Mother Ruscha

The guide booklet for the Ed Ruscha exhibition at the Hayward Gallery states: “There are no rules for looking at my paintings ... There’s no right or wrong way to approach my work, each viewer will come away with his or her own associations anyway. And that’s the way it should be.”

I like that a lot.

One of my biggest ambitions is to open a queer arts venue in that big space on Charing Cross Road –the building that was the Marquee for a while but is now a dreadful sports pub called the Montague Pike or something. One of the rules is that there will be NO SCHOOL OR COLLEGE PARTIES - nobody being dragged around by a know-it-all telling them what to think and what to feel when the look at the exhibits. How arrogant!

Instead there will be glittery sofas where people can relax and enjoy the works while sipping a finely mixed cocktail. There will be ambient music, tasteful lighting and a strictly no cunts allowed door policy. Sound perfect? Yes, I thought so, but let’s face it ... it’s not going to happen.

I lack the necessary drive or whatever it is to develop such fanciful notions. Try as I might, I can’t even manage to find my way out of a shite job in local government, never mind open up an elitist art salon in London. I was born into the wrong life, I’m convinced of it. My parents used to say, “I think we got the wrong one when we picked her up from the hospital.” Is it too late to go back and press charges?

Anyway, let’s focus, where were we? Oh ... ED RUSCHA, yes. After that auspicious start I was sad to find the show a little disappointing. It’s not awful, it just never really gets going. There’s no atmosphere and there's not really all that much to look at. Even though I like to wander round slowly and absorb all the pieces, I was still all done in about 30 minutes.

It’s hard to think that this is the same place that had the wonderful Walking in my Mind until a few weeks ago, where I spent ages visiting and revisiting each of the rooms, experiencing their individual magic.

There were two pieces I enjoyed a lot, my favourite was this one - Wen Out For Cigrets N Never Came Back.



I’m always enchanted by the suggestion of abandonment and the enormous sense of freedom that comes with it. I’m not sure where the streets below are but it reminds me very much of New York, and I love the romanticism of NY being the kind of place you can get lost in. Or of just checking into the Hotel Chelsea and never leaving, living among all that history and creating random bits of art.

The other one I loved was this – Not A Bad World Is It?



I think maybe I should buy a print of this and put it up on my wall at the day job, next to my pictures of drag queens and kittens – the things that remind me there is a real world out there when I’m having problems staying upright in my chair.

It’s kind of the antithesis to Banksy’s paintings where he will take an idyllic country scene and then put across a barrier of police tape or a surveillance system. They always make me smile.

I’m thinking of the Anish Kapoor at Royal Academy next ... or maybe Pop Life at Tate Modern. I’m put off by the fact it’s at Tate Modern though. Anyone been?