Quote of the week: " The art world is a strange one; full of people with far too much money to spray around and time to spend coming up with a pompous or grandiosely understated explanations as to what their art means. "
Hello all – how are we? Feeling Christmassy yet? I am not. As I sit here typing this article, I am staring out of my office window, looking at thick raindrops trickling down my window. I'm also listening to ‘Santa Baby’ in an attempt to get into the Christmas frame of mind. Let it snow.
Following last week’s extravagant series of events, including Katie Price being chucked out of Raffles, we venture this week up north for a funeral. My first. Back to the vale of Lytham St.Annes, Blackpool, I ventured to attend my Granddad’s funeral. This sad occasion, though nothing to do with jet-setting, presented a whole series of socially awkward moments. Sitting on the train, I was contemplating what to do at a funeral. I’m a cheery chap by nature and the thought of mourning or how to act at a funeral service had never really occurred to me before. Am I allowed to smile, to laugh or crack jokes to lighten the mood? This is surely what my Granddad, a cheery fellow himself, would have wanted. I soon found out that funerals are a very strange thing and the feeling of going to one cannot be described unless you have actually been to one. It’s the same as when you never know how you’re going to react when you find out someone you knew has died. For the non-funeral goers amongst you I would advise the following after my debut experience. Firstly, know when to smile and crack jokes and secondly, know when to be solemn. In other words, just use your loaf and do what comes naturally.
After a morbid weekend at the funeral, speaking mostly to people sixty or seventy years my senior, I arrived back in London with some serious jet-setting to do, involving the world of art. The art world is a strange one; full of people with far too much money to spray around and time to spend coming up with a pompous or grandiosely understated explanations as to what their art means. In this world, it is OK to take drugs if it takes you to some higher level of creativity, in which to indulge in or produce your art. It therefore comes with a plethora of champagne and other substance infused parties, which mean that more art gets sold and more wild creations get made.
I always think people who collect art, particularly modern art (where the meaning is unclear by the likes of Mark Rothco and Andy Warhol), do so for the very same reasons that a person joins an exclusive club in London. They do it because it makes them feel like a bald eagle does to a field mouse or a body builder does to a geek. On a higher level; it is a status symbol in short. It therefore comes with its social perks, one of which I shall explain.
I have recently been immersed in this world after I began living with a family friend of ours who is a successful art curator and director of a large modern art gallery that has just come to London from
New York. Round at the house, we regularly have visits from Damien Hurst , Tracy Emin and the like. Much to my amusement. I actually made Damien a cup of tea and gave him one of my girlfriend’s home-made cupcakes just the other day. This lady also sources art for Roman Abramovic’s wife, Dasha Zukova, who is a big modern art collector. So, I got invited to the opening of a new illustrators exhibition, a girl called Emily Carew Woodard, a friend of mine who has just been picked up by a big player in the art world.
Her illustrations are extremely intricate and mostly of cute looking, deliberately out of proportion animals riding bicycles or fishing. The art seemed like something that would be in a new edition of Grimm’s Tales or in Liberty’s, on the front of one of their Christmas cards. (If you ever get the chance to pop in to the Liberty stationary section, by the way, you will not be disappointed.)
Whilst at this event, I bumped into an old friend whom I hadn’t seen for a long while, who as it turned out was hosting the art gallery opening. After the usual catchup chit-chat, I said to him: “James, there’s so much bloody alcohol here! Most of it 2002 Champagne and there’s only about 30 odd people here. There’s about 3 bottles per person, how come?!” James’ answer was as simple as it was to the point.
He replied: “Felix, people buy things when they’re drunk.” My friend, Emily, who was selling her illustrations for £30 quid each at a market in Shoreditch, just a year ago, took home £35,000 that night. The Champagne theory is clearly a winner. Take note.
Interestingly, being famous in the art world is one of the few places where people can know your work but not your face. Being at an art gallery, you can be having a chat with the artist who actually did the works or people with super famous names, in the small world that it is, and be completely clueless. This is something that I thought would be deeply different from a launch party that I went to later in the week for
a new line of jewelry by Chamilia, a similar brand to Links London, but US-based. This was a PR event at its best. Freebies with value, mojitos on tap and slebs everywhere. Ones that I thought I would recognise, being supposedly media savvy and clued up on sleb culture. If you watched that terrible TV show I was on, you’ll know that this is not the case – see Jodie Marsh interview. On the night, rumour had it that Kelly Brook was going to be there amongst other bright young things. Once the mojitos were flowing, I began talking to plenty of randomers and eventually found myself bumbling up to a lady with ginger hair and a green handbag. In an attempt to be flirtatious, I opened with: “I love your auburn hair, it’s very rare to find someone with natural hair like that. It complements your emerald handbag very well indeed!” To which she replied: “Why thank you, it’s dyed though, sadly. I wish! You're not looking too bad yourself.”
Not a bad start, I thought. I then notice people crowding round this person and a photographer from Getty images bustling in to catch a snap of her. Turns out it was Katy B. Lovely lady all the same. Art world and sleazy sleb induced PR events are not socially dissimilar for me, it would seem. I always seem to end up talking to famous people and not knowing it.
From funerals to funky illustrations, last week was a good'un, to say the least. In jet-set terms, I would say it was like a G6 colliding with a Spitfire, and then both parties being able to eject and land safely, just. See you after Christmas for plenty of festive escapades, if your not Christmassed out by then that is. Now get those Christmas lists sorted.
