CUP LOSS
I might not have mentioned this enough times but I have left for the Glastonbury festival. So as to not deprive the world of my art while I am away being inspired by and, more likely, being inspiring to musicians, I have prepared news predictions and accompanying art for each day I am away. This is the first.
Last night England’s vital match with Slovenia ended in shock when, in the last 5minutes of the game, as the score lay at 14-14, a small child suddenly ran onto the pitch. Seeing that he was in danger of being run over by a local rhinocerous who had charged onto the pitch after being frightened by the vuvuzelas, team manager Fabio Capello ran onto the pitch to pick up the child, despite all players being determined to play on. The rhinocerous was then tackled by a roaming pack of English football hooligans.
Capello’s action forced a penalty shot to Slovenia and they won 15-14. The decision earned Capello widespread condemnation from the British public and media.
England's shock loss to Slovenia
I was very moved and quite surprised by this news/prediction of mine. I have sculpted this replica rhinocerous to remind us all of the message that sometimes there are more important/immediately-dangerous things in life than who wins and who loses. Most of them are to do with escaped wild animals.
This is something England seems to have forgotten… in my scenario.
News Art: VUVUZELA – THEY ARE TRYING TO BAN MY ART!!
When I heard about the World Cup I was so excited! Finally I would be able to barrack for football teams as I could now simply transfer my various prejudices and stereotypes of nations onto their representative teams! I knew I had to create an artwork in tribute to this glorious game.
Vuvuzela first prototype
I decided to make a musical instrument that represented the glory that is football.
First, I gave it the same amount of musical notes as the usual fascinating game has goals (anywhere in the range of zero to one). I then made its length correspond with how long a game feels (very, very, very long). Finally I gave it the ability to lure women with Louis Vuitton handbags in the shapes of shoes from nightclubs all over Essex.
After making the prototype I wondered to myself, “what is the only thing more fascinating then a person talking in a long, dull monotone about Fabio’s late announcement of team lineups?” The answer? “Everyone at work and the pub and on TV and on radio and on the bus talking in a long dull monotone about Fabio’s late announcement of team lineups!!”
Hence I realised I had to make not just one of these instruments but thousands and thousands and thousands. As their long drone sounded across the world I realised I had successfully conveyed through art the magic of football.
However, as often occurs with all brilliant, ground breaking art, there are now people who want to silence its message. And its honk. In one way I am happy because you are not a true artist unless you are causing controversy and upset but on the other hand I’m worried I’ll have to give my £200 funding grant back to Hackney Council.
So please, if you value expression and beauty and permanent ear damage, send a letter to your local Minister for the Arts asking him (or her) to demand that they (or them) keep these art installations in place in South Africa.
News Art – WORLD CUP ANGER
Posted by Heidi in Sport, Uncategorized on June 14, 2010
The press today has been filled with recriminations as it reviews World Cup action so far. In England keeper Robert Green has been ridiculed for the goal he allowed against America and in Australia the press have attacked the Socceroos’ 4-0 demolition from Germany.
World Cup match update
The British and Australian public are disappointed. I thought about whether they will forgive their teams. Thinking the word ‘forgive’ made me think about ‘forgiveness’, much more so then the other words in the sentence did, and I decided to explore this issue.
I realised that to receive forgiveness, as these footballers seek to do, you must first learn to forgive others. I decided to constuct an artwork of the place most associated with forgiveness to look into this.
I set up a flower shop in Liverpool St Station. I would deduce with each customer if they were purchasing the flowers with the aim of receiving forgiveness from someone (I could tell by their gait) and with these customers I would not give them the flowers until they had first forgiven me for something.
They didn’t realise it but I was cleansing their soul to make their forgiveness more attainable.
Many were confused and walked away when I held back the flowers and asked them to forgive me for a lie I had told or a homeless person I had ignored or a fake personality I had assumed for benefit fraud. But sometimes they understood entirely and interacted with the art, such as in the following exchange:
Customer: Hi can I have the geraniums please?
Me: Forgive me, I don’t know which are the geraniums.
Customer: They’re those ones near your foot.
Me: Are you saying you forgive me for not knowing?
Customer: Uhhh… sure.
Me: Then take the Geraniums my friend, they are yours.
Customer: No these are daisies.
In conclusion, I learnt that if Robert Green were to answer my email asking him to forgive me for not bothering to walk my diet coke can up to the recycling bin then he would probably find the press a little lighter on the jokes about his ball dropping issue (which made me think about the issue of when boys reach puberty).
News Art – WORLD CUP STARTS TODAY!
Posted by Heidi in Sport, The Lion King on June 11, 2010
This is a wonderful moment in not just South Africa’s history but also Africa’s. It is time for them to make the world forget the stereotypes and generalisations of this beautiful and diverse continent.
When this tournament is over we will all know so much more about this land and its people and no longer pigeonhole it with the two dimensional imagery of safaris, deserts and lions that we have always lazily called upon.
I felt I was well positioned to help portray the modern Africa, due to my ability to immediately see to the heart of an issue and discard all media-informed assumptions. I wanted to pay tribute to this great and courageous risk they are taking in order to present the new Africa to the world because ‘sometimes you have to be like a giraffe and stick your neck out to get what you want’. These wise words came to me as I once again remembered the wisdom of Mufasa , the Lion King, a great leader and a great man. So I have sculpted Mufasa here as inspiration for the great continent as they strive to make us see the real Africa.
Mufasa's Advice On Staging A World Cup
I then thought about how South Africa must battle the many doubters who have questioned their preparedness. I wanted to tell South Africa to keep their confidence, because ‘If you doubt yourself, others will doubt you too’. This advice was originally said, I believe, by Mufasa the Lion King, who I have sculpted below to remind South Africa to stand strong.
Mufasa's advice on ignoring FIFA's doubts
But in the end, I know South Africa will be fine, even without my art. They are going to give us not only a wonderful and enjoyable World Cup but a completely unique one.The world is about to be blown away by the many sides to this great continent we never imagined existed and it will never again be merely a place of legend and half remembered childhood stories to us.
This is going to be a World Cup unlike any other and they are going to do it their own way because, as someone once said, ‘No lion ever became great by being a copycat’. I forget who it was but I have sculpted a lion here as a reminder of these words. Obviously I realise there is more to Africa then lions but I figured just one couldn’t hurt.
Some lion