Martin Creed, who won the Turner Prize in 2001 for The lights going on and off, has made a film about people vomiting. The lovely Sarah Kent wrote about it recently in Time Out.
One after another, people walk on to the oh-so-pure, white set and throw up. The first girl doesn’t produce much; she sticks her fingers down her throat several times, but comes up with only a few drops of bile before giving up and leaving the frame. The next person does better and the third spews up a reasonable amount. Martin Creed has edited the ‘Sick Film’ so that things build from scant beginnings to a crescendo – a veritable waterfall in terms of quantity, spread and colour.
Sarah: "What prompted you to film people vomiting?"
Martin: "I’ve been doing a lot of talks lately and the idea came from trying to talk about working – turning feelings, thoughts, desires, hopes and ideas into something to show other people. Vomiting is a good example of trying to get something from the inside out; its painful and making work can be painful too; its also uncontrollable. I want to make work that is more like a vomit than a rumination.
I always try to control things, but a lot of good things are found in the uncontrollable moments of life. Thinking gets in the way so often; it checks you and stops you expressing yourself freely. Vomiting is a very simple form of expression; it's a reflex that bypasses the thinking process and, since I made the film, I’ve been thinking a lot about acting. I find myself repeating myself, because its so difficult to make things fresh each time. The ‘Sick Film’ is an attempt to make a fresh thing never made before – a work without prejudice and without hope."
Of course. How could anyone have failed to appreciate the deeper purpose at work here.Personally, I think Creed's art is mostly mediocre. (Though I have to confess to a sneaking appreciation of his Half the air in a given space, pictured.) Its ideological message is the same as that of other 'top' contemporary art: reductionism, degradation, postmodern sneering. For more on this, see previous post.