ap pear nice

The spectacle manifests itself as an enormous positivity, out of reach and beyond dispute. All it says is: “Everything that appears is good; whatever is good will appear.” The attitude that is demands in principle is the same passive acceptance that it has already secured by means of its seeming incontrovertibly, and indeed by its monopolization of the realm of appearances.
Guy Debord: ‘The Society of the Spectacle’

Busy times busy times – preparing pieces for exhibiting in Central St. Martins next week – the MA interim show. Private view is Thursday 7th & it opens to public for weekend 8th to the 10th March. The show’s now hung – time’s giving me the run around – I’m losing track. I’ve seen music, poetry, film… not much chance to read though. Plus there is of course the substantial William Blake exhibition of at the Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge.

the MA took a swing at digital psycho-geography – a week or so ago now – but gone are the days of rummaging around the weirder parts of the web (semi) accidentally. We could follow the social media algorythmns to the inevitable sinkhole of creepy fascism, but following rabbit holes to diverse / mad, and perplexing spaces is not the head scratchingu joy it once was. Curating ‘experience’ and funnelling traffic ruins the fun of surfing. The notion of the spectacle was mentioned along with the situationists and some psycho-geographers.

Debord though – i’ve been watching his films & flicking through his books. His is a remarkable achievement.

To be seen to do something is to achieve something — to do something – to have worked, developed, applied patience, worked hard and sensitively with colleagues, experimented, explored and grafted away to create a thing — that’s a mugs game.

It’s in being seen to be the thing – because the thing is the person – to have done the work is no thing.

The spectacle is the thing, the person and the visibility. I see this very clearly around me and in the various places I’ve worked, how media functions and how achievements are stacked up. Being seen to have respectable career is good – to do something worth doing means nowt. & this is why bankers get paid more than nurses – to put it simply – but it is true every level of British life anyway….