Fourteen minutes of fame

My 14 minutes of fame are soon over.

At the opening on Saturday, with some 70 guests all in all, I tried to explain my project in a short welcoming speech before introducing Torbjörn Elensky and his reading of his text about the prints.

It was a great moment, albeit not exactly like I wanted it to be. 

Friends and family and some unfamiliar faces, no hostility.

I got too carried away and didn't breathe enough to say what I wanted. 

I'll retry further down.

Most people know what it's like to host one's own party. 

Hosting your own exhibition and trying to make into something a little bit like an afternoon tea party adds to the confusion that would already be there, were you only "throwing an exhibition".

Luckily, I had manufactured just enough tea bag tags to last for every guest and so (still wearing a silly beard then) I offered them to everyone, to pick their favorite message from this plate, before I started the speech.

Conversation pieces, check. (I hate that expression by the way: Check!)

Anyway, I wanted my speech to have been more like this:

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Welcome everybody.

As I feel the atmosphere is friendly and in good spirit, I would like to take this opportunity to talk about who I really am.

I have hidden my real identity much too long. 

Working some 20 years as a graphic designer and an art director/creative director with commissions from clients of all kinds I have always remained true to one secret vocation.

I am and have always been an artist, regardless of this definition.

And all the same, this is my solo show debut!

Over the years, I have taken part of a few design exhibitions, always group shows (and only actually in other countries than Sweden.)

For years I have longed to be the subject of my own art, and not the interpreter of someone else's messages.

And so, in conjunction with a teachers' exhibition at Beckmans College of Design, where I am a senior lecturer, I started to work with negative messages, in red, in the fall of 2011.

The very first poster was IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT. 

Since then the one theme has been different versions of accusations.

A year later I had the original message translated into Swedish, French, and German.

Each language is charged with different connotations, depending on the combination of words and, let's say, cultural traditions and history.

In addition to these, the other theme, a series of "matter-of-factual" messages, have been printed in two sets.

I have wanted to work with these two subjects in order to, for one thing, explore our relationship with blame as a human reaction to anything that goes wrong, and for the other, to examine the extreme certainty of assertions - also human? - that some people sometimes display. (Other people: always.)

To simplify, I believe that we as humans can be divided into two groups.

• Some people always blame others.

• Others always blame themselves.

• Some people always have the answer.

• Others always question the answer.

In everyday life I often wonder about my own reactions concerning these issues.

I look upon myself as a man who, as a reflex, blames himself. 

But then again, I don't really have any problems with placing guilt on whoever is nearby, when something goes wrong.

I believe we are all affected with both qualities. Some people are just more extreme than others.

The past weeks I've been blaming my beard for a lot of things.

I decided to let it grow when, in December, the plans for this exhibition came about.

I have now shaved.

Sometimes, the best way to liberate oneself from a problem is simply to get rid of it.

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Clemens Poellinger (link in Swedish only) wrote a summary of my art. Quite to the point with few words.

To explain this project fully, however, I need to go through its different parts.

In its entirety the project includes not only the 14 posters and the miniature interior Red Print Room.

The exhibition also comprises this blog, a printed 24-page pamphlet, a short film (+ some clips), and a Spotify playlist  (which I don't expect will grow much further, even though it has had two songs added to its original "14 SONGS OF GUILT AND BLAME").

Not least the playlist was a joy to put together.

A late developer with the wonders of Spotify, making the list threw me back to teenage years and the bliss of compiling the most important songs ever.

This pick of tunes was done very fast, and with not so discriminating a selection as in a mixtape of one's youth.

Regardless, it's worthwhile not only to listen to the music. Listing the songs' titles creates some kind of poetry:

Guilty Partner
Guilty
Guilt
Guilty conscience
Modern Guilt
Guilty
Guilty
Guilty
Blame It On the Boogie
Don't Blame Your Daughter
I Don't Blame You
Love To Blame
One To Blame
Blame It On The Girls
Put The blame On Mame
The Blame

Today Pernilla Glaser lectured at Beckmans. 

She told the students something like this: "If you have a problem, put it on a list and deal with other stuff instead".

There you go.

Thank you for your attention.

And thank you Catarina Landberg for helping me with all the printing business.

This is proof

Any proof readers out there?

Tonight I'll be wetransferring the final art work of a leaflet for the exhibition. There's no staff around to assist me at my office.

Here's the text. Please help me out, don't hesitate to comment, particularly if you find errors. 

It's not necessary that you know French, German and/or Swedish, I'll find native tongues for those three:

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RED PRINT ROOM 2012
MDF, foam board, sawn and milled walnut veneer, pine, linden and birch wood, wall paint, clear polypropylene, brass fittings, miniature posters, wallpaper adhesive.
Miniature Ply-Chair, Morrison. laminated wood, natural color, scale 1:6, 77x140x65 mm. (Jasper Morrison, 1989). Overall dimensions 662x432x542 mm

IT’S ALL YOUR FAULT
1/6, THE BLAME SERIES
FEEL BAD POSTERS
Size 600x800 mm
Edition of 35
2011

YOU ARE SO WRONG
2/6, THE BLAME SERIES
FEEL BAD POSTERS
Size 600x800 mm
Edition of 35
2011

