In autumn September/ October 1997, my friend recommended that I check out the Sensations exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts. I was 17 years old, doing the final year of my A Levels and also in the process of starting to apply to go to art school. I had no idea what I was going to see at Sensations, my friend who was a year older than me and she was doing her Foundation course at Central St Martins, she invited me and spoke highly about this exhibition. So, I got on the tube with my friends and joined the long queue at the Royal Academy of Arts to see Sensations.
Keep in mind that my experience before I saw sensations was limited to GCSE and A Level Art at the Green School of Girls in Isleworth, in a corner of west London. My GCSE and A Level Art teacher Ms Stephens, Ms Nichols and Ms Douglas who I cannot ever credit enough and have immense gratitude for teaching me and helping me reach my goals at a young age. My educational experience at GCSE and A Level Art was traditional and to some degree conservative, I learnt a lot about drawing, painting and sculptors: Van Gogh, Matisse, Picasso, Cezzane, Joseph Beuys, many other white male artists who were made and kept visible in UK art education. Within this educational experience Frida Khalo, Georgia O’Keeffe were mainly the only female artists I was taught about and alongside a short glance of exposure to Cindy Sherman at the Tate. Sensations was the first time I saw ‘conceptual contemporary art’ – I was mind blown, without any exaggerations it felt like discovering a brand new planet. At the time, I did not know any of the artists whose work I saw at Sensations. I thought I had found something groundbreaking. The artwork I remember making a note of was Marc Quinn’s sculpture head full of blood titled ‘Self 1991’ and Tracy Emin’s Tent was of interest.
In the years between 1999-2002, during my BA Fashion degree years I became more familiar with Tracy Emin and often referenced her work in my degree course work. Emin was essentially one of the only female artists that seemed to be well documented and there was accessible material about her such as newspaper and magazine articles. Particularly as a fashion student; I had not signed up on a degree course that was going to broaden my female artist references and my continued interest in fine art was generally self initiated.
The raw, uneasy and uncomfortableness of Emin’s work grew on me; mainly due to the sheer accessibility to another female artist. Was I a real fan of Emin’s work I still am not sure, firstly because she has white washed herself, therefore it is apparent her narrative is not entirely authentic and honest. If I had accessibility to a wider range of female artists; would I have had any interest in Emin is something I question despite of holding an empathy, support towards her tenacity and position because I also do consider, if Emin claimed her identity as a mixed race person that makes her a women of colour, would she have survived, made it amongst the brutally racist YBAs (Young British Artists) and would she have been fated the same as the rest of YBAs (Young Black Artists) to be erased, censored and without no financial business. It would be interesting to see Emin tell her full truth beyond the Munch and Egon Schiele’s.
Identity politics is a dirty word for the YBAs (Young British Artists), they are also indoctrinated and self declared ‘Thatcher’s children’. Thatcher who made anti-racism in education against the law.
The definition of identity is how one places and recognises themselves. When a white male artist Micheal Landly makes an artwork titled ‘Breakdown’ (2001), this artwork was a reaction to consumerist society. In this artwork Landly destroyed all of his belongings to ‘smithereens’ as quoted by Landly. Breakdown artwork also includes an inventory; listing all the items that belong to Landly that he destroyed. If Landly was not a white male artist in London, would he have been able to contemplate such an idea, could he have afforded or had access to funding/ resources to produce, organise the machine that destroyed his items. If Landly was in Syria or Palestine he most probably would not own 5% of the items, let alone to have the choice and option to destroy items to turn into a public spectacle on Oxford Street in central London in the name of ‘art’. The artwork ‘Breakdown’ is a demonstration of the white male privileged identity.
Damien Hirst proudly says ‘All My Ideas Are Stolen Anyway’ is the title of a Frieze article (2018) about Hirst. The article continues “The artist claims that he was taught ‘don’t borrow ideas, steal them’ by Michael Craig-Martin at Goldsmiths”. Michael Craig-Martin was the teacher of many of the YBAs (Young British Artists). The British Empire is built on stealing and killing; stealing is an inherent condition of white supremacy. White supremacy could not survive without stealing, stealing is the constitutive and innate bone structure of the white supremacist identity. Hirst built his art practice through his identity as a white supremacist; seizing and using white supremacist identification and fundamental white supremacist colonial conditions and routines of stealing in the practice of his art. Landly and Hirst’s artwork is centered and conceived through their privileged identities. Conceding ‘identity politics’ into the identity politics of white supremacist privilege.
