Tim Blair

"Important works by Ofili, who won the Turner Prize in 1998, have gone. Among them is the first work in his Captain Shit sequence, a parody of 1970s blaxploitation cartoons."

oh no, not capt shit!

my weekend is ruined...

Bonfire of the inanities.

Tell me, please, that the collected works of Ted Rall were also lost, along with priceless Chomsky manuscripts, and Moore memorabilia.

Any "works" consisting of 3 basketballs sealed in an aquarium, with a price tag of $60,000.00?

Damn - missed one...

I have to say that, though I am not particularly aggrieved by the loss of the Emins or the Offilis or Chapman brothers, there were also many great painter's works lost in the fire, such as Heron, Caulfield and Gary Hume. I can't really see anything to gloat about in that, though the execrable Emin does make it easy to mock her and her crowd's blinkered nihilistic stupidness:

"Emin said: "This news comes between Iraqi weddings being bombed and people dying in the Dominican Republic in flash floods - so we have to get it into perspective. But I am really gutted. I just thank God no one was hurt. I can't replace my works."

Is "Eminem" the accusative case of "Emin"? Eminis, Emine, Emini. Plural Emines, Emin[i]um, Eminibus... Romanes eunt domus... Except Eminem actually has talent, even if he's twisted.

"Tracey Emin artworks worth up to $14 have ...

Was there meant to be an "m" before "have"? Oh, wait ...

"Emin not only lost her applique tent, All the People I Have Ever Slept With, but also her beach hut, The Last Thing I Said Is Don't Leave Me. Both were part of Saatchi's collection."

I'm an uncultured American, I admit. Perhaps that is why I don't bemoan the fact that I'll never get to see the above two works of art. (A tent and a hut?) Hopefully, insurance payments will allow her to go on and create more fabulous 'works of art'. I just hope I never get to view them.

I feel sorry for anyone who has their work destroyed, so I do feel bad for the artist. I have a hard time imagining what those lost pieces must have looked like. This is a good thing. I would have hated to spend money for a museum and been subjected to these two 'works of art'.

A "beach hut" and an "applique tent"? Does this woman work in the medium of substandard housing?

Perhaps I can commission a vinyl outhouse and a Naugahyde Yurt entitled Yes I Drank Too Much, But the Room Is Spinning the Wrong Direction.

Or "Where the Hell Did That Yak Come From?"

Bit of a pisser for you right wing chaps, most of the stuff was owned by Charlie Saatchi.... Mrs Thatcher's ad man.
But dont worry, the world is still full of pictures of sad eyed clowns and infeasibly huge breasted women with swords. Plus, art lovers rejoice...plenty of Jack Vettriano to go around.

According to the article the fire *still* isn't entirely out, and they don't know yet what caused it. And I have to wonder why all this supposedly valuable stuff was stored in an oversized shed with gas canisters nearby.

And take it easy, Rogier, I don't begrudge Mr. Saatchi his taste in art, though I don't share it. If I had his kind of money I'd be looking for Vermeers and Mary Cassatts - or even a couple of your own works, if any are on the market.

(And who is Jack Vettriano?)

I once turned my etch-a-sketch upside down and shook it when I was a little kid. Where were the art critics, since I didn't insure it?
When I was a little kid I also took all my Play-doh creations and put them into the can. Can I get any sort of compensation?

Ah, not English I see. Jack Vettriano is the darling of the tea towel set. His 'Singing Butler' is everywhere over here. Stunningly original, if you dont count the Winslow Homer original.
Yeah, makes me wonder. all that art kept in a lockup near the railway arches. Art? Tracey's tent is quite nice really, the Chapmans' thing was OK.

We had Tim Blair in my day 'Gothic? Dont make me laugh, all those nodding ogees, nancy-boy voussoirs... fricking rayonnant Frenchy bastards...'
Probably sips his Montrachet with Paddy & Piers in some tosspot Paddington wine bar.

...Bit of a pisser for you right wing chaps, most of the stuff was owned by Charlie Saatchi....

Saatchi's no right-winger, mate. He's the patron saint of chardonnay socialism. And I'll bet he hoisted a glass of chardonnay, on realising he'll never have to view any of this 'art' again.

Well, I guess Emin will just have to go and sleep with a bunch more people, and make a new tent. Better get cracking, dearie!

Annalucia, the much-despised Mr. Vettriano is one of those dreadful people who produce (sniff) representational (sniff) "art", rather than Real Art like, "Dog Feces in Lucite", or "A Small Lump of Putty I Found in My Armpit One Midsummer Morning".

Rogier:

All I want to know is that this masterpiece is safe. Now that's art my friend.

And so's this.

Angie: LoL.

Perhaps the fire was performance art- a nihilist/post-modern display that everything is worth nothing and nothing is worth everything.

