it’s a good definition, but the flaw is that it’s open to abuse from people who want to be critical of art they don’t like, by using the supposition that because an artist is paid to do the work one doesn’t like, that artist is therefore not an artist. Does that make sense? In this particular instance, using it to attack Hirst is a bit laughable. Just because being paid to make work of an expensive nature intrinsically allows you to make work of an expensive nature, it doesn’t make your ideas less valid, or your identity as an artist less real than someone who paints in a shed for 20 years with no recognition. It doesn’t make Hirst MORE of an artist than that bloke in the shed, but equally it doesnt make him less of one.

Posted by alistair unpopular on August 29th, 2005 at 1:52 pm

I just liked the sausage comparison.

Posted by Jerry on August 29th, 2005 at 7:30 pm

Is it art or is it arse? YOU be the judge is the best advice. BTW Jack The Rapper for president. Older and wiser than Everett.
http://www.xs4all.nl/%7elaridae/ambach/1.html

Posted by Are You Gay? on August 29th, 2005 at 7:30 pm

It’s an attempt to justify his own method, his own artistry, by denoucing someone elses.

He might as well be liam gallagher moaning about bloc party.

Posted by barry on August 29th, 2005 at 8:49 pm

Damien Hirst, Liam Gallagher and Bloc Party are all employees - they are financially bound to those who have the final say over the finished product. They are indentured workers exploited for their work. That is not to say that from such a relationship a thing of beauty may not be spawned (renaissance art was the product of this type of financial relationship, as was the classic pop of the ’50’s and ’60’s) But as Childish say’s "basically it’s sausages". It becomes a product as soon as someone is paying for it. The Watts Towers, Hasil Adkins, Confederacy of Dunces… all produced with no patronage, alone, they represent art… everything else is sausage meat.

Posted by Holger Meins on August 30th, 2005 at 7:29 pm

I don’t get it. Is the term ’sausage’ supposed to be derogatory in this context?

Posted by Richard on August 30th, 2005 at 8:35 pm

"they are financially bound to those who have the final say over the finished product"
That may not always be the case.

Perhaps the only deteroriation that occurs when artists work is patronised(?) is that it becomes informed by that personal transaction, narrowed from a larger relationship with…society, community, other?

Posted by barry on August 30th, 2005 at 11:45 pm

Sausages? I’d be flattered if MY art was compared to sausages.

Posted by Katey on August 31st, 2005 at 4:03 am

""they are financially bound to those who have the final say over the finished product"
That may not always be the case."

It may not always be the case… but it is a great rarity for the money men (and it is invariably men) to hand over cash without wanting to poke their fingers in the pie.

I don’t think there is anything derogatory implied by the use of the "sausage" analogy… it serves to highlight the difference between art and commerce. There is nothing ignoble about commerce, but it is perhaps ignoble to pretend that commerce is the same as art.

Posted by Holger Meins on August 31st, 2005 at 1:22 pm

A tangentally relevant article by Steve Albini about money and art can be found at:

http://www.musicianassist.com/archive/article/ART/a-1098-1.htm

Posted by Maskelyne on August 31st, 2005 at 10:32 pm

For the sake of clarity, money screws art. It doesn’t matter if you do it to make money, or get paid to do it, either way the art is diluted. Good art comes from the heart as well as the head; it’s about the validity and the passion of the communication, be that inspiring, irritating or whatever. Money doesn’t inspire me. Life, death, happyness and suffering does.

Posted by Larry Pickleman on September 15th, 2005 at 6:16 pm