Go to an art exhibition

This is a spoof of contemporary art, from the TV comedy series Nathan Barley.

Such a scurrilous portrayal is of course a deeply unfair caricature of the art world.  For example, here's how Cardiff art studios tactileBosch (you can tell they're cutting-edge and avant-garde because the first word is in lower case and the second in upper case) describe their 'Moist' series of exhibitions.

MOIST is…descriptive / disturbing / visceral / erotically charged…and very DAMP. Whether ab-jective or subjective / in situ or without / it is wetness personified, a reaction to environment. MOIST is about location, not necessarily site specific but site responsive. A damp basement dripping with moisture, mould fornicating on a clammy wall. Its an environment that might make you shriek out loud or run screaming from the room… slime dripping from your fingertips…it could be sexually gratifying, an orgasmic response to a word or situation or a quagmire of mortal intrigue.

See? That's what the real deal looks like. Much more sensible.

I went to see the Moist, sorry, I meant MOIST, exhibition in a corner of a hipster fashion store.

Hmmm, I'm not sure what's particularly MOIST about it. I'm not saying it's bad art; I'm just not getting any particular vibes of dampness. If I were cynical, I might suggest that they'd asked for work on the theme of MOIST, and the various artists had just sent them whatever they'd been working on at the time.

I thought somebody had left some pieces of bric-a-brac on the floor. Then I realised it was one of the art exhibits.

Well, it's a good thing they added a bit of paper. If it had been just a teacup and a crowbar then that would have looked rubbish.

There seems to be a thing at the moment for sticking art into unused shopping space. On the way back I popped into the Literature Lounge in the St Davids 2 shopping centre, where they're planning a month of recitals and workshops in a slot where a coffee bar had gone bust. I chatted to a nice lady from Literature Wales who invited me to come back the next day for a book-swapping event.

I suppose the whole art-in-empty-shops thing makes a good amount of sense in the depths of the recession. We've got lots of bankrupted shops lying about looking tatty. We've got plenty of starving artists and writers who want to show their wares and will perform for a mouthful of thin gruel. Two problems solved at once.

Maybe this is what the Big Society is supposed to look like?