With that fine a line in bullshit a grant must surely follow, or at least a critic's gig at Fairfax?

infeasibly huge breasted women with swords

Someone wasn't paying attention while dodging Sandman shagwagons in the beach parking lot... It's the muscled barbarian wearing silver-filigree lion's-head posing-pouch and polar-bear-fur uggh boots who wields the sword. The big-breasted woman's role is to hang off him admiringly while he slice'n'dices a sea-serpent.

CurrencyLad (may I call you Cur?), the snooker-playing dogs opus is safe, preserved in a million pool-rooms of a million Kerrigan chateaux across this wide brown land.

Who needs 'art' when you've got Nigella.

No, Habib, the fire was an Act of God.

I thought Uday Hussain had cornered the art market on infeasibly huge breasted women with swords.
Now, there was a real loss when his collection was destroyed in the liberation of Iraq. Rather puts the Saatchi stuff in the shade.

I'm personally offended by the suggestion that breasts can ever be considered infeasibly huge.

If we don't set our sights high how will we ever reach the important goals - after all there is a Cougar T-shirt out there that needs filling.

Who cares? Just rejoice! I'm breaking out the champers to celebrate the loss to the world of this crap!

Uncle Milk:

...the snooker-playing dogs opus is safe, preserved in a million pool-rooms of a million Kerrigan chateaux across this wide brown land.

I'm talkin' 'bout the ORIGINAL. All I know is that it's behind bullet-proof glass somewhere. It's smaller than people expect they say.

CurrencyLad (may I call you Cur?)...

I'd prefer you didn't unless you're trying to be offensive. (?)

>> CurrencyLad (may I call you Cur?)...

> I'd prefer you didn't unless you're trying to be offensive. (?)

Far from it. I like your material.

While we're on big breasts, how d'ya make five pounds of fat interesting? Put a nipple on it.

Sorry Uncle Milk.

Thought of him when he was mentioned here, naturally thought of this and...

It must be all this talk of that weird global warming/global cooling/global some bloody thing bad... anyway, I'm spaced out with a cold. Sniff.

Scarcely recognised your familiar tag when I responded...

"Don't post when drunk, stoned"... or grouchy.

Sincere apologies.

I meant I was thinking of HIM.

Me not with it today.

I've tried to learn to admire "installation art". I've walked around the bi-sected sheep, cows and sharks; looked around in the tent; examined the male mannequins with little penises for noses; stubbed my toes on bricks lying around the floor of The Tate; chugged up and down the monumental pieces in the Turbine Hall; etc., etc., etc.

It's too-clever-by-half-bull-shit. Worse, like the abstract paintings in Vonnegut's famous story, it's disappearing - "installation art" is notoriously difficult to "conserve".

Arson.

Belatedly, but, Byron from Oz.... Saatchi could never be counted a socialist patron saint. Thatcherite to the core, you might remember the Falklands War... a Saatchi & Saatchi production.
Uncle Milk, you may be a tad behind the times. Big breasted sheilas get their own swords now, in figurines they sell to sad people who dont get out much.... plus a million duff games called SwordDoom 2, or suchlike.

Ahh good old ever reliable right wing worship of dumb.

Art destroyed.... art.... elite... intellectual..... socialist.......GREAT!

And convincing yourself that Charles Saatchi is a champagne socialist just because he owns millions of pounds of it is a particular masterstroke.

goldsmith

Ahh, yes, the invaluable work of Patrick Heron

Like this:

http://www.waddington-galleries.com/ARTIST/HERO/SHERO.HTM

My 4 year old niece scribbles more artistically. What utter tripe this "art" was. Banal, shallow, pretentious---yeah, THAT's an invaluable cultural treasure...

So now you're an art critic? Easy targets and cheap shots are no way to get my approval.

Ahh good old ever reliable right wing worship of dumb.

Nope, just good old elitist worship of that golden combination of talent and hard work. I can see the hard work in Tracy Emin's stuff, but not much more. (If I spent two years making the world's longest crochet chain, would that make it a priceless work of art? No, because anyone else could do it, given the time!) For the other works, they don't seem to have much of either element.

I would say that you're the real example of dumb. Because some of us don't fall in with this year's artists of the century (to twist a phrase from Tom Wolfe) we must all be lugs who think that velvet Elvis portraits are high art. Bad, bad logic there, my friend.

And who associates good art with socialism? Ever been to Eastern Europe? The good stuff *stops* with socialism - once the govt. starts pushing "correct" thinking patterns and trying to deny the existence of certain basic human characteristics (not to mention penalizing you severely for stepping out of the box) the art suffers dreadfully. You think velvet Elvis portraits are bad? Check out some of those old paintings of Soviet leaders.

But hey, what do I know? It's not like I've actually lived there or anything.

Easy targets and cheap shots are no way to get my approval.

Breaking story! Blogtroll BlogMiranda BlogDivide still witholds her approval from Tim Blair. Thousands across the world still do not give a rat's ass. One anonymous source confided, "You know, Miranda's approval isn't something anyone really wants to have."

LMAO!