If you’re wondering, all I ever want for Christmas is socks and undies.
Keep on jet-setting.
Following last week’s extravagant series of events, including Katie Price being chucked out of Raffles, we venture this week up north for a funeral. My first. Back to the vale of Lytham St.Annes, Blackpool, I ventured to attend my Granddad’s funeral. This sad occasion, though nothing to do with jet-setting, presented a whole series of socially awkward moments. Sitting on the train, I was contemplating what to do at a funeral. I’m a cheery chap by nature and the thought of mourning or how to act at a funeral service had never really occurred to me before. Am I allowed to smile, to laugh or crack jokes to lighten the mood? This is surely what my Granddad, a cheery fellow himself, would have wanted. I soon found out that funerals are a very strange thing and the feeling of going to one cannot be described unless you have actually been to one. It’s the same as when you never know how you’re going to react when you find out someone you knew has died. For the non-funeral goers amongst you I would advise the following after my debut experience. Firstly, know when to smile and crack jokes and secondly, know when to be solemn. In other words, just use your loaf and do what comes naturally.
After a morbid weekend at the funeral, speaking mostly to people sixty or seventy years my senior, I arrived back in London with some serious jet-setting to do, involving the world of art. The art world is a strange one; full of people with far too much money to spray around and time to spend coming up with a pompous or grandiosely understated explanations as to what their art means. In this world, it is OK to take drugs if it takes you to some higher level of creativity, in which to indulge in or produce your art. It therefore comes with a plethora of champagne and other substance infused parties, which mean that more art gets sold and more wild creations get made.
I always think people who collect art, particularly modern art (where the meaning is unclear by the likes of Mark Rothco and Andy Warhol), do so for the very same reasons that a person joins an exclusive club in London. They do it because it makes them feel like a bald eagle does to a field mouse or a body builder does to a geek. On a higher level; it is a status symbol in short. It therefore comes with its social perks, one of which I shall explain.
I have recently been immersed in this world after I began living with a family friend of ours who is a successful art curator and director of a large modern art gallery that has just come to London from
New York. Round at the house, we regularly have visits from Damien Hurst , Tracy Emin and the like. Much to my amusement. I actually made Damien a cup of tea and gave him one of my girlfriend’s home-made cupcakes just the other day. This lady also sources art for Roman Abramovic’s wife, Dasha Zukova, who is a big modern art collector. So, I got invited to the opening of a new illustrators exhibition, a girl called Emily Carew Woodard, a friend of mine who has just been picked up by a big player in the art world.
Her illustrations are extremely intricate and mostly of cute looking, deliberately out of proportion animals riding bicycles or fishing. The art seemed like something that would be in a new edition of Grimm’s Tales or in Liberty’s, on the front of one of their Christmas cards. (If you ever get the chance to pop in to the Liberty stationary section, by the way, you will not be disappointed.)
Whilst at this event, I bumped into an old friend whom I hadn’t seen for a long while, who as it turned out was hosting the art gallery opening. After the usual catchup chit-chat, I said to him: “James, there’s so much bloody alcohol here! Most of it 2002 Champagne and there’s only about 30 odd people here. There’s about 3 bottles per person, how come?!” James’ answer was as simple as it was to the point.
He replied: “Felix, people buy things when they’re drunk.” My friend, Emily, who was selling her illustrations for £30 quid each at a market in Shoreditch, just a year ago, took home £35,000 that night. The Champagne theory is clearly a winner. Take note.
Interestingly, being famous in the art world is one of the few places where people can know your work but not your face. Being at an art gallery, you can be having a chat with the artist who actually did the works or people with super famous names, in the small world that it is, and be completely clueless. This is something that I thought would be deeply different from a launch party that I went to later in the week for
a new line of jewelry by Chamilia, a similar brand to Links London, but US-based. This was a PR event at its best. Freebies with value, mojitos on tap and slebs everywhere. Ones that I thought I would recognise, being supposedly media savvy and clued up on sleb culture. If you watched that terrible TV show I was on, you’ll know that this is not the case – see Jodie Marsh interview. On the night, rumour had it that Kelly Brook was going to be there amongst other bright young things. Once the mojitos were flowing, I began talking to plenty of randomers and eventually found myself bumbling up to a lady with ginger hair and a green handbag. In an attempt to be flirtatious, I opened with: “I love your auburn hair, it’s very rare to find someone with natural hair like that. It complements your emerald handbag very well indeed!” To which she replied: “Why thank you, it’s dyed though, sadly. I wish! You're not looking too bad yourself.”
Not a bad start, I thought. I then notice people crowding round this person and a photographer from Getty images bustling in to catch a snap of her. Turns out it was Katy B. Lovely lady all the same. Art world and sleazy sleb induced PR events are not socially dissimilar for me, it would seem. I always seem to end up talking to famous people and not knowing it.
From funerals to funky illustrations, last week was a good'un, to say the least. In jet-set terms, I would say it was like a G6 colliding with a Spitfire, and then both parties being able to eject and land safely, just. See you after Christmas for plenty of festive escapades, if your not Christmassed out by then that is. Now get those Christmas lists sorted.
If you’re wondering, all I ever want for Christmas is socks and undies.
Keep on jet-setting.