A painted bronze bust of the artist with a shotgun nose inspired by Magritte’s Oscar.
This rather curious looking character with bulging eggs for eyes and a shotgun nose is taken from a Magritte painting ‘L’ellipse’. He has become a self portrait turned 2D to 3D and cast in bronze and then painted with all the lurid and clashing colours of the original. Magritte is one of the most striking and consistent of the so-called surrealists and his imagery permeated the Artist’s work His child-like painting syle produces image after image of the familiar meeting the unfamiliar. Like dreams that take the realities of the day and collage them into impossible yet highly plausible scenarios, Magritte expresses his subconscious on canvas. Oscar is a character from a period of his life called by critics his ‘Vache’ or ‘Renoir’ period, when he appeared to be reacting against the controlled, meticulous and tranquil clocks and pipes and moustaches: the signifiers of ordered civilized European society. Suddenly he got expressive and violent – but with humour.
The violent imagery of the shotgun impotently and Pinnochio-like in place of a nose (sneezing out the bullets), juxtaposed with the spooky eye peering from the bowler hat – symbol of power and professionalism and of course the grown-up gentleman’s ill fitting check suit. This contrasts with the fay positioning of the back to front hands offering up – or is it pleading in supplication?
Essays
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Gavin Turk Is Not A Common Thief - Matt Mason
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Gavin Turk Is Not A Common Thief - Matt Mason
Some people think he is, but I disagree. I think he’s more like Hans Gruber, the German terrorist who takes over Nakatomi Towers in Die Hard.
Let me explain.
Mr. Turk is certainly a copycat. This is a well known fact, and indeed, a reason people are drawn to his work. The way he deals with concepts such as authorship and originality resonate with us, and for good reason.
Most of us are common thieves.
Every day each of us break copyright laws many times, without even realizing. If you photocopy a page from a book, take a picture of a work of art you didn’t produce, sing ‘Happy Birthday’ in public or forward an email you didn’t write, you’re guilty.
Our ideas about property rights, intellectual or otherwise, are generally viewed as good for society. Most of the time, they are. The problem is our laws pertaining to intellectual property are no longer sophisticated enough to deal with the ways we use information in the real world.
A law professor named John Tehranian from The University of Utah recently conducted an experiment that proves this. He made
