An alternative to « keep spending and stay in debt »

Multi-disciplinary visual arts exhibition Affluenza is currently taking place in Clerkenwell, London, from 19 to 28 March.

This project intiated by photographer and Samaritan volunteer Hege Sæbjørnsen is a challenging artistic response to the gloomy atmosphere reinforced - if not produced - by the financial crisis. It will not be enough to reverse the trend for sure but this project, at least, raises original questions instead of giving preconceived economic answers. It is opening a dialogue between artists, thinkers and the viewers about money, consumption and anxiety in postmodern societies. Focusing on the destructive impact of greed that explains to a large extent the recent banks failures, Affluenza aims to 'raise awareness and propose constructive solutions'.

The place will be a meeting point for confirmed and emerging artists. Rasha Khahil is one of those. She is currently completing an MA at the Royal College of Art. 'I'm really excited to be a part of this project because it has social implications'. Her work as a freelance designer is photography based and showing people who perform their identity between public and private sphere. Rasha will present an installation piece entitled 'M for Stalking'. She says: 'People spend so much time on social networking. Spying on each other. I'm doing it myself... This piece started when I stalked my boyfriend on the internet. I like this theme of social anxieties in postmodern cities.' She notices that being from a different nationality increases the feeling of strangeness.

Hege Sæbjørnsen, organizer and project manager, explains: 'All in London is about making money but we need to invest emotionally, not only financially'. She thinks that 'although it's a breakdown, the situation we are facing is a golden opportunity for bringing something together.' This project is not only a platform for 40 international artists, it is also a place with teenager seminars. It is willing to tackle what clinical psychologist Oliver James defines as 'the disease of affluence': a contagious anxiety that results from continual insatisfaction.
Affluenza is a pilot project supported by the Samaritans and the New Economic Foundation. A swap party is previewed in addition to talks entitled 'We all make the economy, stupid!' and 'How to de-brand your life'.

Affluenza exhibition
211 St. John's Street, Clerkenwell (nearest tube: Farringdon)

A version of this article was first published on City Online Magazine

Yes, but no, but YES : A display of class contempt

There is at least one English word you cannot translate in another language. It is "Chav".

A German friend recently asked me about it and I felt a bit depressed. For whatever you say to explain, at the end, "Chav" is simply how the nice and neat middle-class nicely and neatly despise the working-class. By laughing, of course. Indeed, it is only humor!
Poor, tasteless, uneducated and ridiculous - that's how the average bourgeois perceives the "Chav". Middle-class people actually distinguish themselves from the others by sharing a common intelligence of the social spectrum - which implies a common object of mockery and rejection.

But the irony of this class contempt is that what they mock is actually not so far from what they are.

Read this article in the Guardian entitled "Balm for the soul" (27/02/09). The writer Linda Grant is explaining in a truly touching - but disturbing - way how her very old mother used to enjoy shopping when she was too old and too sick to appreciate any other pleasure. At that point, you have to admit - as apparently "Chavs" and some Guardian writers do - that shopping is all about pleasure.

The Guardian's writer shopping references are Macy's and Selfridges. Those of "Chavs", Adidas and Burberry. Different attributes but same substance!

What is actually criticized as being the "Chav style" is simply a caricature of the middle-class, that reveals the true face of the latter: greed, ostentation and bad taste. All wrapped in a fake moderation. But the middle-class apparently does not like to be caricatured: its sense of humor is not unlimited. You are allowed to laugh at Vicky Pollard only - and, by extension, at any working-class offspring who is not hugging the walls, consumed by the shame of being poor.

Even if I have no special interest in the economy of big brands counterfeiting, can't help delighting of Burberry's embarrassment. "Burberry admits chav effect checked sales over Christmas": that was what you could read in the Telegraph in 2005, apparently very preoccupied by l'image de marque de la marque. Hopefully, as the Daily Mail put it, everything is now back to normal and "Burberry's shaken off its chav image to become the fashionistas' favourite once more". That was a close shave!

Even though, it sounds really stupid to be proud of being a Chav. But Julie Burchill is, according to what she wrote in the Times.
She simply neglected one detail: that she is actually NOT a Chav... Hello girl, your articles are published in the Times! That's why she could afford the luxury of being proud, no one would actually discriminate her as a Chav.

This notion of "Chav pride" is particularly pernicious because it keeps the real so-called "Chavs" away from political emancipation and consciousness. A minimum of dignity is required at that point - especially if you truly feel a part of the working-class because of your family background, personal history, political choices, etc.

And that sense of dignity first implies to deconstruct and undermine the "Chav" category which is nothing more than a display of class contempt disguised in harmless jokes.

Sean Snyder, decoding filmic illusions

“There will be some things that people will see.
There will be some things that people won’t see.”
Donald Rumsfeld


Video installations of Sean Snyder are currently screened at the Institute of Contemporary Arts until 19 April. As part of a project entitled Index, they offer a stimulating reflexion about war images and representation. Crossing over recent history and popular culture, these images - mix of archives, pictures, video boxes and tapes - blur the frontiers between allegedly far-away battlefields and the apolitical comfort of television viewers’ sofas.

This accumulation of images, in particular through TV and advertising, creates a surrounding narrative which first effect is to dispossess the viewer of any judgement and capacity to understand what is actually viewed. Snyder, who is both a video director and a theorist, calls “visual rhetoric” the sensitive form ideology takes. Indeed, “War on Terror” started on two fronts: the military one and the visual one.

Nevertheless, the artist does not please himself in this easy - even though legitimate - denunciation of propaganda. His work is also a reflection about technology and its wide use that prevents official propaganda from being the only source of representation. In a paper entitled Optics. Compression. Propaganda., he writes: “The use of digital photography among members of the US military was made infamously known through the public disclosure of images of incidents at Abu Ghraib detention”.
What is called with a disgusting sense of modesty “Abu Ghraib incident” is not an isolated event. Also in the private sphere, soldiers were sending digital pictures via mails to their families and friends. Snyder mentions some of the captions: “Today’s youth... Tomorrow’s terrorists”, “Sure the sunset looks great, but look at the rest of the picture - that’s still Iraq”, etc. Taking pictures is truly “shooting”.

At that point, technological products cannot be used without taking in consideration the ideological consequences they imply. Quoting the French film theorist Jean-Louis Baudry, Snyder explains how the scientific base of new media does not automatically ensure them a neutrality.

The part business played in this visual rhetoric of war is not ignored. The last video shows how brands accompanied both invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. Snyder writes that “Saddam Hussein’s personal tastes have been subjected to paparazzi-like scrutinity. The media particularly enjoyed cataloging the contents of Saddam Hussein’s hideout after he was captured.”
Snyder mentions some of the brand names - 7 Up, Mars bars, Palmolive natural soap, Lacoste eau de Cologne, etc. And concludes his paper with Saddam Hussein’s comment during the trial: “This is all theater...”

But the strongest video among these installations is probably the one entitled Afghanistan circa 1985, which is not related to any theory. This work is truly a gem, a “pure” moment when archives and sounds take the high risk of not relying on any comment.

It is a fascinating footage shot during the Russian occupation of Afghanistan where occupying troops join the villagers in a traditional Afghani dance. This very bizarre scene shows an interaction that cannot be easily described because it is mixing music, war, folklore, in a choregraphy filled with extreme implicit violence. Soldiers are clapping their hands with smiles, but machine guns are still slung over their shoulder.

Sean Snyder Index - 12 February to 19 April 2009
Institute of Contemporary Arts
The Mall
London SW1Y 5AH

A version of this review was first published in City Online Magazine