A brand-tastic sign of the times

Inspired by Matthew Collings’ recent celebration of tate modern, I thought I’d have a go. Quite literally…

A triumph of celebrity, novelty, ego and obsession over product – something we used to call content. Tate’s well-oiled marketing machine whirls uninterrupted like a giant turbine sucking in a random public to collectively experience the ‘experience’.

Nothing to do? Why not kill 20 minutes or perhaps a day down by the riverside. Pop in, be part of the scene and be seen. The inconvenient truth is that the art is incidental.

The one-trick pony of the magnificent turbine hall has been flogged to death with a procession of over-sized items. A kind of High & Mighty aesthetic playground. Ooh it’s its a big crack, ooh its a big spider, ooh its a big slide, ooh its a big sun, ooh its a big dark container, ooh its a big sort of trumpet… Ooh its such a big space we’ll have to keep super-sizing something, anything to fill it.

And the public, so readily accepting of the brit-tate-hype lap it up, basking in the temporary limelight of participation and interaction with inflated visual engineering projects more at home in theme parks and generally better covered in the cinematic arts.

Personally, I have never been a grunge lounger sprawling on the floor of the giant turbine waiting room or a saddo checking myself out in the ‘ooh its a big mirrored ceiling’. So please @Tate don’t tweet referring to me as a fan. Sorry to disappoint you.

Surely it’s madness to suggest that this dear old British landmark is a tad compromised. Oh well that’s me, crazy.