‘A look at the origins of the Young British Artists in the art schools of the mid-80s, a shocking and provocative movement which would culminate in the notorious 1997 exhibition Sensation.’ (Sensationalist, 2022).
In January 2023, I watched ‘Sensationalists: The Bad Girls and Boys of British Art’ on BBC iplayer, 3 episode documentary, each episode is 1 hour long, released in time for the 25th anniversary of Charles Saatchi’s group exhibition ‘Sensation’ in 1997 at the Royal Academy of Arts. I’m 42 years old, writing a book about censorship and erasure of black and brown female artists in the UK. The only black spokesperson in this documentary is Goldie. Goldie is exceptional, he deserves all the merits and credits for contribution to UK’s creative culture as an artist and musician but of course he was not the only black artist in London during the 80’s and 90’s. The main message of this documentary is to celebrate and to look at 80’s and 90’s portraying the YBAs (Young British Artists) as the ‘pioneers’ of the conceptual contemporary art scene in the UK and at the time they were not aligned with the art establishment. But they were very much part of the same machine of the racist UK art establishment. Cork Street in Mayfair, London is known for art galleries, it was also mentioned in ‘Sensationalists’ as the only other art at the time. Cork Street’s historical commitment to the establishment is not a farce but it is untrue to say that Cork Street was the only art present besides the YBAs (Young British Artists).
“Steve who moved to Amsterdam and always shied away from the media shebang, became the second consecutive Black Turner Prize winner after Chris Offilli in a contemporary British art scene from which many people of ethnic heritage felt excluded. Apart from a few Black, Asian and minority ethnic artist like Anish Kapoor, Mona Hatoum, Isaac Julien, Yinka Shonibare and Chris Offili, the mainstream British art scene was heavily white dominated, as can be seen from the Turner Prize nominations during the 1990’s, Talented minority ethnic British artists such as Rasheed Araeen, Sonia Boyce, John Akonfrah, Lubaina Himid, Babara Walker, Ingrid Pollard, Claudette Johnson, Sokari Douglas Camp, Maud Sulter, Sutapa Biwas, Donald Rodney, Sunil Gupta, Hew Locke, Denzil Forrester and many more remained on the sidelines during this period, despite producing thought provoking and visually arresting work.
Many of these artists had been part of a rich creative flourishing throughout the 1980s,” (Fullerton, 2021, p.137).
“A relatively successful artist such as Maud Sulter could pass away (as she did in 2008) with hardly anything in the way of acknowledgement and obituaries. And an artist such as Brenda Agard, relatively young though she was, could fall from view and pass into oblivion as if her stellar contributions were somehow insignificant and unimportant.” (Chambers, 2014, p.5).
The two quotes above highlight the erasure of black and brown artists. ‘The Story of the Britain Revolution Art Rage’ Fullerton looks at the rise of the YBAs (Young British Artist) and ‘Black Artist in British Art A History Since the 1950s’ Chambers exposes the historical presence of black and brown artists in the UK. Both of these books and quotes alongside WOCI provide concrete evidence of the strong presence of black and brown artists in 80s and 90s and also at the same time the erasure of black and brown artists in the 80s and 90s – which has been repeated all over again by the BCC’s Sensationalists in 2022. Prompting the urgency once again to state the repetition of racist, violent and terrorist white supremacist history to uphold the falsification of white supremacist identity, culture and art.
Samia Malik
Bibliography
Keith Allen. Min Clough. (2022). Sensationalist: The Bad Girls and Boys of British Art. BBC. iPlayer.
Eddie Chambers. (2014). Black Artist in British Art A History Since the 1950s. I.B. Taurus. pp.5.
Elizabeth Fullerton. (2021). The Story of the Britain Revolution Art Rage. Thames & Hudson. pp.137.
In News. (2018). All My Ideas Are Stolen Anyway. Frieze.
WOCI Reading Group is reconvening at South London Gallery with artist Farah Soobhan
WOMEN OF COLOUR INDEX READING GROUP 