Stuckism and Punk Philosophy: controversialism in the fine art environment

1. Stuckism and Punk Philosophy:controversialism in the fine art environment

2. In December 1976, I heard ‘Anarchy in the UK’ for the first time and my life changed forever. I became a provincial punk. In 1985 I met Pauline Murray and Robert Blamire from the punk group Penetration, and played on and off with them for the next 20 years.

3. In 2000 I read an article on Stuckism, and my life changed again

4. Rachel Jordon Turnerprize Hotel There was an immediate identification within the ideas expressed and the work accompanying it, that had as great an impact on me as the day I heard The Sex Pistols for the first time. This led to me contacting them, declaring I was probably a Stuckist, and asking what I should do next.

5. What is Stuckism?

6. Recording session for The Medway Poets LP, Rochester Adult Education Centre 11 December 1987

7. Charles Thomson

8. Billy Childish

9. Mark D Shed Boat Shed Shed The Stuckists are “pro-contemporary figurative painting with ideas and anti conceptual art, mainly because of its poverty of concepts.”(Milner, F. 2004 dust jacket).

10. Charles Thomson Is my shoe art?

11. What is punk philosophy? (this is a very difficult question to answer) What is punk attitude? (still quite difficult)

12. Muggleton, (2000) quotes one of his “informers”, who talks of punk being:“what you make it. Paradoxically, this is the essence of punk, and only ‘true’ punks realize this” (p.2).however…

13. Methodology:what have I been doing since 1977?looking in the right placelooking in the right waytalk to the practitionerworking without a map (no agenda)

14. “Truth is what it is, regardless of what we want it to be”Pocket Guide to Stuckism, Charles Thomson, March 2004

15. As practitioners, we all share similar issues(if we are authentic in what we do)I wanted to document what I do anyway- that is: talk about, argue about, and get excited about art and ideas with other practitioners.

16. narrative enquiry:The dynamic between the researcher and the subject can create barriers, as there is an implicit agreement that there is a power asymmetry, that of the ‘academic’ and the subject.This is not in fact the reality, as the researcher is often not professional within the role of an interlocutor. Neither are they necessarily experts when discussing life stories with the subject. As Czarniawska states, what a researcher can offer in this situation is “respectful and interested attention.”

17. obsessional tendencies (vital)the part time option

19. Controversialism

20. W H Smith record counter June 1977

21. Recent letter from Thomson to the Independent:Michael Glover (“The best artist on the shortlist presents judges with a problem”, 5 May 2011) has surely underestimated the Tate by suggesting that there is anything dubious about a jury including Godfrey Worsdale, the director of the Baltic, nominating George Shaw, an artist currently exhibiting at the Baltic, for the Turner Prize to be held at the Baltic.  The Tate will no doubt ensure that its ethically watertight conflict of interest management policy will be enforced with customary rigour and Worsdale will promptly leave the room every time the nominees are discussed. Charles ThomsonCo-founder, The Stuckists

22. The ‘practice’ bit

23. Paul Harvey Henry Williamson sitting outside his writing hut reflecting on his role as a father

24. Stuckism and PunkA ClarificationHelping to get art back on its feet

25. Wolf Howard El Toro

26. Damien Hirst The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living

27. why bother?

28. Painting is mysterious. It creates worlds within worlds, giving access to the unseen psychological realities that we inhabit.