YOU’RE TO BLAME
3/6, THE BLAME SERIES
FEEL BAD POSTERS
Not printed

YOU ARE WAY OUT OF LINE
4/6, THE BLAME SERIES
FEEL BAD POSTERS
Not printed

BLAME LAME BA BLA BLA BLA
5/6, THE BLAME SERIES
FEEL BAD POSTERS
Size 600x800 mm
Edition of 35
2011

DIALOGUE
6/6, THE BLAME SERIES
FEEL BAD POSTERS
Size 600x800 mm
Edition of 35
2011

NO YOU SHUT UP
A TELLING-OFF POSTER
Size 600x800 mm
Edition of 50
2012

TOUT EST DE TA FAUTE*
1/1, THE BLÂME SERIES
A FEEL BAD POSTER IN FRENCH
Size 500x700 mm
Edition of 50
2012

ALLES IST DEINE SCHULD*
1/1, THE SCHULD SERIES
A FEEL BAD POSTER IN GERMAN
Size 500x700 mm
Edition of 50
2012

ALLT ÄR DITT FEL*
1/1, THE KLANDER SERIES
A FEEL BAD POSTER IN SWEDISH
Size 500x700 mm
Edition of 50
2012

THIS IS TRUE
1/3 THE MATTER OF FACT SERIES
FEEL NOTHING POSTERS
Size 500x700 mm
Edition of 50
2012

THIS IS FALSE
2/3 THE MATTER OF FACT SERIES
FEEL NOTHING POSTERS
Size 500x700 mm
Edition of 50
2012

THIS IS NOT
3/3 THE MATTER OF FACT SERIES
FEEL NOTHING POSTERS
Size 500x700 mm
Edition of 50
2012

THIS IS ALL*
1/3 THE MATTER OF FACT SERIES II
FEEL NOTHING POSTERS
Size 500x700 mm
Edition of 50
2012

THIS IS THIS*
2/3 THE MATTER OF FACT SERIES II
FEEL NOTHING POSTERS
Size 500x700 mm
Edition of 50
2012

THIS IS YOU*
3/3 THE MATTER OF FACT SERIES II
FEEL NOTHING POSTERS
Size 500x700 mm
Edition of 50
2012

- - -

Torbjörn Elensky:

It’s all your fault
John Carpenter’s cult movie They Live (1988) tells of how aliens secretly have invaded earth, and brainwashed humanity with an array of subliminal messages hidden beneath the ordinary, friendly publicity that surrounds us. In the movie a construction worker finds a pair of glasses that make him see through all the superficial messages in our everyday lives. Behind the pretty images, the encouraging phrases and the exhortations to enjoy life by buying more stuff a couple of very simple and straight messages can be found: Stay Asleep, No Imagination, Submit to Authority.
14 Red Prints are like a variation on the same theme: this is in clear text all we need to know.

This is true
Who could be better at spreading a lie than he who knows the truth? If you know what really matters, you can keep it to yourself, and make sure you spread a version that better suits your purposes. Based on your knowledge, you can manipulate the impression of reality, and ultimately reality itself. This is not an activity that is necessarily evil in itself. It may be useful to screen what comes to public attention, or how a certain problem is to be perceived. If you say it straight as it is, it can be misunderstood, and the consequences will be far worse of a misunderstood truth than of a constructive lie, which can be the basis for a continuing conversation about community, conversation conditions, which acts are desirable, and what is harmful in the long run.

This is false
But unfortunately, the reverse does not work – just because you know the lie you do not know where the truth is hiding. You see, the lie has such a wealth of form, it can say anything – at least as long as it is likely – and it can rebuild itself in layer upon layer of self confirming references. Truth can hang loosely in the air. It may be shocking, inappropriate, and, unlike the lie, also completely unlikely.

This is you, This is this, This is all
Lars Fuhre’s Red Prints are a superb tournament of the confident assertions, allegations and requests of propaganda and advertising. They hit it right on target because they are created by a man who knows how to convince. Who is better suited than he to also undermine the expressions of audacious arrogance?

This is not
Doubts are raised by allegations. Where nothing is said there is no uncertainty. Therefore every cocksure opinion is the carrier of its own opposite, for if it may be in one way, it may easily as well be in the opposite.

When certainty is unsecured it opens for comedy as well as concern. My first impulse when I see the Red Prints is that I start to smile to myself. Yes, this is just so, that’s exactly how the straight, undoubting assertions hit me in the stomach and head. It’s a nice feeling of recognition and insight. But then, when I look at them more closely, I see how scary they really are. Just as the subliminal posters in They Live. And I internalize the only sensible answer to all this, which I also have gotten off one of Lars Fuhre’s Red Prints:

No you shut up

- - -

All posters, with year of production, are signed, numbered and stamped with the artist’s embossed monogram. Printed 2011/2012 on a Heidelberg SOLD offset printer from 1970 at Sibirien Lito, Stockholm. Typography: Replica by Lineto.

*This print is included in the Nationalmuseum Stockholm collection.

Model maker Ralf Hanicke. Film by Oskar Pernefeldt and Simon Jung Krestesen.

This leaflet was printed at Vitt Grafiska, Stockholm, in conjunction with the exhibition 14 RED PRINTS BY LARS FUHRE at Rönnells Antikvariat, Birger Jarlsgatan 32, Stockholm. March 16–April 6, 2013. Graphic design by Lars Fuhre. Photography Helena Björck. Paper Olin Rough High White 120 g, from Antalis.

14redprints.blogspot.se

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I know you're out there and I need your comments before dawn. Thank you.