- Paperback: 240 pages
- Publisher: Quartet Books (1 Jun 1998)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0704380919
- ISBN-13: 978-0704380912
- Product Dimensions: 20 x 13.8 x 2.4 cm
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,348,261 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This came out in 1998. I picked up a copy from a great pile of them in a smart London gallery a few years later. Browsing through the freebie, I read the chapters on artists I knew something about (Richard Long, Tracey Emin, David Shrigley, Douglas Gordon) and skipped the rest. My verdict was that it was written in a very accessible way (no art babble) and gave something of the various intense flavours of the art scene in London in the mid-Nineties. Three stars, then.
Coming across the book again the other day I read it from cover to cover and it was a different experience altogether. The reader is given a very important piece of information right at the start: McLaren used to work in an accountancy firm. The whole book then becomes a celebration of him having got out of that dull place. It explains why he engages with all the artists' work in such a full-blooded way (he'd much rather be in an art gallery than sitting in an office doing his sums). It also explains why so much of the work he chooses to engage with has a grey or a melancholic side to it (you can take the author out of the accountancy firm but you can't take the accountancy firm out of the author). Indeed the main aspect of McLaren's take on the art he writes about is a well-developed sense of absurdity, a quality that some of the artists' seem to share (but by no means all).
The chapters are all over the place. There is a thread involving the author's partner Joanna, who is studying for an M.A. at Chelsea Art School. There is a thread where he comes pretty close to stalking Bob Smith (luckily that is one artist who does have a sense of irony). And there is a thread following McLaren's progress (or lack of it) in getting the little pieces he is writing published. Half-way through the book, McLaren distributes a questionnaire (to artists) asking for advice as to how he should finish his book. Does he take the advice he's given, or does he finish the book in his own way? Both, I think. Joanna, who, it turns out, used to work in the same accountancy firm as the author, puts on an exhibition that consists entirely of polycarbonate cubicles in a basement. A couple of their ex-colleagues from the City are invited along and encouraged to engage with the multi-layered environment. The result is pretty life-affirming, I have to say. I mean it's very funny.
Coming across the book again the other day I read it from cover to cover and it was a different experience altogether. The reader is given a very important piece of information right at the start: McLaren used to work in an accountancy firm. The whole book then becomes a celebration of him having got out of that dull place. It explains why he engages with all the artists' work in such a full-blooded way (he'd much rather be in an art gallery than sitting in an office doing his sums). It also explains why so much of the work he chooses to engage with has a grey or a melancholic side to it (you can take the author out of the accountancy firm but you can't take the accountancy firm out of the author). Indeed the main aspect of McLaren's take on the art he writes about is a well-developed sense of absurdity, a quality that some of the artists' seem to share (but by no means all).
The chapters are all over the place. There is a thread involving the author's partner Joanna, who is studying for an M.A. at Chelsea Art School. There is a thread where he comes pretty close to stalking Bob Smith (luckily that is one artist who does have a sense of irony). And there is a thread following McLaren's progress (or lack of it) in getting the little pieces he is writing published. Half-way through the book, McLaren distributes a questionnaire (to artists) asking for advice as to how he should finish his book. Does he take the advice he's given, or does he finish the book in his own way? Both, I think. Joanna, who, it turns out, used to work in the same accountancy firm as the author, puts on an exhibition that consists entirely of polycarbonate cubicles in a basement. A couple of their ex-colleagues from the City are invited along and encouraged to engage with the multi-layered environment. The result is pretty life-affirming, I have to say. I mean it's very funny.
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