Spank the Monkey
BALTIC, Gateshead, UK
27 September – 7 January 2007
work by Chiho Aoshima, Banksy, Dzine, Dr. Lakra, FAILE, Freaks Gallery, Shepard Fairey, Groovisions, Invader, Kozyndan, Barry Mcgee, Ryan Mcginness, Takashi Murakami, Miss Van, Neasden Control Centre, Os Gemeos, David Shrigley, Natasha Struchkova, Swoon, Aya Takano, Ed Templeton,Yasumasa Yonehara.

Reviewed by: Rea Cris

There is always a risk when exhibiting street or urban art to fall into the commercial trap. Do you display the work as ‘arty merchandise’ or as commercial artists’ artwork? Most curators would defend their intentions as being of the latter, but most exhibits turn into the former.
Spank the Monkey is an international exhibit of contemporary urban and street art. As well as works shown in the Baltic itself, the exhibit spills out into the streets around Newcastle and Gateshead. It consists of twenty-two artists, some of the more famous names being Bansky, Takashi Murakami, David Shrigley and Shepard Fairey. One would have hoped that Spank the Monkey would have been a platform for the involved artists to focus on their art practice rather than their merchandise. Rather the exhibit is saturated with commercialization, from the wide range of merchandise available in the Baltic store to the display of Murakami’s Louis Vuitton bags. Alongside his bags, Murakami shows a video, Superflat Monogram (2003), which represents an Alice-in-Wonderland scenario where a Japanese girl falls through a tunnel into a world of cute cuddly toys and mobile texting. It resembles a commercial rather than an installation and its bubblegum pop music assaults the rest of the exhibit. The programme tells you to look out for a ‘unique project’ from illustrators Kozyndan in conjunction with PlayStation, but who knows what it might be as its not exhibited. Instead there is a PlayStation station similar to those found in shops where you can try out the various games (when you put down the consol the game cries ‘Oh you got bored!’ as if its your fault). I’m surprised that such commercial successes such as Emily Strange haven’t also been included.
All hope is not lost! There were sincere and serious aspects of the exhibit. Ed Templeton’s It’s too late Now 1995-2006 is a photomontage of images such as a boy at the beach with a swastika drawn on his chest, a girl crying on a public telephone, an old man asleep on a bench. Another is the work of magazine editor and photographer Yasumasa Yonehara’s Get naked and bend over. I’m serious 2003-2006. Polaroids, displayed in miniature cases, shows pictures of young Japanese women in various low-key pornographic pose without ever showing the photographer. The work is not voyeuristic or appealing to shock tactics. Rather it addresses the Lolita complex from women’s point of view. The ‘schoolgirl’ obsession in Japan is represented in its most popular form of manga and anime and at it’s most shocking was discovered when real schoolgirls would sleep with businessmen in exchange for designer goods. These are the extremes and Yonehara’s work places us back in reality. Japanese women are sexually stereotyped as either the schoolgirl or geisha. These photographs show that Japanese women are the same as western women, with the same natural sexual desires, the proof being that all the individual photographs are entitled Yes, she wants to. In their unremarkable bedrooms, they act like any other woman.
In exhibits such as Spank the Monkey the question always arises whether the commercial aspect can be separated from the artwork? I guess the answer would depend upon where you draw the fine lines between art for art sake and commercial art.

http://www.balticmill.com/whatsOn/present/ExhibitionDetail.php?exhibID=53

responses:

tonya - I understand your point, but, isn’t there something to be said for embracing the commercial side of art – i.e. illustration and graphic design within the real world? With a lot of these artists there is an idea of taking art outside the gallery, or at least not limiting it to the framing confines of the art institution. There instead seems to be an interest in the intersection between art, pop culture, and consumerism. It’s the new pop art, except instead of bringing commercialism into the museum, they are bringing art to the everyday – like Keith Harring did in the 1980s with his Pop Shop. I don’t think that it would be proper to ignore this element of these artists’ work. I agree that the PlayStation seems a bit out of place (although I would like to see what Kozyndan did for them). I think that in this day of late capitalist economy and age of easy accessibility, there is a good deal of attention paid to design – be it good design or just something interesting or unique. Therefore, when such artists as Kozyndan or Murakami produce commercial work, why not put it on display?

rea - I agree with your point that commercialization is just as much as part of art and to touch upon Keith Harring, Baltic was running another exhibit at the same time displaying his earlier drawings. This connection obviously ties in all that he was trying to do with Pop Shop and its influence on the later generation shown in Spank the Monkey. What I disagree with the exhibit (and maybe didn't explain well) was the intention behind Baltic putting an exhibit like this up. Rather than embrace the two aspects (art and merchandise), Baltic seemed to be focusing on only the merchandising aspects. Whether this was to attract a younger audience, increase vistor numbers or show people that they can have groovy but cheap affordable art, I don't know but I believe this type of work should be embraced first as an art and secondly as a commercial means.